Technology & Learning - May 2008 - (Page 12)

The Trouble with Txt A new report from the Pew Internet and American Life project confirms what many worried English teachers have reported—64 percent of teens admit that they insert some informal writing styles used in personal electronic communication into their writing for school. Some 25 percent have used emoticons in their school writing; 50 percent have used informal punctuation and grammar; and 38 percent have used text shortcuts such as “LOL,” meaning “laugh out loud.” Richard Sterling, chair of the advisory board for the National Commission on Writing, executive director emeritus of the National Writing Project and senior fellow at the College Board, says, “We think these findings point to a critical strategy question for all educators: How can we connect the enthusiasm of young people for informal, technologybased writing with classroom experiences that illuminate the power of well-organized, well-reasoned writing?” For the full report, go to techlearning.com The Future Continued Pennsylvania’s Classrooms for the Future program is now in full effect. The state’s Department of Education has delivered more than 81,900 laptops, 4,075 interactive whiteboards, targeted professional development, and myriad technology tools to enhance learning at 257 schools in 213 districts. “Our teachers are in awe of the interactive whiteboards’ capabilities,” notes Cheryl Potteiger, the Hamburg Area School District’s assistant superintendent. “The whiteboards offer assessments, resources, and dynamic instructional tools that encourage teachers and students to collaborate and interact.” Seeing the technology’s immediate success in the high school, the district plans to install interactive whiteboards in every core classroom in each of the district’s six schools by the end of the 2008-’09 school year, giving the district’s 2,700 students and 185 teachers the opportunity to benefit from 21st-century learning tools. According to Potteiger, professional development for teachers and administrators has been key to the program’s success, Hamburg employs a full-time Classrooms for the Future coach, Teresa Freiwald, who serves as a constant resource for the teachers. Freiwald encourages teachers to use the technology, and she helps teachers identify new approaches to lessons through seamless technology integration. No Hanna Montana? Search engine site netTrekker.com now publishes a quarterly index of the most popular search terms by students with games taking the top spot this spring. “Search engines like Google and Yahoo pull together lists of the most popular keyword queries, underscoring our nation’s interests Rank Keyword and fixations and showcas1. Games ing trends and patterns,” 2. Dogs says Thinkronize CEO 3. Animals Randy Wilhelm. “Our 4. Civil War report offers a different 5. George Washington view—a real-time schoolbased mirror of what our 6. Holocaust children are searching for— 7. Abraham Lincoln both for academic purposes 8. Multiplication and out of genuine curiosi9. Math Games ty.” The now used by more 10. Weather than 11 million students, 11. Frogs 600,000 teachers, and 12. Fractions 20,000 schools in all 50 13. Planets states in the United States. 14. Sharks The total number of unique 15. Plants search terms for the spring quarter was 1,844,677. 12 | www.techlearning.com http://www.techlearning.com http://www.netTrekker.com http://www.techlearning.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Technology & Learning - May 2008

Technology & Learning - May 2008 Contents New@techlearning.com Editor’s Desk News and Trends E-Learning Gets Real Cover Story: Make Students Info Literate School CIO Product Guide Reviews Best of the Blogs What’s New LOY Profile Series

Technology & Learning - May 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.