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Assignment, Module 3 - Edmodo.com is a free, secure, social learning site for classrooms.  It is a blogging-type platform that allows users to share ideas, post questions, polls, files, links, and other assignments.  Students can create an avatar for responding to the assignment.  It also allows for mobile access and messaging.  It includes a class calendar, a grading application, and RSS feeds.  Educators can set up a secure site for each class or learning unit.  It can be employed in a  synchronous or asynchronous format.   Also, it includes a teacher connections forum.

* Edmodo is a social networking/learning management system tool for students and teachers to engage and personalize learning, connect with resources, and measure progress. It can be used for essential or generative learning through participation in discussion threads, learning groups and communities, delivery of content for assignments and resources, and taking tests and quizzes. * I found Edmodo to be better than other authentic assessment activity resources because many teachers use it as a learning management system, it is easy to use and provides a safe and secure online classroom environment that is free. Edmodo also provides the capability of interfacing assignment and assessments with other web resources.

This website provides a list for how teachers can incorporate Google Docs in the classroom. Teachers will be excited about participating in this training because it can eliminate the fear of losing data, having multiple files of the same document, or the limitations of using one computer. Using this website will help teachers see the positive advantages for learning about Google Docs.

Authentic assessments are a great way to see if learning is transferable beyond a multiple choice test, but how do you determine if the objectives have been met? The answer: rubrics! Rubristar is a free online tool used to create rubrics for any subject. Rubristar also allows the user to connect to a community database of saved rubrics to use or modify to meet their individual needs.

This site allows the teacher to build authentic assessments based on the goals of the activity. The rubric can be saved and posted to email, wiki site, and as a pdf. file for use by the learner.

This site demonstrates how to use the Snipping Tool in Microsoft software to capture images on the screen. This tool is helpful in creating pre-training tutorials where learners discover how to insert media into the computer and download files. This process generates essential learning as participants select tutorials necessary to build prior knowledge of workshop skills. The snipping tool is quick, easily accessible, and produces quality images effortlessly uploaded into a slideshow.

Bubbl.us is a very simple brainstorming/mindmapping tool. In my workshop (Using Wikis in Education) I will use the graphic organizer as a pre-training tool to introduce the purposes for using a wiki in education. This will be a good tool for essential processing because the learners will be exposed to key concepts before the main learning event takes place. The learners will be given the key concepts in the primary nodes in the mindmap as the categories under which they will classify their new learning. Bubbl.us allows the learner to map out ideas and make connections. I liked this site because the mindmap was simple to create and it could be easily exported as a JPEG file. The only drawback is that I wish that it had the ability to import pictures/graphics and notes.

Prezi is a web-based presentation tool using a map layout and zooming to show contextual relationships.

What it is: Prezi is an online presentation software that allows collaboration among multiple users to create unique multimedia presentations. Why it's better: Instead of a traditional slide presentation, Prezi provides a platform to create presentations that are as creative as each individual user. Images, sounds, videos, and text can all be mixed together to create the most effective presentation possible.

Prezi is a presentation tool that can either be created online or offline. It offers collaboration among users and has zoom features to highlight information. Presentations can be viewed from a desktop, iPad, or iPhone. One way that Prezi can be used for essential learning is to segment a presentation to make it learner-paced. This website offers a better product for keeping learners engaged.

The purpose of this site is to create many different kinds of rubrics. A workshop participant can use a rubric to determine how much they learned during the workshop and self-assess if they have met the workshop's objectives. This site is exemplary because it leads the user step-by-step through the creation of a rubric. The site contains templates for all subject areas. Users can also search for and use rubrics that have already been created.

This site is a must see for all educators who are creating problem based learning or projects. Teachers can create their own template or use the read- made templates. The file can be exported for use or saved for future editing.

* Brief description of Web site: A free tool to help users (i.e. educators) create quality rubrics. Registered users can save and edit rubrics online. They can also access these created rubrics from any location. * Brief explanation of why you found this site to be better than others you found: Besides the fact that this is a free resource, users have the option of using templates provided by the site or creating their rubric from scratch. The site also offers step by step tutorials.

The graphic organizers provided here are, for the most part, plain in appearance. These will allow students to create their own look to these organizers whenever possible. The files are presented in .pdf format. There are approximately 80 different graphic organizers on this site. I found the options in this site more adaptable to different uses. Plus I prefer some of the editing options in Adobe Acrobat over MS Word and PowerPoint.

Freeology offers a variety of graphic organizer templates that can be printed for use in the classroom. The graphic organizers help students to maintain focus on what is the most important within the content area or topic of study. These organizers allow the learner to organize the information in an easy to read and user friendly method.

Online quiz making tool. Well-suited to assessing essential learning. Explanation of choice: Free and, unlike others I found, was selected for ISTEs 101 Best web sites 2005-2006.

This site allows users to create online quizzes and organize results. This site is effective, because it allows the user to create questions that have multimedia files attached instead of just basic questions with no graphics or videos. Students can also review quizzes and see what the correct answers were if they missed any questions. The site also guides the user through any possible dilemmas by providing a page of FAQ's and a link to contact the QuizStar support team.

