NGfL Cymru Financial Education

Lovely materials especially the Coin challenge

 http://www.ngfl-cymru.org.uk/vtc/2009-10/maths/financial-literacy/index.html

phrases and pictures

Make a phrase and link it to photos in flickr use Phrasr


http://www.pimpampum.net/phrasr/

Nice list of reasons to use collaborative work
 44 benefits of collaborative work
Just discovered Drop Box- heard of it before but never really thought of using it. The sharing aspect would make it great for collaborative work too.
https://www.dropbox.com
How about a collaborative online database?- Mango data is reasonably priced and the most intuitive I've used with children
http://mangodataonline.com/

Great site for free online books for putting on itunes
http://www.audioowl.com/
This and more on this blog
http://blog.learningtoday.com/blog/bid/28291/Hear-This-3-Free-Resources-for-Audio-Stories-for-Students

Great sit for all things ecological- this list would be great for engendering discussion in the classroom- 9 not so daft things to save the planet
http://ht.ly/1HaML

Lexipedia

Brilliant way to understand words and their multiple functions

http://www.lexipedia.com/

Photographs

Great slide show program to show slides very quickly
www.photopeach.com

Sounds good- ways to use sound in the classroom

10 ways to use Audacity in the classroom http://bit.ly/bgK6q5
Easy speak microphones great quick recording for little hands- from TTS
http://www.tts-group.co.uk/Product.aspx?cref=TTSPR1081690

Games based learning

Had a few interesting days considering use of Second Life to attend virtual ICT education conferences. Only problem was that 'SL' time- which is the same as Pacific Time is eight hours behind us. I have not been motivated yet to get up at 3 in the morning to find out what is happening.
On the subject of games based learning I had the pleasure of hearing Dawn Halleybone at ESIS talking about the use of games consoles in the classroom. Her blog is an inspiration.
http://hallyd.edublogs.org/tag/wii/
See also:
http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/ictineducation/gamesbasedlearning/

I am going to set up a Wii based project using the 'Endless Ocean' software in one of my schools: should be interesting.

11 advantages of using a blog for teaching

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

11 advantages of using a blog for teaching

View more presentations from Frank Calberg Services.

St David's Day

Good old NGfL Cymru
http://bit.ly/9RaSxN
http://bit.ly/d1Zh5f

Merthyr ICT Good Practice conference

Been a while- very busy with the conference. Brilliant to see John Davitt speak- so many great ideas, his philosophy on New and Old tools was insightful, funny and refreshing. Gave me further cause to use Twitter as a source of great ideas. Follow me and note the people I follow for some of the most innovative minds in education today- link to Twitter on the right.
Good wiki on classroom blogging ideas here: http://classroomblogging.wikispaces.com/Blogging+Activities

General techie sites for teachers

Haven't had time to try this one yet - Free technology for teachers: http://ow.ly/12JIb
Blog with some great links
http://ozgekaraoglu.edublogs.org/

How to embed anything into your website/blog/wiki
http://bit.ly/3DrDNC

Googly Apps

I am hoping this will become quite big section as we investigate the huge amount of free applications supplied by Google.
How are others using Google Docs?
http://bit.ly/5LgB1x

How to publish a quiz in Google docs

http://bit.ly/9MBkra

Digital Natives

Are our children as e savvy as we would like to think?- interesting article on research carried out on googling etc:
http://bit.ly/d3izLv

Science stuff

Great site to play with- can use it to engender discussion about forces
http://www.crayonphysics.com/

Lovely ways to get little ones using the 'Cloud'

You Tube video of children in Moosejaw Canada
http://bit.ly/90s09f

Literacy

Worth a try- recommended highly on twitter.
http://teacher.scholastic.com/writewit/poetry/poetry_engine.htm

Moodling

5 tips to enhance your moodle course http://bit.ly/8jkyVy

A site worth watching- free tech for teachers

Let's all collaborate

E2BN has excellent collaborative tools- http://www.e2bn.org/. Discovery box and Museum box are also very good presentation tools-good for all those fed up with  PowerPoint!
Creaza has a whole suite of possibilities: http://www.creaza.com/
and don't forget mind mapping collaboration with Mindmeister.
Google Apps for collaboration will desrve a post all of its own at a later date!

