ING Unsung Heroes began in 1995 as a way for ING to demonstrate its commitment to the education community. Grants are given to K-12 educators utilizing new teaching methods and techniques that improve learning.

All K-12 education professionals are eligible to apply. Applicants must be employed by an accredited K-12 public or private school located in the U.S. and be a full-time educator, teacher, principal, paraprofessional, or classified staff member working on a project with demonstrated effectiveness in improving student learning. That's YOU!

Submit an application for an ING Unsung Heroes ...   more...

“Whatever it takes” is an attitude that drives most of Finland’s 62,000 educators in 3,500 schools from Lapland to Turku—professionals selected from the top 10 percent of the nation’s graduates to earn a required master’s degree in education. 

"Whatever it takes" should be education's manifesto everywhere. Every child is unique, special, and gifted. Finland values good teachers, expects them to be highly trained (Master degrees), pays them what they are worth, and provides them ongoing support. Children start school at seven and stay with ...   more...

The month of December is rich in holiday traditions for millions of people around the world so we created this project for you.

Free Animation from Animation Library

We offer you this project, Celebrating December Holidays, filled with resources to help excite and inspire teachers, parents, and children about this wonderful time of year. You can learn about your own family traditions as well as those of others from countries around the globe. 

Happy Hannukah! Chanukah or Hannukah, the Festival ...   more...

Eyes on the Solar System is a 3-D interactive environment full of real NASA mission data. Explore the cosmos from your computer. See the entire solar system moving in real time. Use this visualization tool control space and time. As an armchair astronaut it’s up to you.

Use the tutorials to learn how to navigate EYES on the Solar System.

Hop on the the NASA Spacecraft Juno. Juno’s principal goal in this NASA mission is to understand the origin and evolution of Jupiter. Underneath its dense cloud cover, Jupiter safeguards secrets to the fundamental processes and conditions that governed ...   more...

Online Conference November 14-18, 2011 
Don't miss any of the 325 presentations starting this Monday as part of the Global Education Collaborative. Each presentation is using Blackboard Collaborative for you to participate or watch later.

Personalizing learning means moving to student-centered learning. This takes time. Here are a few tips to help you transform your learning environment. 

1. Find out how each student learns best.
2. Allow students to choose their topic.
3. Encourage teachers and students to co-design the curriculum.
4. Ask lots of questions.
5. Teach less, learn more.
6. Share how you learn.
7. Connect, extend, challenge.
8. Re-evaluate assessment.
9. Define goals and encourage reflection.
10. Focus on learning, not work.
11. Coordinate student led conferences .

Learning begins with the learner. What children know and what ...   more...

Curation is a new skill that all of us can use. There are multiple curation tools where you can collect resources based on a topic, tags, and other people's suggestions. One curation tool that is growing quickly is Scoop-it. Barbara has set up several Scoop-its that you can follow and rescoop any of the resources to your own Scoop-its: 

Barbara posts regularly on her blog Rethinking Learning. Join her as she facilitates growing creative and engaging learning environments. Here's some of the latest posts:

• Making Change with Good Questions
• Creative Thinkering
• Curation as a 21st Century Skill
• Who are our Experts Now?
• What is Personalized Learning?
• Prepare Students for the Real-World

Contact Barbara, follow Barbara's blog, 
and follow her at   . 

We are so proud of the featured projects our members have created that they now appear in the lower right on the outside of My eCoach so everyone can view them. Here are a few of the featured projects since the last newsletter:

• Using Google Docs 
  by Nicole Elenz-Martin
• Percentages Save or Make you Money by Ken Bakken 
• Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Knowby Trish Ledoux
• Yelp.com isn't Designed for Kids by Michelle Lee
• Director of First Impressions by Ruby Pedroza
• Dare Mighty Things by Pam Lowe
• Living in the Cloud by Brian Dvorak
• Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs...   more...