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Hohli Online Charts Builder is a nice tool for creating a variety of charts for online display. Using the Hohli Online Charts Builder you can create bar graphs, line graphs, pie charts, Venn diagrams, scatter plots, and radar charts. Hohli Online Charts Builder is a nice tool for creating a variety of charts for online display. Using the Hohli Online Charts Builder you can create bar graphs, line graphs, pie charts, Venn diagrams, scatter plots, and radar charts.

Creating videos used to require that you own expensive equipment and software. Fortunately, that is no longer the case. In fact, now there are many tools you can use to create videos online. Here is a collection of great tools for creating videos online.

"A learning environment expert and education advocate, Elyse is dedicated to improving the teaching of writing by helping educators understand the changing nature of the discipline in a digital age."

One way to empower students is to involve them in the process of analyzing their learning and evaluating their work. When they do, true learning takes place, way beyond the intended curriculum. READ ON to see how you can create rubrics with your students to evaluate student-created videos, writing, or other projects. Included are two examples of rubrics my kindergarten students made to evaluate their digital photo story and our class movie.

Good for any class doing a character study The ever clever Russel Tarr has developed a new neat tool for creating fictional text message exchanges between fictional and or historical characters. The Classtools SMS Generator is free to use and does not require students to log-in. To use the SMS Generator just click the left speech bubble icon and enter a message. Then to create a reply just click the right speech bubble icon and enter a new message. You can make the exchange as long as you like.

<< Smarthistory.org is a free multi-media web-book designed as a dynamic enhancement (or even substitute) for the traditional art history textbook. Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker began smARThistory in 2005 by creating a blog featuring free audio guides in the form of podcasts for use in The Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Soon after, we embedded the audio files in our online survey courses. The response from our students was so positive that we decided to create a multi-media survey of art history web-book. We created audios and videos about works of art found in standard art history survey texts, organized the files stylistically and chronologically, and added text and still images. >>

ABSTRACT This article outlines a learning intervention which the authors call Learning by Design. The goal of this intervention is classroom and curriculum transformation, and the professional learning of teachers. The experiment involves the practical application of the learning theory to everyday classroom practice. Its ideas are grounded in pedagogical principles originally articulated in the Multiliteracies project, an approach to teaching and learning that addresses literacy and learning in the context of new media and the globalizing knowledge economy. The need for a new approach to learning arises from a complex range of factors - among them, changes in society and the economy; the potential for new forms of communication made possible by emerging technologies; and rising expectations amongst learners that education will maximize their potential for personal fulfillment, civic participation and access to work. The authors first brought together the Learning by Design team of researchers and teachers in 2003 in order to reflect upon and create new and dynamic learning environments. A series of research and development activities were embarked upon in Australia and, more recently, in the United States, exploring the potentials of new pedagogical approaches, assisted by digital technologies, to transform today's learning environments and create learning for the future - learning environments which could be more relevant to a changing world, more effective in meeting community expectations and which manage educational resources more efficiently. One of the key challenges was to create learning environments which engaged the sensibilities of learners who are increasingly immersed in digital and global lifestyles - from the entertainment sources they choose to the way they work and learn. It was also about enabling teachers to explicitly track and be aware of the relationship between their pedagogical choices and their students' learning outcomes.

TimeToast allows a user (sign-up required) to create interactive timelines that can be viewed in a Flash environment or a text-based list.  Students can enter text, images and links for any event on the timeline and there is a function to create a span of time for longer events.  Once the timeline is published, it can be shared.  For younger students, it might be good to have a classroom account.