Quizstar is an online assessment tool. Instructors can create quizzes online for their students to take. Quizzes can be made in many languages. Quizstar allows multimedia attachment to quizzes.

Online graphic organizer creation tool. Great for generative learning processes helping students make connections to prior learning. Explanation of choice: Recommended because it is online, free, and unlike other tools, no signup is required.

Gliffy provides users with an online interface for creating flowcharts, diagrams, and other graphic organizers. This site allows users to either choose from predesigned templates or to build graphic organizers from scratch. The diagrams can be easily saved as .jpeg files or published to the Internet. This online interface makes is possible for users to visually depict essential material and then develop the necessary connections for generative processing. This website is better than other sites that offer access to graphic organizers because users have the choice between preformatted templates and creating their own diagrams. In addition, users are responsible for inputting the relevant information related to their project. In addition, this website allows users to create their diagrams on the computer rather than simply printing off templates and completing them by hand.

Gliffy allows users to create custom graphic organizers. Starting with a basic design, users can edit the graphic organizer to fit their needs, based on the content. Customization includes additional boxes, connections, or color. A teacher could also begin to fill in the graphic organizer with major topics or key terms. With a pro account, users can add collaborators or publish the graphic organizer to the web. Gliffy can contribute to essential and generative processing by allowing learners to manage and organize the information being presented to them. It is better than other similar sites because it allows the user to customize the graphic organizer to the needs created by the content.

This is a great online alternative to Power Point. It allows you to create power point style presentations that can be shared via a url or downloaded. It is a great alternative first, because its free and still offers most of the common options used in Power Point. Being able to share it via url, and allow the users to download it as an html.

Very easy to use site for creating online, collaborative presentations (a la PowerPoint). The site offers very little in terms of how-to information, and it is primarily at the generative level of cognitive processing, focusing on creating and applying the tool. However, it is a very simple interface, much like PowerPoint stripped down to the basics. Its advantages are ease-of-use, share-ability, privacy options, and the ability to download presentations.

Description: This site requires users to register in order to save and access presentations. It is simple and easy to use. Presentations can be accessed from any computer without downloading special plug-ins. Explanation: This is a good tool for users to create online presentations for sharing or accessing from anywhere. It is preferred to other sites because it is easy to use and free.

Google docs is a great way to merge existing documents, with the ability to create and organize documents online. It is better than a lot of other options because it is free, and transfers across computer platforms.

Google docs is a web based productivity platform that allows the creation of documents, spreadsheets, diagrams and forms. Multiple users can access files simultaneously, allow for collaboration.

Google has a ton of free resources that have the same functionality as Powerpoint or Keynote. One of the great components of Google Docs is the ability to collaborate with others through real time chat or make comments/revisions to a document. For a presentation, Google Docs has a presentation tool that is easy to use, free, and accessible from any location with an internet connection. Although the presentations are not flashy, they help teachers incorporate multimedia into their instruction and make the technology accessible for all of their students.

This website from UNC has a user test for Blackboard. It includes a discussion forum test, an upload file test, and a quiz test. It is well organized in that you have to pass the first test to get a password to complete the second, and then the second to complete the third. The benefit is that it is open to anyone (you get a universal login) and it is in the real platform, so it is authentic.

This document sharing website allows users to share a large variety of documents for free. The user just has to upload their document to their dropbox and anyone with permission to view their dropbox will have access to the document. The site provides a short tutorial on using dropbox and provides users with a free account with a large storage capacity. For more storage users can upgrade their account or get other users to sign up for a free account. This site does not offer the ability to collaborate in real time, but it supports all file formats.

This is a free site that lets you import images to create a slide show or a quiz along with an mp3 file to embed in your web page, wiki or blog. I tried this at a professional development development conference and found it to be extremely user friendly and a cinch to put together. I like how I can create a quiz with images and text on a screen to ask a question or make a comment.

* Brief description of Web site: A free tool that allows user the ability to enhance their fast-paced online conversations. Users can create images and videos of what they see on their computer screen, and then share them instantly with others. * Brief explanation of why you found this site to be better than others you found: Besides the fact that this is a free resource, this tool allows for various modes of multimedia, including images/graphics, text, and narration.

Jing is an online computer service that provides its users with the capability to capture basic video, animation, and still images, while also being able to share what has been captured on the web with others. Jing can capture anything displayed on the computer screen, including pictures, video, and even movements of the mouse. The final product can be saved for further use, shared online, or emailed to others, but videos are limited to five minutes. Jing is considered a technology-centered program that has the capability to produce learning. The technology-centered approach fails to lean to lasting improvements in education, therefore, the use of Jing alone would not warrant effective learning. This particular screencasting program is one of the best, because it is free and it can be used in a number of ways (from pre-training, to teaching, to presenting).

o Jing is a screencast program where users can create a video of their screens while narrating instructions. In addition, users can develop screenshots with notations to create manuals and instructions. Students can demonstrate procedural knowledge through the use of this program and make sense of processes. In addition, teachers can share vast guidance on how online programs and feature work through the creation of screencasts. o The site is free which is pretty incredible considering you can also host your videos and share them via a url which makes emailing large files much easier. The site is easy to use and the quality of the screencasts remarkable.