Passwords

Thanks to my friend Sara Isbell, who sent this email recently to her staff. I thought it was great, so I stole it with her permission :) 

The top 25 worst passwords, in order (and their current rankings compared with the previous year's rankings)

1.  password (unchanged)

2.  123456 (unchanged)

3.  12345678 (unchanged)

4.  abc123 (up 1)

5.  qwerty (down 1)

6.  monkey (unchanged)

7.  letmein (up 1)

8.  dragon (up 2)

9.  111111 (up 3)

10. baseball (up 1)

11. iloveyou (up 2)

12. trustno1 (down 3)

13. 1234567 (down 6)

14. sunshine (up 1)

15. master (down 1)

16. 123123 (up 4)

17. welcome (new)

18. shadow (up 1)

19. ashley (down 3)

20. football (up 5)

21. jesus (new)

22. michael (up 2)

23. ninja  (new)

24. mustang (new)

25. password1 (new)

Spooky stuff.

From: http://www.technewsdaily.com/8391-25-weakest-passwords.html

Most experts agree on the basics of creating strong passwords. Here are some tips from the Identity Theft Resource Center:

• A password should contain at least eight characters (some experts say 10 or 14 characters is the minimum).
• The password should have at least three of the four following types of characters — upper-case letters (ABC), lower-case letters (abc), numerals (123), and punctuation marks or other special characters (!#$%&*_=+? ).
• If you’re using only one capital letter or special character, don’t make it the first or last character in the password.
• Avoid common names, slang words or any words in the dictionary. Computers can run through entire dictionaries in minutes.
• Don’t include any part of your name or any part of your email addresses.
• Choose an especially strong password for websites that hold especially sensitive personal information — for example, banks or online retailers that store your credit-card information.
• Don’t ever refer to anything that can be learned from your social networking profiles or an Internet search. In other words, don’t make it your favorite band or movie, your pet’s name, your nickname, your phone number or, especially, your birth date.

Here’s a good way to create a strong password. Pick a phrase you’ll remember. Take the first letter of each word and run them together into a “word.” Capitalize some letters and substitute numerals where it would make sense to.

For example, the phrase “I hate to work late” could become “iH82wkl8.”

Or tweak that formula and don’t abbreviate all the words. "This little piggy went to market" might become "tlpWENT2m."

From: http://www.technewsdaily.com/2347-how-to-create-remember-super-secure-passwords.html

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ClassBadges.com

Well! A new, fun thing has inspired me to create a new blog entry! There has been a movement, gaining momentum over the last few years, regarding the use of online "badges". A badge is something that you can earn for completing a set of requirements. There is a Mozilla badge project, which is attempting to standardize the use of badges across communities. The great thing about this project, if it works, is that students could earn credit for skills not necessarily taught (or tested) in your average classroom.

Let's say a student is an awesome programmer. That is a pretty marketable skill! One that colleges might be interested in! But how will they know? It isn't covered on a state test. And a programming class in one school might be extremely different than a programming class in another.

That's where badges come in. A student could earn badges for different programming skills he picks up. So he could prove his knowledge level to a potential college. Or a potential employer. Cool stuff. So then comes this cool little site called Classbadges.com. Not affiliated really with the larger badge movement I don't think, but somewhat similar in concept.

Think video games. In a video game, players earn achievements for successes and mastery of skills. These badges would do the same! Teachers can create classes in classbadges.com, and they can create badges for those classes which the students can earn. I love this idea! Check out more about classbadges.com below!

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NearPod

NearPod is a fantastic app for the ipod/iPad, designed to help teachers during instruction. Teachers create a presentation onthe computer using the Nearpod site. Then during class, they control the presentation through the Nearpod App on an iPad. Students can use the Nearpod Student App on either an iPad or an or an iPhone or iPod Touch Device.

What makes this unique is that this app allows students to interact with the presentation. The teacher can ask students to draw something on their devices, and then can see all of their drawings on the Teacher App.  The teacher can even share a drawing with the whole class (without a student name attached). There are even polls and quizzes that can be added to a presentations, and sending videos to the whole class is also possible. I would highly encourage you to check out the site at http://www.nearpod.com/ where you can see a video of what this looks like in a classroom. We did this with the Project iNSPIRE More Professional Development class this summer, and it was hands-down the favorite thing teachers saw that day.

To create a Nearpod account, you do need to have an iPad. If you don't have an iPad but would like an account, contact me and I will set up an account for you, and give you your login information.

Nearpod also offers frequent webinars that are amazing, and I would encourage you to attend if it will fit in your schedule! You do not have to have a device to attend, but it is helpful.

