2013 Edublog Awards

Celebrating 10 Years of the Best of the Web in Education, the 2013 Edublog Awards are now accepting nominations.  Nominations are open till December 1st.  To nominate the best of the web for awards, people must post their nominations in a blog post (Mine will be available soon) or on their website and then share the link to the nominations (instructions to do so are at the link above).  There are 19 different categories for awards .

• Best individual blog
• Best group blog
• Best new blog
• Best class blog
• Best student blog
• Best ed tech / resource sharing blog
• Best teacher blog
• Best library / librarian blog
• Best administrator blog
• Most influential blog post of the year
• Best individual tweeter
• Best twitter hashtag
• Best free web tool
• Best educational use of audio / video / visual / podcast
• Best educational wiki
• Best open PD / unconference / webinar series
• Best educational use of a social network
• Best mobile app
• Lifetime achievement

You can visit their website and also see previous winners, which for new people to looking to start reading blogs is a great place to start.  Here is a link to last years results.  

2012 Edublog Award Winners

The 2012 Edublog Awards have come to a close and the winners have been announced.  You can find the winners and runner-ups in each category HERE.  As I always like to say, this is the best way to be introduced to the "Best of the Web" in integrating technology in the class room and meeting those people who are both pioneers and new to educational technology. 

One of the reasons that I have become a fan of these awards is the ability to read the teacher and student blogs that have been created.  It provides great insight into how other teachers are not only using technology, but how they are being engaged with their students and trying new things in their classrooms.  Sometimes the best success is a result of failure, and often times we learn how to do things right when they don't go as planned the first time. 

If you are just getting started in learning about educational technology, the Edublog Awards is a good starting point.

Edublog Awards - Voting is NOW OPEN!

I recently posted my nominations for the 2012 Edublog Awards and after tons of nominations, the voting is now open.  Voting for these can be a long process, especially if you don't know about the blogs, sites, and people being nominated.  However, the Edublog Awards themselves provide a wonderful opportunity to discover and connect with some great educators who are sharing some valuable resources. 

These people who have been nominated use their valuable time to provide and share with you.  The least we can do as peers is learn about them and then make an educated vote based on what we have gathered.  The best way to see all that were nominated and be able to click on each is to view the Google Doc they have set up that provides links and results from the nomination process.  If you only want to be able to visit the finalists, you can do that on the Edublog Awards main page under the 2012 Categories Links.

Voting is open till the end of the day on Sunday, December 9th, so you have about just over 6 days to vote from the time of this posting. 

2010 Edublog Award Winners

If you are new to the idea of reading blogs, or are looking to add to your Google Reader, then I recommend checking out the 2010 Edublog Award Winners.  Although I came up short of finishing in the top three, being nominated at all is quite an honor and I am humbled to be included with so many great educators.  The winners are not specifically limited to blogs, there are other websites to examine that include wikis, audio, video, and elearning sites. 

Check out the winners and give them your support.

2010 Edublog Awards - Voting is Now Open

One of the best ways to discover some great educational blogs is to visit the Edublog Awards.  After weeks of nominating voting is now open.  You can vote for blogs, tweets, wikis, social networks, audio and video categories.  There are 23 categories that you can vote for.  You can see my nominations here. 

The Pursuit of Technology Integration Happiness has been nominated in two categories and I am completely humbled to be included with these other great bloggers and educators.  You can vote for The Pursuit of Technology Integration Happiness for the Best Resource Sharing Blog and Best Educational Technology Support Blog. 

Check out all the other great categories and case a vote!  Thanks for your vote!

The 2010 Edublog Awards

Nominations for the 2010 Edublog Awards can now be made.  This is the 7th year that the awards are being conducted.  You can view the 2009 winners here.  Nominations are closed on December 13th, Voting ends December 14th, and the Awards ceremony is December 15th.  You can find instructions for nominating blogs, wiki's, and Tweets by visiting the 2010 Edublog Awards site and following the directions.

