tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-104376522024-02-19T23:37:38.728-07:00Rod’s EdTech ReviewThis blog is all about Educational Technologies and how to use them.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.comBlogger121125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-14960625095237299702014-02-07T12:41:00.002-07:002014-02-07T12:41:52.171-07:00Teaching With Blogs by Todd NickleTodd Nickle has put up a great resource that focuses on teaching with blogs and several tools that can help you do that.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://easyblogteaching.blogspot.ca/">http://easyblogteaching.blogspot.ca/</a> is the link. Check it out.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-90557897957844063722013-04-11T23:19:00.002-06:002013-04-11T23:20:53.918-06:00Beyond flipping classroomsHere is an interesting article by <a href="http://www.fastcoexist.com/users/cathy-davidson" target="_blank">Cathy Davidson</a> that challenges the notion of the flipped classroom being good enough to make a difference. The article is <a href="http://www.fastcoexist.com/1679807/why-flip-the-classroom-when-we-can-make-it-do-cartwheels" target="_blank">Why Flip The Classroom When We Can Make It Do Cartwheels?</a> and it does a great job of describing how they have gone beyond flipping classes at Duke to applying the principles under study to real world challenges. <br />
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<a name='more'></a><br /><br />
It is impressive what they are doing and warrants considering. How could you design your courses to have your students working on real world challenges that are authentic, interesting, challenging and engaging? That is the question.<br />
<br />
Cathy promises to provide more information about how to do this. I look forward to it.<br />
<br />
This reminds me of the Educative assignment describe by Dee Fink. These are assignments that require the students to apply what they have learned to problems/challenges that they would very likely encounter in the professional workplaces they are preparing for. A more future focused approach to assessment rather than focus on what the student has learned.<br />
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<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-41860103690289281662013-03-25T12:04:00.001-06:002013-03-25T12:08:04.636-06:00Prezi adds Voice Overs and Background MusicI have been using <a href="http://prezi.com/" target="_blank">Prezi </a>off and on for a few years. One of the features that <a href="http://prezi.com/" target="_blank">Prezi </a>has lacked until now is the ability to put a voice narration on your presentation. There are plenty of ways to do this with slideshows made with other tools and you could actually do it with Prezi but it was not easy because you had to stick the sound file into a SWF file and post it to your Prezi canvas like a flash object. Not any more.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>Two recent added features make this much easier to do. Now you can insert MP3 sound files into your Prezi as voice over narration or even as background music. Voice overs are attached to the steps on your path so in a way, this is using the traditional slide show metaphor. This works great though, you just need to have an MP3 file for each step in your presentation path. The MP3 files can be created with <a href="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/" target="_blank">Audacity </a>or any other audio recording application that can export to MP3 format. Most mobile devices have apps available that can do this, so you can even use your smart phone to record your voice overs. <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-l1Wss4hFr2g/UVCRjbCCOhI/AAAAAAAAC4k/1Hlsj-nONgM/s1600/Capture.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-l1Wss4hFr2g/UVCRjbCCOhI/AAAAAAAAC4k/1Hlsj-nONgM/s320/Capture.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
To insert your MP3 files into your prezi, go into edit mode, create your path steps, select the step you want to insert your voice over file and then pull down the Insert menu and select Add Voice-over to Path Step.... Then you just need to repeat this for each step in your path. <br />
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Adding background music is even easier because you can only have one MP3 file loaded as the background music. So if you wanted to have multiple songs in the background you would need to knit them together into one MP3 file before inserting it. Again, you could use <a href="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/" target="_blank">Audacity </a>to build this file. <br />
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One nice feature is that the background music will automatically scale its volume down when a voice-over file is playing.<br />
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Of course you MP3 files will eat up your storage space quota on Prezi so watch out for that.<br />
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This new feature can make Prezi much more useful as a online lecture presentation tool for teaching purposes and the price is still free for educators and students. Unfortunately, it is still Flash based but the Prezi app for iOS helps make it playable on iOS devices. I hope they come out with Prezi app for Android devices as the latest ones don't support Flash either.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-87062526634772527672013-03-22T13:26:00.002-06:002013-03-22T13:27:54.595-06:00EdTech Innovation conference in Calgary in May 2103<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://74.208.163.226/edinnovation.ca/wp-content/uploads/logo_edtech_300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://74.208.163.226/edinnovation.ca/wp-content/uploads/logo_edtech_300.jpg" /></a></div>
