When I was in school we called them "webs", now they are mind maps. No matter what you call them, they can be a fun way to get ideas out of your head and into something visual that you can share and use as a planning reference. Mindmeister is a good app that is available on a variety of devices. https://www.mindmeister.com/

They do offer a paid tier, but the free product works well for most classroom activities. Students will need an account, but they can sign in with their Google Apps accounts and if you are using Chrome browser and signed in there is an extension that can be allowed access to your basic authentication info and will sign you in automatically.

Augmented reality works a bit like a QR or barcode in that you scan something, but then it gets really fun. While you can simply have the scan take you to a video or web link, you can also overlay a virtual transparency onto the real world. This post from Educational Technology and Mobile Learning features an AR app from Aurasma, but another company Daquri has some pretty fancy stuff as well. One of the cooler AR toys I've seen is the Elements 4D blocks http://elements4d.daqri.com/
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2015/10/5-ways-to-use-augmented-reality-app.html

This is a wonderful collection of recorded debates.

Our mission is to provide a new forum for intelligent discussion, grounded in facts and informed by reasoned analysis; to transcend the toxically emotional and the reflexively ideological; and to encourage recognition that the opposing side has intellectually respectable views.
http://intelligencesquaredus.org/

I've always had mixed feelings about testing. On one hand we need not only to know how our students are doing, but to be able to share that knowledge with others in a meaningful way. Numerical data can paint a clear picture, but it isn't always an accurate picture. Now even an administration that once actively promoted more testing under the guise of rigor and accountability, now recognizes that the current profusion of testing is counter productive.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/study-says-standardized-testing-is-overwhelming-nations-public-schools/2015/10/24/8a22092c-79ae-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html
Standardized testing has been around for generations and it isn't going away any time soon. Technology has made testing more productive in some ways, but it has also made it more pervasive. The craving for data along with a breauacracy that supports that desire will keep testing around for a long time, but we can minimize the damage and possibly even find some benefit in prudently using some of the data that we collect.

While the plethora of testing and the faux accountability has driven some teachers to quit and made it, in some circles, fashionable for those teachers to publicly enumerate their reasons for doing so, this letter has a slightly different tone. http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/11/a-not-quitting-letter.html

I particularly enjoyed the reference to edu-tourists. Those sometimes well-meaning meddlers who have little, if any, experience in out field and yet feel that they have something to teach educators about education. I would not walk onto a construction site and tell someone how to properly pour concrete, nor would I walk into an attorney's office and tell her how to properly draft a will or other legal document. Why then do construction workers, lawyers, and all manner of people seem to think they know how teaching should be properly carried out? Because they went to school? Because they have children? I have a house with a concrete walkway. I have a will and have worked with lawyers for a variety of reasons. I even have a fair handle on the law as it relates to education. Still I will stick to what I know.