In years past, a person had to have a good amount of resources to write and publish something that was available for everyone to read. Now, all one needs is a blog. Blogs are pages that allow the authors to write on any subject they want to tackle. These are great for education since it allows educators to network and read ideas and tricks from other educators that will allow them to gain fresh ideas to take back to their classroom. There are blogs for every topic that is imaginable. The trick is to find useful ones.
Discovery Resources
1. Go to the Blogger About page and read about the history of Blogger.com.
2. Go to the Blogger Features page and read about the resources that are available through Blogger.com.
3. Search for some topics of interest from Google Blog Search.
4. Read the Blog entry from Wikipedia.
Discovery Exercise
1. Create a blog from Blogger.com. If you have a Google account, you can use these credentials.
2. Write about some of the Blogs that you came across during your blog search.
3. Give some ideas on how you can use your blog to communicate with other educators, parents and students.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Thing #7 - Twitter
Who, what, when, where, why and how are not just the basics of information gathering anymore. These terms also encapsulate social media outlets and Twitter in particular. Twitter has been described as a blog in 140 characters or less. Everybody from news organizations to celebrities use Twitter to get information out to followers. One other method that Twitter is being used is as a backchannel communication method. With Twitter, students can communicate to instructors in real time with out interrupting the lesson at hand. Professors can then periodically check their Twitter feed to receive feedback and questions to help guide the lesson. Twitter also has different add ons from the ability to create a poll to send to followers to adding a Twitter feed display to a PowerPoint slide.
Discovery Resources
1. Visit the Twitter About page to read more about the service.
2. Search for some topics of interest to see what Twitter users are "Tweeting" about.
3. Read the Wikipedia entry on Twitter.
4. Check out some of the Twitter Apps available.
Discovery Exercises
1. Create a Twitter account.
2. Follow @bchatchett.
3. Tweet something to me.
4. Write a blog posting about your Twitter experience and ideas for classroom Twitter activities.
Thing #6 - Live Mesh
If you are like me, you will use at least two computers during a work day. Keeping all of my documents together and current is a challenging task on the best of days. One service that I use to keep track of everything is Live Mesh from Microsoft. This web application allows for me to edit a document on one computer, save it back to Mesh and access the same document from another computer. This service serves two purposes. One is to keep everything organized and current and two is to keep everything backed up off site. This is great since by using cloud storage, if my hard drive dies, my documents will live on. Other great features are the ability to access other computers desktops using the remote desktop feature as well having a 5 GB of storage. Live Mesh can also be used on Macs and smartphones.
Discovery Resources
1. Read the overview about Live Mesh.
2. Read about the features of Live Mesh.
3. Read the Wikipedia entry on Live Mesh.
4. Learn more about Cloud Computing.
Discovery Exercises
1. Create a free account with Live Mesh.
2. Create a 1 page document on any subject you choose.
3. Upload this document to Live Mesh.
4. Write a blog post describing your experience with Live Mesh and what you learned about Cloud Computing.
Image courtesy of Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cloud_computing.svg)
Think #5 - Photoshop.com
Finding the right program to edit your photos can be an expensive and time consuming task. One of the most widely known programs is Adobe Photoshop. This is a very powerful program and in addition to the time that it would take to learn the program, it is very expensive. Adobe has developed Photoshop.com as a way to edit photos quickly, easily and best of all free! Photoshop.com has the basic Photoshop elements available such as crop, re-size and red eye correction. But in addition to these, you can crop out elements, change the color of the picture as well add effects to change the texture of the image. Another fun offering is the ability to add overlays and other elements to spice up the images.
Discovery Resources
1. Read the Photoshop.com FAQ to learn more about this service.
2. Read this review about Photoshop.com.
Discovery Exercises
1. Create a free account at Photoshop.com.
2. Upload an image to your account.
3. Use some of the elements that are available with the Photoshop.com service and edit the image that was uploaded.
4. Post the image to your blog.
5. Write a review of Photoshop.com and how you plan to use this service in the future.
Thing #4 - Gmail
Let's face it, email is the prevalent method of communication in the 21st century. When children are born these days they are weighed, measured and given an email address. Most ISP's will provide you with an email address that can be used as long as you are a subscriber to their service. The same rings true with an email address that is provided by an academic institution. You have an address as long as you are a student there. Sometimes you will be allowed to keep this address but not often. Google provides users with an email address for life (life being the life of the service, but this being Google, they will be around for a long time). You will be able to choose your own email address provided that it is not currently in use. One great thing about Gmail is that it can be accessed from anywhere you have access to the Internet. There is no special reader needed due to the fact that it is web driven. Gmail messages can also be directly delivered to most smartphones. Users can also archive old messages to keep their inbox clear.
Discovery Resources
1. Visit Gmail and learn about the service.
2. Read some of the Gmail blog for more information.
Discovery Exercises
1. Create a Gmail account.
2. Send me a message using your Gmail address.
3. Check your Inbox for a response.
4. Blog about your experience and thoughts about using Gmail.
Thing #3 - docstoc
Following the document theme, posting a document to a web page (including blogs) has always involved copying the text and pasting it in the editor. There was usually little of the formatting that would remain due to the text now being reliant on the page styling. Also, if users wanted to post more than one document page, it made the web page unsightly and hard to follow. The only other option was to allow for the download of the document, but if it was a large document then this presents its own challenges. Docstoc will allow content editors to embed entire documents on their page by linking back to the uploaded document at docstoc. This service is not just for documents, but can also be used to view spreadsheets, PowerPoints and .pdf files. Any Microsoft Office formatted document can be uploaded for use. If you do not have Microsoft Office, Google Docs will allow for creation and exporting to these formats.
Discovery Resources
1. Visit docstoc about page to learn more about the service.
2. Visit the docstoc blog to view different types of docstoc embedded documents.
Discovery Exercise
1. Create a 2 page Microsoft Word document on a topic of your choosing.
2. Create a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation with minimum of 5 slides on a topic of your choosing.
3. Create a free docstoc account.
4. Upload both the Word Document and the PowerPoint presentation to docstoc.
5. Embed these on your blog.
Thing #2 - FillAnyPDF
Creating documents for distribution is always a time consuming and costly undertaking. Even with using a computer and printer, printing and paper cost are always something that school systems are fighting to reduce. Also, storage of current documents and disposal of old documents are something that has to be kept up with.
Fillanypdf.com is a web based service that will allow users to upload a .pdf document and convert it to an editable .pdf that can securely be transmitted to others via email. The advantage to this is that users can see who has clicked on the download link and who has not. With .pdfs you will be able to store these digital documents with no filing, storage space, or paper used. Any word processor can be used to create a regular .pdf. If you do not have access to one, then Google docs and be used to create a document and saved to a .pdf format for upload to the fillanypdf.com service.
Discovery Resources
1. Read about the .pdf format.
2. Download Adobe Reader if you do not have it currently installed. (Free)
3. Download this .pdf and become familiar on how Adobe Reader works.
Discovery Exercise
1. Using the word processor program of your choice, create a questionnaire about any subject that interests you. Be sure to save in the .pdf format.
2. Create a free account at fillanypdf.com.
3. Upload your document to you account.
4. Forward this to me for review at my email address.
5. Post a copy of your questionnaire to your blog.
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