Blogger Web Comments for Firefox extension

Love this new extension for Firefox - Blogger Web Comments for Firefox which makes it easy to see what bloggers are saying about a page you are viewing (in Firefox). Up pops a message, date it was posted, a link to the blog comment and an opportunity to respond with your own comment. Cool!

The best Web 2.0 software for 2005

Dion Hinchcliffe's "Best Web 2.0 software for 2005" provides links to a range of innovative Web 2.0 software releases in many categories as well as giving credit "to all the hard-working folks building the next generation of the Web." The list highlights the amazing range of web apps with a focus on the quality releases for 2005 and an invitation for community input to broaden the list.

Dion's posting has already attracted a considerable number of additional suggestions including new categories for consideration. And links to other collections of the top Web 2.0 apps for 2005 including Mark Millerton's "Top 10 Innovative Web 2.0 Applications of 2005"

Well worth a browse!

In search of Learning Object Metadata Editors

I was alerted to this resource from Stephen's Web for highlighting Norm Friesen's page on LOM Editors .

This resource provides an overview of a range of LOM editing/creation tools which "support the creation of high-quality learning object metadata" necessary for successful implementation of the IEEE LOM standard. It provides brief descriptors and links to a list of tools (updated post 2004 and readily available) which users can test and evaluate.

"CanCore suggests that tools for metadata editing and management should generally expose their users to as little of the complexity of LOM element names and structures as possible... (as the) ... significance and complexity of many of these names and structures are likley to be challenging except for very specialized users."

Tools include the popular Reload v 2.0. Alas, some of the other links were dead when I tried to access them tonight.

Also interested in exploring the potential of the New Zealand open source eXe tool (off-line authoring environment to assist teachers and academics in the publishing of web content without the need to become proficient in HTML or XML markup).
Anyone else trialling eXe?

Shortlist for the 2005 Edublog Awards

Browse the Shortlist for the 2005 Edublog Awards (see previous post) and keep up to date with comments tagged in Technorati. Even more feeds to add to my aggregator!

Less than a week to vote for your favourites in each category. Alas, only one vote per category.
Register your votes before Dec 17th.

Del.icio.us now in the Yahoo! stable

Social Software tools are proving to be a big hit with Yahoo! Del.icio.us is now officially part of the Yahoo! stable just like Flickr earlier this year.
Thanks, Joshua Schachter, (founder of Del.icio.us) for developing a brilliant Read/Write/Web social bookmarking tool for a growing and empowered community (power of folksonomy!).

I'm a big fan of Web 2.0 tools and Del.icio.us is one of my favourites. Richard MacManus expresses a concern: "Yahoo! acquires del.icio.us - just don't make it a walled garden, like My Web 2.0!" Hopefully, we will continue to see improvements but not at the expense of keeping Del.icio.us free and open, including its handy integration tools. What's that about "shutting the stable door..."?

Edublogs Awards 2005

Nominations are open for the 2005 Edublog Awards until December 4th. The awards are open to edubloggers in a host of categories. (nominations are restricted to 2 per category)
The categories include: * Most innovative edublogging project, service or programme * Best newcomer * Most influential post, resource or presentation * Best library/librarian blog * Best teachers blog * Best example/case study of use of weblogs within teaching and learning and 4 more.
The four most popular, eligible nominations in each category will be posted to the Awards site and votes can be cast from 5th December to 17th December.
I'm nominating my favourites from around the globe, including a number of Aussie bloggers.
Check out a range of Australian edubloggers on the Australian Edubloggers wiki.

Learning Technologies Conference 2005 wiki

The theme for this year's Learning Technologies Conference (QLD) is "Combined Presence."
The program promises an exciting mix of discussion and showcasing emerging technologies and the challenges and opportunities these present to 21st century educators and learners.
The conference wiki will provide a collaborative space for the conference community and interested others to participate.

