Dooley Noted

Writing With Technology

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 12 Feb 2014 21:59:00 +0000

As the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) have arrived and teachers have begun rewriting pacing guides, unit plans, and lessons, I've been thinking about ways to increase the amount of writing students do in our classrooms. We've recently had an influx of technology in my district resulting in devices in students hands in most classrooms by the beginning of the 2014-15 school year. That being said, I began my search for ideas through my usual PLN channels. The very first link I was drawn towards was from +Shelly Sanchez Terrell titled "15+ Resources to Inspire Writing with Digital Prompts" (cross posted at teacherrebootcamp.com).

The link has a multitude of great ideas with associated resources. I paired it down a bit more and added some additional resources below. I'm going to be sharing with my staff through our technology integration plan and suggest you all do the same!

Notes for success

Vary the types of writing - different mediums, types, stories, etc
Allow students to be creative - don't restrict the topic (at least not all the time!)

Can writing be fun? Duh!

Timing - a whole class on expository writing = tough for most students to focus and "power through"

Resources

Blogger - obviously! We have student Google accounts so this would be seamless. The best attribute to blogging is at the end of the year, students have a chronological snapshot of their writings (hopefully with tags)
Make Beliefs Comix has over 350 free printables for teachers - sorted by topic, event, and holidays. Students can create their own comic with this tool in multiple languages.
Student choice of prompts - why not let students have some input and buy in?
Memes - who doesn't like memes (put your hand down, Johnny)? See this presentation for more info, with LOTS of ideas. If anything, click the link and laugh out loud on some of Shelley's examples.
Twitter - losing a bit of steam as of late, giving way to Instagram. However, still very valuable lesson on how to succinctly compose thoughts, 140 characters at a time.
Scholastic Story Starters- this is an interactive website where students write their names and fill out questions.
Plinky- a question appears and below the question students write their opinion. Great brainstorming starter. How about setting this as a routine, maybe prompting the beginning of class?

Phone call with parent at the end of the day - tough call?

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 23 Jan 2014 00:08:00 +0000

Image Source

Today I decided to take a risk, and end my day with a parent phone call. Now, I'm not really a pessimist but I strive to follow up on all parent messages in the am hours. I think that's when I'm at my best and when I have the clearest mindset of the day. Today was different, and I needed to talk with a parent as I was unable to call this morning. So I dialed the phone; boy was I surprised when the parent picked up and we had one heckuva a positive dialogue. This parent even took the time and energy to tell me how well our school had not only prepared her oldest student years prior, but to tell us how she appreciates everything we have done for her current student. She shared the great news about the prestigious institution her student was just accepted to and I could almost see her smile through the phone. I must admit, I could not be happier to end my day with a phone call like that. I'm packing it in, as I couldn't end the day on a better note.

Be a LEADER

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 21 Jan 2014 21:01:00 +0000

Image Source

Words to live by: Be a Leader, Not a Boss. I work hard, with a shovel in hand, in the trenches with my teachers almost daily. I find it easy to walk the walk. This impresses upon them as an administrator, I'm not above that work. I am also not above showing, giving direction and advice, giving and earning respect, and using kindness in my thoughts and actions. I personally love the antiquated photocopy to the left - it represents a nostalgic approach to leading. I am fairly certain these traits have withstood the hands of time. This is my personal pledge.

So I ask you, are you a leader or a boss? Inquiring minds want to know...

Getting caught up...

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 21 Jan 2014 20:47:00 +0000

Image source

So I have been completely caught up with my Curriculum & Instruction position to do any blogging over the course of this school year. I've had a lot to say, but just have not put in the work to document my thoughts in my blog! On the flip side, it has been quite a nice break as I've been able to focus more on my site and provide individual facetime with my teachers, which I firmly believe is appreciated. It has allowed me the time to share my thoughts, more focused thoughts, with my PLN via Twitter and Google+. That is an important realization for me as I comfortably understand it is extremely tough to balance my online professional learning environment with my mortar and bricks one. I think of +Eric Sheninger and how the world he does it (still wondering, let me know if you have the secret!), all the while writing a book! Maybe I'm just too caught up and need to accept the idea of what I do best - striking a comfortable balance? I like that. I know what I excel at. I know what I need more guided practice at. I am okay with that. This will always give me comfort in knowing what I do well is appreciated, and will always push me to improve elsewhere. Simple thoughts for a Tuesday, I know.

