Teaching Office Resources, University Lectures, Things Found on Twitter

Twitter continues to grow as part of my professional learning network. This week I learned about a number of new resources for training, teaching and learning. For example, from MSOfficeResKit   I learned about a large set of customizable training resources for teaching Office 2007. The full list on on the MS Office resource Kit blog. From the site:

You can customize and use each of these presentation templates to provide in-house training to your users. Each presentation contains detailed instructions for performing the task, including screenshots and short quizzes. Instructions on how to use the template are included on the last slide in each deck.

Pretty cool. Designed for professional development/training I don’t see why these would not also be useful in the school classroom.

And then there is Academic Earth. I forget who I heard that one from because I just hit the link and didn’t get back to it for a while. The computer science sessions look very interesting to me. Harvard, MIT, Berkeley and Stanford are all represented with computer science course lectures. I’ve heard good  things about al four of those universities – even the ones on the west coast. (joke people joke)

And two talks by Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer are making their way around these days. Bill Gates’ TED talk where he talks about malaria and then about quality teachers is the first one. The tech geeks are talking about Bill letting mosquitoes loose but educators are all discussion what it means to be a good teacher. And the role if any of tests in determining that.

Steve Ballmer talked to the Democratic Caucus last week about the need for more science and technology education. Some interesting snippets:

“And in today's knowledge-driven world, innovation will depend on people who are actually technologically sophisticated, have strong critical thinking skills, have expertise in math and science and engineering.”

“We really need to transform math and science education in America. We need to improve teacher training, teacher quality. I was talking earlier in the day with some folks about just how many of our math and science teachers don't have the correct training and accreditation, and that stands in the way of us really breaking through.”

“For those who are unemployed, we need new technical skills training to give those people a start back up the economic ladder.”

“I sat down with the speaker at 8:00 AM, and she woke me right up. She said there are four things I want you to make sure you understand are a priority: science, science, science, and science.”

A lot of good stuff being discussed these days. If you’re on Twitter follow me at https://twitter.com/AlfredTwo