7 Technology Education books you must read.

Over the past few years I have read a few collection of winners, a few collection of losers and far too many mediocre education technology books. The aim here is to share the ones that have been so highly recommended  that got to be considered must reads. I have not read all of them so we are probably going to add this on our to read list together.
Let's take a look, shall we?


1. Out of Our Minds

Sir Ken Robinson
Anyone familiar with Ken Robinson and his amazingly popular TED talk, ‘Do Schools Kill Creativity‘ (if you have not seen this just go watch it, I will wait), will understand that this is a must read. The book follows Ken’s belief that creativity is greatly undervalued in modern education. Delving into why this has occurred and how we can change it, the book will completely change your mind-set on learning and creativity (in the broadest sense).


2. A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change 

Douglas Thomas & John Seely Brown
With so much change occurring in the education space it is often difficult to keep up, stay enthused and most importantly, embrace and grow through change. Not just a critique on current educational practices, ‘A New Culture of Learning’ discusses how schools can embrace a new model of learning and how technology can help foster teaching and change.


3.Personal Learning Networks: Using the Power of Connections to Transform Education

Will Richardson & Rob Mancabelli
 The book studies the most powerful tool in an EdTech leader’s arsenal, the PLN. Dissecting and advising on the benefits and learning opportunities that can be achieved through networking, this is a great read for anyone building or just starting to grow their PLN.

4. Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology: The Digital Revolution and Schooling in 
America

Allan Collins & Richard Halverson
Re-enforcing many concepts that education technology mavens see as beneficial to 21st century learning, ‘Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology’ builds an EdTech future that in truth should not be at all far off. With technology creeping into every device, career path and facet of modern living, the book takes a clear steer at how this should impact learning.

5.Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations

Clay Shirky
 Clay Shirky writes about the huge role technology has played in shaping group organization. Not specifically an education technology book, it really is a must for anyone interested in understanding just how powerful technology can be.

6. Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World

Heidi Hayes Jacobs
Broken down into seven key areas from content and assessment to habits of the mind, ‘Curriculum 21’ lays out a path for transforming schools into what they must become. With the collective wisdom of ten education thought leaders, renowned author and speaker Heidi Hayes Jacobs shares an idealistic view of where education needs to head.


7. Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

Daniel H. Pink
A book I discovered after watching an inspiring YouTube video (once again, you gotta watch this), ‘Drive’ is a brilliant book for both personal and professional growth. Understanding exactly what motivates people to succeed will change the way you motivate yourself, your staff and most importantly, your students. It’s amazing how a few simple concepts backed by fascinating research can have such a huge mental impact.

This was all for this blog , i hope you will read them one day as well as myself since i haven't read them all.

Bye~

Technology tools to help you in teaching writing.

There is a wide range of assistive technology (AT) tools available to help students who struggle with writing. Some of these tools help students circumvent the actual physical task of writing, while others facilitate proper spelling, punctuation, grammar, word usage, and organization.

AT tools that assist with writing fall into several categories:


Abbreviation expanders:

Used with word processing, these software programs allow a user to create, store, and re-use abbreviations for frequently-used words or phrases. This can save the user keystrokes and ensure proper spelling of words and phrases he has coded as abbreviations. This type of tool benefits people who struggle with writing.

Alternative keyboards:

These programmable keyboards have special overlays that customize the appearance and function of a standard keyboard. Students who have LD or have trouble typing may benefit from customization that reduces input choices, groups keys by color/location, and adds graphics to aid comprehension. This type of tool benefits people who struggle with writing.

Graphic organizers & outlining:

Graphic organizers and outlining programs help users who have trouble organizing and outlining information as they begin a writing project. This type of program lets a user "dump" information in an unstructured manner and later helps him organize the information into appropriate categories and order. This type of tool benefits people who struggle with writing.

Speech Synthesizers/Screen Readers:

These systems can display and read aloud text on a computer screen, including text that has been typed by the user, scanned in from printed pages (e.g., books, letters), or text appearing on the Internet. This type of tool may benefit people who struggle with reading and writing.

Paper-based computer pen:

This technology records and links audio to what a person writes using the pen and special paper. It enables the user to take notes while simultaneously recording someone( e.g., a teacher) speaking. The user can later listen to any section of his notes by touching the pen to his corresponding handwriting or diagrams. This type of tool may benefit people who struggle with writing, listening, memory and reading.

So, this are some of the ones i found and found more interesting to share with you. I hope they were helpful.

Recommended Video Apps

Hello everyone ,


As teachers we are about to face many difficulties as about to how we can find ways of making our classes more interesting and even though we have already a vast knowledge of some technological tools that may come to our rescue , i wanted to take a specific one in this post.

Videos.

Obviously all of us know about videos but the think is that actually you editing a video yourself is not an easy task and most of us may not even know how to do that. So, here i am today enlightening you on that matter by presenting you some of the video making programs that i have myself tested and show you what you can achieve with each of them.

1- Kinemaster  

KineMaster is the only full-featured professional video editor for Android, supporting multiple layers of video, images, and text, as well as precise cutting and trimming, multi-track audio, precise volume envelope control, color LUT filters, 3D transitions, and much more.

For professionals and amateurs alike, KineMaster offers an unprecedented level of control over the mobile editing process, and for artists and educators, handwriting layers allow you to draw directly on the video (also handy for storyboarding). Their users include mobile journalists, YouTube creators, short film producers, educators and other professionals from various industries around the world.

2- FimoraGo       

A pretty powerful video editor application, which will not stamp a watermark or place a time limit on your clip. With FilmoraGo you can make videos with music and effects. Your amazing video could be easily shared to your friends on Youtube, Instagram, Facebook, WhatsAPP .ect  And is quiet easy to use.

3- VideoShow        

It's an easy and practical video editing app & movie scene maker for both film directors and beginners. It has HD export, no quality loss No duration Limits and no watermarks or crops or ads.It's easy to use and has a wide variety of functions .Plus has hundreds of pieces of free music all fully licensed.

Here you have some links of Youtube tutorial videos on those apps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBUUbkPNgGE      : Kinemaster 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X46UEGsgCGY       : FimoraGO

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzio5-gmwWM        : VideoShow

Thank you for reading ^^