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Planet Nutshell produces short animated videos to explain products, services, and concepts. One of their series of videos is all about the Internet and Internet safety for K-12 students. The series is called NetSafe and it has 17 episodes that were produced for the Utah Education Network.

This article is a good definition of what a community of practice (CoP) is and how they are used. It is not specific to online/social networks but offers good background on how communities are formed and what they are used for. With this general knowledge can be applied to many specific domains such as a personal learning network, a google circle or an anime club.

Free Online Interactive Whiteboard Teaching Resources for all Subject Areas.

fun, interactive drawing site---simple line drawings are transformed into a story

Another great resource for presentation software. It's got a fairly easy learning curve. I think it would be a great way for students to demonstrate learning.

An online learning environment based around GBL!

High-quality footage and educational animation/simulations from NASA searchable by age group and topic.

8th grade students in New York were given the assignment to tweet about the book and movie animal farm as they studied those. The students felt that it took a potentially "boring" project and made it more fun. They got deeper insight into the material than if they had just done it by themselves. This assignment could be done for any number of topics or mediums.

How do you spur curiosity? Just ask the six quirky characters of Smithsonian's Seriously Amazing Website. The Wild will share the diversity of the animal kingdom; The Green reflects the wonder of the natural landscape; The New will show how technology and creativity collide; The Masterpiece embodies artistic expression; The Storyteller shares the tales of the people of America; The Discoverer explores the world and universe. Seriously Amazing links the knowledge and resources of the Smithsonian Institution and sparks a spirit of inquiry. Grades 3-12. Tip: Challenge students to select one of the 6 areas of exploration and learn 5 new facts to share with the class.

In an animated video, Steven Johnson examines how good ideas develop. He proposes they rarely happen in a moment, but develop over time. It is necessary for those good ideas to come in contact with other good ideas from outside sources. When we have systems that allow for these ideas to come together, we are creating an atmosphere where better ideas can flourish. He believes that an increase in using the internet will lead to an increase in connectivity and more good ideas than ever before.

I enjoyed this video very much! Somethings are so obvious but the realization doesn't hit until you hear it or read it. In this case, I enjoyed the narration of how a good idea is very seldomly an "Eureka" moment. The internet was a work in progress for 10 years. I had no idea! Something that struck me is that great, life-changing ideas are usually a collaborative effort. I can also appreciate the narrator's stand that it is possible that all of the digital distractions might actually hinder those ideas. But, with technology collaboration on those ideas has gotten a little easier.

A site which gives a lot of great information on multimedia and hypermedia uses in the classroom, as well as many informational resources.

There is a clear disconnect between the media students are accustomed to using outside the classroom and the media they predominantly use within the classroom. Students spend copious amounts of their free time socializing, shopping, and even studying on the Internet, where they are flooded with text, images, video, animation, and sound in what is a complex multimedia environment.

I have to balance reading with other learning sources and so this video on Communities of Practice in action is simple and effective. It focuses on uk govt as as example but covers the main idea, if not the academic theory. Person, working with others, driven to connect, collaborate and learn. Simple but effective

This video was helpful in showing how a Community of Practice is useful to individuals. I also found it helpful to be reminded that there may also be a face to face element in a Community of Practice, and it does not all have to be digital.

This is a great site for students to upload a picture of either themselves or a figure in history and record a voice over. Great for a biography or autobiography assignment.

Blabberize allows you to quickly create an animated character that speaks in your voice.

VoiceThread is a collaborative multimedia slide show tool that supports voice, video, animated commenting, and several document formats.

Transforming media into collaborative spaces with video, voice and text commenting.

Presentations with added voice, video and text comments.

Prezi is a next-generation presentation tool that allows you to create animated presentations on a virtual canvas.

DoInk allows you to easily create vector-based Flash-style animations.

A nice representation displayed by student.

Project K-Nect is designed to create a supplemental resource for secondary at-risk students to focus on increasing their math skills through a common and popular technology - mobile smartphones.

In North Carolina, about 100 ninth-grade students in four schools in North Carolina have been issued smartphones for use in their math classes. They use the phones to network among themselves on problems, receive instruction from teachers, play math-improving games, or watch an animation showing the problem being solved.

Through a grant from a smartphone maker, students were given devices that would allow them to contact other students and tutors about math problems when not at school. It also gave them access to materials for class that they otherwise would not have had away from school. While this wouldn't be applicable in all schools, the social networking aspect of the program helped students better manage their personal learning experience.

Pup's Supper describes the life of a sea otter pup and its mother. It has been animated and made interactive by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Foundation. The aquarium has several live cameras including one in the otter enclosure.