Wizer - A Free Platform to Create and Share Interactive Worksheets for Your Students

Wizer is an educational platform that allows instructors to create quick, easy and fun digital worksheets, to share them with fellow instructors, and to keep track of student performance.

The "FAQ's" below will tell you question types, multimedia resources, login formation, and some of the technology requirements.

As you know, "free" and "time-saving" are important factors to me....

Wizer FAQ's:

1. How much does Wizer cost?

Wizer is FREE for teachers. You may build, assign, share and use as many worksheets as you like for free.

2. How many worksheets can I make?

As many as you want! The use of the Wizer digital worksheet builder is unlimited. Make as many as you’d like. Please click to ‘share on gallery’ so that other Wizer teachers can see what you’ve created and use it with their students. Your influence is growing!

3. Can I use another teacher’s worksheet?

Yes. Wizer is a community of innovative teachers who create and share their digital lessons. Any worksheet on the public gallery can be used by simply clicking ‘Use’ or ‘Use this worksheet’. This duplicates the worksheet and puts the copy in your account. You can use it as-is or make some adjustments to fine tune it for your students.

4. What is the public gallery?

When teachers create a worksheet, they may chose to ‘publish on gallery’ to share it with other teachers. Any worksheet shared on the public gallery can be viewed by other teachers for inspiration or used with their students. To use a gallery worksheet, just click ‘Use’ or ‘Use this Worksheet.’

5. Does Wizer work on iPads and tablets?

Yes! Wizer worksheets can be completed on any iPad or tablet.

6. Does Wizer work on Chrome Books and laptops?

Yes. Any 1-to-1 device that is connected to the internet and has a web browser can be used to create and complete Wizer worksheets. The best browsers are Chrome and Safari.

7. How do I assign the Wizer worksheet to my students?

 

To assign a worksheet to students do the following:

When creating the worksheet, at the navigation on top click on 'Assign to students'.

On the window that opens you can create an assignment for each class. Each gets its own link & pin code so you can later review their answers separately for each class.

There are 3 ways for you to share it with the students (from left to right):

1. Use the Google Classroom link and follow Google's instructions.

2. Copy the link and simply share it with your students.

3. Instruct your students to go to this link: https://app.wizer.me/learn/ and enter the pin code.

8. How do students login, complete and submit Wizer worksheets?

1. Google Classroom: Click on link.

2. Link: Click on link, sign in using G+ or name/password

3. PIN: Go to https://app.wizer.me/learn/, enter PIN worksheet PIN. 

9. Can I use Wizer with Google Classroom?

Yes. Wizer is integrated with Google Classroom and Wizer worksheets can be assigned to students directly via the green Google Classroom link. The first time you assign a Wizer worksheet via Google Classroom you will be asked to confirm your connection with a few simple steps.

10. Can I use Wizer with Haiku?

Yes. If your school uses Haiku digital learning platform you can create or use Wizer worksheets, then copy the worksheet link into your classroom pages.

11. Can I use Wizer with Moodle?

Yes. If your school uses Moodle open source learning platform you can paste worksheet links directly into class assignments.

12. What kind of multimedia resources can I use in Wizer worksheets?

You can easily add video, audio and images to any Wizer worksheet. Images can be made interactive using the Fill on an Image question type.

13. What kinds of questions can I make with Wizer?

Wizer question types: Open answer, multiple choice, matching, fill in the blank, fill on an image and tables.

Sleep - A Student's Most Important Homework Assignment

Want to know how sleep "resets" your brain? How memories are formed and retained?  Then watch The Benefits of a Good Night's Sleep, embedded below, and learn how sleep balances and regulates the body's vital systems which, in turn, affects declarative and procedural memory.

This short TED-Ed lesson by Shai Marcu is an important topic as school starts and students will soon be staying up late or all night in order to cram for tests and other educational requirements. Marcu goes into detail describing the neurological importance of 8 hours of sleep, but the application is interesting as going to sleep three hours after memorizing math formulas (declarative memory) and one hour after practicing music scales (procedural memory) is the most ideal.

I'm left wondering what I might have accomplished if my sleep and learning patterns were consistent during my formative years...
    

