Group items tagged

"Audacious. Egregious. Crazy. These are just some of the adjectives I used in my conversation with Amber.  She actually asked me how I wanted to move forward, putting the onus of a solution back on me. I understand why, too: she's just as powerless as I am. I would love for Apple to face public backlash and financial ramifications for having taken advantage of its customers in such a brazen and unethical way, but Apple seems beyond reproach at this point. It took three representatives before I could even speak to someone who comprehended what I was saying, and even when she admitted to Apple's shady practice, she was able to offer no solution besides "don't use the product." When our data is finally a full-blown utility, however, "just don't use the product" will cease to be an option. Apple will be in control, bringing their 1984 commercial full circle into a tragic, oppressive irony. "

"2010 was the year the cloud's impact became clear, permanent and more far-reaching than this slow-thinker had previously realized. Few things we did in my school district have not been in some way cloud-related - and those projects on the horizon look to be as well. My own personal technology use for both work and leisure has changed significantly this year due to ubiquitous cloud access and the devices meant to take advantage of it."

Interesting to consider some of the 2011 trends identified in this blog entry.

Great post and great comments from Alan Kay, Brian Harvey and others!!!!! "Because of my recent posts on teaching with Logo and the culture of older programming languages, I've been poking around the Logo sites.  My most enjoyable find has been the Logo Books page of the Logo Foundation. "

"Later this week I am going to be a virtual guest in a class at the University of the Philippines, Diliman. The topic I've been invited to speak about is using Google Chrome extensions and apps in education. In preparation for my virtual visit I've created this list of some of my favorite apps and extensions."

"I confess!  I'm a Flipboard flip-a-holic. I wasn't always this way.  I originally hated Flipbaord and found the magazine style layout cluttered. Life has changed and Flipboard is now the most used app on my tablet. And since I wrote my post on Google Reader replacements, I've had a lot of people ask me what benefits I gain using Flipboard that they missed! So I've put together this information to help you get started using Flipboard or get more out of using Flipboard."

"As of the Mountain Lion version, Apple's Mail is better than ever at helping you manage your email. And Google's Web-based Gmail is also pretty good-but how do you combine the two in just the right way so as to get the best of both? The answer is simple-follow my guide below, wherein I describe my favorite way to balance a few features and compromises to make Mail and OS X work best with the Gmail Way."

Let's CC is not a search engine, but rather offers quick and easy access to search services provided by other independent organizations from one single page just like search.creativecommons.org. CC Korea has no control over the results that are returned and makes no warranties whatsoever regarding the results. If you are in doubt you should contact the copyright holder directly, or try to contact the site where you found the contents. Let's CC uses APIs provided by Fiickr, Jamendo, ccMixter, Youtube and Slideshare, so you can find CC-licensed images, sounds, videos and docs at once with just one click. You can also save your favorite works and add tags to them. They are stored in My Favorites folder, so you can see them anytime you want. On My Favorites page, you can manage previously marked as favorite contents and add tags to them. Moreover, Let's CC contents that have been marked as favorite will appear at the top of the search results so that users will be able to find more relevant contents easily.

Two years ago I wrote a column for Inside Higher Ed entitled "The iPad for Academics." Now, two years and two new models of iPad later, it seems time to revisit some of that original column: How well does it stand up, how did my predictions turn out, and what have I learned since then? The answers are, roughly, "good" "O.K." and "a lot." When I wrote my column, no one was sure what the future held for the iPad, and there was serious skepticism about the more apocalyptic predictions. In fact, somewhat boringly, Apple's release of the iPad did what most Apple products do -- change the world, sell millions of units, and alter our information ecosystem irrevocably -- but it didn't end the world.

It never ceases to amaze me how Google has become such an integral part of our lives. Search has evolved in such colossal proportions and especially with the advent of Google instant my belief that Google can actually read my mind has only been fortified. Search Marketers around the world are always on their Toes and as Google states "Don't try to follow our algorithm but try to think about the direction in which we are heading, build content for the users and not the search engines". I sometimes wonder if Google was actually a person he would be an amazing election candidate. But then again the high and mighty also have their share of secrets, secrets that should never come up, what I am about to reveal can be touted as one of the many chapters of the Da Vinci of Google.

