September eBook Top 5 Collection OCM BOCES Instructional Support would highlight these selections from our eBook Professional Library. View Professional eBook Library.

Cell Phones in the Classroom Provides practical ways teachers and administrators from schools around the world are using cell phones for classroom projects, homework assignments, and communication with parents. Read more

Freedom to Fail This text provides a raft of strategies for ensuring that students experience small, constructive failures as a means to greater achievement, and offers practical suggestions for ensuring that constructive failure doesn't detrimentally affect students' summative assessments. Read more

The 12 Touchstones of Good Teaching Drilling down into 12 daily touchstones of great teaching, this book makes it easier for educators to stay focused on the hallmarks of effective instruction. Read more

How to Make Decisions with Different Kinds of Student Assessment Data Identifies the critical elements and nuances of assessment data and how that information can best be used to inform improvement efforts in the school or district. Read more

Web 2.0, How-to for Educators Explores the very best online collaborative tools available today (including blogs, wikis, and social networking) and Web 2.0 applications (Skype, Google Earth, Wordle, and more) that make a difference in education. Read more

September 2, 2016

The Learning Network, a service provided by The New York Times, has a comprehensive election unit that you can use this fall. There are four smaller mini-units within the bigger structure and they can help you navigate what might seem like a tricky election landscape.

Image: Sam Azgor

Are shortened URLs getting in the way of you finding a good resource? Some district filters block shortened Internet addresses. This site can help you get around that impediment.

The principal-librarian relationship is a very important one. Here are some ideas for strengthening it.

Share this short set of design principles with teachers who are on the verge of some Project-Based Learning. While not specific enough to plan around, these ideas will frame it well.

Evidence shows that learning increases when students understand exactly what they're supposed to learn and what their work will look like when they learn it. This half day session on September 29th will focus on designing, implementing and assessing learning targets so that students have clear goals and a clear vision of what success looks like.

This video can remind adults about how we talk to our students and how they interpret it. Two ways are presented, quite effectively. We know this, but a reminder can’t hurt.

You can find a research-based strategy or approach for just about every situation, using this list.

The fall catalog of offerings from Curriculum, Instruction & Assessment is up. Click here to learn more about standards-based instruction, leadership, deeper learning, literacy, standards-areas, culture, assessment, and much more!

Instead of trying to catch plagiarism, design your projects and assignments to be more open-ended so that plagiarism just won’t help.

Leveled Literacy Intervention is offered at three levels: primary (grades K-2- starting September 20), intermediate (starting October 5) and middle/high school grades (starting December 17).  OCM BOCES also provides an ongoing group for educators who are already implementing to deepen their knowledge and refine their skills by collective learning and sharing.

Image: CC Barney Moss

Thousands of children’s books are available online.

Registration is now open for the regional science conference set for November 8th. Space is limited; included districts have a limited number of spaces. Don’t hesitate to claim yours before registration is open to a wider audience.

The social studies collaborative gets underway on September 28th. These facilitated sessions are for K-12 teachers and administrators who participated in the summer 2015 and 2016 social studies curriculum work to continue the process of curriculum mapping, unit design and inquiry writing.

Teaching content is teaching reading, Daniel Willingham explains in this video. He goes on to make the case that reading strategies will only get you so far; background knowledge is necessary for reading comprehension, too.