Group items tagged

"Top 10 Sites for Creating Digital Music 1. Myna - Far and away my favorite online music editor. This is very similar to Garageband and a nice alternative for those who do not have the Apple application. 2. Soundation - Very easy to use, with a drag/drop interface for creating excellent-sounding music. 3. Jam Studio - Fun site that lets users select a "key" to play in and a theme to match. 4. Loop Labs - Nice time- line editor; learning curve is a bit higher than most sites. 5. Your Spins - Great site for mixing prerecorded music and sharing with others. 6. Indaba - Unique site where users can create collaborative music pieces to make one final product. 7. Creating Music - Very user friendly website shows kids how to create digital music. 8. Contrapunctus Variations - Wonderful site for creating orchestral music by selecting an instrument and clicking on a time line. 9. iNudge - Fun site for kids, who can make music by drawing shapes. 10. Glitchscape - Create sound by drawing vector shaped rectangles. "

Fom the Tech and Learning blog

"A.nnotate is an online annotation, collaboration and indexing system for documents and images, supporting PDF and MS Office formats. Instead of emailing different versions of a document back and forth you can now all comment on a single read-only copy online. Unlike online word processors, the document is displayed in high quality with fonts and layout just like the printed version. It is easy to use and runs in all common web browsers, with no software or plugins to install. "

Your Next Read is a neat little site that provides you with a web of book recommendations based on the authors and books you already like. Here's how it works; type in the title of a book you like or author you like and Your Next Read will provide you with a web of books that might also enjoy. Click on any of the books appearing the web to create another new web. Below you'll see the web of recommendations that appeared when I typed in Gary Paulsen's book Hatchet.

From Mara Linaberger: Great discussion on the iPad everyone! Next Friday we will be launching an iPad pilot with 48 art, music and theatre teachers at IU1 as part of our ArtsEducator 2.0 project. You can read about our inquiry and preparation done this summer to get some practice in, and to think through some of the logistics these folks might face this fall with their own pad here: http://artsedtech.wordpress.com/ Our thinking was to have the teachers use the iPad as a personal tool first, then move to them as a tool for instruction. The logical step for some may be to then take the tool into student use while others may stick to it as an instructional tool. We'll be documenting our project online here.

From Mara Linaberger Great discussion on the iPad everyone! Next Friday we will be launching an iPad pilot with 48 art, music and theatre teachers at IU1 as part of our ArtsEducator 2.0 project. You can read about our inquiry and preparation done this summer to get some practice in, and to think through some of the logistics these folks might face this fall with their own pad here:

"Laments about our schools are nothing new; everyone is an expert, it seems, when it comes to education. While most critics point to the lack of funding or the shortage of teachers, John Taylor Gatto insists the problem goes deeper; we've turned our schools, he says, into "torture chambers." If that sounds abrasively radical, consider this: Gatto, with almost thirty years' experience as a public-school teacher, has just been named New York City's Teacher of the Year for 1989. Gatto teaches seventh grade at Junior High School 54 on Manhattan's Upper West Side. Something of a local legend, he's a chess player and a songwriter - and he grows garlic. He was once named Citizen of the Week for coming to the aid of a woman who had been robbed. He has lectured on James Joyce's Ulysses at Cornell University and has taught philosophy at California State College. Perhaps it's not surprising that he's been approached by a film company interested in making a movie of his life. Gatto once ran for the New York State Senate on the Conservative Party ticket, and some of his ideas are quite traditional: he stresses "family values" and questions increased funds for education. But he's too much of a maverick to be easily labeled. At a recent hearing in New York, he castigated the school system for "the murder of 1 million black and Latino children," and was met with a standing ovation. What follows is the text of the speech he gave upon being named Teacher of the Year."

"The following lesson ideas utilize several of the Lite or free apps available for the iPad. These are basic lesson ideas that demonstrate the concept with specific content areas, but can be applied with a variety of curricular areas and grade levels."