Cheating Your Way Through High School and College: The Numbers

Academic cheating seems to be growing at an ever alarming rate. Cheating occurs at every level of education and certification and it includes students, educators, and administrators. Technology has also given cheaters new methods for cheating and, unfortunately, you can find most of these methods demonstrated on YouTube (you can find additional resources on cheating HERE).

Best College Reviews created an interesting infographic about cheating in high school and college that I wanted to share with you. They provide resons for cheating and how cheating occurs among other interesting factoids.

Please take a look at their website to find additional resources on cheating (listed below the infographic).


Source: BestCollegeReviews.org (please follow the link for additional resources on cheating)

Education On Demand..... Within Your Hands

Dr. Robbie K. Melton

I recently had the opportunity to meet Dr. Robbie K. Melton who is the Associate Vice Chancellor for Mobilization and Emerging Technology for the Tennesseee Board of Regents (mTBR) and a well known "Appologist."

Robbie oversees mobilization strategies and initiatives for the sixth largest statewide system of public higher education in the country: mTBR serves students enrolled in 46 institutions throughout the state (six state universities, 27 technology centers for technical/vocational education, and all of the state's 13 community colleges).

A significant part of her function is to study technology and its current and future application on education. More specifically, mTBR seeks new innovations in emerging technologies, social networking, gaming, simulations, amd virtual worlds for the purpose of increasing recruiting, retention, graduation rates and to improve teaching, learning, and workforce development. TBR creates teams that are composed of staff, faculty, students, administrators, and industry partners who are tasked with working on specific problems related to both mobile technology and its use in an education context.

Robbie and her staff are provided with the latest technology and a classroom evaluation is conducted to determine how students interact with the devices (the evaluation also includes general usability, ADA, durability, and security issues). Besides students, they provide support to instructors and staff as well. I think it's an interesting that Robbie noted that a "digital divide" exists between student and instructor, but it's typically the instructor that has the out-dated mobile device.

Now for the exciting part.... TBR maintains a mobile app resource center that points to extensive collections for education: 70,000 apps and counting. The site is easy to navigate with drop-down menus for the type of app, mobile device, academic area, workforce cluster, etc. The site also provides ratings for mobile devices and has a plethora of videos and presentations as additional resources.

Robbie is a dynamic speaker that has a passion for not only educational technology, but for it's application. I hate to say it, because I like my job, but I think Robbie has one of the coolest jobs in education. Don't you agree?

Teacher of Thousands: Piyush Patel

Here is a TEDxOStateU video entitled "Teacher of Thousands: Piyush Patel."


Piyush Patel founded and runs a company that generates virtual training programs for creative professionals who produce films, video games, commercials and other projects. Located in Oklahoma City, PL Studios Inc.,  along with the Digital-Tutors division, works with clients including Disney, NASA, Nike, Dreamworks, Pixar, EA Sports and Mercedes-Benz.

Piyush Patel

In 2010, the company was recognized as an official honoree of the broadband category at the 14th annual Webby Awards and was listed as one of the 50 Most Usable Rich Internet Applications of the year by the 2009 O’Reilly’s Inside RIA.

Patel is an advisory board member for the Oklahoma Technology Council, a member of the AIGA Oklahoma board of directors, a member of the Oklahoma State Chamber board of directors and the former president for the Oklahoma Chapter of Entrepreneurs Organization. He was a tenured professor at Northern Oklahoma College before founding PL Studios, Inc.

Patel has also been instrumental in helping the CareerTech Testing Center and the Oklahoma Department of Career and Technology Education in the development of our skills standards (knowledge, skills, and abilities needed to perform related jobs within an industry) for Motion Graphics Artist, 3D Animator, and 3D Modeler. Digital-Tutors has provided their endorsement of these standards which serve as the foundation for competency-based instruction in these areas.

Congratulations to Piyush on a great TEDx talk and for having the idea to create an instructional concept that can change the lives of thousands from across the globe!

Sir Ken Robinson: Principles of Alternative Education are... Just Good Education

In 2006, Sir Ken Robinson made an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that nurtures (rather than undermines) creativity. This video has been viewed more than 14 million times.

