April is School Library Month, National Poetry Month, and National Robotics Week! Wow! Read further in the newsletter for more information and resources to plan your own celebrations!
National Poetry Month, a celebration of poetry, introduced in 1996 and organized by the Academy of American Poets as a way to increase awareness and appreciation of poetry in the United States. Celebrate at your school with Poem in Your Pocket Day. Poem in Your Pocket Day was initiated in April 2002 by the Office of the Mayor in New York City, in partnership. In 2008, the Academy of American Poets took the initiative to all fifty United States, encouraging individuals around the country to participate. Keep a poem in your pocket and share it with those you meet. Walt Whitman said, ‘To have great poets, there must be great audiences, too.’
In honor of all forms of poetry – listen to Theo Wilson, a slam poet with words that reach into our being and stirs our souls. Have tissues handy and don’t say you weren’t warned.
APP NEWS
Create a Mobile App Using Google Sheets
Glide is a service that lets you add information to a Google sheet, then quickly create an app from its contents, all without coding. Read more at this most recent TCEA post and at Glide’s instructional video.
What is your favorite app? Please share your favorite applications or websites that you use with students at What’s Your App? Watch for your submission to be featured in APP NEWS soon!
Additional digital learning resources/apps can be found at CVL Digital Literacy.
School Library Month
The 2019 theme is Everyone Belongs @ Your School Library and the 2019 spokesperson is Dav Pilkey.
Resources and Ideas for all grade levels
2019 Printable Poster
FlipGrid April 2019
On April 24th, 2019, unite to celebrate International #StudentVoiceDay! Students can join the Our Global Classroom Flipgrid and answer one question: How will you use your voice to change the world? Sign up your school, classroom, or students to participate and Amplify at #StudentVoiceDay.
Immersive Reader has arrived at FlipGrid! “Immersive Reader is a component of Microsoft’s suite of Learning Tools that focus on accessibility in the classroom. Whether a learner is dyslexic, an early or struggling reader, an ELL student, or simply needs a little assistance, Immersive Reader makes reading and understanding easier.”
InnEdCO 2019 – Learning Academies & Keynotes at Keystone, Oh My!!
InnEdCO announces Gitanjali Rao as a keynote speaker. She is 13 years old and is an 8th grader at STEM School Highlands Ranch in Highlands Ranch, CO. She was named America’s Top Young Scientist of 2017 by the Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge, with a patent-pending device to detect lead in water faster than any other current techniques.
What’s Happening at the Learning Academies – for more info go to InnEdCO2019
Register for InnEdCO
Call for Nominations – Making ‘IT’ Happen!
The Making ‘IT’ Happen award honors outstanding educators and leaders who demonstrate extraordinary commitment, leadership, courage, and persistence in improving digital learning opportunities for students. Nominate a colleague by May 6th at Making IT Happen Award
Ted Talks for Educators
3 Rules to Spark Learning – Ramsey Musallam, a high school chemistry teacher, expands curiosity in the classroom through multimedia and new technology.
ISTE is Accepting ‘New Ideas’ Proposals
ISTE 2019 is seeking – Diverse stories/paths to success, short engaging presentations, and sessions on timely ed-tech topics, ideas or approaches to teaching and learning. Submit your new idea by April 26th at Submit a Proposal
May the Game Be With You!
GameCon VII “The World’s Greatest Gaming Convention” for teens is happening on April 13th, 2019. For only $10, teens, (grades 6-12), receive lunch, a full day of games, and a huge amount of gaming loot. More information to share with your students at GameConVII.
Robo Week!
National Robotics Week is a series of grassroots events and activities during the month of April aimed at increasing public awareness of the strength and importance of the U.S. robotics industry.
Georgia Tech Roundup and printable Robo Trading Cards ten famous robots developed by companies and researchers in the U.S. along with facts about each.
Use Science Buddies NGSS aligned, free Lesson Plans to do robotics activities with simple circuits for elementary and middle school students. Using electronics parts, craft supplies, and recycled materials, students can build their own unique robots and explore engineering design, too!