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The<a href="http://edinnovation.ca/" target="_blank"> EdTech Innovations conference</a> will take place in Calgary this year. Go to their website at <a href="http://edinnovation.ca/" target="_blank">http://edinnovation.ca/ </a>for more information and to sign up.<br />
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I signed up and look forward to attending. It runs May 1-3, 2013.<br />
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Speakers include:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>John Baker</li>
<li>Deborah Quazzo</li>
<li>Jose Ferreira</li>
<li>Dean Shareski</li>
<li>Heather Payne</li>
<li>Audrey Watters</li>
<li>Dan Pontefract</li>
</ul>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-42326435530617108342013-03-22T13:21:00.001-06:002013-03-22T13:28:00.305-06:00TCC Online Conference 2013<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.tcconlineconference.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/banner_sm-e1360787914346.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.tcconlineconference.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/banner_sm-e1360787914346.png" /></a></div>
I just registered for the <a href="http://www.tcconlineconference.org/" target="_blank">18th Annual TCC Online Conference for 2013</a>. Although this conference is based in Hawaii, it is online so no one has to travel there. :(<br />
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I have attended this conference several times before and it is a very good conference with the cost, which isn't much ($99 before April 2).<br />
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One of this year's keynote speakers is <a href="http://www.tcconlineconference.org/keynotes/" target="_blank">Dr. Terry Anderson</a>, who is a former mentor of mine. We worked together in Grouard Alberta, a long time ago.<br />
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The conference runs April 16-18, 2013<br />
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<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-69750505485296577902012-09-18T23:51:00.002-06:002012-09-18T23:51:41.286-06:00Adult Learning PrinciplesHere is an interesting little video that teaching basic Adult Learning Principles in less than 3 minutes.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/8lvkJhXnEZk?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
Enjoy.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-43434315485181742852012-08-29T08:47:00.001-06:002013-03-22T12:57:18.200-06:00Classroom Response System - Home - Top Hat MonocleYesterday, a few professors and I participated in an online demonstration of the Top Hat Monocle classroom response systems. I was impressed. Currently we are using the i>clicker systems here at MRU and we are quite happy with it, but the Top Hat "clickers" offer some very interesting advantages. If you are shopping around, you may want to consider them.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br /><br />
Advantages:<br />
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<ul>
<li>Completely Web based so there is no hardware to acquire, misplace, break or upgrade.</li>
<li>Supports WiFi, cellular data and SMS texting connections. </li>
<li>Runs on all connectible devices, so students use their own device.</li>
<li>Supports a wide variety of polling/quiz questions, beyond multiple choice. </li>
<li>Supports graphics, animations and visual responses.</li>
<li>The only fees are for the students and those costs are competitive.</li>
<li>Polls can be taken before and after class times. </li>
<li>Canadian innovation.</li>
</ul>
<div>
Disadvantages:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Relies on solid networking connections in the classroom.</li>
<li>Students would have to have a device.</li>
<li>Complex set up for the more complex question types.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<br />
Go to <a href="http://www.tophatmonocle.com/">Classroom Response System - Home - Top Hat Monocle</a> for more details.<br />
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Post a comment if you are using these and let us know how it is going.<br />
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<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-76987577870606264012012-08-24T18:35:00.002-06:002012-08-24T18:35:57.573-06:00Sharing Content on SlideShare.netI signed up for a SlideShare.net account yesterday so I can explore if we can use this web app with instructors to help them post their slideshows and documents for their students to access. Before checking further, I thought this was just like the other Slidedeck sharing sites, which are many, but I was pleasantly surprised that you can add an audio narration to the powerpoint slides, if you wish. You do this by uploading a MP3 file with your narration and then adjust your slides to synchronize on the time line. I haven't actually tried this yet but it is very promising.<br />
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You can also add other documents to your account and distribute them to others, while tracking the number of accesses. <br />
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This is a free service that has a Pro level of server that is a for-fee service. They claim to be the largest sharing site for presentations. <br />
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I did notice that they are using Flash technology, which is becoming old and obsolete, especially since Apple mobile devices can not open them.<br />
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Check it out at <a href="http://slideshare.net/">http://slideshare.net. </a><br />
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If you are using this, please share your comments about it.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-18423916429508074442012-08-24T18:27:00.001-06:002012-08-24T18:27:51.670-06:00Improvements to Lore.comLore.com, formerly coursekit.com has just made some improvements to their service:<br />