I've been thinking and reading about what it would be like to teach a (math) class in a school with a Bring Your Own Device policy. My answer: "My class will teach the world what they learn with me. Everything will be accessible online and on a mobile device." Here's what I would set up:

"Like most technology fans, I am always ready and willing to try any technology that promises to simplify my life. QR codes seemed to present an accessible and uniform way for people with smart devices to interact with advertising, marketing and media. Those little squares of code seemed to open a world of opportunity and potential. But after using them for a length of time, I shifted my perspective."

I have managed to get the Windows powered assessment and reporting software Accelerus that our school uses running on my OSX laptop. Check out the screenshot below. Was a bit tricky but Google was my friend as I tried out a couple of different ideas. The best guide I found was perhaps this one. It does require a knowledge of partitions and terminal commands but it worked a treat fo me. Along the way, I learned heaps and enjoyed the tinkering. I might have some fun and try to get Ubuntu Linux running again on this computer.

Every once and a while something comes along that causes me to wonder: Why isn't everyone using this (or something like it)? I look around college classrooms and libraries I find people using the usual suspects of programs:  MS Word and Pages.  I use Pages too, but it's only really good for the final composition of a paper, and it's a terrible research and note taking tool (it's a word processor, not a note taking tool). I've come to the point where nearly all my studies are done with Evernote.  I know there are are a ton of other programs out there (like Zotero, Scrivener, OneNote etc...) and this is not to say that those aren't good programs (I use Zotero with Amazon.com to make bibliographies super easy - but Zotero's note taking tool feels tacked on), but I just happen to use Evernote, heavily.  If you're a student and you are not using something like Evernote, you are probably missing out on being more productive and doing better work.

Decision: To use the Notebook, The Tablet or my iPhone. I think to myself. How do other people view Twitter? Where are they? Who are they and how often to they check Twitter and for how long. I guess this line of thought is why I became a Geographer. Then I thought to myself. I have all the resources I need in my hand to answer these questions. It's nearly lunchtime so I'll post a 24 hours survey, tweet a few invites to participate and tomorrow lunch I can check the results. So I did. Below are the results and some discussion from #WhoTweets. I would like to acknowledge all those who responded and retweeted to the invite to participate. 97 Respondents is a great result. Thank you everyone.

HERE'S a scene in my house: My almost 9-year-old is on the internet doing something or other, and I am not standing over her shoulder or otherwise monitoring her. Is this negligent? Am I throwing her to the wolves? I have no idea how to approach these thorny questions, so I have lunch with the academic and Microsoft researcher, danah boyd (she spells her name in lowercase letters for complicated philosophical and aesthetic reasons), who has studied this cluster of issues in an original and challenging way.

I have teachers ask me frequently about app recommendations for different subject areas. "What app could I use to teach subtraction?" "What app would you recommend for my students to practice writing?" "I want to use iPads in my Science class. What app is good for that?" I usually sigh to myself, when I receive questions like that. While I am not against in suggesting apps ( which I love doing), I am not comfortable with the level of disconnect between the teacher (who knows her/his students best) and the curriculum related skills and objectives and pedagogical relationship that needs to be in place for an app to be a match to use in a classroom or with an individual learner.

My name is Joel Levin. I am a computer teacher at a private school in New York City. This blog chronicles my foray into using Minecraft in the classroom. The results were far from expected.

More recently I've discovered some great new tools to read and share my favorite content which I've included here in this list. Whether you are a person who just likes to stay on top of the latest news, a blogger like me who needs a way to organize the vast amount of information that comes my way or a person who just enjoys sharing what they find with others you'll love this list.

Tag My Doc (Beta) is a time-saving web service that uses QR Codes to share documents. Tag My Doc has a basic free service (and a few paid plans) that enables you to share your documents in real time with anyone and everyone who is interested in it. It is a huge time-saver because it saves you from emailing people individually.

"It's no secret that Google Docs has made teachers more effective at teaching writing. After making a full Google Docs integration this year in my history classroom, I will never go back. My students are required to write every paper in Google Docs. This way, I can help with the process and not just the finished product. In this post, I will talk about using Google Docs and the need for a chrome browser extension called WatchDoc that allows for the most efficient, effective teaching with Google Docs."