EdTech Links of the Week - 10-31-24

Each week I keep an eye out for the latest edtech resources through blogs, social media, podcasts, videos, user groups, and more. I then try to reshare these resources in many ways.

One way I share these is here on the blog in these "EdTech Links of the Week" posts. See below to explore the latest batch of resources, and be sure to share with others who may benefit.

If you want to make sure you don't miss new resources, you can:

🔗 View all EdTech Links of the Week: bit.ly/caa-links

📰 Sign up for my weekly email newsletter: bit.ly/curts-news
📧 Join the "Control Alt Achieve" email discussion group: bit.ly/caa-emailgroup

🔔 Get new blog posts automatically through email - FollowIt link

And as always, please let me know of any resources that you recommend. I would love to learn from you!

What's New in Google - October 2024

Catch up on everything new in Google Workspace for Education from October 2024, and see great ideas and resources!

Below is the recorded video from our October 2024 Google User Meeting, along with the meeting agenda with all the awesome resources and Google updates from the last few months. This includes lots of new Google updates and Google resources for your class.

The monthly meetings are hosted by the Google Educator Group of Ohio, but are open to anyone from any location. The purpose of these meetings is to:

• Connect Google-using educators
• Share the latest Google Workspace news and features
• Provide tutorials, demonstrations, and how-to’s
• Share best practices of how Google Workspace is being used within schools
• Ask questions and get answers

The video from the meeting is recorded and available for later viewing for those who cannot attend or connect live. See below to view the recorded video, agenda, and all the resources from the October 2024 meeting:

Did a Robot Write this Report? Managing AI Cheating

Generative AI is a powerful tool that can be used to support teachers and students. Most of the time when I am sharing about AI or doing AI trainings, I often focus on the positives aspects of this technology and how it can be used to benefit education.

Unfortunately, just as AI can be used to generate lesson plans, provide helpful feedback, and serve as a personalized tutor, it can also be used to write a paper, provide answers, and do students' work.

In short, AI can be used to cheat. Depending on the study you look at, research shows that between 60% and 70% of students admit to using AI to cheat.

It is critical for schools to explore and address this concern so that students can benefit from the support of AI, but not abuse this tool and ultimately hurt their own learning.

But how can we manage this? Recently I recorded a 50-minute video where I do a deep dive into addressing AI cheating. To be clear however, there are no easy answers. We are all learning this together and my presentation simply shares hopefully helpful ideas. I welcome your suggestions, thoughts, questions, comments, and opinions!

See below to watch the recorded video and access all of the support materials.

Podcast Spotlight: One-to-One Podcast

I recently had the pleasure to be a guest on the "One-to-One Podcast".

Anyone who knows me, knows how much I love podcasts and am always mentioning something new I learned from one of them, so I was super excited to get to join an episode of this podcast.

The podcast is hosted by Brian Bates and Linda DeYounge and is described as follows:

Learn about the latest topics in edtech with the Learning Technology Center of Illinois, a program of the Illinois State Board of Education. Each episode will include discussions about integrating the most recent tech into classrooms, interviews with movers and shakers in education technology, and answers to questions from listeners.

I had a wonderful time chatting with Linda and Brian about creative uses of technology in the classroom, the importance of student voice and choice, my current top three favorite EdTech tools, and more!

Take a look below to listen to or watch the episode, access the resources that I shared in the episode, and explore more about the podcast.

EdTech Links of the Week - 10-24-24

Each week I keep an eye out for the latest edtech resources through blogs, social media, podcasts, videos, user groups, and more. I then try to reshare these resources in many ways.

One way I share these is here on the blog in these "EdTech Links of the Week" posts. See below to explore the latest batch of resources, and be sure to share with others who may benefit.

If you want to make sure you don't miss new resources, you can:

🔗 View all EdTech Links of the Week: bit.ly/caa-links

📰 Sign up for my weekly email newsletter: bit.ly/curts-news
📧 Join the "Control Alt Achieve" email discussion group: bit.ly/caa-emailgroup

🔔 Get new blog posts automatically through email - FollowIt link

And as always, please let me know of any resources that you recommend. I would love to learn from you!

Halloween Themed Google Fonts

As I have shared in several previous posts, I have always had a love for fonts. The right typeface can help to communicate information or spice up content.

With Halloween almost here, I decided to share some of my favorite fonts for the spooky season.

My favorite place to explore typefaces is Google Fonts, where (as of this writing) Google provides over 1,700 free fonts. You can explore and preview all of these typefaces at https://fonts.google.com/

These fonts can be used by you and your students to add style, personality, and creativity to your Google Docs, Slides, Sheets, Forms, Sites, and more. You can easily add any of these fonts to your Google tools by clicking the font menu, choosing "More fonts", and then typing in the font name.

If you are not using Google tools, you can also download the fonts for use in the programs on your computer.

See below for a dozen of my favorite fonts for Halloween. Some tie into the scary side of the season, while others lean into the candy and fun.

Citation Needed: AI Tools that Provide Sources

Although artificial intelligence can be a great benefit for educators and students, there are also valid concerns that schools need to consider and address (see https://bit.ly/curts-aimisuse for more details).

One of those concerns is the possibility for AI to produce content that is incorrect. In short, AI can make mistakes.

When discussing this with schools, I usually recommend several ideas to help address this concern:

• Educate students on the potential for misinformation
• Encourage critical thinking and skepticism among students
• Use multiple chat tools to get a variety of responses
• Improve the initial prompt to get more accurate responses
• Ask follow-up questions to expand information and perspectives
• Use tools that help check and verify information

For this blog post I am going to take a closer look at the final suggestion listed above - "Use tools that help check and verify information". Thankfully there are many AI tools that assist with fact checking or can provide sources you can use to learn more and verify the information.

See below for details on five suggested AI tools and how they can be used to help address potential inaccuracies. I have also included details for the free versions of each of these tools. 

Be sure to explore all of my AI resources at https://www.controlaltachieve.com/ai and as always I would love to hear your ideas, recommendations, and questions.