If one buys a new PC, laptop, or netbook computer today, it probably comes preloaded with Microsoft Office 2010 Starter Edition. This is a significantly limited, advertising-laden version of Microsoft's suite of productivity programs, Microsoft Office. This continues the trend of PC makers providing ever more crippled versions of Microsoft's…

Helping kids find their passion outside the confines of standardized curriculum and testing can be a messy endeavor, but worth the challenge. Marc Prensky, author of "BRAIN GAIN: Technology and the Quest for Digital Wisdom," said that, rather than finding different ways for everyone to do the same curriculum, educators need to allow individual…

More districts realize that communicating in a clear and engaging way with stakeholders about everything from the district's overall education vision to scholastic and extracurricular success stories can go a long way toward enlisting broad community support. And although face-to-face communications are still important, technology provides a…

Most faculty are thoughtful, innovative, open to new ideas--except when it comes to changing their teaching methods. Many merely mimic their teachers for years on end. Some even use old college notes to teach their classes throughout their careers. There are exceptions but they are just that--exceptions. Single one-way oral communication still…

Generation Y teachers--those under 30 years of age--have higher expectations for technology than their colleagues from earlier generations--for good reason. Improved instructional and networking technology is one important aspect of a modern high-performing workplace. This generational difference is important, since a majority of seasoned…

Busy educators who want to ask advice, offer opinions, and engage in discussions with colleagues increasingly turn to professional learning networks (PLNs)--online communities that allow the sharing of lesson plans, teaching strategies, and student work, as well as collaboration across grade levels and departments. As budget cuts limit…

Last year, kindergarten through high school students in the rural Hector, Arkansas, School District barely had the technology resources that keep kids interested in math and science. This year, they potentially have the most advanced resources in the country--before they even step into the classroom. One school bus in Arkansas' Pope County has…

"Hybrid schools" are schools that combine "face-to-face" education in a specific place with online instruction. In this article, the authors describe school models which offer a vision for what deeply integrated technology can mean for children's education, for the way schools are structured, and for the promise of greater…

Rarely does a day go by when one doesn't hear or read something relating to digital communication and school. Whether it's referencing cell phones, email, Facebook, texting, blogs, or Twitter, this constant barrage of messages in the media makes it clear that electronic communications are in the forefront of students' lives. They are also an…

Carpe Diem, a public charter school, is an entirely new type of school and one of only a handful of its kind in the U.S. They seek to combine the best of traditional, face-to-face instruction with the best cutting-edge online curriculum. The result is something education experts call a hybrid school. Instead of a traditional brick-and-mortar…

It isn't a stretch to say that the definitions of "teaching online" and "teaching with technology" vary, even from instructor to instructor. Whatever the level of technology, and regardless of teachers' comfort level with it, one has to remember that for all that educational technology can offer through new communication methods and the ability to…

Of all the recent budget cuts made by the Eagle County, Colorado, school district, none sparked as much anger or faced the same scrutiny as the decision to cut three foreign-language teaching positions and replace them with online instruction. At a spring school board meeting, supporters of the targeted programs in French and German, as well as…

Just a few years ago, social networking meant little more to educators than the headache of determining whether to penalize students for inappropriate activities captured on Facebook or MySpace. Now, teachers and students have an array of social-networking sites and tools--from Ning to VoiceThread and Second Life--to draw on for such serious uses…

Previous generations of students learned about history from reading the textbooks, listening to teachers, and analyzing primary source documents. Today, these forms of instruction take a backseat to learning about the past from such media as Hollywood commercial film, YouTube, Netflix, and video games. Teachers must find ways to teach students to…

In 2004, prior to the launch of their 1-to-1 laptop program, the superintendent expressed some anxiety about the prospect of radically changing teaching and learning by issuing a laptop computer to every student and teacher. Although the concept was exciting, it carried big risks and would take time and thorough planning to execute well. Even with…