"If you're a teacher / administrator / librarian / education professor that somehow 'doesn't even realize [yet] that there's a decision to be made,' should you even be working in a school or university? Don't our children and our school systems need and deserve someone who's in a different place than you are? It's one thing to still be a learner; heck, we're all learners with this technology stuff. It's another to opt out or not even recognize the choice. If we look at what our kids need, shouldn't we replace you with someone else? "

"Easily incorporate computational thinking into your curriculum with these classroom-ready lessons, examples, and programs. For more resources, including discussion forums and news, visit our ECT Discussion Forums. Note: Lessons include complete teacher editions, student worksheets, and any applicable Python programs. Examples include short exercises from core subjects with key CT concepts to consider. Programs include Python examples and exercises for teachers to enhance their existing lessons. All lessons, examples, and programs are based on California K-12 state standards."

"Learning Focused Schools practices are assisting teachers with developing and implementing "Best Practice" however, the effective integration of the latest 21st Century tools and strategies is also necessary to develop highly differentiated instructional practices. These strategies will assist students with not only core content area proficiency but also 21st Century skills and NETS proficiencies. This page offers many ideas and practical application of LFS and effective 21st Century instructional technology strategies."

Be Funky is a simple tool for turning digital photographs into digital comics. The image you see to the left is a cartoonized image of me based on a photograph I took with my webcam. Be Funky can be used for simple one frame images or be used to create an entire strip of cartoonized images with inserted text.

This is a great site! I like to use it to 'hide' student faces when using images of students online.

For all things education, take a look at Expert Village's free How To Videos with amazing tips on school and teaching related issues. Get the most from a guidance counselor or discover the world of home schooling. Increase your educational knowledge and help students get excited about class materials. Prepare children for preschool or ease stress on test days. Expert Village's videos are easy to follow and packed with information.

Schools are working with a flexible definition of literacy, influenced by established core concepts of media literacy, to: * promote the development of critical thinking skills necessary to independently 'read' & 'write', and make meaning of messages in a variety of forms * promote the basic operational skills, and understanding of the languages necessary to independently 'read' and 'write' effective messages in various forms of media (print, video, audio, etc.) * instill confidence in the ability to adapt those skills and concepts to emerging forms of communication * connect and transfer the fundamentals of literacy to other forms of real world communication and problem solving Challenges & Questions: * How do you fit this into already full school schedules? * If these type of productions do take time from other discipline and skills, is it worth it? * When and how do we train teachers to be confident enough in their own media literacy to fluidly guide students? * Where is the balance that satisfies outcomes schools are traditionally responsible for with the real world needs of our students?

Another free music site for use with projects. Please follow their request to share your creations with them.

Thanks to Beth McGuire for forwarding this one via email. This program is sponsored by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress and the Pennsylvania Center for the Book. Readers from grades 4 - 12 can participate in this program by writing a personal letter to an author, living or dead, explaining how that author's work changed the student's way of thinking about the world or themselves. The deadline is December 6, 2008.

The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, in partnership with Target Stores and in cooperation with affiliate state centers for the book, invites readers in grades 4 through 12 to enter Letters About Literature, a national reading-writing contest.

Available 9/8/08.

Imagine YouTube's ease of sharing and watching videos, but in a secure, private environment made for content like internal corporate announcements, team member status updates, employee training materials and informal information-sharing. Videos can be easily shared with everyone in the company or with specific individuals.

'This Directory lists (in alphabetical order by Twitter username) learning professionals from both education and corporate training, as well as other related professionals and e-learning products and services on Twitter. If you are a learning professional who wants to connect with others via Twitter and would like to appear in the Directory, email us with the entry details you would like to have.'

Recipes4Success is your best resource for supporting project work with students. Recipes4Success includes software tutorials and reference guides, online tools, and a step-by-step process for implementing project-building with students.

This section contains reproducible copies of primary documents from the holdings of the National Archives of the United States, teaching activities correlated to the National History Standards and National Standards for Civics and Government, and cross-curricular connections. Teaching with primary documents encourages a varied learning environment for teachers and students alike. Lectures, demonstrations, analysis of documents, independent research, and group work become a gateway for research with historical records in ways that sharpen students' skills and enthusiasm for history, social studies, and the humanities.

GoAnimate.com is an entertainment website that enables the simple creation of unique computer animated stories, satires and sentiments that can be shared with the entire online community. The site offers simple to more advanced innovative features that provide users with a multitude of possibilities for customizing their animations.

GoAnimate.com is an entertainment website that enables the simple creation of unique computer animated stories, satires and sentiments that can be shared with the entire online community. The site offers simple to more advanced innovative features that pr