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Top 10 Office Supply Hacks - Get some extra mileage out of the supply closet. Lifehacker has 10 bonus uses for everyday office supplies. Keep snack foods fresh by using binder clips as chip clips. Did some clod write on your white board with permanant marker? Dry erase ink will make it come right off. You’ll want these ideas handy before class starts again.

17 Writing Secrets  - Want to bump your students’ writing from good to great (or at least from middling to halfway decent), Writer’s Digest presents these 17 writing secrets to help students make good word choices, and remind them of the importance of fixing stuff that’s kinda wordy and lame revision.

101+ Web Resources for Students - Courtesy of StudentHacks.org, this list is pretty much what it sounds like. It features everything from dictionaries to Shakespeare’s complete works to resources for the yearbook staff. If your students are looking for some handy Web tools, this is a great place to start.

100 Helpful Web Tools for Every Kind of Learner - Different students learn in different ways. What works for visual learners may not make sense to a kinesthetic learner. If you’re fixing to differentiate your instruction, check out these tools that cater to different learning styles. -BILL FERRIS

Photo credit: MarkyBon on flickr

10 Virtually Instant Ways to Improve Your Life - I’m all for improving my life, but why does it have to take soooo long? Here are ten easy ways to pull yourself up by your boot straps courtesy of Stepcase Lifehack. If you find yourself wanting to change something about your life, then why not start out with the simple stuff like Don’t over-generalize and Don’t take things too personally.

12 Ways to Use Project Censored in Your Classroom - Project Censored is an intiative designed to help aggregate news stories that often go under reported. This guide offers ways teachers can educate their students in fair journalism methods and help them understand the practice and importance of research. There are in-class activities and projects on the list, so if your students are studying media and journalism, this is a good place to start them on the right path.

 101 Scholarships Just For Teachers - From TeachingTips.com comes this amazing list of scholarships available for teachers working their way through college. It might be too late for most of us, but if you have some students who are interested in becoming teachers themselves, give them this list to ease college’s financial burdens. Some are region specific, so all 101 might not be completely pertinent. By the way, be sure and check out some of the other amazing lists on TeachingTips, they’ve got some great stuff there.

101 Things to Do When You’re Bored - I don’t know how anybody could possibly get bored when there are hundreds of Instructify posts to read, but if you find yourself with some idle time, then try out a few of these activities to rescue yourself from ennui. Lists Galore recommends flying a kite, starting a blog, or you know, making a list. - JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

Photo credit: Wetsun on Flickr

Welcome to the Carnival of Education Career Fair! We’ve retracted the bleachers and set up the booths on the gymnasium floor so these brave teachers can see what they might be doing if they weren’t teaching (perish the thought).

Motivational Speaker
Mr. D at I Want to Teach Forever agreed to sport a freaking mohawk as long as his students worked hard, which was about three weeks. Sadly, his motivational experiment has concluded. Long live the mohawk.

Camp Counselor
As a kid, my wife got to go to Space Camp and Marine Science Camp. Had Tisha Kulak and American Consumer News been around back then to point out how to save money on tuition to summer research camps, I might’ve been able to go, too.

Productivity Consultant
Instructify-favorite studenthacks.org has some great tips for students who want to learn how to write a research paper.

Pro Athletes
The Jose Vilson uses Derek Jeter as an example of how nurturing students’ talent and leadership ability early on can reap great results.

And over at Jay P. Greene’s Blog, the author talks about the importance of identifying students’ talents, whether they’re a left tackle or potential honor student.

Economist
ESL teacher Larry Ferlazzo knows that money is the international language.

Translator
Melissa B. at The Scholastic Scribe provides a handy-dandy English-to-Eduspeak dictionary.

Director
Mathew Needleman at Creating Lifelong Learners takes a proactive approach to managing disruptive students during a class movie project.

Advice Columnist
Let’s Play Math! has some advice on teaching math to a struggling student.

Detective
OverwhelmedMom gets to the bottom of problems that gifted students face.

Investigative Reporters
The proprietor of a voice from the middle knows the means to discovery is asking the right questions.