An oldie but goodie- children collaboratively annotate photos/pictures or videos
http://voicethread.com/#home
Share your favourite parts of the day
http://www.memiary.com/
Great slideshare with ideas for Memiary
http://www.slideshare.net/markwarner/using-memiary-in-the-classroom
Ether pad
Real time sharing by multiple users
http://etherpad.com/

Little 'uns

Nice site for activities: http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/

Communication is the name of the game!

Crack into pdfs -legally.
http://freemypdf.com/
My favourite free mind mapping tool- can be used collaboratively at the same time: http://www.mindmeister.com/ Seriously- this is one to try. Children can share mindmap online - updates without refreshing!
2 connect
http://www.2simple.com/2connect/
Even more in the Cooltools4schools wikispace
http://cooltoolsforschools.wikispaces.com/Presentation+Tools

Brilliant presentation tool- add audio to make a webinar!
http://www.slideshare.net/
Don't forget the fabulous E2BN presentation tools_
Discovery box
http://discoverybox.e2bn.org/

Describe a journey using photos and video
http://mapvivo.com/

This isn't communication unless you count playing an instrument- for the wannabee rock musicians
http://gigajam.e2bn.org/

BETT highlights and Merthyr conference.

BETT turned up some useful things. The future is interactive plasma screens it seems- both on wall and flipped to form table top! Fantastic 3D also- pehaps these will tour schools in the same way as Star Lab?
Loved the Mantra Lingua pens. Fantastic for adding recording to display/ books etc. Coed y lan purchased one so will be interested to see the outcome.
The E2BN stall was great- useful links to NEN.  To get all age appropriate free tools go to this link
http://www.e2bn.org/tandl
http://www.nen.gov.uk/tandl


We've booked John Davitt for the Merthyr Conference- hopefully this will enthuse everyone.
Remote Learning -pre Moodle
New ideas for remote learning or linking groups of schools together include using Centra 7 or Flash meeting E2BN, Online Mango databases, wikispaces and using Mindmeister online mindmapping.

A wander round some items that could be useful

Shelly Terrell's Teacher Bootcamp
http://teacherbootcamp.edublogs.org/

I particularly like the 30 day challenge!

Electronic Village online
http://evosessions.pbworks.com/

A digital version of Bloom's Taxonomy:
http://edorigami.wikispaces.com/Bloom%27s+Digital+Taxonomy

A useful tip for those of us sharing work via Blog/Wiki etc
http://blog.sharpsav.com/2010/01/rule-1-be-aware-of-your-audience.html

Jonathon Davitt

Looks like someone to follow
http://www.jonathansblog.net/davitts-learning-event-generator-creative-curriculum
Great tool
http://www.newtools.org/showtxt.php?docid=737

Chosing a suitable progression of activities for students

Just came across this- great discussion about two alternative deliveries of a learning objective to produce a brochure- aimed at adult learners but has real implications at all levels of education.
http://bit.ly/85L9Qc

Need to learn more about using Twitter as a PLN
http://www.vrml.k12.la.us/curriculum/tech/socialnetwork/PLN.htm
http://edupln.ning.com/

New Blog

Blog Star Date 1
Well, decided to start a new Blog solely to cover my thoughts and links for all things ICT and educational.

On Monday did some Moodle training in a secondary school. Granted it was early days for them but they were intent on loading up all their material from their server, needless to say this was mainly PowerPoint, they didn't want to know about any of the other facilities such as wiki, forums or glossaries- I referred them to Tomaz Lasic's fabulous stuff, and his 2 minute videos. I have to say the 'tinternet' was excruciatingly slow which doesn't endear non ICT folk to anything you are trying to demonstrate. It occurred to me that there is a strong correlation between educators supreme love of PowerPoint and their 'Sage on the Stageness' (Erica McWilliam) - also picked up from the fabulous Tomaz's writings (see Human, first link above).