Moving at the Speed of Creativity

Tag: edtech

  • Beware of Phishing Cell Phone Calls: Don’t Share Personal Info with Strangers

    Here’s an important cautionary tale for anyone with a cell phone: Beware of phishing calls. Don’t share personal information with strangers over the phone, if you can’t verify their identity and authority with absolute certainty. “Security Stock-11091” (CC BY 2.0) by Hivint Like many others, I’ve noticed a significant uptick in the past few months of spam phone…

  • Make Media Camps in July 2018: Kansas City, Oklahoma City and Dallas

    I’m excited to announce the availability of three upcoming “Make Media Camps” for PK-12 teachers and university faculty in July 2018 in Kansas City, Oklahoma City, and Dallas. The past five summers, I have led and co-led 3 day iPad Media Camp workshops with my wife, Shelly Fryer. This summer, we are continuing to iterate with…

  • Reminded About the Power of Student Centered Pedagogy

    Yesterday I was blessed by the opportunity to attend and participate in day 2 of the 2018 LearnFest (@theLearnFest) Conference in Austin, Texas. LearnFest, or “The Learning Festival,” is Carl Hooker‘s (@mrhooker) new iteration of iPadPalooza. LearnFest joins a very short, personal list of top quality, amazing educational technology professional development events. These include The Mobile…

  • Innovating in the Fast Lane: The Role for Technology Leaders in the Coming Decade

    These are my notes, tweets and re-tweets from Donna Orem’s opening keynote at the 2018 ATLIS Conference in Washington D.C. The title of her keynote was “Innovating in the Fast Lane: The Role for Technology Leaders in the Coming Decade.” Donna is the President of the National Association of Independent Schools. The description of her keynote was: Accelerated…

  • Digital Health and Wellness: A Cross-Disciplinary Approach

    These are my notes from the breakout session “Digital Health and Wellness: A Cross-Disciplinary Approach” at the 2018 ATLIS Conference in Washington D.C. on April 16, 2018. Presenters were by Jenni Swanson Voorhees (@jsvoorhees), Richard Griffith (@doctorgriffith), and Angela Smith (@angelasmith21), from Sidwell Friends (@SidwellFriends). Presentation resources are available on the Google Doc linked on bit.ly/SFSDigLit. #ATLISac The…

  • Inspired by Ohio Student Interactive Scratch Games

    I’m presenting and attending at the 2018 Ohio Educational Technology Conference in Columbus today and tomorrow, and this afternoon I stopped by the poster sessions outside the vendor hall. I met several different Ohio high school students who have been learning to create interactive games using the free Scratch programming language and MakeyMakey controllers. This is…

  • Things I’m Learning about HDMI Cables

    I’ve learned and am still learning some important lessons about HDMI cables as a school technology director. Unlike older VGA cables used with many classroom projectors in the past, HDMI cables can carry both video AND audio signals. VGA cables required the use of a separate (usally 1/8th inch) audio cable when playing videos or…

  • 10 Things I Learned Visiting Egypt

    Last Wednesday about 8 members of our school faculty and staff spent the morning at the Innovation Hub at the University of Oklahoma (@ouinnovationhub). Last Saturday morning I reflected on five things I learned from that “mini-retreat.”  In this post, I’m going to share slides from a short presentation I gave at the retreat, as well as…

  • Developing Computational Thinking with Scratch Coding (webinar video)

    Last night I had an opportunity to present a free, evening webinar for the Oklahoma State Department of Education’s Educational Technology Division, as part of a series they hosted to prepare teachers for Computer Science Education Week. The title of my presentation was, “Developing Computational Thinking with Scratch Coding.” The webinar recording is 1 hour and 11…

  • The Podcasting Legacy of Bob Sprankle and The Scholars of Room 208

    Today my friend Bob Sprankle would have been 55 years old. Before Bob’s untimely death in December 2015, I had been working with him to archive some of his websites. Bob was one of the first elementary educators in the world to use audio podcasting with his students, and was recognized by the New York Times…