In early January 2012, Robinson addressed how population growth and technology are fueling huge changes in education. He argues that the principles of “alternative” education are those that should be applied to mainstream education. He states, that "the principles of alternative education are designed to re-engage young people with education." Please watch the video below to see Robinson's comments on how the principles of alternative education should be moved to the center of education.


To watch the video on YouTube click HERE.

Related post:
Sir Ken Robinson: Do Schools Kill Creativity?

35 Sources for Curated Educational Videos

I found a great resource written by Carri Schneider (Getting Smart, July 3, 2012) that I wanted to share with you.

As the author states:

While many teachers begin by creating their own content and videos, most start by sifting through free online sources. The amount of available information out there is staggering.

YouTube users across the globe upload 48 hours of content every minute. And a google search for “science video” yields over 4 billion results!

Fortunately, there are some great websites and services that take the guesswork out of finding and sorting educational video content.

Here are a few of the curated video sites that Schneider highlighted:

• The Futures Channel: Based on the goal of using new media technologies to create a channel between scientists, enginners, explorers, visionaries and learners, The Future Channel partners with schools to provide these high-quality digital learning resources.
• EduTube: Launched in 2008, EduTube focuses on popular and high quality educational videos that are sorted by EduTube index – a measure of quality, popularity and educational value.
• Edutopia Video: Edutopia’s large video library is sortable by topic and by grade level.

Please click HERE to find additional resources educational videos and read "35 Sources for Curated Educational Videos" in it's entirety.

Now I Know - Gaining Insight from Entrepreneurs

Now I Know is a series of videos produced by Sprinkle Lab that features discussions with entrepreneurs concerning their successes, failures, and lessons learned. I've watched several videos at this point and found them to be quite informative. I also think the videos could be a great resource for students, especially those involved in career and technical education.

The embedded video below features features Linda Avey, founder of 23 and Me, talking about educating yourself in today's world.


All of the videos are three minutes or less and some of the notable interviews include Craig Newmark (founder of Craigslist) discussing his thoughts on when to lead and when to get out of the way and Halle Tecco (founder of RockHealth) gives her perspective on perseverance.

What about having your students create something similar by interviewing members of your local industry committees or by interviewing each other about their classroom experiences?

Introducing TED-Ed: Lessons Worth Sharing

Have you seen TED-Ed?  It's a great new resource that utilizes crowd-sourcing paired with top notch animators and video editing.  It can be accessed both at YouTube (www.youtube.com/tededucation) or on YouTube EDU (not usually blocked by firewalls).

According to TED-Ed:

TED-Ed's mission is to capture and amplify the voices of great educators around the world. We do this by pairing extraordinary educators with talented animators to produce a new library of curiosity-igniting videos. A new site, which will launch in early April 2012, will feature these new TED-Ed Originals as well as some powerful new learning tools.

For those who can't wait that long, we're pleased to announce the official launch of TED-Ed's YouTube channel featuring all of our new videos. Also, we are happy to extend an open invitation for the nomination of educators and animators and the suggestion of lesson ideas.

Thanks to Debi Crabtree at Hamilton County Virtual School for sharing TED-Ed.

Who is Cheating on Tests?

A quick review of articles on the internet show 40% to 95% of students admit to cheating at some point in their academic career. Then there is the huge standardized test cheating scandal in Atlanta where teachers were caught bumping up student's test scores (there are other similar stories as well). I then made a quick search on YouTube and found the following:
YouTube search results:  How to cheat in school - 7,640 results
                                     How to cheat on a test - 31,000 results

I then asked myself, "Am I the only one that didn't cheat in school?" Should I pull out my old high school yearbook and contemplate which 4 out of 10 friends were cheating their way through high school and college? Or should I just send them a direct message on Facebook or conduct an anonymous online poll to gather a more truthful response? Do students get a "high" on cheating or are they just lazy? I really like the student responses on some of these articles where they state that they cheat because "Everyone else is doing it"? Isn't that what all the stereotypical drug dealers tell the kids in the movies? "Take some drugs kid, everyone else is. It's the cool thing to do."