Presentations and papers relate to innovative combinations and best practices using learning technologies ... blends of real time and stored (audio, visual and web) media. These include "Social Software - the Age of Connection and the Connected Learner," "Videoblogs and Podcasting, New Knowledge and Old Pedagogies," "Zero to Collaboration in Seconds," and "Rich Media Presence in Education: Is it the Next Wave?" and much more!

Gerry White (Education Au) is giving the keynote address on "Australian Skills for the 21st Century" (overview of changes in Australia with reference to ICT in the VET sector and ICT skills needed for Australia to be successful in a global society).

Edublogs, uniblogs and now learner blogs

Bloggers never had it so good with the advent of sibling blogging sites to edublogs (education professionals). Uniblogs for lecturers and uni students and best of all learner blogs for students, thanks to James Farmer.
There is growing interest in blogging in middle and senior school settings but concerns around safety.
Learner blogs aims to provide a safe environment for students to join the blogosphere. Uses WPMU technology. "Only one blog per user is allowed, but you can have unlimited users, and you can have multiple users on a single blog." More information on blogsavvy (James Farmer)

Yackpack

Discovered Yackpack while browsing. This looks like an interesting new social collaboration tool. Focus on sharing audio messages amongst a group of friends/colleagues. Could be useful in the e-portfolio learning community for collaboration.

Can you trust Wikipedia? (The Guardian)

One of several articles (this one from The UK Guardian) emerging on the veracity of Wikipedia.
Makes use of a "panel of experts" to assess accuracy of entries.
(Critical Literacy)
Wikipedia is my first port of call for emerging technologies, Read/Write web in particular.

Noted many Wikipedia references in the recent publication, "EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES: A framework for thinking" by Education Au for ACT Department of Education and Training.

Word verification feature

Implemented "word verification" for posts and comments to prevent comment spam after encountering some examples of automated advertising comments. A much appreciated feature in Blogger.

eHub (Emily Chang)

Reviewing my Del.icio.us tags for Web 2.0 and re-visited Emily Chang's eHub.
"eHub is a constantly updated list of web applications, services, resources, blogs or sites with a focus on next generation web (web 2.0), social software, blogging, Ajax, Ruby on Rails, location mapping, open source, folksonomy, design and digital media sharing."

Currently has resource links and interviews for 302 resources, including alpha versions of new tools. A taste of things to come in Web 2.0 tools.

E-learning 2.0 (Stephen Downes)

Great article from Stephen Downes on E-Learning 2.0 in eLearn magazine, referenced from his OL Daily. Explores the whole new world of e-learning in the Web 2.0 environment.

Congrats to Mike Roach - PM's Prize for Science Education

Congratulations to Mike Roach who was awarded the Prime Minister's Award for Science education. Mike is a dedicated teacher and mentor, passionate about space science and willing to share his passion and enthuse others.
View a pic of Mike receiving his award from the PM.
Mike is currently investigating the effect a 24 hour TV satellite feed from NASA has on student learning.

Directory of Australian edubloggers

The Directory of Australian edubloggers wiki is a useful resource to locate other Australians interested in blogging and podcasting in educational settings.

Learning Technologies blog

Just joined The Learning Technologies User Group (LTUG) professional support service for organisations and individuals using learning technologies.
Read the blog to get some idea of the rich dialogue and interests of the membership.

Emerging Technologies: a framework for thinking

Have just downloaded the Emerging Technologies: a framework for thinking (pdf report) developed by Education Au for the ACT Dept of Education on emerging technologies (infrastructures, classroom and teaching tools, and delivery devices) relevant to education and training in pre-school, school and VET sectors. Technologies are no longer considered "emerging" when they are considered "must haves" such as has happened with e-mail.
Major focus is on technologies directly relating to the delivery and enhancement of teaching and learning.
Extremely comprehensive listing with brief summaries on educational uses and benefits and issues for each and some references to case studies. Definitions (and abbreviations) are clearly provided.
The report includes DR and IP; equity & accessibility; pedagogy & ICT; open source; web services; Standards; LMS; personalisation; digital student report card systems; plagiarism detection; virtual classrooms; IWBs; e-Portfolios; PDAS; Tablet PCs; gaming technologies; assistive technologies; syndication RSS & ATOM; podcasts & vodcasts; blogs and wikis; VoIP; moblogs; P2P; Smart Cards; a decision making matrix and much more, including an extensive reference list.
An excellent resource for educators!

