Canva: The Tool of Tomorrow, Today

So many tools compete for space on the Internet and that trend will never change. After all, it is a designer's world and if you have the next best idea, you simply must create it, right?

Well, one of the areas in which we have struggled for many years is finding actual online graphic design tools that were simple, logical, didn't lead to spam attacks, and didn't automatically install watermark images which destroyed the illusion you had done it yourself.

Canva has raised the bar. When I got the recommendation to try it out, I shook my head and thought, "yeah, sure" but twenty minutes later and I dumped my previous blog post idea and here I am. This free design tool will change the way you spotlight work and family pictures in social media, will allow you to build posters and business cards, and will quickly pump up presentation slides, email headers (yep!), Pinterest and blog posts. You can keep your designs private, share them with colleagues, family, and friends, or make them public and share with the world.

You will find easy-to follow tutorials, and teaching resources where the lesson plan is presented with templates for student completion. In fact, within a minute of signing up and in you are walked through the fastest training tutorial I have ever used successfully.

The one caveat (specific warning) is that while many elements are free and of course, your own photographs are always an option, you will see many wonderful graphics which are not free. All are listed for $1.00 each and you are not charged unless you publish your creation, but still, there is a cost.

Don't wait - check this out. While teachers will cheer, this one is for anyone who is online for any reason. So, that means you! This design took less than two minutes to create. Enjoy!

Spotlight on Tools

One of my goals in this blog is to assist in filtering information for best practices and quality tools which can hopefully make your jobs easier. Some really great tools can across my desk this time.

EduCanon

This online learning environment, created by and for teachers, allows you to use any video, your own or that of a third party, and annotate it, embed questions and directions, and pace it so students are accountable for the work. I especially like the ability to ask for reflection from students - you know, those thought-provoking moments we find hard to build into online work. Watching video content is often called passive learning. EduCanon creates active learners and best of all, this tool is free!

Check out the website, scroll through the many examples of work done by other teachers, and jump in! Sign-up and -in is simple and you are on your way. Create and share work, set up students to create content as well, and share successes with staff. You will not only find units to access and tools to freely use, but an informative blog attached to the website. I particularly enjoyed the January 5th entry about the "stayability" of the Flipped Classroom model. Curious about what a "bulb" is and how to share between colleagues, set up class sites, and connect to edmodo? Check it out - you'll thank me for this one!

Bibblio

I have to say that I am excited about this site as well. Never heard of it? Well, you have now and here is how the founders answer the question "How is Bibblio different from other similar sites on the web?"

"Bibblio indexes all of the great materials that are already on the web, across different formats and platforms. With a single home for curation like this, you are no longer forced down individual platforms such as YouTube, Soundcloud or SlideShare, but are free to browse the most inspiring content from the internet all in one place. There is a lot less clutter here too."

You can add your quality content, create your channel, use any of the content on the site and it will never cost you anything. Guaranteed free for life - now that's a promise educators like a lot. Look over this site and see that you think, and if you add content, let me know and I will happily link and promote through my blog and my Pinterest site, Online Educators Lounge.

Can't wait to share more winning 21st Century tech tools to enhance your teaching experience.

Spotlight: How Blended Learning and Gamification Increase Student Engagement

Let me introduce you to Rob Schwartz, a teacher at Sheridan Technical High School, a blended learning magnet school in Fort Lauderdale, FL. I came across this article when he was interviewed by Dan Gordon for T|H|E Journal (January 27, 2015) and brings us two decades of expertise teaching technology. This is a great read and reminds us what really engages students and develops the foundational skills for careers and life.

First of all, blended learning is a current positive trend which allows students to work in-person as well as virtually. Some feel it is the best of both worlds and Schwartz agrees, although he also admits

it is possible to create community and connections among online students; it is just more challenging to do so. I believe if an educator fails to master that ability to connect his or her students, a crucial marker is missing no matter the venue for the education.

The gist of his focus is the need to give assignments that encourage or require students to interact, problem-solve, and use the skills they are learning as opposed to testing for right and wrong answers. Face it, the world is all about the Internet in every way (when was it you last wrote a paper check or deposited one without scanning it on your smartphone, hmm?) and as the role models for how to use it to learn and grow, we need to do just that: use it! While I agree that hands-on problem-solving and gamified approaches are positive, I do disagree with his personal assessment that online course content looks more like a textbook rewrite and cannot adequately engage collaborative efforts. My feeling? It's about the strength of the educator as an online facilitator as I asserted before.

Check out BrainBuffet, a website developed by Schwartz's students based on assignments given. It is robust - scroll down past the blog area and the real meat of the site will jump out at you. There are linked resources, eye-popping graphics, evidence of their work, gamer scores, and free tutorials. Click into the visitors section (the link is on the top tabbed menu) and find more gold buried there. I suspect if traffic really picks up, maybe the number of hits might open new venues for this excellent educator and his students. If you have considered using Wordpress to build your own blog and click through their link, the program benefits. Consider it!

EdBlog alert: PBS Teacher Lounge

A relatively new blog has come onto the scene for education and is housed on a trusted site: PBS. It is the Teacher Lounge on the PBS NewsHour tab and is currently driven by educators who have important news or strong, fact-based opinions to share.

The most recent piece addresses "Separating Fact from Fiction: The Problems of Teaching North Korea," and is written by Christopher Mazura, a high school teacher from Guilderland Center, New York. Easily read with excellent points, I really like his voice and the varied voices of other writers. I think you will too.

As educators in this fast-paced world, we not only should but we need to stay abreast of all of the many voices whose expertise opens our eyes to the world. If we stay in our insular spaces with our heads down, we are doomed to not bring the best to our students no matter their age (or ours).

The places we seek these voices are as critical as the time we take to engage and read. For as much as I love Google and Yahoo and other such sites, educational blogs nested on such quality websites as PBS have earned our trust and connections, and beg us to accept our responsibility to share those things which are contemporary and educationally sound, and evoke our deeper learning and that of our students.

Let me know what you think. This blog is definitely growing.