Tag Archives: web2.0

A Little Something from Waffle Bytes

Melinda Waffle from Calhoun ISD blogged some great notes and resources from Leslie Fisher’s “The Web You Might Not Know About.” Instead of posting a link to her blog, she’s graciously allowed the post to be re-published here on MACUL’s blog.  Thanks Melinda!

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AT MACUL 2012 Conference attending the Leslie Fisher session:  The Web 2.0 You Might Not Know About…
(Finally up after my battery died 15 minutes before the end of the session…)

RockMelt – Free browser for Mac or PC
Social media browser – connects to social media but leaves you on current page

Evernote Clearly can be attached to any web browser – will extract story out of web page and save to Evernote; schools.evernote.com for school accounts; can now add audio recordings; bought skitch app for drawing; solution for iPads in multiple hands (teacher on student accounts); Evernote Peek adds flash card capability for iPad

Twitter – soapbox moment about uses for Education :-)
Added ability to receive tweets with no twitter account, uses text messaging.  Use twitter widgets to place tweets onto webpage (real time updating…).

www.coveritlive.com – backchannel room, can go to it at anytime to see as is.

www.todaysmeet.com – free backchannel chat, pretty open

www.gosoapbox.com – allows interaction between speaker & the audience; create questions, vote to promote; similar to the Purdue’s Hotseat.  No longer free

typewith.me – collaboration site online; can load a pdf on there and collaborate it. Can now get up to 100 people into the room, can be in room on mobile device; has time slider to review material.

www.pinterest.com – tool for sharing resources; virtual pinboard; organizable by topic, ideas, etc

Wunderlist – To Dos in one location (any platform); collaborative to dos;

Zamzar – file conversion site (free!)

en.linoit.com – online cork board to post stickies, other resources, etc; it’s an iPad it

www.scoopit.com – organize a topic in one place; create boards, when browsing can add links from sites to your boards; people can subscribe to the board (schools using as school newspaper)

join.me – simple group meetings; change, or take control of the screen

www.weebly.com – create websites easily; two sites you can create for free; weebly for education – the teacher can control privacy

www.wufoo.com – create drag & drop forms online;

Eventbrite – schedule events easily; keeps track of waiting list on limited room events.

www.classdojo.com – student engagement & reward tracker; teacher can load behaviors & students for tracking

www.smalldemons.com – learn more about literature

www.remind101.com – teacher creates account; others join via text/email; no phone/emails exchanged and the teacher can communicate with students/parents

wiffiti.com. – message board.

www.jetjaw.com – polling/feedback online, can conditionalize by answer

www.kaywa.com – QR Code management

www.polleverywhere.com  – new wordle support (see word cloud of open ended question answers)

www.storify.com – take tidbits from everywhere & mash together

Favorite Web 2.0 highlighted at MACUL

If you are like me, you walked away from MACUL in a daze. Thrilled with how much you were able to learn in 2 short days, and at the same time overwhelmed. Wow! Many Web 2.0 Tools were mentioned in the sessions I attended and many were shared by more than one Speaker. I will try to highlight a few that are think are well worth your time and free. I am a big fan of the FREE Web Tools.

Screencasting Tools
CamStudio http://camstudio.org/
Jinghttp://www.jingproject.com/
I have used both. Very easy to use and great results. A favorite aspect of Jing is that it will give you an embedd code for your screenshot(picture) or screencast(video.)
Ideas on when to use: Mathcasts (idea I learned from last year’s MACUL) Students talk and explain math problem on computer screen (IWB is a plus here) and it is recorded for others to view/learn from later.
Teacher may record lesson as she teaches for absent students to view later, Or message/directions to students when teacher will be absent.
Pull a clip out of a YouTube or other online video.

Blabberizehttp://blabberize.com/
Blabberize is easy to use. You upload a picture, adjust the dots they give you around the location of the mouth, and then record the words you want your picture to say. Blabberize lets you embed it in your blog, wiki or website to share. Students may create a blabber as part of a report on a famous figure – so many ideas. A 1st grade teacher used pictures of spiders that the children created and then had them share their spider facts or stories as the spider talking. One Warning – Do not allow children to browse the public files (there are over 5000.) I did this once and came across a very inappropriate one.


Voice Thread
http://ed.voicethread.com/#home This may have a minimal one time cost (I think I once paid $10.) Another way for students to share stories, create visual projects, comment on each others work. One suggestion was to embed a DEstreaming video or clip into the Voicethread, have the students watch independently and then comment.

Animoto http://animoto.com/education Easy tool to turn pictures and video clips into a professional looking video. These videos can be download to your computer as well as embedded on blog or wiki. You may add text as well. There are free educator accounts and you can set up accounts for your students.

Smilebox http://www.smilebox.com/ This one wasn’t mentioned, but I use it as another video sharing tool. Like Animoto you can add pictures or video clips.

Preview of Friday’s WEBKids 2.0: Read/Write Tools for our Youngest Learners

Webkids 2.0

The great philosopher Jimmy Buffett tells us, “There is a fine line between Saturday Night and Sunday Morning.” I guess this post would qualify as one that rides the fine line between self-promotion, a preview, and an invite to a virtual visit.

I will be presenting on Friday morning at 10:00 am in the DeVos Place Grand Gallery Room E. The focus of my talk will be on web 2.0 tools specifically useful with PK-2 students.

Here are my session goals: 1) to give attendees tools and ideas that can be applied the first day they return to their classrooms and 2) to share some of my experiences with these tools that all come “kid approved”.

The hour will be split into sections with one featuring “teacher tools” and the other showcasing “student tools”. All resources are free and available online.

Please check out my list of session links as a preview or as a “virtual visit” if you are unable to attend.

I always look forward to meeting lots of other MACULers. Hope to see you on Friday.