Trying out edublogs | WordPressMu blog

Opened an account at edublogs to trial edublogs. Same theme but southozzie. Haven't found much time to post here at this stage.
Edublogs has opened up a new community.

ScreenCastsOnline resource

ScreenCastsOnline is new online resource with a Mac bias. Podcasting (Pt 1) - Create your own Podcast caught my eye (covering a tutorial on using Garage Band). A popular resource, shooting up to position 99 in the iTunes Top 100 subscribed podcasts within a few weeks!.

Took the opportunity to update my iTunes to v5 on the weekend.

Can Technology Enhance Learning? session

If you missed the live Elluminate session of Anne Bartlett-Bragg, "Can Technology Enhance Learning?" this week, visit the Learning Times Australia website to locate the archived version about learning in the age of connection. The focus was on future learning paradigms and the potential of social software. It's not about renovating learning with technology but radically reconceptualising learning culture in a new era of customisable learning environments.
Challenges and Issues rounded out a stimulating discussion.

You need to register (free) first to access the LTA community.

21st century literacies

While exploring some references to podcasts, I came across this link on Kathleen Bennet's blog on 21st century literacies. It provides a succinct summary and direct link to the downloadable pdf report "Global Imperative" Report of the 21st Century Literacy Summit developed by Adobe Systems, the George Lucas Foundation and New Media Consortium.

The report highlights the "profound shift... taking place in the way people communicate and express themselves;"... a " new form of communication and self-expres­sion occurs multimodally, incorporating visual and aural elements with textual elements, and an immediacy which itself is a di­mension of the new language."

This shift is recognised as occurring in many countries across the globe and has profound implications for curriculum standards, teaching and learning, teacher professional development and accreditation.

The definition of 21st century literacy refers to ... "the set of abilities and skills where aural, visual and digital literacy overlap. These include the ability to understand the power of images and sounds, to recognize and use that power, to manipulate and transform digital media, to distribute them pervasively, and to easily adapt them to new forms."

The report recognises the inadequacy of schooling experiences and outdated curriculum for young, often disengaged people. Poor attendance and retention rates are part of the equation.

21st century literacy characteristics are deemed to be multimodal, encouraging creative fluency and interpretive facility, new grammar and rules of construction (using vocabulary and tools relevant to their experiences), interactive communication (in a web 2.0 connected learning environment) a sense of immediacy, ability to use media to evoke emotional responses and a potential to transform the way we learn.

The report makes for fascinating reading and poses the question, "What does a world that values 21st century literacy look like?"

Does this sit well in a climate of ever increasing basic skills testing and plain language reporting?

Australian e-Portfolio Conference

The Australian e-Portfolio Conference is scheduled for Dec 6 and 7 2005 at Uni of Melbourne. It will be held in conjunction with EIfEL (European Institute for E-Learning). The conference strands include *ePortfolios for Higher Education; *ePortfolios for learning - pre-school, school, ‘not school’; *Professional portfolios; *Digital storytelling; *Mobile learning; *ePortfolios policy issues; *Knowledge Management and *ePortfolio software.
TAFE Victoria is sponsoring a debate, "Should everyone have an e-Portfolio?" The TAFE VC e-Portfolio website offers educators an opportunity to create your own personal space (10Mb limit). Note conditions.
Refer to previous posts on the open source Elgg software highlighted at various European e-Portfolio workshops/conferences.

What is RSS and why should you care?

As an avid fan of RSS, I was pleased to see Search Engine Watch dedicating some space to RSS.
Search Engine Watch has provided an easy to understand 3 part series on RSS feeds with Part 1 on What is RSS and why should you care? These contain useful links for those discovering RSS, possibly for the first time, or curious to find out more about feeds.
Part 2 is on RSS Search Engines and includes a comparison on different search engines, giving the thumbs up to Yahoo as "arguably the farthest along with RSS. Yahoo's advanced search lets you limit results to XML, RDF and RSS file types." Easy integration with MyYahoo! personalised space.
Part 3 in the series (on RSS readers) is out tomorrow.
Lots of different feeds to subscribe to on their webfeeds page.