Rigor Defined

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 15:03:00 +0000

At the San Diego Summer Institute for AVID, a large group of educators defined "rigor" and created a gallery walk. What you see below is the result. I am fairly certain most people have different definitions but the similarities are not shocking!

AVID Summer Institute 2013: Day 1

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 05:33:00 +0000

So...I'm in San Diego for some professional development with my staff, all revolving around our first go at implementing AVID this year. I must say, this Summer Institute sure has started with a bang. We got together first thing this AM with a bunch of other districts in our Site Teams (basically all of us from our site). We had a nice overview of the AVID system, an overview of what to expect in our Site Team meetings, and then had some great intellectually stimulating conversation focused on student achievement.

I then had the great pleasure to attend the strand titled Leadership Implementation (High School) facilitated by Brett Bowers and Lise Reilly. We eased into the topic, our facilitators getting an idea of where attendees were at in relation to AVID comfort-level. We moved on to discussing a number of ideas/thoughts. Without providing my detailed notes, I've captured some visualizations for those that would rather watch or view (like myself!). My biggest takeaway from day 1:

Question: how can you prevent AVID from being 'just another thing on someone's plate?'
Answer: AVID is THE PLATE! Everything else spills over and fills the holes...

If you are interested in following along, I'm tweeting some of my "a-ha's" and other important takeaways via Twitter, with the hashtag #AVIDIS13.

2012 AVID Summer Institute Speaker:

11 Essentials of AVID: these are small screenshots of our work, comment for larger versions

Rigor:

1:1 Android Tablets!

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 24 Jul 2013 20:22:00 +0000

We have finally picked a direction with our initial rollout of the non-traditional 1:1 program in my District. The Samsung Tab 3 10" tablets with Android 4.2.2 have officially been ordered for the first Cohort of teachers!!! Needless to say, I'm excited and paralyzed at the same moment, afraid of what is about to happen. We have scheduled a 4-day summer institute for our first group of teachers, in hopes of them becoming peer experts. Will keep updated using #AndroidsInClass, stay tuned!

Image from: http://cdn.androidpolice.com/

Ice breakers with technology

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14:18:00 +0000

21st Century Icebreakers: 11 Ways To Get To Know Your Students with Technology

Here is an excellent article I came across involving icebreakers and the utilization of technology. As summer winds down, planning for the start up of next year ramps up. Keeping this in my mind, I'm always open to finding fresh and easy-to-implement ideas for my teachers. From the author:

Have students create a Pinterest board with 10 pins that summarizes them.
Ask students to create a 30 second podcast that introduces themselves. Then allow students to present them or play them on separate devices as an audio gallery.
Create a classroom blog and ask each student to write a blog post introducing themselves to the rest of the classroom.
Have students create a quick comic strip to describe themselves or to recreate a recent funny moment in their lives.
Use PollEverywhere to ask students interesting questions and get to know them as a class, like their favorite subjects, bands or TV shows.
Use GoogleForms or SurveyMonkey to survey students about their interests, academic inclinations, and background info – a 21st century alternative to the “Getting to Know You” info sheet!
Have students create word clouds to describe themselves and share with the rest of the class.
Have students go on a QR code scavenger hunt in teams to get to know each other and learn about your classroom rules in a fun, engaging way.
Ask students to create their own Voki avatars that introduce themselves to the class. Encourage them to be creative with the backgrounds, characters and details of the avatar to reflect their own personalities and preferences.
Have students create graffiti online that speaks to their interests and personalities and share with the class.
Have students create mashup videos of themselves with Weavly to introduce their interests to the class.

My favorites that I would add to this extensive list of ideas would be:

Create a Glogster photo blog of the things they enjoy (account needed)
Skitch - annotation and markup tool
Animoto - great little videos for free/cheap!
Prezi - great direct substitute for PowerPoint, it's like PP but in 2013!
Blabberize - seriously, make photos talk. I mean, awesomeness?

