Free Technology for Teachers

Fall of the Berlin Wall - Video and Photos

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:49:00 +0000

Tomorrow, November 9, marks the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. CBS News has two visual resources looking back at the events of November 1989. The Fall of the Berlin Wall is a slideshow of twelve images with captions from twenty years ago. Berlin Wall in Pictures is a three minute documentary of the political circumstances leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the fall Berlin Wall.

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Maps of War - Animated Thematic Maps

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:50:00 +0000

Maps of War has a collection of seven animated maps based on the themes of war, religion, and politics. Click here to see the History of Religions map. You can embed these maps into a blog or website, but I found that my blog loaded very slowly when I tried embedding the maps. Maps of War also has an extensive library of maps from third parties like the BBC and the New York Times. Many of the maps contained in the library are interactive learning tools.

Applications for Education
Maps of War's animated maps are a great visual aid for students. The timeline that accompanies each map make the maps a great resource for showing changes over time. As the maps change the timelines change accordingly.

Here are some related resources that may be of interest to you:
Timelines.com - Multimedia Timelines, Wiki-style
Historic Maps in K-12 Classrooms
US History Animated

Changes to Free Technology for Teachers

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:22:00 +0000

If you normally read Free Technology for Teachers in your favorite RSS reader, you may not have noticed that I have made some changes to the blog's layout. I changed the layout for a couple of reasons. First, I wanted to highlight the two free ebooklets that I offer (I have plans for two more of these before the end of the year). Second, I wanted to clean-up the way the blog looked.

Here's the list of changes:
1. I have consolidated the links to resources that used to appear on the left side of the blog. These now appear as lists under the heading "Favorite Resources Lists."
2. I've added a contact form under the "About Me Section."
3. The search box is now larger and easier to use (hopefully).
4. The subscription options are easier to locate.
5. A lighter background to provide better contrast and easier reading (hopefully).

Still to come:
1. Wibiya toolbar.
2. Consolidated collection of all of my slide presentations.

If you have suggestions for making the look of Free Technology for Teachers better, please feel free to contact me.

Site Maintenance

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:53:00 +0000

For the next couple of hours Free Technology for Teachers will be undergoing some changes and updates. If things appear a little wonky, don't worry, it'll be fixed soon.

Update
Phase one of the site update is complete. I have some more tweaks planned that I hope to complete next weekend.

Learn English - Games for Kids to Learn English

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:00:00 +0000

Learn English Kids is a project sponsored by the British Council. Learn English is designed to help young ESL students. Students can visit the website to play educational games, listen and read along with short stories, or listen to and sing along with English songs. Learn English Kids also has a number of activities designed to help students practice writing in English.

Applications for Educators
Learn English Kids has many activities that students can do individually which is great for differentiated instruction. Learn English Kids also has a long list of activities and lessons that teachers can do with a whole class. The teacher section of Learn English Kids has some articles and reports that will be of interest to ESL teachers.

Why Teachers Use Twitter

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:25:00 +0000

At the 140 Character Conference in Los Angeles last month, Parentella hosted a discussion panel with four educators that are in my PLN. During the panel discussion these four educators discussed how Twitter is changing education. The video is embedded below. Thanks to Beth Still for sharing the video.

Twitter & Education - #140conf LA from RealPlayer SP on Vimeo.

Wet Mount Helps You Organize Web Research

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:19:00 +0000

Wet Mount is a website designed to organize findings from the Internet. The organization process is based on a simple number-line concept. When users find information (text, image, or video) that information is placed in a chart. As more information is found the chart can be reorganized to accommodate more information and place it based on relevance to the original search terms. Watch a screencast here.

Applications for Education
Wet Mount could be a great tool for helping students to organize their findings from Internet research. Often students will find a video or image relevant to their search terms, but don't have an immediate use for that content. Using Wet Mount students could put that information aside for later use without forgetting where it fits into their research. I think of Wet Mount as a digital version of organizing research using notecards with "slugs."

Chemistry Never Sleeps and Free Chemistry Lessons

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:30:00 +0000

My colleague and chemistry teacher, Walter Perry, started a blog this summer as a companion to his classroom blog. Over the last four months he's slowly added some useful content to Chemistry Never Sleeps. Chemistry Never Sleeps is a mix of Walter's personal commentary about teaching with links and examples of Chemistry resources for teachers and students. A recent post included a slide presentation about the Periodic Table.