<br />
<ul style="background-color: white; color: #414141; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.63636302947998px; line-height: 21px; padding-left: 15px;">
<li style="margin-left: 15px;"><b>New course tools:</b> They recently redesigned Lore's course management tools—discussion, calendar, library, and gradebook—for the fall. They've continued to refine the product to help turn your class into a community.</li>
<li style="margin-left: 15px;"><b>Academic profile:</b> You and your students all have profiles showing your background, aspirations, and courses. You can follow them and they can follow you. We've added a few other things too. </li>
<li style="margin-left: 15px;"><b>Academic groups:</b> You and your students can now create academic groups, which have most of the same functionality as a course. You can create one with your department or colleagues at other schools.</li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="color: #414141; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">And here is a link to an article posted in the Economist about the story of Lore.com. Check it out at http://www.economist.com/node/21560917 </span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #414141; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #414141; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">I find it interesting that their business model to patterned after Facebook's, achieve critical mass the money will follow. Or will they just go until their $6Million runs out. </span></span></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-80576679901006230492012-08-09T11:23:00.002-06:002012-08-09T11:26:00.213-06:00MOOCs at Coursera.orgMOOCs (Massive Open Online Course) seem to be the buzz this summer and I just found a very interesting Ted Talk about the MOOCs that are available at <a href="https://www.coursera.org/">Coursera.org<b> </b></a> You can go to to the Ted Talk at <a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/daphne_koller_what_we_re_learning_from_online_education.html">http://www.ted.com/talks/daphne_koller_what_we_re_learning_from_online_education.html</a> Daphne Koller is the speaker.<br />
<br />
But then go over to <a href="https://www.coursera.org/">https://www.coursera.org/</a> and check out the free, university level online classes that you can take. I found three intriguing ones, two about designing online courses and an intro to Logic that I signed up for just because it starts next month and I want to see what these are all about, and how they manage to design them so that they work.<br />
<br />
The two education courses that look very appealing are <a href="https://www.coursera.org/course/edc">eLearning and Digital Cultures</a> and<br />
<a href="https://www.coursera.org/course/foe">Fundamentals of Online Education: Planning and Application</a> <br />
<br />
If you would like a crash course in MOOCs go to <a href="http://moocmooc.com/">moocmooc.com</a> and sign up for a MOOC about MOOC's that starts next week (Aug 12) or just read the article at <a href="http://www.hybridpedagogy.com/Journal/files/MOOC_MOOC.html">http://www.hybridpedagogy.com/Journal/files/MOOC_MOOC.html</a> that explains what MOOC are. I signed up for that on, too. So I may see you online.<br />
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If you know of any good MOOCs, please share.<br />
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<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-38672699621499048442012-08-09T10:44:00.001-06:002012-08-09T10:56:52.003-06:00Nexus 7Last week my Nexus 7 Tablet arrived. I ordered the 16 GB model for the Google Play site. I really like this device. I have worked with many mobile devices to compare this to including the Asus Transformer Prime and iPad but this one is the best of them all in my experience. And that is not taking into account that it cost less than half of the other two tablets mentioned. And the 8GB model is the same price as the 8GB iPod Touch.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br /><br />
<a href="http://www.google.com/nexus/#/7">http://www.google.com/nexus/#/7</a> is the link to learn more about this device but it just became available last month and it is selling out fast. I was in Futureshop yesterday and although they had a demo model on the floor, the website shows that none of the stores in Calgary have any in stock.<br />
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What do I like about it other than it is only 7 inches so it fits in my pocket (jacket pocket), it only cost $250, it is fast (Tegra 3 quad core processor), the screen is excellent (1280x800 pixels), it runs Android Jelly Bean and all of the Google Apps that I use and it has a battery that gives me all day running time.<br />
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This device is going to make a different both in the mobile device market and in education, as more students and faculty start to acquire these. At less than half the price of an iPad, and easier to carry around, I think University students will pick these up where they didn't choose the iPad, which is too large and too expensive. I have heard many students say that they have already invested in a laptop and smartphone and couldn't justify an iPad, which is about the price of a laptop. <br />
<br />
Will they pick up a Nexus 7 for $200? Good question. Would you? I did, I suggest you should. This is the killer Android device and it is loaded with killer apps and media.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-66825904287946913302012-08-09T09:36:00.001-06:002012-08-09T10:51:19.119-06:00LORE.comLast term I explored using a brand new EdTech tool call Coursekit.com that was a free online alternative to Blackboard. I was teaching two sections of my Creativity in the Workplace class and I put both sections on it, after asking the students if they were game to test it out. It went well.<br />