15 Educator Discounts

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 14:37:00 +0000

If you're an educator, and you're even remotely like me (thrifty, with a family, and a need to save some $$), then here is a list of the most popular educator discounts (thanks to friends at SimpleK12)

Barnes & Noble Educator Program - Up to 25% off
Banana Republic - 15% off
Ann Taylor Loft - 15% off
Apple Products - education pricing available
FedEx Office - 15% off
The Container Store - special teacher discounts throughout the year
Hancock Fabrics - 10% off
J.Crew - 15% off
Jo-Ann's - 15% off
Michael's - 15% off
Office Depot - various teacher discounts and offers
OfficeMax - Teacher Appreciation Days around the back-to-school season.
Staples - various offers and Teacher Appreciation Days
The Limited - 15% off
STA Travel - various teacher discounts

Any other good ones out there? As educators, you must share yours!

Tablets in Classrooms - Some Research

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 16:42:00 +0000

In going through my Pocket web clippings, I came back around to this article from Edudemic. They have ever so kindly culminated six examples of tablet classroom integration and provided links for further reading. This is a must read for anyone needing justification for tablet integration or for those that love to read about technology integration and their persuasion on learning.

6 Examples Of Successful Classroom Tablet Integration

Android Tablets in the Classroom

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 17:29:00 +0000

We finally received our set of forty Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1" Android tablets! This classroom set of tablets was purchased from Logical Choice months ago - unfortunately, they failed to notify us that they were on back order so we simply had to wait. My plan is this:

A rolling cart with a full class set of devices, capable of connecting to the internet and the school network anywhere on campus
6 teachers to integrate the technology directly into 6 different content areas

Math, Agriculture, Art, English, Social Sciences, and Foreign Language are all on board!

Troubleshooting the devices - how do we set them up so the students cannot destroy them?! Good question, I know.

My district IT Tech specialist quickly placed an "app locker" on all of the devices and I selected a pair of teachers to troubleshoot any potential issues over spring break. My instructions were simple, try to think like your students and see where you can get into trouble on the devices, taking notes along the way. We go to break tomorrow so I'm interested to see what they come up with upon our return.

I sent my teachers off with hacking directions and began tinkering myself last night. I immediately broke out of the app locker by uninstalling it through a number of menu commands, and had the open source Android OS at my mercy. At that point, I realized we needed something more; more robust and more educationally focused. Some quick research turned up one product called TabPilot.

I immediately hooked up with another Jarrett (I know, crazy right, even spelled the same as my name!) who turned out to be the president of the company. We worked through setting up the systems and they provided me with a 10-device free Standard Edition of the app to tryout. As it turns out, this is a great product that does exactly what I want it to. It is relatively inexpensive for our set of 40 devices, so I'm pretty pleased thus far. I simply need to convince IT that it is a better solution, and then of course, find the funding!

As note, I'll be blogging about my Android Tablets in our classrooms as we progress beyond setup, implementation, and eventually evidence of improved student learning. Feel free to follow along on this blog, or on Twitter under #AndroidsInClass.

Ipad 1:1 Schools

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 03:41:00 +0000

Are there any 1:1 ipad schools? Are there any 1:1 ipad schools receiving grants to fund implementation? Are there any 1:1 ipad schools where implementation is significantly increasing student learning?

I am equally intrigued as I am skeptical. You see, I spent time as a teacher in a school in Nevada where a 1:1 MacBook initiative was rolled out to the Freshman class my last year there. I taught Computer Science and knew the initiative would immediately create new, unique, and exciting learning opportunities for this group of students. Do ipads do the same? Do they do it bettet?

I am more than happy to do some work and tech training with a teacher on a trial basis, but I have no idea where to start. Besides asking my principal to shell out $15k to supply a classroom with ipads, do I have other options at the state or federal level? Or even private grants? What about Perkins? As you can see, I have lots of questions and few answers on this topic. Anybody have advice?

Tweet of the Day

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 04:24:00 +0000

So I have been thinking, "how can I contribute a little slice of what I find to be the most interesting tweets or articles I read all day?" Of course, the natural answer is to simply retweet those profound words of wisdom or thought-provoking articles. Well, I was looking for a little better way to keep track of these daily educational gems, so I spawned my own hashtag, #MrD-ToD.

Now, I acknowledge that I lack a few creative bones in my body and am barely original. However, I'd like to think my hashtag is fairly self explanatory and should be easy to follow. If you happen by chance to be the other person (besides myself of course) following this hashtag, you can expect to read some pretty excellent daily musings, most educational in nature.

