It’s the end of the week, and just like almost every Friday at The Solopreneur Life, I have a menu of information for you. This week’s “Bits” is being delivered late, because I had major Web site problems early in the week that brought down TheSolopreneurLife.com for about 72 hours. As you can imagine, it threw me off my schedule just a tad. 

So, this week’s Bits is short, and it’s mostly vegetables that are very good for you. The main Bit deals with the one line of code crippled my Web site, the villain who caused the problem, and the obscure WordPress plugin that rescued my site.

Continue reading … The Solopreneur Life’s “Friday Bits” Column #40 « The Solopreneur Life.

What does it mean to be fully loaded? I often consider the notion for my students. In fact, ever since I acquired the first apps for my iPhone, I’ve adopted the admittedly odd habit of pondering which apps I would “load” onto my students.If, indeed, high school students were smartphones or iPads, I would do my very best to fully load them with the critical skills and tools they need to become information- and media-fluent adults. …

Read complete article: Fully Loaded: Outfitting a teacher librarian for the 21st century. Here’s what it takes. ...

We need to prepare ALL of our students for citizenship  in the 21st century global community!

The National Education Technology Plan, Transforming American Education: Learning Powered by Technology, calls for applying the advanced technologies used in our daily personal and professional lives to our entire education system to improve student learning, accelerate and scale up the adoption of effective practices, and use data and information for continuous improvement. It presents five goals with recommendations for states, districts, the federal government, and other stakeholders. Each goal addresses one of the five essential components of learning powered by technology: Learning, Assessment, Teaching, Infrastructure, and Productivity.

Learn more … http://www.ed.gov/technology/netp-2010

The rise of technology in education is opening doors for learners of all backgrounds: students from diverse economic situations, students with special passions and students with unique educational needs. The following courses, resources and research are excellent guides for using educational technology to support diverse learners in the classroom.

via Educational Technology for Diverse Learners « Curriki’s Blog.

Learn tips and tricks to explore the world, find interesting places and share content with others.

Follow this hands-on learning game at your own pace until you complete each level and become a true explorer!

More about this game

This self-paced game will get you familiar with both the basics and more advanced features of Google Earth.

Once you complete the course, you’ll be able to:
Fly to your home
Explore the oceans
See sights around the world
Explore street-level imagery
View 3D buildings
See 3D terrain
View user-submitted images
Explore historical images of the Earth
Mark places, draw paths and measure distances
Get driving directions
Tour any location

via Google Earth: Learn – Google Earth Help.

U.Va. Astronomer, Students Create Book on Universe for Schoolkids
September 1, 2010 — Last year, University of Virginia astronomer Kelsey Johnson and a team of student volunteers established an astronomy club, called “Dark Skies, Bright Kids,” in rural southern Albemarle County elementary schools.They are seeking to spark early interest in astronomy among children who live far enough away from bright city lights to actually get a great view of the night sky. They hold weekly after-school meetings, and, every other Friday night, set up telescopes on school grounds for family-oriented sky gazing.

The schools there have a large Hispanic population, so Johnson and her team – drawn mostly from the astronomy department in U.Va.’s College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences – also are reaching out to students whose native language is Spanish. …

… She currently is seeking a $25,000 grant from Pepsi, through its Pepsi Refresh educational grant program, which allows the public to vote on projects for funding. (To vote, click here; you can vote up to 10 times per day through the month of September). Johnson also is seeking other funding sources, which would allow her, she hopes, to distribute the book more broadly in Virginia, and maybe even nationally.

Read complete article: U.Va. Astronomer, Students Create Book on Universe for Schoolkids.

Nourish Interactive’s mission is to offer fun, innovative solutions that empower children to make healthy choices.

Support our bilingual free website by voting in the Michelle Obama‘s Fight Childhood Obesity contest. Vote for our four games.

Via Nourish Interactive

InterroBang is a socially-networked, problem-solving, service-learning game in which K-12 students complete missions in the real world — an extension of the Smithsonian’s online conference “Problem Solving with Smithsonian Experts.” InterroBang players and experts award points for completed missions based on a problem-solving rubric. Supported by Microsoft and with input from the National Service-Learning Clearinghouse.

Check it out at www.playInterroBang.com.

Via: Resource Center | www.nationalservice.gov/resources | 800-860-2684 | resourcecenter@etr.org

Below is a post from the creator of Wordle .  What a wonderful blend of art and science!

Friday, May 21, 2010

Wordle as “Beautiful Visualization”

O’Reilly has a nifty series of books on “beauty” in technology. Editor Julie Steele asked me to contribute a chapter about Wordle to the book on Beautiful Visualization. If you’re a visualization fanatic, then you may want to go buy a copy (for which all royalties go to Architecture for Humanity). However, if you’re merely curious about how Wordle came to be, or how it works, you might enjoy this PDF of Beautiful Visualization, Chapter 3: Wordle.

Posted by Jonathan Feinberg at 4:34 PM

via Wordle Blog: Wordle as “Beautiful Visualization”.