In addition, eduwonkette responds to a Wall Street Journal article about the criteria used to evaluate teachers.

Game Developer
Alvaro at SharpBrains shares a few games to stimulate your temporal lobe.

Diplomat
Coach Brown tries to reach an understanding with hostile parents.

Nutritionists
At Homework. Dinner. Life. Angela points out that good nutrition habits ought to be maintained year-round, not just a few days before the test.

Meanwhile, Chanman at Buckhorn Road says all that caffeine students drink can’t be good for them.

Cartographer
Dan Callahan, a.k.a. geek.teacher, harnesses Google Maps for a lesson in community mapping.

Librarian
@EDU takes the work out of student research by pointing them toward Google Alerts.

Politician
Jane Artabasy at Golden Apple Teaching Excellence Network unloads the loaded word of the day, “elitism,” showing it’s nothing to be frightened of - especially in schools.

The folks at Golden Apple also mull over the differences in races and learning styles.

Astronaut
HowDoWhy asks, what is a solar system, anyway? Furthermore, just how big is ours?

Human Resources Specialist
Over at Right on the Left Coast, Darren discusses the sticky situation of a teacher dating an 18-year-old student at a different school.

Mentors
Allison Jones at Entry Level Living wants to revamp the way young people think about leadership.

The folks at the Efficient Leadership Files have some ideas on that as well.

Statistician
Lead from the Start crunches the numbers about the disconnect between teachers and EdSector.

Strategist
Seth Pearce at NYC Students Blog has an intriguing idea on how to overcome schools’ non-stop test preparation.

Lobbyist
PZ Meyers at Pharyngula has some news about a disturbing bill in the Oklahoma legislature regarding religion in schools.

Road Grader
As the great homework debate rages on, Shabam School makes a good case for grading homework.

Kindergarten Teacher (sorry, I couldn’t come up with anything else)
Kiri at Elbows, Knees, Dreams shares her thoughts (and asks for others’ opinions) about early entrance to Kindergarten.

Photo credit: ou_ags on flickr

Assign a Day is an online calendar management system designed for teachers and students. It’s a free service that allows you to create and manage your classroom online and share assignments with your students. The interface is incredibly intuitive and is a great way for you to post current and upcoming tasks. Just register (it’s free to do so, and doesn’t require much information to get started), create a calendar, and begin posting. Set the dates of your assignment and a description and you’re ready to go. The calendar can be viewed in grid or list form, and adding assignments is easy. You can then choose to share your calendar with other educators to edit in case you want to collaborate.

The program isn’t for personal calendars, though, as it is specific for teachers and their students. The whole thing is powered by 4Teachers.org, creators of such tools as RubiStar and QuizStar. This is a great tool for teachers to make sure their students no longer have the excuse “I didn’t know that was due today!” -JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

Assign a Day

Not indicative of its title, Worsely School in Canada has an impressive array of resources available to K - 12 Educators here. There are games, tools, and plans aplenty, so you might kill some time just exploring the site. There’s the usual suspects as far as content is concerned — math, science, English, and some areas where you can request the things you’d like to see covered. The site is designed nicely, with intuitive controls, yet lots of pages to click through. However, the resources themselves are incredibly detailed, and have a lot of great visual accompaniment to help you see what they mean.

The Worsely School might not be much different than your own (though it might already have the funding you need to get something like this going– who knows?), so what can you do to make your school as full of resources and materials to share with other teachers worldwide? Public education is truly the “village” that raises our children in today’s times, so its up to us to share and inspire others who share our craft. Let us know in the comments what ideas you’ve had to broaden the educational spectrum. -JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

Worsely School’s Teacher Resources  

What’s your classroom management style? Do you lay down the law? Do you try to relate to your students on a personal level?

Classroom management is tricky in that every teacher is expected to know it even though no one really teaches it. Blogger Dan Meyer at dy/dan asks teachers, So How Do You Teach Classroom Management? In the article Meyer discusses a few of the tactics he uses. He also asks, since what works for him might not work for you, can you teach it effectively? Be sure to peruse the comments, as several educators weigh in with their opinions. - BILL FERRIS

So How Do You Teach Classroom Management?

