Internet @ Schools
CATEGORY: No Child Left Behind
The Common Core offers a uniform, nationwide measure of where our students are and where they need to be, and Victor's Tools for Learning feature this month provides you with a descriptive list of companies that can help you get started.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Mar 2013 - Mar/Apr 2013 Issue
By
Victor Rivero
Worried about the Common Core State Standards? If you are a teacher, you don't have to be. Granted, it will take time and effort to adapt your teaching plans to meet these standards. But there are a lot of tools to help you do it, available right now on the web.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Mar 2013 - Mar/Apr 2013 Issue
By
James Careless
Expanded the number of devices usable for collecting classroom walkthrough (CWT) data, the application allows users to gather instruction data through classroom walkthroughs on a netbook, laptop, or tablet PC, with or without an internet connection.
News/Breaking News - Posted 09 Mar 2010
Educators have begun to shun the monolithic basal approach to teaching reading, opting for a more robust mix of specialized print and technology-based resources that provide intensive, dynamic, motivating methods that children embrace and enjoy. These print and technology tools must use student data as a cornerstone of an approach that intensifies and individualizes instruction. Find out more from Lexia Learning's Bob McCabe.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Jan 2010 - Jan/Feb 2010 Issue
By
Bob McCabe
According to the SIIA's Vision K-20 survey, the lowest level for its Five Measures of Progress is in the use of technology-based assessment tools, with an average score of just 46%. Clearly, there's room for improvement! And since knowing more about these tools is a good first step to using them to your advantage, Victor Rivero brings you a sampling of some of the more recent excellent products and services you may find useful when it comes to gaining much-needed assistance with assessment.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Jan 2010 - Jan/Feb 2010 Issue
By
Victor Rivero
Today, everything from the school lunch program to attendance rosters, telephone operations, and more can be handled by computer systems. And, of course, more and more student assessment can be managed (or at least scored) with computers, generating data results that can be used for additional software manipulation. Data management systems are developing enormous amounts of information that can be stored and then combined and additionally analyzed (or “mined” or “drilled”) for data-driven instructional leadership. This roundup takes a look at several products with different approaches to data-driven decision making.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 May 2009 - May/Jun 2009 Issue
By
Charles G. Doe
Media specialists everywhere have stories to tell about teachers who believe they no longer have time to teach their favorite units, collaborate, or use technology in educationally sound or creative ways. The combination of NCLB and other demands have created a situation where teachers have little time or interest in using technology beyond basic instructional management and easy-to-implement instructional tasks they are comfortable with. But you can help by bringing your creative ideas to your teachers! Read about two such great ideas in this month’s Media Center.
Column/The New Media Center - Posted 01 Jan 2009 - Jan/Feb 2009 Issue
By
Mary Alice Anderson
The latest collection of PBS TeacherLine courses addresses classroom instruction for the fastest-growing segment of student population.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Feb 2008
Many organizations are distributing free newsletters with timely articles and links to valuable resources. Joining a mailing list or RSS feed is easy and convenient, and it's a timesaver when you want the latest news about innovative technology and practical ideas for integrating it into your classroom. This month, Cyberbee directs you to a selected mix of educational technology newsletters and RSS feeds to investigate.
Column/CyberBee - Posted 01 Jul 2007 - Jul/Aug 2007 Issue
By
Linda C. Joseph
The Washington Post takes a look at problems with online testing in a May 28 article that examines disruptions in this year’s Virginia Standards of Learning testing.
News/Cool Links - Posted 28 May 2007
Test scores were not significantly higher in classrooms using selected reading and mathematics software products than those in control classrooms, according to a new study released by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance.
News/Breaking News - Posted 05 Apr 2007
The rewrite provides one easy-to-use system that optimizes performance and provides better overall administration functions and data security, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Nov 2006
The Virtual History - Ancient Egypt multi-level, 5 – 7 day module is intended as a capstone to a traditionally taught section on ancient Egypt.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Oct 2006
The fourth annual survey of teacher technology use indicates technology access and professional development are driving improved teacher and student performance, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Jun 2006
Facts on File launched a database redesign project with the expansion and enhancement of the company’s six history databases: American History Online, American Women’s History Online, African-American History Online, American Indian History Online, Ancient History Online, and World History Online.
News/Breaking News - Posted 14 May 2006
Part of Tool Factory’s On Track Series, Spell Track is composed of self-paced activities, unique word lists, and reinforcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Apr 2006
Twenty new science movies and a Spanish version of BrainPOP are currently launching.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Apr 2006
The new online service is available to help districts measure K-8 students’ proficiency with information and communication technology.
News/Breaking News - Posted 22 Mar 2006
Sunburst’s new program focuses on student improvement in grades K-12 using technology developed for targeted intervention.
News/Breaking News - Posted 23 Jan 2006
CompassLearning Odyssey for English Language Learners will now be available in Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), Haitian Creole, Hmong; Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, and Vietnamese.
News/Breaking News - Posted 10 Jan 2006
The software’s emphasis is on teaching children math concepts through challenging computer games that use simple visual objects and virtual machines that they can manipulate to solve problems, without using any words or symbols.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Jan 2006
The program’s new teaching system and management tools will have greater impact on helping older struggling readers, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 14 Dec 2005
Lori Callister focuses on how assessment data can enable you "to make decisions that support student growth and make real and lasting improvements in [your] schools." A sidebar, "Leveraging Data for Learning: Resources and Further Examples," presents six more assessment data-use success stories.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Nov 2005 - Nov/Dec 2005 Issue
By
Lori Calister
Districts nationwide are assessing progress toward achieving technology goals through a beta program that uses Learning.com's TechLiteracy Assessment.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 Oct 2005
Viewpoint expands the company’s family of information products to include new reporting capabilities and the ability to create student plans (IEPs, 504 plans, health and academic improvement plans).
