Posted in gadgets of convenience, parents and technology

No More Overheated Laptop — Best New Gadget Support!

Posted on by Marti Weston

If you are at all like me, you use a laptop much of the time while it’s sitting — well —  in your lap. Problem is, they get hotter and hotter the longer we work, and eventually, it’s downright uncomfortable, not to mention bad for the computer. If I put the laptop on a pillow, my usual solution, it still gets hot and so does the pillow, which can’t be good.

For Christmas, in a package that claimed to be from Steve Jobs <grin>, I received a Targus Lap Chill Mat Notebook fan, and it has solved the heat problem. When I work, the flat plastic  fan sits on my lap underneath my laptop and connects, via USB, to my Macbook. As soon as it’s connected, the fan comes on, circulating air underneath the laptop and no heat accumulates. It’s a miracle!
Continue reading “No More Overheated Laptop — Best New Gadget Support!” →

Posted in assessing learning, digital citizenship, digital parenting, parents and technology, teaching digital kids

Assessing Students but Not With Grades

Posted on by Marti Weston

I’ve just finished up a digital citizenship unit with my students, covering privacy, digital footprints, digital communication and the lack of human cues, and a bit about how easy it is for a person to cyber-bully using sarcasm, criticism, and flippant comments. It’s a lot to cover in a month, but we manage quite well.

After we complete the classroom activities, and most of these are collaborative smaller projects, the children complete a final poster project. I expect the poster to communicate as much information as possible on one of the topics. The posters are not digital creations because we hang them in a school hallway — a digital citizenship exhibition — for a month in the winter.

I am always amazed at the way these posters demonstrate how much my students have learned. Some children focus on the artwork, while others are more text oriented. Still others use a computer, clip art, or a presentation tool, combining components to make their posters.  Continue reading “Assessing Students but Not With Grades” →

Posted in 21st century job hunting, parents and technology

IBM Benefits from Young Adult Social Networking Skills

Posted on by Marti Weston
Read the entire article.

Perhaps the parents of digital kids don’t have to worry quite so much about the focus on

According to a San Jose Mercury News report, IBM is exploring ways to use social media to improve its business practices.  The company, working with San Jose State University graduate and undergraduate students, has identified potential ideas, related to social media, to connect and communicate.

The article, IBM Sees Students’ Facebook as More than a Waste of Time (yes, the headline could be grammatically tightened up),describes how the students, with so much experience using social media, are presenting all sorts of  ideas that can possibly transform the connections that employees make with one another and with customers.

Another example that demonstrates how multi-generational groups that include (and different perspectives) can come together to make good discoveries.

BONUS: This type of activity prepares students to understand and work in the adult world.

Posted in digital parenting, hearing loss, iPhones and iPads, parents and technology, technology and health problems

App Demonstrates How Hearing Can Be Impaired

Posted on by Marti Weston
Check out your hearing!

It’s a fact of life. We all spend lots of time attached to headphones.

Most of us know enough to take care with the volume, but are we really doing it? Moreover, what can we do to ensure that our kids are regulating the volume as they listen to music?  It doesn’t help that many pre-teens and adolescents don’t always listen to their parents.

Now a new app, Auto-Old My Music, may be able to communicate the dangers of extremely loud music better than we can. This app, available for iPhone and iPod, plays the music differently — it’s muffled and not particularly clear — just the way it might sound to a person who is hearing impaired.

Now that might successfully drive the point home.

The Auto-Old My Music app, designed by the Baptist Memorial Health Care in Memphis, Tennessee, is a response to research, Change in Prevalence of Hearing Loss in U.S. Adolescents, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Read the full article in PDF format.

Articles to Check Out

You can also read my 2010 post, Teens and Hearing Loss.

Posted in cell phones, digital parenting, parents and technology

Want Sleep in Your Home? Get Charging Stations

Posted on by Marti Weston
Charging stations at Pottery Barn.

To make a positive difference in the quality of  your household’s sleep, consider purchasing one or two charging stations where family members’ phones and other devices can be charged at your house. Install charging stations away from the bedrooms of family members. A Google search for charging stations gets you started, or you can begin with this Mashable post, 10 Chic Charging Stations.

I recently discovered, in a small way, just how a cell phone screen can affect sleep. I received a new Solitaire game app, and I started playing two or three games on my iPhone just before bed several nights in a row. A few games grew into  20 or 30 minutes of play, but when I put down the phone, it took me a long time to settle down. The fourth night I did not play, and sleep came easily. Lesson learned.

I’ve added four pictures of charging stations that my family has checked out — some practical and others with a bit of whimsy. Many others are available. Continue reading “Want Sleep in Your Home? Get Charging Stations” →

Posted in parents and technology

Happy New Year from MediaTechParenting!

Posted on by Marti Weston

Welcome 2012!

I’ve taken ten days off from blogging to enjoy friends, my senior parents, my daughter, her husband, and their little dog. To the left of this post, and down a bit, you can see a cute picture of him sitting at their Mac as if he is preparing to search the web or maybe write a blog post.

The holidays included lots of time for relaxing, some early winter yard cleaning, and plenty of New Year’s organizing around the house.

Stay tuned. In 2012 I’ll have plenty to share on MediaTechParenting — books I am reading, research I’ve discovered, cool gadgets I’ve received, and articles on technology.

We can be sure that 2012 will bring increased innovation, more technological gadgets, expanded social media, and lots of opportunities to experiment and collaborate with digital resources. Our children and students, we can be certain, will competently and confidently embrace just about everything that comes down the pike.

We adults will need to embrace change, learn as much as we can, model appropriate behavior for the children in our families and classes, and remind ourselves of the importance of  lifelong collaborative learning.

Posted in answers to media questions, digital parenting, media literacy, parents and technology, social media, social networking

You Can be Media Savvy with Your Kids in 2012!

Posted on by Marti Weston

Common Sense Media recently posted Six Ways to be a Media Savvy Parent in 2012. The December 2011 report suggests all sorts of ideas that can help parents (and other adults) develop stronger media (and media literacy) skills.

Suggestions include downloading a game to play with the kids, trying out a social media site, investigating YouTube, and much more. Some these can ideas will provide great fun for kids and parents over the holiday vacation.

Visit Common Sense Media and try out some of these features.

Thanks to my colleague and friend Renee Hawkins for spotting a good media post (one that I had missed). Renee blogs with another friend and colleague, Susan Davis, at The Flying Trapeze.