Contrary to popular belief, I do perform a bit of research prior to jumping into things of this nature. I don't want to be that, guy that just created the 2,096,521st "Tweet of the Day" for education. Much to my surprise, I found nobody else providing something of the like. Well, guess I am a bit original today. Up, up, and away with Mr. Dooley's Tweet (s) of the Day!

Principalm for School Administrators

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 21:06:00 +0000

Anybody running Principalm software for student data management system on the go? Well I am! I must say, for the price we paid (roughly $1k for our 1k students), we sure get a lot of bang for that buck. I run Principalm on my LG Revolution smartphone (android powered) and boy is it smooth. At the drop of the hat, I have student schedules, lockers, health conditions, parking info, grades, attendance, and discipline history at the ready. Oh, and did I mention a 4" picture of the student!?

I think so highly of the software that we provided it to all three campus supervisors on older Palm handheld devices. They use it to deliver student notices, check attendance/truancy records, learn student names/pictures, and the like. This software has given us all the ability to have the majority of our student data management system on the go. I have absolutely no complaints thus far, and am looking forward to expanding its' use elsewhere on campus (as well as connecting through an Infinite Campus back door - I currently have to download Ad Hoc reports if I want updated info, my only minor issue).

Lastly, it is important to make a note that the data is secure, even on my smartphone. It is password protected, and it is setup to wipe the data at the third incorrect password attempt. There are some additional security features but I never plan on letting my phone out of my view.

If you are an administrator looking at the software as an option for your campus, feel free to ask questions...

A Refresher...

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 02:45:00 +0000

So I've been away from blogging, tweeting, and everything else associated with #Edchat in well over a year and a half...

I've come to realize that my Assistant Principal job is quite demanding, but have also realized that I need to have more balance in my professional life. I have not been taking the time to reflect upon my philosophy and practice, and promise to begin looking more closely at how I am positively influencing my students. I look forward to being back on the cutting edge of technology, bringing what's useful to the front doors of my school...

Teacher Top 10 Video

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 14:49:00 +0000

Just thought I would share a hilarious video about the "Top 10 Things You Don't Learn About Teaching in College."

Enjoy!

YouTube Video: Download and Import to iMovie

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 17:28:00 +0000

If you've always wondered how to get a video from YouTube into your iMovie project, well wonder no more! I put together a simple and short tutorial on how to do this. The video has no audio, but the steps are simple:

Use FireFox
Install Video Downloader add-on
Go to a YouTube video
Click download arrow at bottom of FF
Upload the saved .flv file to ZamZar and convert to .mp4
Check your email and download the converted file
Import the converted .mp4 file into iMovie
That's it!

Watch the video here (it may take a while to load, it's 13MB!):

Reflection Week 15

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 00:14:00 +0000

Core Values

Clarify who we are
Govern personal relationships
Guide us on how to teach
Inform us on how to reward
Honesty
Transparency with statistics of student/community population
Look up Singleton & Linton, 2006, pp 60-61
Acceptance
Embracing cultural differences
Cultural barriers – break them down
Break the vicious circle/cycle
“Money is never going to make education more equitable if we do not properly desegregates our schools so that the minority population of students have as much to gain from public schools as middle and upper class students.” Jonathan Kozon, 1991.
Modeling
Model expectations of what I want my students to produce or learn
Learn by example
Intrinsic motivation
I value my own education, never a choice for me
Payback, sense of helping others
Caring, making a difference
Respect and trust
Friendly
Maintain healthy relationships
Focus on building confidence
Organization
Key to keeping up with the changes in education
Ownership and pride
http://www.Nps.gov/training/uc/whcv.htm

Decision Making

You get paid for your judgments.
With good judgment, you can find the knowledge (or those that do)
Why is it so difficult to make a decision?
Our value in the eyes of others are sometimes more important than the best decision
Why is decision making such an important activity for principals?
You’re paid for them
Decisions made in education are people decisions
It’s important, affects the students for the rest of their lives.
How do you make decisions? How does you r principal make decisions?
Gut instinct? Not in hiring…
Think it through
How will it affect most involved
Involve stake holders
Do not ASSUME
Are there techniques that would help a principal make a decision?
Stay aligned with your core values and school culture
Compare and contrast the various models of the decision making process.
When should a principal not involve others in the decision making process?
Confidentiality
Personnel issues
Make some minor alone decisions to begin with, to prove to staff that you can.
Are there techniques that would help a group make a decision?
Are there advantages to having a group make decisions?