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It was brand new and still a little rough around the edges but the feedback from the students was that they liked it better than Blackboard, which they are all familiar with because it is heavily used at MRU. Coursekit is interesting because it is free to use, well supported and developed by university students. It was the last characteristic to attracted my attention the most. I was intrigued with how university students would design a better LMS. <br />
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This summer Coursekit was renamed to <a href="http://lore.com/">LORE.com</a> and received a significant facelift. It is very student and community centred. Not unlike Facebook. I found it the most useful to get the students to share with each other, which is not easy to do in Blackboard.<br />
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You need to check it out if you are looking for an alternative to your institutionally provided LMS. What is great about LORE.com is that it is designed to be adopted at the instructor level so you don't have to try to talk your institution into adopting it. And your students can use their Facebook logins to log in to LORE.com so they don't have to manage another login.<br />
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I don't think I will be using it this year because now that we have Google Apps for Education, I am going to be designing our course sites using Google Sites and Groups. These are more mobile device friendly, too.<br />
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If you have used LORE.com, post a comment about it.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-27220744446076435682012-08-09T09:25:00.002-06:002012-08-09T09:25:26.754-06:00Reviving this BlogA while ago, I thought it would be a good idea to move my blogging activities over to a different blog system. I used the WordPress site at MRU for a while and then thought I would use Posterous after an inspiring conference workshop on how great it is. But instead, I fell into the world of microblogging on Twitter and how much easier it is to post a short blog post than it is a longer in-depth one like this one. Long story short, I have been away from this blog for a long time, as you can see in the chronology of posts.<br />
<br />
But, I am back. I have no idea if this blog will pick up any readers but then that what blogging is about. I am also back to Blogger, because Mount Royal University, the institution where I work, is just now adopting Google Apps for Education for all of its students this Fall, and Blogger is one of the apps that is now available to our community of students and faculty. And Blogger has evolved since I was last on it so I will be blogging here again. I have come back.<br />
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From the explorations that I made on the other blogging tools, I still find Blogger to be the easiest blogging tool to use. That said, I haven't had a chance to try some of the newer ones but I do hope to try them and post reviews on them here.<br />
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Feel free to post comments on what blogging tool you find useful and why.<br />
<br />
Rod Corbett<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-29226510970834062252011-01-29T12:59:00.000-07:002011-01-29T12:59:02.711-07:00moving to rodcorbett.posterous.com<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #424037; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 21px;"></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 15px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I have just moved my blog over to Posterous.com. I was able to move the archive of posts from before to this site. I have been posting to twitter for a few months now and will start blogging here again. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 15px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I choose this tool because it makes it much easier to post to. I can use the Android apps and email to post to it allowing me to post more often. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 15px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Rod</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-4564733727673552112010-12-06T19:28:00.000-07:002010-12-06T19:28:36.432-07:00Blogging on TwitterThe reason I have not been posting anything new to this blog for some time is because I have started to post my news on Twitter. I have found that it is much easier to share the things I shared here on Twitter.<br />
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If you are interested in seeing what I have been posting lately go to <a href="http://twitter.com/rbcorbett">http://twitter.com/rbcorbett</a>.<br />
<br />
Rod<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-53391532399433933492010-10-12T09:48:00.001-06:002010-10-12T09:48:58.564-06:00Using games in teaching ChemistryI am making a presentation today on how to use games to teaching chemistry. Go to <a href="http://goo.gl/epcK">http://goo.gl/epcK</a> to access the hand out of links and resources.<br />
<div><br />
</div><div>Rod Corbett</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-79356737868899597932010-09-06T10:28:00.003-06:002010-09-06T11:59:48.828-06:00Easy Annotator for your PresentationIf you don't use PowerPoint, or even if you do, to make presentation, check out this little freeware gem. It is called Pointofix and it allows you to capture any screen during your presentation, annotate it, print or save it for archiving or sharing with your audience.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
<br />
It is a German product so the web site is in German but enough of it is in English that you should be able to find the Download and install the English translation of the menus. You can always use Google Translate at <a href="http://translate.google.com/">http://translate.google.com/</a> to translate the website into English. It is worth the trouble.<br />