I was a newbie to the blogging atmosphere a year ago; in fact, this blog was only a couple weeks old when the 2009 Nominations were announced, so it has been a great learning experience in just one year that enables me to nominate more then I did in 2009. Without further ado and with great pleasure, I present my nominations for the 2010 Edublog Awards:

Best Individual Blog: Lisa Nielson: The Innovative Educator

Best Individual Tweeter: Shelly Terrell

Best New Blog: Greg Kulowiec: The History 2.0 Classroom

Best Resource Sharing Blog: Steven Anderson: Web 2.0 Classroom Blog

Most Influential Blog Post: Kelly Tenkely: iLearn Technlogy Blog: Blogging Alliance I and II

Most Influential Tweet/Series of Tweets/Tweet Discussion: #edchat

Best Teacher Blog: Nicholas Provenzano: The Nerdy Teacher Blog

Best School Administrator Blog: Eric Sheninger: A Principal's Reflections

Best Educational Tech Support Blog: Learn it in 5

Best Librarian/Library Blog: Julie Greller: A Media Specialist Guide to the Internet

Best Educational Wiki: Gina Hartman: Twitter 4 Teachers

Best Educational Use of a Social Network: The Educators PLN

Lifetime Achievement: Sue Waters

Not that I am a huge fan of self promotion, but.....

2010 Edublog Awards

Must See Monday #2 - Free Technology 4 Teachers

Let me start off by saying that Free Technology 4 Teachers shares some of the best resources for teachers, no matter what subject matter you teach.  Free Technology for Teachers is the project of Mr. Richard Byrne; which you can follow on Twitter, and I highly recommend that you do so.  Mr. Byrne is a Google Certified Teacher and has been posting Technology for teachers since November of 2007.  Is it a coincidence that I started this blog in November as well? Hmm...probably not since my started 2 years later, and that is beside the point, since Mr. Byrne was an inspiration for my blog.

Now, why is this site a Must See...well, it is really more than a Must See, it is a Must Follow.  So far 15,000 other people do.  Daily post about Web 2.0 and other technology resources that teachers can use; and every single post I have read has always been free...hence the title of the blog.  Over 2600 post to date with technology related resources.  Do the math...that is over 100 a month!  Man, and he does all this on top of teaching...Kudos!

Free Technology 4 Teachers was nominated and won The Best Resource Sharing Blog and The Best Individual Blog in the 2009 Edublog Awards.  That makes him a Repeat Champ since he won The Best Resource Sharing Blog in 2008 as well.  You can Become a Fan on Facebook as well...and let me give Mr. Byrne credit for giving me the idea to create a Fan Page as well for this blog.  Any links he adds go to a Favorite List that he has created based on the resource in each post.  So find your subject matter and see what can help you in your classroom.

Two documents on Free Technology 4 Teachers that I suggest you view are digital magazines created on Yudu.  I have posted about the Twelve Essentials for Technology Integration before and they are a great tool for beginners trying to integrate technology.  He also has another publication, Beyond Google, which discusses "15+ tools and strategies for better Web Search Results."  It appears he has a thing for Green Laptops though because both front pages have Green Laptops.  I personally prefer red (Go Louisville Cardinals!)

While typing this post, Mr. Byrne typed another post about technology.  Keep up the great work for all the educators out there!

Think Twice Thursday #1 - Education Humor

So what is the purpose behind Think Twice Thursday's?  To share a resource, website, article, or blog that you should think twice about using, visiting, following, sharing, and/or subscribing too.  So I start off this week posting about a blog that I voted for in the New Blog Category of the 2009 Edublog Awards.  In education we can always count on some stressful times when it comes to testing, NCLB, RTI, technology integration, lesson planning, duties, coaching, and oh yeah.....teaching.  So for many of us, humor can be a source of relief.  But the best humor for me always has to deal with education.

Right now you could probably think of a situation in teaching, or something a student said or did that would make you laugh right now.  That is one of the joys of teaching.  Well This Week's Education Humor helps to organize many of our thoughts and experiences into a blog worth thinking twice about visiting, as well as sharing with your colleagues; I did.

What I like about the blog is all the connections to experiences in the classroom, experiences with administration, and experiences with students and parents.  There are two categories that his post fall under that I have seen so far; School Stories and a Learning Laffs List.  He also has cartoons titled "Schoolies"  and "Mr Woodhead" that he has created and shares within his blog that are funny and worth printing and taping to your file cabinet, or pinning to a bulletin board.

Below is the first post I read when I visited for the first time.  The post that got my attention.  I am only copying and pasting it completely because as my reader I want you to see how clever and funny the post really are.

