Deb Norton Tech

Happy Fall Ya’ll Today is my Friday, so I’m sharing some Links and Loves a little early. I want to try making these pumpkins - this is called Hydro Dipping and it is sooooo interesting!  Or perhaps I will make these since they look simple. This is an excellent video for National Stop Bullying Month (October) The people of Puerto Rico are getting some help with Internet through Project Loon.  Read more about Project loon and other moonshot thinking projects here. Padlet now has voting and grading . Woo Hoo!  I use Padlet all of the time. One of my goals this fall is to eat healthy and prep meals for the week on the weekend. Here are some recipes I’ve been giving a try.  I made the Quinoa and Mushroom Stuffed Acorn Squash and it was so flavorful! And because I had a lot of leftover Quinoa, I also made this recipe . YUMMMMMMM!  Finally, I’ve been savoring this lovely zucchini bread .  You can follow my hea...

Survival Tips Today's post is all about knowing a few tips for helping you to survive your incredibly busy day. Create that To Do List with Gmail Tasks: If you are like me, you probably get a lot of emails throughout the day.    I often don't have time to deal with emails right away, but I don't want to forget to go back and take care of them later.   One way I manage the emails that come through is to add them to my task list.  Click on the box to select the email, click on "more" and "add to tasks". The task list will appear at the bottom of your screen.  Later when you are ready to take care of the email, open up your task list. To open the Task List click on the top left corner where it says Gmail and choose tasks. Look under the tasks that you have saved and click on "related email" and the email that is associated with the task will open up.  Click on the box in the Task List next to the email item to mark the ema...

One of the things I love about technology and the Internet is how r a n d o m things can be. Here is a list of very r a n d o m Links and Loves. This week I did some coding with students in an after school program. Code.org has an entire collection of coding activities ranging from grades 2 - 12. We used Karel the Dog to learn basic Java Script which was challenging enough for the students. Thank you Kasey Bell from Shake Up Learning for teaching me how to make short gifs using Gyazo . This is such a simple and useful tool for any educator. I was very moved by this video shared with me from Tara Lere, an educator from East Range Academy of Science and Technology in Minnesota, who is participating in ISTE’s Verizon Mobile Learning Academy . Tara uses the video in her health class. Gotta Love Millennials is a multi-track video sung by a Gen X singer with a lot of humor. Compare this to If Ye Love Me which is a multi-track video of a song from the Renaissance time...

Sharing a Few Troubleshooting Tips With updates to browsers and the GSuite happening at lightening speed, I sometimes have to solve computer issues on a daily basis. Today I'm sharing a few troubleshooting tips for you and your students that can make mobile learning in the classroom a bit easier. Tip #1 - Enable Flash for recording or viewing videos Sometimes you or your students will get the dreaded puzzle piece screen. This is because Adobe Flash is not being allowed on the site. Here is the quick fix.  Click on the puzzle piece and then click on allow. Here is more of a long term fix. Click on the lock and secure area to the left of the URL (omni box) and then click on always allow on this site. Finally reload the page and Flash will run. Tip #2 - If you get a blocked site screen, one thing to try is to make sure your connection is secure. Add https:// at the beginning of the url to give yourself a secure connection. You may also have to add ...

I showed a few students Auto Draw this week. They were impressed. They felt artistic, talented and creative. Did you play the Baamboozle game “ How Well Do You Know Deb Norton ?”  I wrote about Baamboozle here . I love playing games for learning. Google Pixel Buds - These could be a game changer. Wireless headphones that translate in 40 languages.   After a busy week of HOCO activities and teaching, sometimes we need to just sit for 2 minutes and do nothing . Another option is to be calm and meditate . My weekend goal is to take time to breathe, relax and rejuvenate; even though there are a million things that need to be done. What are your weekend goals?

Baamboozle - A fun game that can be played with your class When I first came across the site Baamboozle , I was instantly reminded of this Friends episode: Games can be so much fun and make learning truly enjoyable. Unless you are playing the game Bamboozled with Joey, Ross and Chandler. Now that I have sidetracked everyone, let's start over.  Baamboozle is a site that has featured games as well as a simple game creation tool.  There are two modes to Baamboozle : Play Game and Study Mode. Study Mode is for students to practice the content in class and Play Game is to play the game in teams. Here is an example of one of the featured games on idioms. Creating your own game is very easy.  Type in a question and the answer and choose how many points the question is worth. Add an image if you wish and click on +Add question.   Project your game in front of your class and decide which mode (study or play) you want to ...