Reflection
This class helped me to think more about my own core values and beliefs as they pertain to my future administrator role. I think that, because my values and beliefs have already been heavily rooted in my current teaching roles, that they will translate well to a principalship. Now obviously this might not be the case, but I believe that my current core values are enough to propel me into the role where I can refine and re-evaluate them. This class also brought forth the need for me to always stick to these core values, especially during the decision making process. The notes above are important to my future success in this arena.

Reflection Week 14

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 02:05:00 +0000

SAGE: Student Achievement Gap Elimination

The culture behind Nevada’s school improvement process embraces high expectations for every student and is built upon the foundation of the following beliefs:
1. The work of schools is student learning;
2. All children benefit from challenging and relevant curriculum;
3. Curriculum, instruction, and assessments must be closely aligned to State Standards;
4. Every teacher can be an expert when provided collaborative and sustained professional development focused on improved instruction;
5. School culture and the learning environment can promote continuous improvement.
6. Parental support and involvement are critical to improved student performance;
7. Effective use of data is vital to continuous improvement of teaching and learning.
Comprehensive improvement plans take several years to implement and demonstrate improvement in the targeted areas. A continuous improvement cycle provides the opportunity for ongoing identification of effective practices and/or actions that should be continued and ineffective practices and/or actions that should be revised or eliminated. There have been many successful school improvement efforts. The education research literature includes hundreds of examples of school improvement that have resulted in increased student learning, improved parent involvement, decreased dropout rates, and an increased percentage of students who enroll in college. The SAGE (Student Achievement Gap Elimination) school improvement process provides schools with a framework for problem solving to target the school improvement efforts best suited for them.

5-Step Plan for Dealing With Stress

Identify the stress risk factors
Decide who might be harmed and how
Evaluate the risks
Record your findings
Monitor and review

Reflection Week 13

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 00:49:00 +0000

End of the Year

Checklist passed out

The most intriguing items on this checklist include:

Student Portfolios
Classroom Inventory
Lunch charges paid

I included these as the most intriguing because I think they are really site-specific items to include on the end of the year checklist for teachers. What I am saying is that these are items that principals choose to implement at their site.

The June Checklist for Principals is much more insightful. Things on the list that peaked my interest included:

Schedule BTS Nights
Yearbook distribution
Review Testing scores
Meeting minutes

Reflection Week 12

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 02:14:00 +0000

Is Your School Fun to Work For?

This short quiz helped me to understand that it is quite important to work in an environment, especially in education, that is fun.
The quiz had some great, yet simple, questions that forced me to really think about the level of fun at my site.

My First Staff Meeting

This handout did not do justice to the presentation, but it is useful in its own right.
The handout had simple, yet effective, tips that included dressing appropriately, bring a stainstick (probably the most useful!), using humor, keeping it short, staying true to your personality.
These were some good tips, and I will most definitely have to revisit these after attaining my first assignment.

Reflection Week 11

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:17:00 +0000

Goals
The presentation on "goals" helped me to understand the biggest benefits of goal setting and the mistakes that can rob you of your goals. The most useful of these were:

Benefits
- Greater peace of mind
- Greater personal growth
- Contribution to others

Mistakes
- Not having a mentor or coach
- Not taking time to celebrate when reaching a goal
- Not working on yourself

Reflection Week 10

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 03:17:00 +0000

9 Characteristics of Effective Schools

Link Here
• Strong and professional principal
• Strong and professional teachers
• Clear positive philosophy
• Environment conducive to learning
• Effective student welfare system
• Strong organisational framework
• Broad, balanced curriculum
• Meaningful assessment and reporting on student progress
• Support for parent and community participation

Reflection Week 9

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 03:16:00 +0000

Listening Skills

Roadblocks
- Interrogating
- Ordering
- Ridiculing
- Probing
- Scolding
- Criticizing

Reasons to Improve
-To avoid saying the wrong thing, being tactless
- To generate a feeling of caring
- To check that you are both are on target with one another
- To help people start listening to you

Questions to Ask Yourself
- What impulses do I have?
- How genuine do I feel now?
- How attentive am I to him right now?
- How comfortable do I feel right now?