Before I completely get on my "ethics" soapbox, take a look at the video below of a professor's response to his class following a major cheating incident at the University of Central Florida (In 2010, 200 out of 600 students obtained access to his 700 test question item bank and used the information to take their midterm exam):

The CareerTech Testing Center recommends that all testing liaisons and instructors compare results and look at trends in test performance. We also look at results and analyze statistical trends and abnormalities, but it often takes a combined effort to detect cheating.

Additional reading:

UCF cheating scandal: 200 students step forward

Don't ditch testing after Atlanta cheating, boost test security
Who Cheats? (previous blog posts concerning cheating).

Reinventing Education...The Khan Academy and Stanford University's Artificial Intelligence Class

You've probably already heard plenty about the Khan Academy, which has contributed to the online education of millions, as well as the free online courses being run by faculty at Stanford University, Peter Norvig and Sebastian Thrun. An Introduction to Artificial Intelligence attracted some 160,000 inquiries, of which 25,000 or more have made it through to its conclusion. If you are not familiar with these projects, you can see Khan, Norvig and Thrun discussing the implications of their work in Reinventing Education - a thought-provoking forty-five minute YouTube video.

I think they demonstrate the incredible progress that has been made toward massively scalable education. I am a believer that you can teach math and science to millions at practically no cost using videos and quizzes (and a hybrid approach would be my preferred avenue), but can we make similar gains in the teaching of other skills? Could a hybrid approach also work in some CTE courses?

Watch Reinventing Education below:

Steering Clear of Cyber Tricks

The Google Digital Literacy Tour...
is dedicated to the education of families on how to stay safe online. iKeepSafe teamed up with Google to create a free curriculum for educators to teach what it means to be a responsible digital citizen.

The curriculum is designed to be interactive, discussion filled and allow students to learn through hands-on and scenario activities. Each workshop contains a resource booklet for both educators and students that can be downloaded in PDF form, presentations to accompany the lesson and animated videos to help frame the conversation.

The three workshops available are:

1. Detecting Lies and Staying True
2. Playing and Staying Safe Online
3. Steering Clear of Cyber Tricks

They also have a fourth video entitled, "Staying Safe on YouTube."

Although the videos are geared toward students, I believe they are a great resource for parents and employees as well.

Please watch "Steering Clear of Cyber Tricks"

Dyslexie is a Typeface for Dyslectics

I found an interesting website and video that I wanted to share with you concerning dyslexia (a developmental reading disorder that occurs when the brain does not properly recognize and process certain symbols).

According to the site studiostudio, Dyslexie is a font that:

"is especially designed for people with dyslexia. When they use it, they make fewer errors whilst they are reading. It makes reading easier for them and it takes less effort. The Dyslexia font is used by several schools, universities, speech therapists and remedial teachers.

Independent research undertaken by the University of Twente, proved that the Dyslexia font improves reading results.

Research
The study at the University of Twente showed that people with dyslexia made fewer reading errors when they use the dyslexia font compared using standard font.

A part of the conclusion of this study is:
The people with dyslexia made fewer errors, than normal readers, on the EMT when using the font “Dyslexie”. This is an indication that reading with the font “Dyslexie” decreases the amount of reading errors."

I haven't read anything else on the "Dyslexie Font" but it would be interesting to know if it truly works???

This Is What the Desk of the Future Looks Like

Mashable had the following article that I wanted to share with you (Stan Schroder, Mashable Tech, November 21, 2011):

EXOpc has posted a video of its EXOdesk — an interactive desk environment that lets you do all sorts of tasks on a virtual space on your desk — in action and it looks amazing. See what you think: [video]

Jane Hart's 2011 Update: Top 100 Tools for Learning

Jane Hart, in the Learning in the Social Workplace blog, just released her final tally for this year's survey.

Top 100 Tools for Learning 2011

View more presentations from Jane Hart

Here are a few quick observations from the author:

This year, as for the last couple of years, the #1 tool is Twitter. But here are a few observations on this year’s list.

• The list is dominated once again by free, online social tools - and proprietary content development tools continue to decline.
• The top three tools – Twitter, YouTube and Google Docs – retain their positions from 2010.
• Other tools have moved up the list since 2010. This include Vimeo (up 41 places) and Yammer (up 37 places).
• There are 23 new tools on the list this year, the highest placed of which is Google+, followed by TED and Scoop.it.
• Other tools have moved down the list, and some have moved off the list completely. Notably this includes Firefox (which was actually the #1 tool in the first survey of tools in 2007) and Second Life.