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The way it works is that you run it and leave it in the upper right hand corner until you need to annotate the screen. Then you click the Start button and it will freeze your screen and allow you to annotate, magnify and save it to a png or jpg file for sharing. You can also print or copy the screen to the clipboard ready for pasting into another app. When you are done, click on the Done button and it goes back to sleep and gives you back control of the screen.<br />
<br />
I really like it because:<br />
<br />
<ul><li>You don't have to install it. It is small and even runs off of a USB Drive. </li>
<li>It is easy to use and free, so you can make copies on all of the computers you use. </li>
<li>It will even allow you to capture screens of video and annotate on them. </li>
<li>It is designed to be useful during a presentation when you are in front of an audience with little fumbling.</li>
<li>You can also use it in your office to prepare screen shots for other purposes. </li>
<li>Unfortunately, it doesn't run on Macs. </li>
</ul><div>Teaching applications</div><div><ul><li>Use this for capturing and annotating any screen during your class room presentations and share with your students by posting the png files on your course website . </li>
<li>Use it for preparing illustrative images for inclusion into course materials. </li>
<li>Capture still screens from videos and add captions to them. </li>
</ul></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-38992884087348646852010-07-10T12:19:00.000-06:002010-07-10T12:19:28.655-06:00New Features to MentionI just received three significant new features on some of the tools I used that you may be interested in.<br />
<br />
Gmail: You can now add multiple signatures with Rich Formatting and images for each of your email addresses. I have been waiting for this as I use Gmail for at least three email addresses regularly including my work email address so now I can set up a signature line that is specific with my work contact information.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>iPod Touch OS4: Unfortunately, I bought my iPod Touch too early last year and missed getting the 3G model. Consequently, when I upgraded to OS4, I was not able to get the multi-tasking feature but the new Folders feature for apps was well worth the trouble. Now I can stop deleting apps in order to explore new apps. Yes, I have filled up my quota of 11 Apps pages. Now I can go beyond that limit, until I hit the next.<br />
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Google Forms: This the forms or survey tool in Google Docs. They just added the feature that allows you to set a Goto Page for each option in the multiple choice question type. The power of this is huge. This makes the tool a lot like Quandary where you can design scenario based learning activities or branching story lines. I have used Quandary for this a few years ago to make role-play activities that the students can work through to challenge their problem solving and critical thinking skills. Although Quandary provides a bit more tools for this, you can't monitor the choices the students make as they walk through it. In Google Forms you can. Very interesting.<br />
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Rod<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-34692848990220821052010-06-19T14:48:00.003-06:002010-07-08T06:56:04.039-06:00Creating Books from WikipediaMost of us all know a bit about Wikipedia but did you know that you can create your own books from Wikipedia pages? And since you can add to existing pages or add pages yourself, this is an interesting and new way to create and publish books.<br />
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How do you do this? Go to Wikipedia.org and get to any article or the Main Page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page. Then look for the option on the left tools menu that says Create a Book. You may have to click on and open the Print/export submenu. You have three options here, Create a book, Download as PDF and Printable Version. The latter two options are also useful and self-explanatory but it is the first that is really interesting.<br />
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After clicking on Create a book option, you will see the Book Creator page with directions to follow. Essentially you just need to click on the Green button that says "Start Book creator" Then you go and look for articles that you want to have in your book. When you find one you click on "Add this page to your book" button that you will now see at the top. Add as many pages as you like. There is no limit that I have found.<br />
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When you have added all of the pages you want for your book, you can click on the Show Book button and look at the pages you selected. Oh, if you need help finding pages, click on the Suggest Pages button and Wikipedia to suggest some pages based on the pages you have already selected.<br />
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Once you have clicked on Show Book, you should now see the Manage your book screen. This is where you can do the following things with your book:<br />
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<ul><li>Give your book a title and subtitle</li>
<li>Remove a page</li>
<li>Change order of the pages</li>
<li>Order hardcopies of your book to be printed and sent to you. This costs but you can see how much before you commit. </li>
<li>Best of all, you can download you book into a PDF file that you can then distribute to your students or whoever you want to receive your book. </li>
<li>You can even choice to have it downloaded in Open Office Writer format that you can then edit afterwards. </li>