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Vennage

It seems that everywhere you look these days, you see infographics. They are a great way to display information because they are so visual and easy to read. Now there are tools to help you create infographics. Vennage is an easy to use tool that allows you build an infographic quickly and easily. You can add charts and graphs, pictures, and text. Easel.ly and Piktochart are other examples of Infographic creators. 

This video gives you a preview of Easel.ly so you can see how it works!

Source: easel.ly via FISD on Pinterest

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Google Research

Something new is available in Google Docs! This is groovy. Once you open your document, you can go to Tools>Research and a search window will pop open on the right side of the screen.

You can search right there, while you are working on your document!

Then hover your mouse over the source on the right and you will see options to preview the source, Insert a link to the source, or get a citation for the source.

For more info about Google Research, check out the Google Help Here

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Gzaas!

Yeah, I have no idea how to pronounce this one.

This is a groovy little tool with a very simple purpose. The only thing it can do is take small amounts of text and make them full screen. Now if you are like my, you like to have a bell ringer when the kids come in the room, and you generally put it on a PowerPoint slide so that it will show it HUGE on the screen. And you can do some cool formatting stuff with it as well.

What you see in the picture above is basically all it takes to get started. You type your text in the box and hit the orange button. It will randomly select a style for you, but you can change it at the bottom of the finished screen if you want. That's pretty much it!

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Summer Technology Courses

Check out these awesome technology offerings for the summer! Registration opens May 12, so be sure to jump in Eduphoria and sign up for the ones you want!

In particular, I want to highlight the Moodle offerings this summer. All teachers will have access to Moodle

Middle School folks, you may want to check this out. It is a great tool and especially wonderful for Flipped Classroom online environments, and offers discussion boards as well as a way for students to turn in work online.

CTE folks, there are some lunch and learn sessions that are designed for the current Moodle user, to show you the differences between the old Moodle and the new (version 2.0) It's a great idea, and if you plan to use Moodle next year I would strongly suggest that you try to attend. You can find them under cross-curricular in the learning Guide.

Be certain to read the workshop descriptions carefully to be certain you are signing up for the right one.

To see a list of offerings, check out the online Professional Development Guide here or check out my Workshop page on this blog (look at the tabs at the top).

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YouTube for YOU!

Frisco Teachers! Did you know that you have a YouTube account associated with your Google Login? It is a great place to store videos that you want to share with your students. If you have students create videos, you could login to your YouTube account and load them all into one place. Create a playlist for each class! This would be especially good as we begin to do more with flipped classroom stuff and you might have more videos that you need to store. Don't use up space on a drive for videos. Store them on YouTube and save the space!

Don't forget to check privacy settings, and be sure not to publish videos of kids who are on the Do Not Publish list.

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Socrative

What is Socrative? Think CPS clickers but simpler. And using handheld devices/phones instead of clickers. Socrative is really simple to use. You create a free account, and start making a quiz. You can do multiple choice, true/false, and even short answer! There is a teacher app and a student app. Once you create an account you are given a room number. Students enter that room number on their app to join your room.

You can even use socrative to ask verbal questions. Can you say formative assessment?! It's kind of brilliant. 

There is a quiz mode, an "exit ticket" mode , and the space race which is a game based on one of your saved quizzes. 

When your class is done, you can clear the room with one click. You can run the entire thing either from your own device or from your computer, whichever you prefer. And it will email you a report at the end of your activity!

This looks like a good one guys! My biggest concern at the moment is that it might not remain free for very long. 

Go here to try it out 

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TED Ed

Most of you have probably heard of the TED talks before. TED talks are "ideas worth spreading" and focus on Technology, Engineering, and Design. From the same people has now emerged TED Ed, and it isn't just about technology!

On TED Ed, you can find entire flipped lessons, created by teachers. AND you can personalize these using a simple interface.  You can also use this site to create a lesson around ANY YouTube video!
I am going to hazard a guess that this is going to be an amazing resource, and I can't wait to dig in deeper!

I really encourage you to take the3 minute tour and find out more! Click here to go to TED Ed for the tour!

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Remind 101

Okay, this is super great for teachers. It's designed just for the educational setting! Basically, this is a way for you to text your kids and parents reminders about things that are coming up. They can even receive the text messages via email if they prefer. The teacher sets up an account, and kids can "subscribe". the teacher never sees the student phone numbers, only the number of people who have subscribed. The teacher then sends out a text and it is received by everyone on the list.