If you are interested in a more detailed analysis, take a look at:
The Top 100 Tools for Learning 2011 (The final list and presentation in full)
Best in Breed Tools 2011
Winners and Losers 2011
Top Tools 2007-2011

Remembering Steve Jobs' 2005 Commencement Address

Steve Jobs, the Apple co-founder and former Chief Executive of Pixar Animation Studios, died yesterday, October 5th, and the web is full of tributes for him. Besides the Apple I, then II, other Apple products include the Macintosh, iMac, iPod, iPhone, iPad and the iTunes Store. Pixar is an Academy Award ®-winning computer animation studio which developed Toy Story (1995),  A Bug's Life (1998), Toy Story 2 (1999), Monsters, Inc. (2001), Finding Nemo (2003), The Incredibles (2004), Cars (2006), Ratatouille (2007), WALL-E (2008), Up (2009) and most recently Toy Story 3 (2010).

For me, one of the most influential things he did was his commencement speech to Stanford University in 2005. It’s been viewed on YouTube over 6.5 million times, but if you haven’t seen it before I’ve embedded it below or you can click on the link HERE.

As he states in the commencement address:

"No one wants to die," he said. "Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true."

If you just want to read the text version, it’s located in the Stanford University News.

The Power of Learning and Forgetting Curves

Dr. Will Thalheimer provides an in-depth look at his work on learning and forgetting curves in the following video that you can access from his Will at Work Learning blog.

I think Dr. Thalheimer's work is extremely relevant in the field of career and technology education as we design and employ learning interventions. We need to analyze not only how we train our students, but what is the result of the training on performance? Did we engage the learner and build understanding during training? After training, did we provide additional learning, prompting mechanisms, reminding mechanisms, and applications for learning? Did we remember that measurement is also an important aspect in the evaluation of learning?

Please watch the following video to understand the power of learning and forgetting curves:



I hope you also took time to consider Dr. Thalheimer's "7 Step Training Maximizer Model" that is at the end of the video. This action item will help ensure that learning curves occur during and after training and the effects of the forgetting curve should be minimized.

10 Internet Technologies Educators Should Be Informed About – 2011 Update

I found a great post on the EmergingEdTech Blog that I wanted to share with you. I agree that these ten technologies should be a topic of discussion, but they should also be a topic for implementation. The post contains numerous links to example apps and articles so you can learn more about each of the categories listed below:

1. Video and Podcasting Resources 
2. Digital Presentation Tools 
3. Collaboration & Brainstorming Tools
4. Blogs & Blogging
5. Social Networking Tools
6. Lecture Capture
7. Student Response Systems & Poll/Survey Tools
8. Educational Gaming
9. Open Educational Resources
10. The iPad and Other Tablet Devices

Please read "10 Internet Technologies Educators Should Be Informed About – 2011 Update" in it's entirety. It's a great resource for educators, especially for those that are new to educational technology.

What a Great Way to Visualize Data

200 Countries over 200 Years in 4 Minutes

Challenging the Myth of Innate Talent

"Champions are not born... they are made."

A new way of thinking about excellence and achievement that challenges the long-held belief that excellence hinges singularly on innate talent. Matthew Syed, the author of Bounce, argues hard work and self-belief, not just talent, play key roles in achieving excellence.

I think this is a concept that holds true for our students as well. Hard work and self-belief are two traits that we must value and help to instill in all of our students. I believe that a student that seems to make exceptional grades with little or no effort should be praised, as always, but we should challenge them to reach new heights through hard work and fostering a belief in what might be. We should also instill these same beliefs in all students as I think we all have personal examples of "average" students that out work their peers which results in a much higher academic and professional ceiling than many of us.

The one thing to add to this discussion is to help our students dream. Nothing can be obtained from hard work and self-belief if there is no dream to guide them.

Please watch the following video to see some of Syed's challenges to the myth of innate talent:



Also see: BBC Meet the Author - Matthew Syed