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Oct 2005
From Scholastic, freely downloadable, comes this update of the uplifting and substantive report “School Libraries Work!”
News/Free Resources - Posted 24 Oct 2005
Key Skills for Reading: Vocabulary Development software offers activities that isolate and reinforce skills needed to meet vocabulary growth requirements in grades 1 to 3, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 30 Sep 2005
MDR’s report features the latest data on purchasing practices and preferences and on teachers’ use of e-mail.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Jul 2005
Learning.com’s new offering will allow districts to assess progress toward achieving national and state technology goals and mandates, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 29 Jun 2005
The SmartTRAX program (Teaching, Reviewing and Assessing Across the Curriculum) is designed as a tool to introduce, instruct, and assess standards-based curriculum and to analyze student progress on an individual or whole-class basis, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Jun 2005
Announced at the 2005 International Reading Association Convention in San Antonio, the Riverdeep products are Destination Reading Course III for grades 4-6, Course IV for grades 6-8, and Course V, a high-school-appropriate Proficiency Course for students who have not mastered the foundational reading skills.
News/Breaking News - Posted 09 May 2005
Yearly ProgressPro Reading/Language Arts fulfills educators’ need for effective ongoing progress monitoring and data-driven instruction to support student achievement, according to McGraw-Hill’s announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 09 May 2005
Expanding educational (and other) assessments and the explosive growth of computer and Internet technologies have produced an ever-increasing number of online assessment tools for nearly any imaginable purpose. Formal assessments, including standardized tests, and more informal assessments, such as those used by classroom teachers, are included in this boom. The assessments discussed here include everything from programs that administrators might look at for standardized testing for an entire district to programs that individual teachers might purchase for their own use or for use within a department.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 May 2005 - May/Jun 2005 Issue
By
Charles G. Doe
Math + Music is a nonlanguage-based program that combines computer activity-based instruction with specialized piano training designed to help teach K-5 math standards, enhance problem-solving skills, and raise math scores on standardized tests.
Archives/In the Spotlight - Posted 01 May 2005 - May/Jun 2005 Issue
By
Kathie Felix
PLATO’S Todos a leer con PLATO Achieve Now curriculum is designed to help ELLs develop literacy skills with materials in Spanish.
News/Breaking News - Posted 25 Apr 2005
The report indicates that student achievement has improved, but that the growth rate for that improvement has declined.
News/Breaking News - Posted 18 Apr 2005
News/Breaking News - Posted 16 Mar 2005
News/Breaking News - Posted 16 Mar 2005
EasyTech, available in English and Spanish, provides a series of instructional lessons that integrate technology into the core curriculum. Working at their own pace, students complete activities while learning how to use a variety of technology tools for their curriculum-related products.
Editorial/Product Reviews - Posted 01 Mar 2005 - Mar/Apr 2005 Issue
By
Sally Finley
News/Breaking News - Posted 18 Feb 2005
News/Cool Links - Posted 09 Feb 2005
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Jan 2005
The NCLB Act mandates technology literacy by the time students reach the eighth grade. To prepare for meeting this mandate, our district worked to equip the school community with all the tools it would need to help the students achieve computer proficiency by the end of their eighth grade year. But initially, we found that not enough of the district's eighth graders had met the standards we set. We soon realized that despite adequate facilities, equipment, and funding, we would not succeed in achieving computer proficiency without a technology literacy teaching tool. The missing piece was curriculum—a program to teach kids technology skills in a real-world context.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Jan 2005 - Jan/Feb 2005 Issue
By
Ann Boyle
We now have some pretty good track records on some new technologies that make access to information—both physical and intellectual access—simpler and, therefore, we hope, better. Hurdles to that access exist in both the physical and virtual worlds. Requiring a PC or specific browser to access information sets a hurdle in place in the virtual environment. Requiring information to be used within a library during specific hours is a hurdle of sorts too. Here are five key technologies that improve access in one way or another, or both.
Column/The Pipeline - Posted 01 Jan 2005 - Jan/Feb 2005 Issue
By
Stephen Abram
Technological advances have provided new opportunities and greater power to support the teachers' endeavors and have simplified the process of collecting and using data to help them make informed decisions about their increasingly thinning resources, to better collaborate on what works, and, ultimately, to help all children learn.
Editorial/Features - Posted 01 Nov 2004 - Nov/Dec 2004 Issue
By
Allan Olson
With federal mandates such as No Child Left Behind stretching school budgets, it is essential to find additional funding sources, especially for technology initiatives. Grants are one option, but where do you start? CyberBee has written numerous grants ranging from a few thousand dollars from private foundations to several million dollars from federal programs such as Enhancing Education Through Technology Title II-D. Much has been learned from these experiences. The examples presented below are general and do not represent an entire grant, which might be several pages in length. These samples of grant language, funding sources, and Web sites are shared in the hope that more teachers will consider writing a grant as an alternative way of providing technology resources and professional development to their schools.
Column/CyberBee - Posted 01 Sep 2004 - Sep/Oct 2004 Issue
By
Linda C. Joseph
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