- Vibrobots—Tiny Robots from Scratch (grades 3-5)
- Building Junkbots—Robots from Recycled Materials (grades 6-8)
NICERC EDUCATION DISCOVERY FORUM
The National Integrated Cyber Education Research Center has developed a library of free modular curricula for teachers to embed across multiple disciplines and empowers them to prepare students to become the next generation of engineers and cyber professionals. More information can be found at NICERC. Request access to the NICERC Curricula at Cyber Interstate.
BE THERE – April 18th & 23rd, 2019 COllapporative Events in Colorado!
Join one or both #COllapporative opportunities for networking and learning! Meeting dates are below along with links to register. Visit #COllapporative for more information to join the learning and fun.
Thursday, April 18th, Register Here – Southern Colorado
Tuesday, April 23rd, Register here – Denver Tech Center
Don’t miss Rock CS on June 6th! Rocky Mountain Computer Science Conference for P-12 Educators
Adams 12 Five Star Schools and St. Vrain Valley School District have teamed up to create the first Colorado Computer Science Conference for P-12 Educators for more information visit – Rock CS! AND on July 7th, there will be additional K-12 professional development workshops. For information please visit www.RockCS.org and follow on Twitter @RockCSCO
Edutopia Video Series How Learning Happens
In this video series, Edutopia explores how educators can guide all students, regardless of their developmental starting points, to become productive and engaged learners.
Education Blogs for 2019
Ditch That Textbook author Matt Miller posts regularly to his blog of the same name. His goals are to “provide practical, “use it in class tomorrow” solutions to teachers’ classroom needs” and “help them focus on what’s most important to keep education relevant.” He offers a number of free ebook downloads at Free ebooks. (Scroll towards the bottom of the page to locate the links.)
Write The World
Write the World offers a range of tools and resources to help you create a vibrant writing community within your classroom. Currently, there are 20,000 students participating in over 100 countries.
Podcasts for Educators
Easy EdTech Podcast with Monica Burns. Launched last month, this podcast series “you’ll get some quick information and actionable tips to energize and elevate teaching and learning!” She ends her podcasts with ways to make EdTech easy. You can subscribe to her podcasts and newsletters at Easy EdTech
To start you can also visit her blog and read her article on Virtual Reality Without a Headset and download her Getting Started with Virtual Reality Handbook.
EDUCATOR EVENTS
4/13 Colorado Teen Lit Conference
4/18 So COllapporative at Harrison SD
4/23 COllapporative (Tech Center)
4/27-4/28 EdTech Team Summit Aspen
5/10 Engaging Congress @ History Colorado
5/18 Primary Sources in the Elementary Classroom
6/6 P-12 Rock CS Adams 12
6/10-6/13 InnEdCO 2019
6/23-6/26 ISTE Philadelphia
6/25-6/27 NICERC Cyber Ed Forum
7/7-7/10 CSTA Annual Conference
Colorado Department of Education Communications
The Colorado Department of Education offers many electronic publications for you. You can sign up by visiting the CDE Communications Office homepage: http://www.cde.state.co.us/communications.
Don’t forget to read the SPARK newsletter from Colorado Commissioner, Katy Anthes.
Articles included in this email distribution and posting may not reflect the views of CDE. This email is a curation service for those interested in Colorado education news.
This semi-monthly newsletter for educators is posted here at the Colorado Virtual Library site on the second and fourth Tuesdays of every month. Please share it with your colleagues! The newsletter welcomes information and happenings from the education community. If you have something you would like to share with the learning community please complete the form located at Learning Edge Newsletter. If you prefer to receive the link to the semi-monthly newsletter posting, please fill out the information form Subscribe to Learning Edge.
Looking for Previous Learning Edge Newsletters?
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- Library Con Live 2020! - November 2, 2020
- iLearn Collaborative News - October 30, 2020
- All About The News Literacy Project - October 30, 2020