Exploring the links on Chemistry Never Sleeps brought me to Mr. Guch's Free Stuff for Chemistry Teachers. Mr. Guch's free stuff includes four free ebooks containing lesson plans, lectures, and quizzes that Mr. Guch developed for his high school Chemistry classes.

Here are some related items that may be of interest to you:
Open Chemistry - Free Content for Teaching Chemistry
The Interactive Periodic Table
Video Demonstrations of the Periodic Table of Elements

Week In Review - The Most Popular Items

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:55:00 +0000

It's Friday and that means it's time for another Free Technology for Teachers week in review. As I do each Friday, I've compiled a list of seven most popular items of the last week. If you've been busy and not able to keep up with your RSS reader or email, the week in review provides a good chance to catch up on the posts that were most popular with other readers.

Here are the seven most popular items of the last seven days:
1. 9 Resources for Website Evaluation Lessons
2. 20 Interesting Ways to Use Audio In Your Classroom
3. Daylight Saving Time Explained
4. The Web Runs on Kindness
5. For Music Teachers - The Euphonium Gets a New Voice
6. Shape Poems - Poem Template from RWT
7. Cool Food Kidz Teaches Kids About Diet & Fitness

The list above is based on item clicks and views. If you ever miss the week in review post, you can always check out the Post Rank widget embedded in the right column of the blog. Post Rank displays the most popular blog entries at any given time.

If you're new to Free Technology for Teachers, welcome, I'm glad you've found this blog. If you like what you see in the links above, please consider subscribing to the blog via RSS or email.
To subscribe via RSS, please click here.
To subscribe via email, please click here.

Copyright Advisory Network Offers Copyright Clarity

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:43:00 +0000

The Copyright Advisory Network offers four resources that will be of particular interest to librarians and teachers. The Fair Use Evaluator helps you make a fair use determination. Exceptions for Educators provides a step-by-step guide to determining if you can use copyrighted materials in your instruction under the educators exemption. The Section 108 Spinner is a tool for deciding if you, as a librarian, can make a reproduction of a copyrighted work. The Public Domain Slider offers a simple scale for determining if a work is copyrighted or if it is in the public domain.

I learned about the Copyright Advisory Network through The Tech Savvy Educator's post about the Public Domain Slider.

Applications for Education
The four tools offered by the Copyright Advisory Network will not take the place of teaching students the difference between legal and illegal use of copyrighted materials. That said, these tools could be useful aid in teaching how to determine if and how a copyrighted work can be used.

Here are some related items that may be of interest to you:
Classroom Copyright Chart
Copyright for Educators
The End to Copyright Confusion
Video Introduction to Understanding Fair Use

Intro to Wikis Video Created By Kids

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 22:43:00 +0000

This afternoon one of the teachers I follow on Twitter, kjellstrom, posted a link to a video his students made to introduce teachers to Wikispaces. This video is a good example of students teaching teachers and a good example of digital storytelling. The students used Xtranormal to create the video. You can find my previous post about Xtranormal here. The video is embedded below.

Applications for Education
Although this video isn't terribly in-depth it does provide an introduction to Wikispaces. The video is also a good example of using Xtranormal for digital storytelling projects. Xtranormal allows anyone that can type the ability to create audio dialogue between characters.

3 Guides to Using Google Earth for Virtual Fieldwork

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:31:00 +0000

Digital Explorer is a service that offers instruction and guidance on using GIS and Google Earth to enhance learning experiences. To that end, Digital Explorer offers three comprehensive guides to using Google Earth for virtual fieldwork and physical fieldwork around your school's grounds. The first two guides in the series cover everything from the basics through advanced Google Earth functions. The third guide in the series offers a six installment project that you and your students can do around your school's grounds.

Thanks to Rich Treves, who also offers great Google Earth advice, for the link to these guides.

Applications for Education
If you've always wanted to try using Google Earth in your classroom, but weren't sure how to get started, Digital Explorer's guides offer you a great place to start. The school grounds project offers students the opportunity to not only learn about Google Earth, but to also develop skill sets like digital photography, blogging, and video creation.

Here are some related items that may be of interest to you:
Great Google Earth/ Maps How-to Videos
How to Enable Google Earth Flight Simulator
Award Winning Google Earth Lesson Plans

Sesame Street Turns 40

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 11:48:00 +0000

All week Google has had images of Sesame Street characters on its homepage because next week marks the 40th anniversary of the premier of Sesame Street. Over the years many celebrities have appeared on the show including bands like REM. If you'd like to start your Friday on a happy note, watch this video of REM performing "Furry, Happy, Monsters" on Sesame Street.

