May 2006

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Web 2.0 Applications for Educators

May 31, 2006 in Education, Technology | No comments

Tired of the same old software on your computer? Think beyond powerpoint, and check out these great Web 2.0 applications. NOTE: included description of most sites is from the site itself.

Audio, Photo and Video Resources

  • Yotophoto is the first internet search engine for finding free-to-use photographs and images. Now indexing over a quarter million Creative Commons, Public Domain, GNU FDL, and various other ‘copyleft’ images.
  • everystockphoto.com is a search engine for creative commons photos, located in Vancouver, BC. We aim to be a community for designers, developers, photographers and other media publishers who want better, easier access to license-specific media on the web.
  • Edit pictures online with Pixoh
  • Google SketchUp is a simple but powerful tool for quickly and easily creating, viewing and modifying your 3D ideas.
  • YackPack allows you to create online voice messages (“yacks”) and share those messages with private or public groups (“packs”)
  • Video Resources, Reviewed by DEN member dalebasler

Office Productivity

  • Free Web Office Suite at gOffice.com
  • With Writely (now owned by Google) you can share documents instantly & collaborate real-time. Pick exactly who can access your documents, Edit your documents from anywhere, Store your documents securely online.
  • Create your own fonts!
  • Free Online storage, Free File Back up, Free File sharing with Orbitfiles.com

Collaborations

  • Over 150,000 people use Backpack to… Organize to do lists, notes, images, and photos, Plan a personal or business trip, Keep track of what your competitors are doing, Plan a home improvement project, Collaborate on a new business idea, Keep track of houses you’re considering buying, Gather information for a research project, Keep a list of gift ideas for friends, Build a For Sale page, Organize and plan a wedding or event, etc.
  • Basecamp is a unique project collaboration tool. Projects don’t fail from a lack of charts, graphs, or reports – they fail from a lack of communication and collaboration. Basecamp makes it simple to communicate and collaborate on projects. It’s elegant, easy, and web-based. You don’t need to download, install, or configure anything (no IT department required!). All you need is a web browser and an internet connection.
  • Elgg is a new breed of learning environment based around choice, flexibility and openness: a Personal Learning Landscape that firmly places individuals at the centre of their learning. With the freedom to incorporate all of your favorite tools within one environment, Elgg allows you to showcase your best work with as many or as few people as you choose.

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Classrooms of the Future?

May 29, 2006 in Education, Technology | No comments

A college professor in the UK has moved his classroom into the virtual world, with podcasts as lectures and blogs/text messaging for assignments. [Link]

 

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Warlick Argues for Technology

May 23, 2006 in Technology | No comments

In Two Cents Worth (David Warlick’s thoughts about education, teaching,  learning, and the 21st century), Warlick recently wrote a post entitled “Curriculum is Dead”. With a provacative title like that, I had to investigate.

In the post, Warlick discusses the difference between classrooms of yesterday and those of today and tomorrow, while explaining the need for technology in our classrooms. His article is summarized nicely with a statement regarding the need for technology in our classrooms – “…it is the lens through which we experience much of our world.”

See Link

Microsoft Educator Resources

May 23, 2006 in Education, Technology | No comments

Not that I want to promote Microsoft anymore than it already does, I came across their Educator Resources Page. Inside, they have some lesson plans, how-to articles, productivity downloads, etc.

The site is not that easy to navigate through, but there are some goodies within. For instance, I found this page that discusses electronic gradebooks. It that articles, tutorials, tips, and even some samples.

There are more types of these work essentials for educators (below). Some look helpful, some look canned, and some just look a little common sense.

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Good Night and Good Luck

May 14, 2006 in Education, Technology | No comments

While watching Good Night and Good Luck last night (an excellent film surrounding the Joseph McCarthy era of communist accusations), I was inspired by a line from Edward R. Murrow’s keynote address at the RTNDA Convention in Chicago, October, 1958:

This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful. (the full address can be found here).

Of course, Murrow is talking about television. Besides the obvious political undertones, I was reminded of how that television and media have great power to teach in our modern classrooms, but unless this technology is properly used – it is simply wires and lights in a box. This is true of all new technology in the classroom; it has to be effectively used in order to be a powerful tool for learning.

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Sync(Toy) Your Files

May 13, 2006 in Technology | No comments

One of my favorite utilities for Windows XP is a little program called SyncToy. This is found as one of Microsoft’s XP PowerToys, found as free downloads for licensed XP users. SyncToy is but one of these programs designed to add functionality to XP.
This how Microsoft describes PowerToys:

PowerToys add fun and functionality to the Windows experience. What are they? PowerToys are additional programs that developers work on after a product has been released.

SyncToy allows you to sync files from a variety of sources – laptops, external hard drives, USB flash drives, digital cameras, portable media players, PDAs, etc.

I like to use SyncToy to sync various flash drives with my home computer. For instance, I keep a USB flash drive for all of my DEN documents. Whether I am working on them at home, at school or anywhere else, I can always sync the files with SyncToy so that nothing is lost. This is what the process looks like:

:synctoy

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How does your state rank?

May 5, 2006 in Technology | No comments

From edweek.org:

 


The ninth annual edition of “Technology Counts 2006: The Information Edge: Using Data to Accelerate Achievement,” grades the states on several school technology indicators, finding, for instance, that West Virginia leads the nation with an overall grade of “A,” while Nevada trails with a “D-.”

A survey of state education officials conducted for the report finds that despite the federal government’s push to make data central to instructional decisions, states are still far from putting their electronic information into a form that local educators can easily use.

Visit http://www.edweek.org/ew/toc/2006/05/04/index.html to download a pdf report specifically for your state.

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