Edublogs Weekly: Tips for editing blogs and King’s Speech for educators

It is almost too embarrassing to write about – but during a recent Edublogs Campus training session, a user asked for an explanation for what all of those icons do in the visual post editor.

I admit, I hadn’t actually played with them all before, and had to do some quick learning for a couple on the fly. Who knew the custom characters tool was there all this time!?

Thanks to my new found custom character button, I can say happy π day everyone! :)

So, here is a quick and complete list of all of the different tools available to you when editing a post:

editor

Featured Post of the Week!

king5 Lessons for Educators from “The King’s Speech

Wow. You should check out this post – even if you haven’t seen the movie! From the EFL Classroom 2.0 blog by David Deubelbeiss.

Have a post that you would like us to consider for post of the week? Send out a tweet using the hashtag #ebshare so we’re sure to see it!

Upcoming Webinars & Live Events

Join us for this week’s live events!

Thursday the 17th @ 4pm PST – Edublogs Serendipity – PD Out Of A Blue Sky

Join us in our fortnightly unconference sessions. Bring along the burning issues and hot topics YOU would like to discuss. The topic is chosen by poll at the start of the session.

If you’re interested in suggesting a topic, or even better, being a presenter, leave a comment and let us know!

Learn more about our live events here!

We hope to see you there and have a great week!

Edublogs Weekly: Skype in the classroom launched

The big education news over the weekend was that Skype launched it’s “Skype in the classroom” website which is now ready for use!

skype

The new free directory promises to make it easy to connect with educators around the globe that are interested in using skype to connect with guest speakers, set up language exchanges, and facilitate class discussions no matter how far apart the classes may be.

And we know this will be successful judging by the thousands of educators each month that visit our own ‘Skype Other Classrooms‘ page – one of our most popular resources for sure!

It only took us about 3 minutes to add ourselves to the directory. Once you submit your class, you can search by location, age, and topic. The filtering in the directory looks great!

Leave a comment below if you register for the site so fellow Edublogs users can more easily find you. :)

notepadFeatured Post of the Week!

Blogger Megan Cashing is a 3rd grade teacher who keeps up with her blog, Teaching: what works and what doesn’t.

Over the past few weeks, she has some excellent and thought provoking posts about homework found here.

Leave her a comment and let her know what you think about homework too after reading the posts.

Have a post that you would like us to consider for post of the week? Send out a tweet using the hashtag #ebshare so we’re sure to see it!

Upcoming Webinars & Live Events

Join us for this week’s live events!

Thursday the 3rd @ 4pm PST – Edublogs Serendipity – PD Out Of A Blue Sky

Join us in our fortnightly unconference sessions. Bring along the burning issues and hot topics YOU would like to discuss. The topic is chosen by poll at the start of the session.

If you’re interested in suggesting a topic, or even better, being a presenter, leave a comment and let us know!

Learn more about our live events here!

We hope to see you there and have a great week!

Edublogs Weekly: Get blogging advice LIVE from the experts!

This week, we think you will be excited about a couple of LIVE webinars that feature a few Edublogs blogging rockstars.

podcast_newTech Talk Tuesdays – (Or Monday for those in the Americas!)

Teaching Commenting and Encouraging Parent Participation

4pm Tuesday the 22nd in Melbourne, Australia or 9pm Monday the 21st in Los Angeles, California.

(See the time and date in your time zone here.)

Linda Yollis, winner of the lifetime achievement award in the 2010 Edublog Award, will share the way that she approaches the all important commenting element of blogging and will also discuss how to get parents involved.

Linda, from Los Angeles, USA, has been an elementary school teacher for 24 years. She is committed to meaningful integration of technology in the classroom and is passionate about educational blogging. Don’t miss this exciting session!

Click here for more!

eT@lking – Wednesday

Learning all about the Student Blogging Challenge

8pm Wednesday the 23rd in Melbourne, Australia time or 9am, Wednesday the 23rd London, England.

(See the time and date in your time zone here.)

Let the student blogging queen, Sue Wyatt, cyberwalk you through the ins and outs of the Student Blogging Challenge.

Don’t forget, the twice-yearly challenge gets underway in March!

Click here for more!

Featured Post of the Week!

network_localGlobally over the past year, “school reform” has been such a (well deserved) hot button topic that it is almost ingrained in pop culture.

And Larry Ferlazzo, of larryferlazzo.edublogs.org is always on top of the debates and issues.

We couldn’t identify just one post to feature, so go here to see all of Larry’s recent posts tagged under school reform!

Have a post that you would like us to consider for post of the week? Send out a tweet using the hashtag #ebshare so we’re sure to see it!

Upcoming Webinars & Live Events

Join us for next week’s live events!

Wednesday the 23rd @ 9:30am PSTAll About Edublogs Campus

For new Campus site-admins or for those interested in learning more about Edublogs Campus.

Thursday the 24th @ 4pm PSTEdublogs Fine Focus- PD Out Of A Blue Sky

Join us for our fortnightly “Fine Focus” sessions each week. In these sessions we range across a variety of topics and include discussion (”Talk Time”), how to use various applications (”Techie How To”), and using technology in the classroom (”Tools and Strategies”). In fact anything “e-” that is of interest to educators!

