Visual*~*Revolution

Here is a great  and touching Canadian produced video to watch with your students. Just 4 days ago this video was uploaded to YouTube and it has  already been viewed more than 3 millions times. It is 7 minutes long but I must say that this is the best video on bullying ever made.

The spoken word poem in the video is written and narrated by Shane Koyczan is our wonderful Canadian poet.

Bullying has long been a practice much disdained by parents and now penalized by the force of law. Literally speaking bullying means to purposefully hurt somebody either by words or actions. Bullying can be caused by individuals as well as by groups. Schools are  the old  haven of this kind of behavior and are still.  There are several efforts to stop bullying in our schools and protect our kids but we still need to do much more.

Here is a great resource on critical thinking skills created by Microsoft. It talks about literacy in the digital age and features some great critical and web search skills students need to have.The guide is just  37 pages but is definitely worth reading.

The site is a wonderful inspiration of how to bring in visuals to “spicen” up or jump start students’ interest. Jon Spencer, one of the creators  shares important considerations in a post Ten Thoughts About Photo Prompts.

Wonderopolis is a fascinating site with great visual prompts for you to “hook” students into inquiry and further research. 

There are over 800 visual prompts from many many categories to choose from and even the option to submit your own “wonder to be included”. (This could be a great activity for your students to prepare submissions)

Each prompt has a video, vocabulary words, further resources and a Did you Know section. Try it out… this is a great way (something for all grade levels) to promote visual literacy, reflective writing and inquiry.

Thanks to Langwitches Blog for this posting.

We’re ruled by habits. We do things the same old way because it’s comfortable. But the risk in staying firmly inside our comfort zones is that it creates psychological barriers that can lead to real limitations, says author and speaker Denis Waitley, who has advised Olympic athletes on how to gain a mental edge. Because we haven’t done anything dynamic in a long time, we begin to think we can’t, he explains.

A new Project Tomorrow report surveying principals concluded that they want to hire new teachers with creative ideas about how technology can be leveraged to create authentic and differentiated learning experiences. But student-teachers report that their tech training focuses only on simple management tools. At the same time, the report concludes that those who have the biggest influence on new teachers — veteran educators –  don’t always embrace new ways of using technology to engage students.

Contrary to popular perception, Twitter has always been more of a niche social network in most countries around the world. In the first wave of research in July 2009, it was estimated that Twitter had just 35.47 million monthly active users across the markets covered at the time. Twitter, however, is shaking off that niche status with impressive style, and is the fastest growing social platform on the planet.

Google's Search Anthropologist Daniel Russell recently shared a short videodemonstrating why word order matters when formulating your search terms. In the two minute video we learn how and why reversing word order can affect the outcome of your search.

From Edvard Munch's 1893 painting 'The Scream' to your vacation photos, there's an important realization made when you use images in the classroom.

Pinterest is growing in popularity in such a way that it presumably will be the top social bookmarking platform of choice for internet users in 2013. The visual concept Pinterest is built on is behind its popularity because  the human mind is constructed in such a way to allow for easy and quicker processing of visual cues better than it does with the  written code.

The majority of content presented to students in school is in form of text, the world outside of school bombards us with information in many forms of media beyond text. Our ability to navigate a media rich world and “read and write” in that world is increasingly important skill to posses.

Facebook has actually created and entire new way of marketing to the masses. Ever since Facebook installed the ‘like’ feature, seeming like you care about what your friends say and think has never been so easy. The Like button was an ingenious idea to quickly and easily get people involved with interesting posts and organizations.

Once a nation is established, they tend to stick around for awhile, so a nation disappearing is quite uncommon. It’s only occurred a handful of times in the last century. But when they do, they completely vanish off the face of the globe: government, flag, and all. Here are the top ten countries that had their moment in the sun but are, alas, no more.

Renowned photographer Steve McCurry takes us on an insightful journey, sharing the varied definitions of home from around the world in his series titled Where We Live.