2012 U.S. Department of Defense Education Activity

What School Leaders Need to Know About Digital Technologies and Social Media

This page contains resources from my work with the United States Department of Defense Education Activity (DODEA). These materials are made available under a Creative Commons 3.0 attribution-share alike license, which means that you are both allowed and encouraged to use them! Please contact me if you have any other questions about these resources.

November 7, 2012

Part A. Our Discussion

A0. Some things to take home with you today

A1. Opening conversation

Part B. Resources

B3. A social, participatory, interactive information landscape

B4. Global

B5. Crowdsourced

B6. Open, accessible, and free; Active and interactive

B7. Robust student voice and agency

B8. Global economy

B9. Technology integration resources

B10. Problem- / Inquiry- / Challenge-based learning resources

B11. Standards, frameworks, and reports you should know about

B13. Some guiding questions

  • What can we do to increase the cognitive complexity of students’ day-to-day work so that they are more often doing deeper thinking and learning work?
  • What can we do to better incorporate digital technologies into students’ deeper thinking and learning work in ways that are authentic, relevant, meaningful, and powerful?
  • What can we do to give students more agency and ownership of what they learn, when they learn, how they learn, and how they show what they’ve learned?
  • What can we do to better recognize and assess when students’ deeper thinking and learning work is (or isn’t) occurring?
  • What can we do to build the internal capacity of both individual educators and school systems to be better learners and faster change agents?
  • As we move toward more cognitively-complex, technology-suffused learning environments, how do we bring educators, board members, parents, communities, policymakers, and higher education along with us?
  • As we move toward more cognitively-complex, technology-suffused learning environments, how do we ensure that traditionally-underserved student and family populations aren’t further disadvantaged?
  • As we move toward more cognitively-complex, technology-suffused learning environments, what individual and societal mindsets – and local, state, and federal policy supports and/or barriers – need reconsideration?

Part C. Professional Learning

C1. Every educator should have a RSS reader

C2. Five education blogs to get you started

C3. Six more education blogs that every educator should be reading

C4. Other education blogs

C6. Educational leadership blogs

C7. Subject-specific blogs

C8. Maximizing your reader

C9. Got an iPad or smartphone?

Miscellaneous Resources

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