VARconnection

Teaching Literacy Resources

Teaching literacy to students means giving them the ability to communicate clearly and participate with those around them. Starting literacy learning early readies students for department testing (STAAR), while also experiencing different genres and styles helps children understand language and how to share their thoughts and ideas. Below are some ways to help students succeed … Continue reading →

Harnessing Social Media in Education

With 4.72 billion users globally, social media has changed the way people communicate. From social lives to education, social media has become a platform for students to collaborate and harness in a variety of different ways to enhance their learning experience. Of course, a tool like social media needs to be used responsibly to maintain a … Continue reading →

How to Choose Technology for the Classroom

K-12 educational institutions are looking for new digital tools and devices to help improve student success and engagement while fostering collaborative learning environments. Finding the right technology to capture students’ attention can be challenging. Here are some tips on how to advance your technology integration. Identify goals. Before browsing all the tools and resources available, … Continue reading →

4 Security Tips for Cyber Security Month

Many schools leverage several different hardware and devices, which leads to different types of operating systems that must be supported. In honor of August being Cyber Security Awareness Month, here are 4 security tips to keep schools protected. 1.Passcode enforcement This is often the first level of defense. There are many different types of password … Continue reading →

4 Tips on Implementing Your Digital Transformation Strategy

The need for distance learning during Covid-19 lead administrators and IT teams to make critical edtech decisions, often without structure needed to support a digital transformation strategy. Three years later, it is now vital that schools have plans to make technology implementation successful. Here are some 4 tips on implementing a strong digital transformation strategy. … Continue reading →

What’s Happening Next with the Digital Divide?

Awareness of the digital divide has reduced the gap between technology and classrooms, however, at the end of 2022, 24 million people still lacked access to high-speed internet. Federal, state, and local governments begun allotting over $100 billion to bring high-speed internet access to every American household through government funding such as the Bipartisan Infrastructure … Continue reading →

Special Ed Figure Roundup

Anne Sullivan Anne Sullivan’s struggle with her sight fueled her ambitions to overcome her disability and became determined to excel at Perkins Institution. Later she became a teacher to Helen Keller where she reimagined special education to fit to Keller’s style of learning. Read more about Anne’s success here: https://www.perkins.org/anne-sullivan/ Louis Braille In 1824, Louis … Continue reading →

Back-to-School: Are you ready for the first day of school?

With school just around the corner there’s still a lot of work for teachers to do both inside and outside of the classroom. Here are 3 ways to help keep teachers on track before students arrive. Make note in this first week of what worked and what didn’t, what you would improve or change. From … Continue reading →

3 Ways to Improve Equity for Students with Disabilities

With 15% of the world’s population having some sort of disability, it requires recognition and adaptability to improve equity among students. Disabilities affect educational institutes, employment, and parenting everywhere, and these barriers need to be pushed past to enable students to reach their full potential as learners. Here are 3 ways to improve equity for … Continue reading →

How disruptive is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is considered a major breakthrough in the field of natural language processing, troubling educators since it broke the internet reaching 1 million users in the first 5 days. The ethics and usability behind ChatGPT have provoked some school districts to block access on school networks and computers. ChatGPT has the ability to generate human-like … Continue reading →