Accounts are free to create, and you can create up to 10 different groups within your username. You just tell the kids which one to sign up for. So for example, I could create a group for my on-level kids, my PAP kids, and the extra-curricular activity that I sponsor. SO COOL!

You can even schedule ahead, so you can pre-write your text reminding the kids about the text next week, and have the system send it the day before. I think that the way kids communicate these days, this is a super effective tool!

Find this cool tool at https://www.remind101.com/

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iSpring

iSpring is a nifty little tool that can convert your PowerPoints to flash. You download this to your computer, and it appears as a tab within PowerPoint. Why would you want this? Well, flash files are smaller than video files created when you record narration with PowerPoint, making them more suitable for upload to the web (Google Docs or Moodle). If you are thinking about giving the Flipped Classroom methodologies a try, this may be a helpful tool to have in your arsenal!

Find iSpring Here!

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Today's Meet

Have you heard of Today's Meet? I first ran across this kind of thing while attending conferences. Today's Meet is an example of a "Back Channel". It is a place to hold an instant messaging conversation among a group pf people. Presenters will use this to provide a place for participants to talk about what they are viewing. When David and I presented at TCEA last year, we set up a Back Channel on Today's meet so people could ask questions or give us feedback during the presentation. One of us did the speaking while the other monitored the Back Channel and responded to questions. Multi-tasking at it's finest.

Now, how about putting this in the classroom? You could set up a Back Channel for kids to use to ask questions during a project. Then you or other students could answer them. This would be a great time for a teacher to use a personal device like an ipad or phone to monitor the back channel while walking the room. I would never encourage a teacher to sit at their own computer for the whole class to monitor this!

Today a teacher used a back channel with her students for a discussion about a novel. Then they had another back channel for the kids to write an exit ticket for class! What a great idea!

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Triptico

Here is a cool little gem sent to me by Miss Kristy McCoy who is always full of great resources. This is unique. It is a desktop application that you download from the Internet. Once downloaded, you no longer need the Internet to run it.

I am not sure if I can adequately describe the simplicity and coolness of this little application. It has more than 25 little tools that you can work with. Some are super simple, like a scoreboard for your classroom games. Others are more involved. Type in a list of words that the kids can click and move around, then choose one of 42 different backgrounds to use. You could do a venn diagram for example and have the kids sort the words.

You can make your own lists. Of students. Of vocabulary. You can use that list in some of the tools, like the spinner that chooses one at random. Can anyone say Kagan? There is also a text spinner you can create yourself. There is a timer. You get the idea. Check it out. It's nifty.

Click here to get the application. 

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Self-Driving Car

Okay folks, this is just cool. Google has been working on a self-driving car. You can watch it in action in the video above. Or read an article about it here. The very first person outside of Google to get to drive the car was a man who is 95% blind. Just amazing. The TED talk about the car can be found here and I find it inspiring that this was initiated by a man who lost his best friend in an auto accident. The implications for people who are blind, aging, otherwise incapable of driving right now are staggering. But what about the rest of the population? I think they could benefit too. How many traffic accidents are caused by drivers who are temporarily incapacitated. Texting while driving, drunk driving, and fatigued driving make up a good portion of automobile fatalities. The widespread availability of such a vehicle is a ways off, but I definitely think it is worth pursuing!

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Facebook Scores- A New HR Tool?

 Last night on the radio I heard an intriguing story about Facebook Scores. It is no secret that employers are using Facebook to make hiring decisions. In fact, 45% of employers admit to using social networking sites to facilitate hiring decisions. The Facebook Score is a new trick though that is leaving some folks a little nervous.

Facebook scores are a way for hiring managers to get a sense of what type of employee you will be before you are hired. You already have a credit score that helps salespeople predict whether you will make good on your payments, and the Facebook score is kind of a similar deal. It tells employers whether or not you will make a good employee. It is kind of an interesting concept, and it is based on things like whether you are positive or negative more often when you post. Read more about the study here, and find out about some of the negatives in this article by msn.

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Take an Interest in Pinterest!

The secondary facilitators are in the process of moving all of our wonderful online resources to Pinterest! Pinterest is great because it is a visual way to organize all your favorite things. So if you need a presentation tool because you're tired of PowerPoint, Pinterest has your answer.

Browse through images and short descriptions, and when you find something you like, repin it to your own board so you can find it later.

You need an invitation to join, but I can do that for you! Email me if you want to sign up and I will take care of it. Need a tutorial? Give me a holler and I will help you out.


Disclaimer: this is not for use with students, With Pinterest, you never know what you're going to get. This is for your professional use- do not project!

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