7 tools that can help your kids work and think distraction free. (Feel free to jump on these yourself.)

I was reminded this morning of a post I wrote several years ago about the distraction caused by our use of tech tools. So . . . a quick update with few new tools designed to help all of us wrangle back our focus.

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I’m torn.

Is social media, cell phone use, and technology really good for us? Or can it be so distracting that we (and our students) are unable to focus long enough to think and deliberate on important issues?

Can we use mobile devices and Google and Twitter and all sorts of other tech tools to encourage learning, collaboration, and creativity? If we really can’t multitask but switch quickly between tasks instead, is back-channeling and Tweeting and texting and other forms of social media just encouraging less comprehension and more confusion?

Researcher Maggie Johnson wrote a book several years ago titled Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age. Her research seems especially appropriate for social studies teachers:

If we forget how to use our powers of deep focus, we’ll depend more on black-and-white thinking, on surface ideas, on surface relationships. That breeds a tremendous potential for tyranny and misunderstanding.

Let me be clear . . . I strongly support the use of social networks and technology as learning tools. But I’m beginning to believe that we’re not really sure how to use these tools appropriately as part of instruction. We’re not asking enough questions about the best ways to integrate tech into what we do every day.

Can students and instructors really use technology/media/social networks in ways that engage and keep students focused on the truly important?

I think so. But

Flipboard and Pocket: Cool content management & collaboration

Who doesn’t love #METC16? Two thousand tech savvy educators all in the same place in beautiful downtown St Charles, Missouri.

(Full disclosure. Haven’t left the conference center / hotel. Am assuming St. Charles is beautiful. I do know that St. Charles was the jumping off point for Lewis, Clark, and the rest of the Corps of Discovery. So . . . it’s awesome from the get-go.)

I’m here in beautiful downtown St. Charles to lead a conversation about using the very cool Flipboard app as a teaching and learning tool. It’s a hands-on session so it’s gonna be a good time of discussion, examples, and working together as we all get smarter.

Still new to the Flipboard universe?

The idea is simple. Much like Pinterest, Flipboard helps you find, organize, and share a wide variety of websites and articles. But unlike Pinterest, it does a much better job of displaying all of the goodies you find. You literally flip pages in your different magazines and boards to read all of your saved content. Originally designed as an iPad app and later an app for Android, Flipboard recently added a web version.

So you can access Flipboard in a variety of places, with or without an account. You can set up boards to automatically add new content or create your own magazines that require that you add your own content. You can use Flipboard for your own learning, share individual bits of content, or share entire magazines with others. You can invite one, or two, or many others to help you add content to those magazines. Other users can ask you to contribute to their magazines.

An example of a couple of boards that automatically update? The Huffington Post and the awesome Mental Floss board.  A few examples of personal magazines are my Historical Thinking magazine and Cyndi Danner-Kuhn’s Technology for Teaching and Learning.  You might like Best Education Magazines or Best Flipboard Topics for Teachers.

It’s not as hard as it might sound but just in case you get a little stuck, I’ve posted some tutorials and helpful tools below to help you get started using the tool. But start thinking first of what Flipboard can do before you worry too much about which buttons to push. And then head over and check out my Using Flipboard in Education magazine for even more goodies.

Here are a few ideas that we played with today:

Integrating technology. Yes. It’s different than simply using technology

I’m spending part of  today getting ready for my METC presentation next week.

(The not so subtle self-promotion? My session on using Flipboard and Pocket as content management tools is next Wednesday at 9:45 in Junior Ballroom A, Lower Level. I’m sure once it’s finished, the presentation is gonna be great. Fingers crossed.)

And as part of my presentation prep, I’m exploring what it really means to integrate technology. I started with the idea that just because teachers or their students use technology as part of teaching and learning, doesn’t necessarily mean that they are actually integrating technology into what they’re doing.

That idea morphed into the next:

A student’s view of technology: “A cat is not a dog.”

Audrey Mullen is a sophomore at Presentation High School in San Jose, California. She started Kite Reviews, an all-student consulting service that provides user reviews of your edtech products. She’s worked with Brainpop, All Can Code, and Readorium.

And she recently posted an article at EdSurge, sharing her thoughts on the use of technology in the high school classroom and the teachers that use it. For those of us on the far side of being a sophomore in high school and who advocate for the effective use of technology as part of instruction, Audrey’s viewpoint should be a vital part of that conversation.

Her article is also a good reminder of how we need to be much more aware of how our decisions impact the actual people who make up our very large customer base. Read the entire article over at EdSurge but here’s a brief teaser of some of her topics:

Digital Learning: 4 ways not to be cranky

A couple of days ago, I was a bit cranky. Frustrated with educators who consistently refuse, for a variety of reasons, to integrate the use of technology tools into their instruction, I went off just a little.

I’m better now.

Cause I get it. I do. Teaching is hard enough without having to learn new stuff and then find ways to insert those new things into my classroom. I still believe we need to do those things but I understand the difficulty. And I think some of the teacher resistance I’ve run across is because people need more rationale, more examples, more ease of use.

So today?

Digital Learning: You’re starting to make me cranky

It’s been a fun couple of months since the holiday break. I’ve had the chance to spend time with a variety of folks doing all sorts of cool stuff. A group of us have been struggling to write questions for the social studies state assessment pilot due out this spring. (Spoiler alert: more on that later this week.)

I’ve spent time with teachers discussing social studies best practices that are aligned to the state’s recently adopted state standards. And I’ve had the opportunity to work with lots of teachers as we shared ideas and discussed ways to integrate technology into instruction.

It’s all part of what is perhaps the best job in the world. I mean, who wouldn’t enjoy themselves spending time with dedicated, amazing people who literally are changing the world?

But . . .