Sep 18, 2020

5 Reasons Why It's More Important Than Ever to Teach Creativity

On the laundry list of skills and content areas teachers have to cover, creativity doesn’t traditionally get top billing. It’s usually lumped together with other soft skills like communication and collaboration: Great to have, though not as important as reading or long division.

But research is showing that creativity isn’t just great to have. It’s an essential human skill — perhaps even an evolutionary imperative in our technology-driven world.

Sep 11, 2020

Providing Hands-on STEM Learning Experiences for All Students

This blog is the second in a series on the importance of mentoring girls and young women through a compassionate “lean-in” culture of practice. Check out the first post “Mentoring Girls and Young Women Through a Compassionate ‘Lean-In’ Culture of Practice.” This post will provide just-in-time resources to help you model how to provide access and equity to robust science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) resources for ALL students, and how to infuse hands-on STEM learning experiences throughout your subject areas and all K–12 grade-level bands.

Aug 28, 2020

Back to School Funding

Back to school may look a little different this year, but one thing hasn’t changed: teachers are still finding innovative ways to improve student learning and they need funding in order to execute their ideas. To help you fund your classroom dreams this year, we’ve compiled a list of funding opportunities for the classroom:

Aug 14, 2020

Supercharge Student Engagement with Esports

Esports is best defined as competitive video games. Games that can be considered esports require skill and are usually played in teams, though some are also single player. When on a team, esports athletes fill certain roles much like traditional sports. Teams are usually formed by students or a staff member who has an interest in gaming or simply wants to see students working together using gaming Esports is unique because it is an inclusive, coed sport and can be a way for students who cannot physically participate in traditional sports to be a part of a team and community.

Jul 31, 2020

Power Students’ Brains with Water

Students are often fascinated to learn that Earth’s water today is the same water dinosaurs gulped down 65 million years ago. Dinosaurs are extinct but the water they drank and swam in is still here.

Jul 24, 2020

Mentoring Girls and Young Women Through a Compassionate “Lean-In’” Culture of Practice

Do you remember dreaming about your career hopes, dreams, and fears as an elementary or middle school student, and how these thoughts may someday impact whom you may become when you grow up? For some of us, we can recall these memories just like they occurred yesterday. Yet for others—like myself—it has been almost five decades to reconnect the learning dots of the how and why I have landed in my science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) leadership career.

Jul 17, 2020

Our Top 5 Resources in June 2020

Each month we publish blogs and several newsletters full of digital learning, funding, professional growth, social media, and STEM resources. Below are items from our blogs and newsletters that educators turned to the most in June.

Jul 10, 2020

Crowdfunding Versus Grant Writing: What’s the Difference?

As school budgets get tighter, more and more educators are turning to crowdfunding sites, such as DonorsChoose, AdoptAClasroom, and GoFundMe, to raise much needed funds for their classrooms. But what is crowdfunding and how is it different from grant writing?

Jul 03, 2020

My Music Technology Toolbox

Children singing, drums beating, ukuleles strumming, learning rhythms and notes—to an outsider, these may seem like activities that would not require much in the way of technology. In today’s music classroom, however, there are many tech tools that help teachers communicate the art of music making to their students. Most of these tools are easy to learn, visually engaging for students, and can even streamline assessments.

Jun 26, 2020

Using Passion Projects to Teach Tech

In smaller rural schools, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education can face troublesome barriers. In our K–12 district of 730 students, we have many of the common obstacles, including limited funds, no extra faculty, and an already overloaded class schedule. These three join arms to block us from using any of the really cool programs we’d like to. Other institutions sing praises of cutting-edge programs and share their successes. Meanwhile, rural schools are trying to figure out how to educate equally deserving kids in STEM.

Jun 19, 2020

Our Top 5 Resources in May 2020

Each month we publish blogs and several newsletters full of digital learning, funding, professional growth, social media, and STEM resources. Below are items from our blogs and newsletters that educators turned to the most in May.

Jun 12, 2020

Educators on the Frontline

Over the last several months, educators have been scrambling to figure out how to accommodate social distancing, deliver e-learning, stagger bell schedules, ensure health and hygiene, retrofit learning spaces, and pave the multilayered path for everyone to safely return to school this fall.

Jun 05, 2020

Elementary Music Technology in the Time of COVID-19

On Thursday, March 12, I left school fully intending to be back in the morning. We were canceling classes the following Monday to have a teacher in-service on how to teach remotely, “just in case,” so I was mentally planning on what items I might need to bring home. At midnight, an email came in to notify us that one of our colleagues had tested positive for COVID-19 and, concurrent with the Governor of Michigan’s declaration, school would be closed until further notice. At that moment, I knew I would have to teach in a new and unfamiliar way and to begin doing it in five days without returning to our building.

May 29, 2020

Integrating STEM Across the Curriculum

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and maker education are viewed and defined differently no matter where you go. To me, the focus of any work in my STEM classes or in my makerspace is on the process and not the product. But STEM shouldn’t be viewed as a “special class” or a separate subject. There are ways to integrate STEM education and making throughout the school year and in every subject.

May 22, 2020

Get Insights into the Landscape of Technology in K–12 Schools

Every year, we conduct a survey of our Big Deal Media K–12 Technology Newsletter readers. The survey not only helps us improve our publications and resources, but also gives us insight into the landscape of technology in K–12 schools. Check out the findings from this year’s survey.