This handout will most definitely be coming with me to my future administrative office. I feel that listening is one of the most challenging administrator skill, and this is something that I will most definitely need to work on in the future.

Computer-Using Educators (CUE) 2010 Conference

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:00:00 +0000

This past weekend, I attended the CUE 2010 Conference in Palm Springs, CA. The trip afforded me some much needed time to do some extended professional learning in the comfort of an EdTech conference. I drove in early Friday morning and missed Thursday's events as well as the keynote (hey, you have to love that 5am Los Angeles traffic right!?). I immediately went to my first session and began learning about Moodle in the Web2.0 class. All of my sessions went extremely well and I gained a ton of new knowledge.

My main goal for attending this conference was to gain some insight into the latest Web 2.0 tools that others were integrating in their classes. Below is my summary of sessions attended as well as some additional notes/sites/resources that I pulled from the #CUE10 hashtag via Twitter (link opens in a TwapperKeeper.com link). Feel free to offer up feedback and any questions you might have. If you'd just like to visit my Delicious Bookmark feed for CUE10, click here.

Web 2.0 in the Classroom: A presentation that discussed how to go about integrating Web 2.0 in your classes. Presenter talked about collaboration, presentations, reading & writing, and provided some resources for future learning goals for teachers.
CUE Unplugged: This wiki was used for CUE's informal "Unplugged" sessions. I bookmarked this for future reading, and thought it was a good enough resource to pass along to other EdTech folks. Some great presentations from politics to online field trips to the perfect classroom.
Welcome to C3: Collect, Connect, Coach (C3). This is a source for administrators that are tired of checking teacher observation boxes; using this iPhone app allows for quicker and easier walkthroughs. Produce charts and other data without syncing.
Teach with the Touch - CUE: Ever seen the iPod Touch being used to teach in the classroom? Well, if you've got a Touch, navigate to this site (mobile version for quicker loading on mobile devices), and check out what you can do!
Extreme Makeover: by Steve Dembo: Presentation by Discovery Education's Steve Dembo. You can get a general understanding of his presentation from the Prezi - just think outside the box.
MapAList: What a nice app this is. Turn a Google Spreadsheet into a map using locations of users. Here is a Google Spreadsheet of Twitter Educators that I turned into a Map:


iPod Flash Cards: Flash cards on an iPod? Yes, that's right! Check out Mr. Coley's site - he has templates that free for students/teachers to use to create flash cards that drop onto the iPod for studying!
Dr. Arnie Abrams: Handouts from Dr. Abrams' sessions at CUE 2010.
Test Your Knowledge With Trivia Games: A website that allows students to show their knowledge by creating a game on any topic of their choice. What better way to get students involved, quizzing each other using technology?
Web 2.0 Tools for Educators: Wow. Web 2.0 tools broken down by type, with examples and descriptions. This might be the best list I've seen in a very long time. Definitely worth a look.
Web 2.0: Animoto video from a Web 2.0 session. Can't recall where it was used, but good source when introducing the topic to students.
digitalgoonies.com: Presentations from the Digital Goonies crew from CUE2010. Topics included Web 2.0 "hot" and "cool" applications, Google Earth, and Geocaching.
Florida Center for Instructional Technology: Another great resources for technology in the classroom. Links to clipart, lessons, maps, etc. Broken down by subject as well.
Lit2Go: Poems and stories in MP3 format. Can anybody say iPod friendly? Extend your classroom.
On-Line Technology Tutorials From Around the World Wide Web: From Internet for Classrooms - tons of tutorials for most applications out there. A valuable tool for teachers when learning a new applicaiton.
Wallpapers, animated gifs and cliparts: Does this need a description?
http://www.cytochromec.net/blog/: Great presentation from Colin Matheson on the integration of Moodle at school sites. He's also on Twitter as @cytochromec.

Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro: Online meeting application. Adobe product, probably works great, but not free.
Google Notes from CUE: A fellow attendee took some notes on his Google sessions. Feel free to browse his whole blog, he had numerous notes with a LOT of tips/tricks.
Google Workshop for Educators: The official "Google for Educators" session. I did not attend, but there is some excellent stuff at this site.