History Tech Podcast: Episode Three – Tweetalongs

Besides being really fun to say, tweetalongs have the ability to connect you and your classroom activities to parents, the community, and other classrooms.

Find out more about tweetalongs and how they got started.

Use the #tweetalong hashtag to follow all sorts of folks.

Gooru: A search engine for learning

I’ve had the chance for some incredible learning opportunities lately, both formal and informal. Two conferences, the National Council for the Social Studies in Seattle and the Association of Educational Service Centers in Tampa, provided some great ideas and networking in a formal way.

But November was also a great month for informal learning through my PLN, with other ESSDACK folks, and with two marvelous people from New Zealand. Ali Hughes and Derek Wenmoth spent several weeks in the US and I had the opportunity to pick their brains last week.

What I learned from them would fill a month of blogs and together with everything else I’ve run across in the last four weeks, my head’s on emergency download mode. So lots to talk about!

Today? Something simple. What the creator calls

A search engine for learning.

Tip of the Week: The Teacher’s Guide to the Library of Congress

The list of non-negiotable resources that every social studies teacher should be using is really not that long. But every time I edit my list, the Library of Congress always finds its way on.

It’s got great lessons, documents. social media, primary source teaching tools . . . basically the sort of stuff every teacher can use. And I’ve written tons about all of their goodies.

But sometimes it’s nice to have all of the goodies in one place. So if you’re looking for that sort of thing, head over to The Teacher’s Guide to the Library of Congress. You’ll find an handy infographic and tons of LOC links broken into tips, tricks, guides, useful tools, and resources.

It’s a nice collection that I probably should have put together years ago. But now I’m off the hook and you’ll find great stuff. Win, win!

5 Days of Helpful Tools: Day 4 – 440 Ways to Use Social Media

It’s Day Four. The question is easy to ask – with so many tools out there, what would best to share? No easy answer but today we’re going with social media tools.

I’m convinced that when used appropriately these sorts of tools can help improve teaching and learning. But a lot of us shy away from using them in education because we’re not sure what that use looks like. So here ya go. Lots of ideas on using social media in the classroom.

• 35 Interesting Ways to Use Twitter in the Classroom
• 100 Ways To Use Twitter In Education, By Degree Of Difficulty
• How To Use Twitter For Teaching And Learning
• 16 Ways Educators Can Use Pinterest
• 37 Ways Teachers Should Use Pinterest
• 100 Ways to Use Facebook in Your Classroom
• 100 More Ways You Should Be Using Facebook in Your Classroom
• 52 Secrets Students Should Know About Google Docs

So go just a little bit crazy. Pick just one of these 440 ways and give it a try.

(I’m sure there’s more than 440. What have we missed?)

Tip of the Week – Pinterest

I’ve had the invite in the Inbox for several months and I just never seemed to get around to activating it.

And depending on who you talk to, 58 percent to 97 percent of Pinterest users are female. So I may not be the only guy who’s been sitting on the fence with the social bookmarking site. But I’m becoming convinced that Pinterest might be a handy thing to have available.

More and more teachers are using the tool to find, share, and integrate resources. The visual look of Pinterest can be a great hook for students. A very cool infographic shares 16 ways that educators can use Pinterest:

Doing a search, middle school social studies for example, will give you a ton of links. And there are more things out there that can help you begin to understand and use Pinterest. Just a few to get you started:

Social Pinboard – National History Education Clearinghouse’s nice article on Pinterest

Teaching History – an example of a history teacher’s channel

Teaching History / Social Studies - another example from the Teaching Channel

Middle Ages – another example

Six Pinners to Follow

Five More to Follow

Pinterest Resources for Teachers – CoolCatTeacher’s Pinterest stuff

Pinterest for Education – a Livebinder with lots of stuff

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Update July 21

Great friend, tech guru, and K-State prof Cindy Danner-Kuhn has some sweet Pinterest boards including a generic Education board as well as Social Studies, iPads, and Pinterest in Ed boards.

Have fun!