Some interesting Web apps
There are so many cool Web apps out there, it is hard to just talk about a few. I encourage you to try any new Web app that you think might help support teaching and learning and add your favorite(s) to the comments below!
Alltop.com presents a categorized page of RSS feeds in all types of categories, education included. It is an easy way to quickly get feeds from the most prolific, informational, and news-worthy blogs. When trying to explain the concepts of RSS and aggregation during a professional development session for teachers, I found demonstrating Alltop a good way to introduce them to those topics by letting them investigate the site.
Voicethread has really become popular with educators. A Voicethread "is an online media album that can hold essentially any type of media (images, documents and videos) and allows people to make comments in 5 different ways - using voice (with a microphone or telephone), text, audio file, or video (with a webcam) - and share them with anyone they wish. A VoiceThread allows group conversations to be collected and shared in one place, from anywhere in the world." It is easy to use, powerful, and a lot of fun!
Twitter is a wonderful tool. Imagine having access to all your personal and professional friends and colleagues for help and support all of the time! Educators are using Twitter to share and gather facts and information from other educators all over the world. Users keep a client open on their desktop, and another user can post a question (I asked my education friends about their school-sponsored student e-mail naming conventions yesterday before deciding what ours would be) and the wonderful, helpful education community always comes through with plenty of suggestions and thoughts! Users can write to you directly or answer the question by directing the answer to you but allowing others to see the answer, too. The "tweets" are limited to 140 characters, so I have become a very succinct question and answer creator!
These three are enough to keep you occupied for hours-- have fun and please share your new discoveries with the rest of us in the comments!
Alltop.com presents a categorized page of RSS feeds in all types of categories, education included. It is an easy way to quickly get feeds from the most prolific, informational, and news-worthy blogs. When trying to explain the concepts of RSS and aggregation during a professional development session for teachers, I found demonstrating Alltop a good way to introduce them to those topics by letting them investigate the site.
Voicethread has really become popular with educators. A Voicethread "is an online media album that can hold essentially any type of media (images, documents and videos) and allows people to make comments in 5 different ways - using voice (with a microphone or telephone), text, audio file, or video (with a webcam) - and share them with anyone they wish. A VoiceThread allows group conversations to be collected and shared in one place, from anywhere in the world." It is easy to use, powerful, and a lot of fun!
Twitter is a wonderful tool. Imagine having access to all your personal and professional friends and colleagues for help and support all of the time! Educators are using Twitter to share and gather facts and information from other educators all over the world. Users keep a client open on their desktop, and another user can post a question (I asked my education friends about their school-sponsored student e-mail naming conventions yesterday before deciding what ours would be) and the wonderful, helpful education community always comes through with plenty of suggestions and thoughts! Users can write to you directly or answer the question by directing the answer to you but allowing others to see the answer, too. The "tweets" are limited to 140 characters, so I have become a very succinct question and answer creator!
These three are enough to keep you occupied for hours-- have fun and please share your new discoveries with the rest of us in the comments!
Labels: Kathy Schrock
posted by Kathy Schrock at 4:16 AM
7 Comments:
I just spent the week putting together a digital backpack of web applications and online resources for students and staff at our school to use. I am looking for feedback. Check out my post about it at Techno Constructivist. There is so much out there and it is hard to keep it all straight. I really do think web apps are the wave of the future (at least for casual use) and most of them promote or at least foster collaboration.
It is hard to know which interesting web apps I would recommend, but I’d like to introduce you to a new teacher online resource called the Teaching Post. The site is still in beta (like everything) and there are a few bugs in it, but it looks like an exciting resource for teachers to upload video, audio, and document resources to support their teaching. Teachers can form groups or make their resources public for everyone which makes it easier to share the teaching instead of just talk about it. http://theteachingpost.com/
I have a wiki that catalogues all the web 2.0 tools that I find as well as a number of other resources. I got a few new links off this post so thanks!
http://educationalsoftware.wikispaces.com
I am collecting examples of how educators are using Voicethread in their classroom or for professional development on a wiki at: http://voicethread4education.wikispaces.com/
My plan is to share these examples with other technology teachers who provide professional development in their schools.
Feel free to add your own examples or links to resources. Thanks in advance,
Colette Cassinelli
http://www.edtechvision.org
I'm building a Flash-based application for building historical / project-planning timelines. It's called Mnemograph. There will be lots of import/export options, collaboration, and the whole API shebang, some day. Here's a sample timeline about the Wright Brothers. SEEKING EDUCATIONAL BETA TESTERS!! You can sign up here.
Good suggestions, Kathy. I think we're going to see Alltop grow in popularity and use.
I'd also suggest that teachers take a look at Ustream as it's contributions are infinite.
For even more, take a look at http://clifmims.com/blog/archives/142.
I am a prospective teacher working his way through college. Your site is amazing. I am going to have to keep checking it out. I love the RSS feed app called Alltop. I used to use news.google.com for my news source. However, I already know that I am going to be switching to Alltop because of its large variety of categories that appeal to me.
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