</ul><div>I also learned that if you sign up for a user account on wikipedia and make 10 contributions, you get extra privileges with your books. Namely, you can save your books on the site and have more than one book in development. And naturally you can then share access to your books so you can share them while they are still in development. I haven't tried that yet but I believe you can contribute 10 photos to the Media Commons and get the credit for that. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Applications for teaching: </div><div><ul><li>You can create your own book, reading pack or textbook and provide it to your students in PDF for free. </li>
<li>Your students could create a book as part of a project or assignment. </li>
</ul><div>If you have tried this, please post a comment about how it went. </div></div><div><br />
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Rod<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-84607867540490877762010-06-14T16:42:00.002-06:002010-06-14T21:35:23.479-06:00Another Free eBook on Teaching with Web 2.0 AppsHere is another free ebook on how to use free Web 2.0 or Cloud Computing apps to enhance your teaching. This ebook is by <a href="http://lifefeast.blogspot.com/2010/06/20-webtools-applied-to-teaching.html" style="color: #2244bb;" target="_blank">Ana Maria Menezes</a><br />
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Very interesting. Some of the tools were covered is the two books by Michael Zimmer but there are always new ideas to be gleaned.<br />
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<iframe height="644px" src="http://issuu.com/anamariacult/docs/webtoolsappliedtoteaching?mode=a_p&wmode=0" width="520px"></iframe><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-44499506996921866202010-06-10T08:37:00.001-06:002010-06-10T08:39:40.730-06:00Two free eBooks about teaching with new Web 2.0 toolsI ran across two very good ebooks about teaching with some of the newest Web 2.0 tools. These tools are actually Cloud Computing based tools that are free to use, as are the ebooks. Michael Zimmer is the author of both books. The ebooks are short and only take a few minutes to flip through. They are hosted on a site called issue.com, another cloud app that allows you to publish ebooks like these.<br />
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I can even embed the books in this post. This first is titled: "Tools for the 21st Century Teacher" <br />
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<iframe height="544px" src="http://issuu.com/MZimmer557/docs/tools_for_the_21st_century_teacher?mode=a_p&wmode=0" width="420px"></iframe><br />
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And the second is titled: "A New Way to Lecture" and focuses on new Cloud Apps that you can use to lecture, without using PowerPoint.<br />
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<iframe height="544px" src="http://issuu.com/MZimmer557/docs/a_new_way_to_lecture?mode=a_p&wmode=0" width="420px"></iframe><br />
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But, these are in Flash format so you won't be able to read them on your iPhone, or iPad. :-(<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-50373163385994058272010-06-05T08:36:00.001-06:002010-06-07T22:37:28.227-06:00Open Ed DiscIf you haven't heard of the Open Education Disc or Open Disc read on. There is an overwhelming volume of open and free software applications available for anyone to explore out there but what educator has the time or experience to harvest that effectively. The people behind the Open Disc have done a great service to all educators. Basically, they have surveyed what open software applications are out there and selected the best that could be used to meet the needs of students and teachers and assembled them on one Disc, which is now a DVD. And the list of free applications is great. You can see the list at <a href="http://www.theopendisc.com/education/">http://www.theopendisc.com/education/</a><br />
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The disc also comes with a menu that helps to guide you through the 50 odd free applications that you can install on your computer today, legally.<br />
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A great scenario that always comes to my mind is that brand new college student, armed with a brand new laptop that has practically no software installed, but the student has no budget for being computer applications like MS Office even. This Open Ed Disc is exactly what they need. It will give them all of the software they will ever need to complete their studies and these are tools they can use on the job after they graduate. It is free, legal and they can pass the disc to a friend.<br />
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To get the disc, you need to download the ISO file to your computer. This is a large file and will take awhile. This file is an image of the 1.3 GB DVD, compressed all in one file. Then you need a DVD burner and software that knows how to burn an ISO file to a blank DVD. This is not as hard as it may sound. If you have a DVD Burner but the software doesn't seem to know what an ISO file is go to <a href="http://infrarecorder.org/?page_id=5">http://infrarecorder.org/?page_id=5</a> and download the InfraRecorder program and use that.<br />
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The only downside to this is that this disc is for Windows and not Macintosh computers. I found Macintosh versions of most of the same programs on the disc at http://www.opensourcemac.org/.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-693327126716727372010-06-05T08:18:00.000-06:002010-06-05T08:18:24.892-06:00iPad ReviewThe Apple iPad has been available in Canada for a week now but I have had one to try out for about three weeks. I have had a lot of people ask me if I would buy one and No, I would not. For the following reasons:<br />