Google Earth Historical Imagery of Berlin

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 01:47:00 +0000

Today, on their Lat Long Blog, Google announced the addition of historical imagery of Berlin to Google Earth. The new imagery includes images from 1945 and 1953. For more historical imagery, turn on the Rumsey Historical Maps layer in Google Earth.

Applications for Education
Next week marks the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The historical imagery in Google Earth could be a good way to show students the changes in Berlin over the last 64 years.

Timelines.com has some good information about the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Here is a related item that may be of interest to you:
Touring the Remains of the Berlin Wall

LIFE Photographs Now Available In Animoto

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 01:06:00 +0000

Animoto is one of my favorite tools for students to use to create stunning multimedia projects. Last week Animoto announced a partnership with LIFE to bring new collections of imagery to Animoto users. Animoto users can find images from LIFE in the categories of Travel and Animals. LIFE is also using Animoto's technology on their website to create great videos like this one about ducks.

Applications for Education
The partnership between Animoto and LIFE makes great animal and scenery photography available to students. The animal photography could be used by elementary school or middle school students to create presentations for science classes in which they're studying animals.

Here are some related items that may be of interest to you:
Animoto Now Accepts Video Clips! This Is Awesome!
Animoto for Education - The End of Boring Slideshows
Animoto in the Special Education Classroom
Video Holiday Greetings Courtesy of Animoto
Using Animoto (and Glogster and Wordle) to Learn
Where I Live... Another Use for Animoto
A Student-Parent-Teacher Lesson Plan

Teaching With Contests

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:39:00 +0000

Academic contests can be a fun way to get students excited about writing an essay, creating a video, writing a poem, or completing any number of learning activities. Teaching With Contests is a blog designed to help you find academic contests that your students can participate in. A quick review of the blog will lead you to contests covering all K-12 content areas.

Thanks to Diane Krause for the link.

Smart.fm - Independent Learning Platform

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:02:00 +0000

Smart.fm is a free service designed to help you learn languages, mathematics, and history independently. At it's most basic, Smart.fm provides a flashcard-like service for learning languages, learning formulas, and learning facts. You can hear the flashcards read to you, read the flashcards, and play games based upon the flashcards you're studying. Smart.fm takes the flashcard concept a step farther by offering a personalized repetition schedule based upon what you've learned and what you haven't yet learned. The schedule adjusts each time you revisit your account. Watch the video below to learn more about how the Smart.fm system works.

If you want to take you're learning on the go, Smart.fm offers iPhone apps.

Smart.fm orginally launched in Japan as a language learning system and has grown to include other content areas. They have plans to include content from places like MIT's OpenCourseWare in the near future.

Applications for Education
Smart.fm could be a good way for students to supplement the content they're learning in your classroom. For example, the Spanish resources that I previewed could be great study aids for high school students learning Spanish.

Smart.fm also looks to be a good resource for students who have an interest in a particular topic when a course on that topic is not offered by their school.

Kidzillions - Parents Teaching Fiscal Responsibility

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:28:00 +0000

Kidzillions is a new service (still in Alpha) designed to help parents teach their pre-teen and teenage children fiscal responsibility. Kidzillions basically takes the idea of an allowance and applies it to an online format. The way that Kidzillions works is parents create accounts for themselves and their children. Then parents establish a list of chores and tasks along with the compensation for the tasks. When the child has completed a task, money can be transferred into their account. The child then can shop with the money, but all purchases have to be approved by the parents.

Applications for Education
Kidzillions looks like it could be a good way for parents to introduce the concepts of fiscal responsibility to their children.

CubeTree - Interesting Option for Learning Communities

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:57:00 +0000

CubeTree is a free service designed for companies that would like to build a social network of wikis, shared items, and microblogs for their employees. Although the service is designed with business use in mind, I can see some applications for it in a continuing education environment.

On CubeTree anyone can create a network and invite colleagues. All colleagues must have the same email domain. For example, if I wanted to create a network, only people with an @freetech4teachers.com domain could be in my network. Everyone in the network can create a profile (Facebook-like), post updates, share documents, collaborate on documents and spreadsheets, and share items from their RSS feeds. The video below offers a good overview of everything CubeTree offers.

Feature Tour from Carlin Wiegner on Vimeo.