NEW EUPHEMISMS FOR BAD STUFF AT SCHOOL
Time-out - "An Isolated Reflection Interval"
Detention - "Post-instructional Behavioral Adjustment Period"
Course Failure - "Unrequested Course Re-registration"
Incomplete Course Grade - "An Unrequited Educational Encounter"
Suspension - "Mandatory Discontinued Attendance"
In-School Suspension - "Mandatory Academically Unassigned Attendance"
Absence - "A Non-school Learning Experience"
Truancy - "An Undocumented Non-school Learning Experience"
Seating Assignment Change - "An Intraclassroom Transfer"
Sent to the Principal - "Compulsory Administrative Consultation"
Retention - "Lateral Academic Advancement"

The author of the Blog also has a website that he has created, LearningLaffs, which I also recommend that you take some time and visit.  It is where you can find an archive of everything on the blog as well as other list, cartoons, videos, and humor.  You can also order collections of his cartoons as well as shirts.  Maybe I can convince the Principal at my school to order some of these for our staff shirts?

So when times get tough, or you are just having one of those days, think twice about taking it out on your students, coworkers, or family, and get a dose of humor instead.

12 Essentials for Technology Integration

Recently the Edublog Awards opened the door to several blogs that will help many of you in your classroom.  One of the award winners is a Mr. Richard Byrne who is responsible for the blog Free Technology 4 Teachers.  I knew about his site prior to learning about the Edublog awards just by searching Google, and his site was part of my motivation for creating this blog as well.

One of the parts of his blog is a digital magazine that he created using Yudu titled The 12 Essentials for Techology Integration.  It is a great publication that offers free resources that you can use in your classroom.  His blog posts are also very original and offer a wide variety of resources across the spectrum of the subject matter that as teachers we cover in our classroom. 

I highly recommend this site not just to visit once, but to subscribe to as well.  He is not just on top of Web 2.0 technology but also news stories and websites helpful to technology integration.

The 2009 Edublog Awards

Winners, First Runner Up, and Second Runner Up have all been announced for all 19 categories.  Each category and its homepage for winners and all those nominated can be found below.

• Best Individual Blog
• Best Individual Tweeter
• Best Group Blog
• Best New Blog
• Best Class Blog
• Best Student Blog
• Best Resource Sharing Blog
• Most Influential Blog Post
• Most influential tweet / series of tweets / tweet based discussion
• Best Teacher Blog
• Best Librarian/Library Blog
• Best Educational Tech Support Blog
• Best ELearning/Corporate Education Blog
• Best Educational Use of Audio
• Best educational use of video / visual
• Best educational wiki
• Best educational use of a social networking service
• Best educational use of a virtual world
• Lifetime achievement

No better resource for education and technology then all the blogs available here.  Check them out and see which ones you can follow to help improve your teaching. 

I am looking forward to next year!

2009 Edublog Awards - Voting is Now OPEN!

Voting is now LIVE for your favorite Edublog, Twitter, or Wiki. The Edublog Awards have done a great job of organizing all the blogs so that you can view all the ones nominated.  I highly reccomend that you check them out and see what you could RSS and follow on a regular basis.  There are 19 categories, and each has more than 15 blogs, wkis, or tweets.  That is at a minimum 300 blog sites...granted some got multiple nominations...but still.  You might need to take some time to sort through them.

For Best New Blog, I highly recommend This Weeks Education Humor.  All us teachers out there need a good laugh, and I had plenty visiting this blog.  That is the only category I looked through so far, otherwise I would give my top choice in them....maybe later.

Enjoy, and good luck to all those edubloggers that were nominated.  Maybe next year for me!

Edublog Awards Part II

Recently, as in last week, I nominated some of my favorite blogs.  Recently all the nominations made by edubloggers all over the world are being shared.  This would be a great way for you to view some of those other edubloggers I was talking about that I have yet to visit.

The Edublog Awards have created a widget that tracks the web for "2009 Edublog Awards"  You can view other peoples nominations very easily through this feed.  Check out all the nominations...when you have time and see what other people see as great and useable resources.

Edublog Awards

The time has come again for the Edublog Awards.  I am new to this whole Edublog experience, but I thought I would share the previous winners of 2008 so that you could view their blogs.  You can also view back to 2004.  Got to wonder if any blogs from 2004 are still up and running with all the changes to the Internet and Technology Integration.

You can nominate a blog for a multitude of different categories.

My Nominations for The 2009 Edublog Awards are:

Best teacher blog - Social Studies Central
Best Resource Sharing Blog - Free Technology For Teachers
Best educational use of a social networking service: Classroom 2.0
Best educational wiki - Moving Forward
Lifetime Achievement - Karl Fisch and Scott McLeod


Personally, I am new to the game.  I am sure there are a lot of other Edubloggers out there that I have not visited, but these are the ones that I have feeds to, so they are ones that I watch and keep up with.

Thanks.  Visit all the great Edubloggers out there and show your support.  They work hard to share information with all of us.