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<ul><li>Too expensive - for the low end price of $550, you could get a real pretty computer real computer. Or get an iPod Touch for less than half of that. <a name='more'></a></li>
<li>I have an iPod Touch which I use all the time. The iPad is too much like it and doesn't fit into my pocket. </li>
<li>The iPad lacks several key functions that I need in a computer:</li>
<ul><li>Flash player - it sounds like it never will support this. </li>
<li>Multitasking - I never realized how I have taken this for granted until I don't have it. </li>
<li>Web cam - even $300 netbooks have this. </li>
<li>Can't edit Google Docs docs probably. I use Google Docs a lot. </li>
<li>VERY Limited file sharing between applications. I can live with this on my iPod but this is one thing that keeps the iPad from being a computer. </li>
</ul><li>Better alternatives on their way. Thanks to Google Android OS, there are several Android Tablets that are about to enter the market and some of them look very good. Dell even has one coming out this summer. And they have all of the missing functions that I need for less money. </li>
</ul><div>Who would like to own an iPad? I do think there is market for these, it just doesn't include me. If you are looking for a personal e-book reader combination media player and you need the larger screen than you will love this. It plays movies, audio, music wonderfully. You can read books, newspapers, magazines it very well, but not websites with Flash objects so makes it poor for students. </div><div><br />
</div><div>The applications for iPad are similar as those for iPhone which can give you some very productive tools but you are still limited by the limited file sharing between applications. One way that App producing get around this is a Wifi network connection to your primary computer but if you work in an environment where this is blocks, this doesn't help. </div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-89560128558183056802010-05-29T08:19:00.001-06:002010-05-29T08:19:38.000-06:00EtherPad Clones<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"></span><br />
Etherpad is a very interesting tool for collaboratively writing on the web without anyone having to register and set up accounts. It has some wonderful features to make this easy but Google has decided to take it off-line. But Google has allowed its code to be shared and so there are several clone sites appearing on the web. <a href="http://etherpad.org/etherpadsites.html" mce_href="http://etherpad.org/etherpadsites.html">Click here to see a list of clone sites.</a><br />
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<a href="http://etherpad.org/etherpadsites.html" mce_href="http://etherpad.org/etherpadsites.html"></a>One of the best clone sites that I have found and will experiment with in my teaching is TitanPad.com. This one seems to be hosted in Europe and they told me that they don't remove inactive documents.<br />
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What I like about this resource:<br />
<ul><li>It is free to use.</li>
<li>There is no registration required.</li>
<li>It is simple to learn and use.</li>
<li>You can export to Word and other document formats.</li>
<li>It keeps track of all of the collaboration events and you can play them back.</li>
</ul>What I plan to use this for in my teaching:<br />
<ul><li>Brainstorming with my class or small groups.</li>
<li>Collaborating on writing notes.</li>
<li>Collaborative story writing.</li>
<li>Create worksheets ahead of time and work through them in class</li>
</ul><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10437652.post-81865212201994323272010-05-29T08:11:00.001-06:002010-05-29T08:12:15.033-06:00Mashpedia - The Real-Time EncyclopediaHere is another gem that <a href="http://leoncygman.blogspot.com/">Leon</a> shared with me. Mashpedia claims to be a real-time encyclopedia. What it really is is a meta search tool. <br />
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On the front page you can see what are current news items, trending topics, people and brands. And you can see links to the current movies out.<br />
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When you enter a search string in the search field what Mashpedia does is searches the following sites with that search string, which is also what is does if you click on any of the links on the front page:<br />
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<ul><li>Wikipedia - for a definition or description about the topic.</li>
<li>Twitter - so you can see what tweats are being posted about the topic today. </li>
<li>Youtube - for videos posted about the topic</li>
<li>Digg - to see who is bookmarking sites about the topic</li>
<li>Flickr - for photos posted about the topic</li>
<li>Google News - for news items about the topic</li>
<li>Google Images - for more images</li>
<li>Google Blog Search - for what is being said by bloggers about the topic</li>
<li>Google Books - for any books about the topic</li>
</ul><div>You can also see comments and post comments. And you can put a link to this page on your website. </div><div><br />
</div><div>The educational application of this is that you can create some of the search pages for you students and place links to them on your online course site. When the student browse them, the pages will be automatically updated with current information. </div><div><br />
</div><div>The down side is that you can't turn off any of the sources so if you are not a fan of any one of the above sites, then you may not want to use this with your students. But you could still use it. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Rod</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Rod's Ed Tech Review Posts</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11147320063115980990noreply@blogger.com0