Applications for Education
CubeTree's terms of service require users to be at least 18. When I was thinking about CubeTree in an education setting I saw it as a possibility for use with adult learners to create a learning community. I can see CubeTree being used in an online setting or a blended (online and face to face) setting for students and teachers to get to know each other, share information that they discover, and collaborate on the creation of a wiki.

The Washington Post's Education Blog Contest

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:47:00 +0000

The Washington Post is looking for your suggestions for the best education blogs of 2009. They're calling it a contest, but I think the reward for those nominated is just recognition. Readers can nominate up to three blogs. Submissions can be made via email or comment on this article on The Washington Post.

I learned about this on Twitter from Larry Ferlazzo whose blog is one of three that I'm nominating.

A Trick or Treater's Dilemma

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:24:00 +0000

I try not to post CNN Student News stories more than once a week, but I couldn't resist posting about one of today's segments. The closing segment of today's episode of CNN Student News is about a woman who accidentally dropped her diamond ring into a Trick or Treater's bag on Halloween.

Applications for Education
The story could be a good way to start an engaging conversation with students about ethics. The story has relevance for young students who are still of "trick or treating" age. The story also has relevance for older students who have a real understanding of the value of money or, in this case, jewelry.

Interview With Beth Still About ISTE Newbie 2010

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:06:00 +0000

As many of you know, last year I was fortunate enough to attend NECC 2009 through the donations of many of you, VoiceThread, and the hard work of Beth Still. You can read about last year's project and my experiences here, here, and here. Last year, the fund-raising began in April. The fund-raising for the 2010 ISTE Newbie Project has begun already. In the video below Beth and I talk about the ISTE 2010 Newbie Project, the purpose, and the fundraising.

Free online screencasting tool

These are the links mentioned in the video:
Beth Still - Nebraska Change Agent
Jason Shrage - Oswego 98

Open Book Exams Become Open Internet Exams

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 19:39:00 +0000

This morning on my drive into work I heard a story on the BBC World News radio program about schools in Denmark allowing students to take final exams while accessing the Internet. The article the story was based on can be found here. What I like about the story's concept is that the questions Danish students are being asked require them to use knowledge rather than regurgitate knowledge. In today's highly-connected world, finding information has become much easier and in turn it has become more difficult to be the "smartest person in the room." This is an important concept to remember when planning lessons and designing assessments. As educators in today's highly-connected world we need to be designing lessons and assessments that ask students to synthesize and apply the information they locate.

The other part of the story that I enjoyed was the interviews with teachers and students. The obvious concern that a lot of people listening to and reading the story will have is about cheating. The teachers addressed this concern by creating questions that cannot, in most cases, be answered well with simple cut and paste. The teachers and students also claim that the penalties for cheating are too severe to take the risk of cheating by emailing or instant messaging other students. While the stiff penalties are certainly a deterrent to cheating, it's more important to note that the emphasis of the exams is placed on application of knowledge rather than recitation of knowledge.

Timelines.com - Multimedia Timelines, Wiki-style

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:21:00 +0000

Creating and studying timelines is one of the fundamental activities of history classes. I've written about a few different tools for creating online timelines, but none have been quite like Timelines.com. Timelines.com uses crowd-sourcing to generate a gallery of multimedia timelines. Each event is accompanied by text, video, and still images. You can see an example here featuring content about the Iran Hostage Crisis which began in 1979.

Timelines.com is arranged in lists of dates, topics, and events. Select any item on any of the lists to view the content that other users have added. If you have more information to add about a particular event, topic, or date you can add it. If a topic or date is not listed, you can add it to the database. I found the easiest way to browse information on Timelines.com is to select the "What Happened On..." option.

Applications for Education
Timelines.com is crowd-sourced so you will have to teach your students to be good consumers of information if you do use it in your classroom. If students register to use Timelines.com (must be 13+) they can make their edits to any of the events on the website. A good exercise for history students might be to locate information that they question the reliability of and then edit that information with justification for their edits.

Here are some related items that may be of interest to you:
TimeRime Multimedia Timeline Builder
Great Timeline Builders

Professional Development Webinars Offered by MLTI

noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:59:00 +0000

MLTI (Maine Learning Technology Initiative), the organization that oversees Maine's 1:1 laptop initiative, is offering a series of professional development webinars throughout the 2009/2010 school year. The webinars are being conducted by members of the MLTI staff. These webinars are being recorded and the first three are now available on Maine121.org. Some of the webinars are specific to Maine schools that are using state-issued MacBooks while other webinars such as "Directed Use of Research Tools," have universal appeal.