If you’re interested in suggesting a topic, or even better, being a presenter, leave a comment and let us know!

Learn more about our live events here!

We hope to see you at all of the great live events this week!

Edublogs Weekly: Get inside tips on blogging with students

blog_acceptIn case you missed it, we started the FREE professional development series on blogging with students this week!

Especially geared for those that want to have their students participate in the upcoming Student Blogging Challenge that is starting in March, gear up and get ready to learn:

  • The educational and curricular benefits of student blogging
  • Choosing a blogging platform
  • Setting up the accounts
  • Managing and following student bloggers
  • Teaching blogging skills and etiquette
  • And much, much more!

Visit the Teacher Challenge blog now and get started with activity #1!

fav_heartFeatured Post of the Week!

Something you may want to bookmark for next year, our featured post is Valentine’s Day Rocks With Technology by Ozge Karaoglu.

Ozge’s post includes a great list of web tools you and your students can use to share with your valentine!

Have a post that you would like us to consider for post of the week? Send out a tweet using the hashtag #ebshare so we’re sure to see it!

Upcoming Webinars & Live Events

Join us for this week’s live events!

Thursday the 17th @ 4pm PST – Edublogs Serendipity – PD Out Of A Blue Sky

Join us in our fortnightly unconference sessions. Bring along the burning issues and hot topics YOU would like to discuss. The topic is chosen by poll at the start of the session.

If you’re interested in suggesting a topic, or even better, being a presenter, leave a comment and let us know!

Learn more about our live events here!

We hope to see you there and have a great week!

Edublogs Weekly: Reading Levels in Google Search Results

Regular readers may notice a small change in the format and schedule of our weekly posts. A few tweaks will hopefully make for a much more useful post for everyone!

Featured Post of the Week!

reading

This week, our featured post is View Google Search Results By Reading Level by Paul Hamilton.

Especially when working with younger students or those learning a new language, this can be a great tool to identify resources that might be easier to understand at that level.

Have a post that you would like us to consider for post of the week? Send out a tweet using the hashtag #ebshare so we’re sure to see it!

Upcoming Webinars & Live Events

Join us for next week’s live events!

Wednesday the 9th @ 9:30am PSTAll About Edublogs Campus

For new Campus site-admins or for those interested in learning more about Edublogs Campus.

Thursday the 10th @ 4pm PSTEdublogs Fine Focus- PD Out Of A Blue Sky

Join us for our fortnightly “Fine Focus” sessions each week. In these sessions we range across a variety of topics and include discussion (”Talk Time”), how to use various applications (”Techie How To”), and using technology in the classroom (”Tools and Strategies”). In fact anything “e-” that is of interest to educators!

If you’re interested in suggesting a topic, or even better, being a presenter, leave a comment and let us know!

Learn more about our live events here!

We hope to see you there and have a great week!

Edublogs Weekly Review: Move over Google Reader, Facebook is my news reader of choice

Right up there with running more and eating healthier, keeping up with the blogs I like to follow has been my easy way out of New Year’s resolutions the past few years.

How many of you out there have also spent a good amount of time setting up your Google Reader only to let the new articles pile up so much that you give up on reading them all?

As an alternative, I’ve recently moved over to Facebook, a site I probably visit too often as it is, as my “feed reader” of choice.

If you haven’t done the same already, or if you are looking for better ways to keep up with the news and blogs that interest you, hopefully the quick overview below will help you out.

readervsfb

First, there are some drawbacks to the Facebook only method. There are many blogs, especially some of the newer or individual educator blogs, out there that don’t yet have their own Facebook page or RSS feed in their profile. These blogs can’t (as far as I can tell) be brought into your Facebook news feed.

And if you are one of those bloggers who isn’t yet importing your feed to Facebook, this recent article by italkless.com has a good overview on how it can be done.

So how do you turn Facebook into an excellent news reader?

Start off by making sure you “like” or “friend” all of your favorite bloggers, news sources, and websites. You will now find their articles and latest posts right in your live news feed in Facebook!

While that is all you really have to do, you might want to create a new Facebook list and take advantage of the new live feed filtering options in Facebook.

You will see in the image below that I have created a facebook list that includes all of my favorite news sources. This makes it easy to catch up on the latest posts when I don’t feel like seeing the status updates of all my friends at the same time.

Create your list and then click on the down arrow in the upper right corner of your facebook homepage or news feed to filter.

News FeedYou might notice that I have a “limited profile” list too. That is where I keep all of my former students and I greatly limit what they can and can’t see on my profile – but that is for a whole different post. :)

Here are a few more more posts and tips about feed readers and RSS you might find useful:

This week in the Edublog world

Want to share a post, ask others to visit a blog for comments, or show off cool student work?

Use the hashtag #ebshare to let us know so we can re-tweet it for you!

Recent Posts You Might Have Missed

Summing it up

What do you think about using Facebook as a feed reader?

Do you like mixing your personal/social life on facebook with work or news?

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