A 3rd grade class creates their own explanations of science mimicking the CommonCraft videos... "BLAH in Plain English"

Kitah Alef, our first graders, received an introductory lesson on properly handling our iPads in the classroom. We created a short video of our rules and tips. Students were excited to be sharing the video with Kindergarten and Pre-schoolers in the future, so they could learn from them.well

Through the ©reativity on Film project, The Film Foundation hopes to create a respect and understanding among young people for the need to protect and preserve our cultural heritage, and enhance their appreciation of art and creation. The Film Foundation uses filmmaking as a point of departure to communicate to young people the important skills they will need to succeed in today's society-such as imagination, collaboration, communication, leadership, and responsibility. The key component of this project is the "Making Movies: A Guide for Young Filmmakers" production manual. Created with the assistance and expertise of 25 professional film artists and educators, this step-by-step production manual includes tips from experts, hands-on exercises, and an 8-week filming schedule-thereby explaining the filmmaking process from story concept to completed film.

As an instructor of undergraduate and graduate students at University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University, I created a syllabus for the benefit of other college/university level instructors. I created a copy of the original syllabus for modification to use with high school students (probably juniors or seniors). I will rely on actual high school teachers to help me modify this source document. Please feel free to use, modify, and share this syllabus in your own way. Reorder the modules, add or subtract required or recommended texts and learning activities. Use your own assessment methods. If you wish to help improve this seed document, contact howard@rheingold.com and I will add you as a commenter and/or editor. 

Summary via The Scout Report (May 2012): "Mocku.ps is a tool created to help designers share their mockups quickly via the Internet. Visitors don't have to sign up to create an account, and they can get started by just uploading their images to the desktop. After this, they can annotate their mockup, and share the URL with other interested parties. First-time users can look at the example offered here and also look over the FAQ area. This version is compatible with all operating systems. [KMG]"

Summary via The Scout Report (April 2012): "The Sumanas Corporation was created in 1994 to help design accurate and interesting products for higher education. Along on the way, they have seen fit to create a range of complementary online animations for students and teachers interested in biology. On this page, visitors will find 37 helpful animations that cover a range of topics. The first two on the site address meiosis and mitosis and they are a good place to start for any student of general biology. Each one of the animations includes audio narration, along with a step-by-step tutorial and a short quiz. Other favorites here include "The Scientific Method" and "Simple Stimuli Trigger Fixed Behaviors" Overall, the site is well-designed and it may pique the curiosity of those who haven't thought much about biology in some time. [KMG]"

I have written several posts before on the importance of making presentation meaningful and interesting. Not just creating a PowerPoint because it's the easiest tool for you to create a visual representation of your content. Comic books are what I consider to be attention grabbers. After bringing out several samples, you now have the student's attention. It's what you do with that attention that really matters. For this post I thought I would share some great web 2.0 tools that allow you and your students to make comic books. I urge you to make these assignments interesting, and relevant. Make sure that they are strongly tied to important curriculum standards and benchmarks. Just because the form of presentation and activity creation is "fun" does not mean that the substance in the curriculum is not important.

Great tips for google apps schools including: Create and assignment In Box with Google forms How to use the revision history Create and use templates

We want to ensure student safety as well as monitor and filter their online behavior. As Web 2.0 becomes more popular and educational technology online sites replace desktop software, this has become more of an issue. A lot of subscription-based or ed tech sites require a student email address to create an account which can become a BIG issue when dealing with CIPA compliance, because a majority of students to not have a school email account. Here are 20 Web 2.0 sites that do not require a student email address to create an account. This list is in alphabetical order. 

Post I wrote a while back on Creating Common Craft style videos. Some good examples of student work here too.

To help schools with the tasks of creating an iBook using iBooks Author an iBook has been created that you can download here that provides the following information:What is an iBook?Content and Design of your iBookiBooks AuthorPreviewing and Publishing your iBookHow to share your iBook copyResources

The fact is that creating a quality infographic is not an easy task and not everyone can do it properly.  It takes design skills, time, a good computer program and patience to get it just right.  Unfortunately not everyone has those qualities and so as a result, a lot of infographics end up in the email trash bin.  But done properly, an infographic can be a really beautiful and informative thing, a feast on the eyes.