Photo credit: WorldIslandInfo.com on flickr

They say time is money. In a school, time is knowledge. For example, the time you spend getting your students to calm down after recess is time you no longer have to teach them their vocabulary words this week. To keep your class on track, whip out this handy dandy Class Timer.

Class Timer can do exactly two things: it can track how long an activity takes, or count down from a predetermined time. But its uses are practically limitless. If you’re giving a test, Class Timer can let them know exactly how long they have left to finish. Once the science lesson is done, tell your kids they’ve got exactly two minutes to get their social studies homework out. Or see who has the fastest time in a math race.

With Class Timer, time won’t slip away from you, and your students will have more time to expand their knowledge. -BILL FERRIS

Class Timer

Are you out of ideas for your classroom displays? Do you feel like you’ve accomplished all you can in the unforgiving medium of construction paper? If so, get inspired again by visiting the Classroom Displays Blog.

Londoner Linda Hartley posts some of the most creative displays from across the pond. They’re tagged by subject, holiday, and all sorts of criteria. So if you’re looking for ideas to steal a little inspiration for your upcoming winter bulletin boards, this is a good place to turn. Now dig your scissors and construction paper out of the trash and get creative again. -BILL FERRIS

Classroom Displays Blog

Missing class terrifies many teachers. Not to knock brave substitute teachers - they’re in an unwinnable situation where they have to walk into unfamiliar territory and try to teach a subject they may or may not know. Still, when you get back, you know you’ll have to play catch-up to get your class back on schedule.

Dan Meyer at dy/dan has a solution. In his post, How I Work: Sub Plans, Meyer outlines how he burns an electronic sub plan onto a DVD. Like the picture says, his substitute merely has to press “play” and the learning begins.

Though Meyer uses pricey programs like Final Cut Pro, you could accomplish the same thing with free tools like Audacity, OpenOffice’s Impress presentation tool, or create a screencast with Screencast-o-Matic.

What his idea will cost you is time. Meyer said it took about 90 minutes. Before that scares you away, he says, “forty of those could be chalked under the Bumblin’ Around column.” The more you do it, the less time it’ll take you. But the real figure to consider is the amount of in-class time this approach could save. Spending 45 minutes to an hour doesn’t sound like so much when it means you won’t have to squeeze two 50 minute lessons into a single class period. -BILL FERRIS

How I Work: Sub Plans

Related Stuff:

Ditch Microsoft Office: OpenOffice Provides a Free Office Suite
Effortlessly Create Video Demonstrations with Screencast-o-Matic

Some teachers are naturals in the classroom. Something about them gives the impression that they know what they’re talking about. Students, and other teachers, are simply compelled to listen to them. But what about the rest of us? Is classroom leadership something you either have or you don’t?

Not according to a post at the Even Happier blog entitled How to Command Respect. Body language is the key to projecting a confident air, and this post is full of advice that will make your students sit up straight and take notice. Tips include keeping good posture, balancing your weight so as not to lean on one foot, keeping eye contact, and don’t fidget.

Like any good self-help blog, it pointed out dozens of bad habits I’d accumulated. But fixing several small things can yield big results. So next time you catch yourself shifting from foot to foot at the front of the class, remember Even Happier’s advice and take charge of your class. –BILL FERRIS

How to Command Respect

Photo credit: megadem on flickr.com.

Too many schools fear the Internet like your four-year-old nephew fears his bedroom closet. Forget resources like OpenCongress.org or FreeRice - these Luddites think every online kilobyte is infested with scammers, predators, and pornography that magically appears on screen the minute the teacher turns her back. So, after spending thousands of dollars equipping classrooms with computers, some schools try to wall up the Internet where kids won’t find it, like in a story by Edgar Allen Poe.

You and I, of course, know this is useless - kids can access whatever they want at home, and students have been figuring out how to break firewalls since they were invented. But how do you convince your school administrators that removing the barriers will open students to a veritable gold mine of educational tools?

It’s up to good Web citizens like you to be an advocate for educational technology. Don’t worry, you don’t have to fight this battle unarmed. Instructify presents these three rules to help you.

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