Open vs Private groups on EdNA Groups

EdNA Groups (based on Moodle) has proved to be very successful in the short 6 months it has been providing a free service to the Australian education and training community. EdNA Groups is updating its services with some custom enhancements which will ultimately enhance Moodle upgrades.
One excellent example is the Online Mentoring Network providing resources, activities and discussion about "exploring tools for, and methods of, mentoring and coaching online." These include collaborative resource wikis on topics such as emerging tools and technologies and mentoring resources.
So what's the controversy?
Leigh Blackall (Teach and Learn Online blog) has posted thoughts on whether EdNA Groups should provide open or private spaces with an interesting reference to longevity of the resource and the usefulness of social software available elsewhere. Value of folksonomy and aggregation possibilities!
Leigh believes that "... teachers and educationalists would be better spent engaged with the open Network, learning the popular tools and understanding the nature of the Internet..." It is sheltering individuals and groups from 'global conversation'.
I use EdNA Groups, my (work) Moodle site and various social software tools and can see EdNA Groups filling a valuable need in providing opportunities for collaborative workspaces, both open and closed. Some developing communities value the ability to conduct discussions and share resources in a private space, protected from the glare of cyberspace.
I also use and promote social software and Web 2.0 tools in facilitating global dialogue and professional learning.

Engaging Youth with Emerging Technologies

Found this link on the ETN blog to an archived Australian Flexible Learners Network webcast (via Elluminate) on Engaging Youth with Emerging Technologies. Audio was very inconsistent and, at times ear shattering, but the content was well worth the pain! In particular, the discussion on m-learning (a project called txt me - using mobile phones and SMS) with disengaged youth.
Points included multi level preparation, critical criteria, mobile phone etiquette, impact on learners and practitioners. Good advice for those interested in m-learning on how young people view their phones (mobile, personal space) and having a saturation point so avoid use verging on spamming.
Ended with some insights on using podcasts with a similar target group and some URLs to follow up the projects discussed.

Learning 2005 Blog and Podcasts

Learning 2005 event is providing free video, audio and pdf files via this blog in the lead up to the conference. All content is freely available (Creative Commons License). Includes some interesting postings such as "Personalization and Learning" audio (Wayne Hodgins) - reasons for, challenges and future. An area of personal interest.
Other audio files include "Social Networking and The World of Learning" (Elliott Masie) and one with the curious title of "SME Burnout - Subject Matter Experts Exhausted" (Elliott Masie). Add these to my del.icio.us tags on personalisation, folksonomy and investigate SME.

Piczo

Piczo provides another example of a free service (for now at least) for teens >13 and adults who wish to take advantage of the intuitive, instant publishing tools to create a webspace with images and lots of linked pages (use the template or create ones with titles of your choosing) and share ideas and photos with friends.
Very straightforward way to claim your own webspace and get up and running with a professional looking site in a very short time.

Ziepod - new podcast player, search, aggregation

Robin Good has highlighted a new podcasting tool on his MasterNewMedia blog, "Streaming Podcasts Is The Way To Go: Ziepod The Sleek Podcasting Player Is Here." I currently use iTunes 4.9 and have investigated iPodder but this sounds like it is worth exploring as he calls it
"a new, outstandingly designed podcasting player, search tool and aggregator."
Ziepod's site mentions its ease-of-use toolkit for findiing and managing audio-based content (podcasts). Has some cool tools like ratings.
Especially liked the link to Feedzie.com a handy website to locate quality podcasts. Yet another service to evaluate in this range of tools to support podcasting. Search by text feeds, audio feeds and tags. Integrates with Ziepod. Has a nifty slideshow as support material.

Elgg.net Radio launched

I have been exploring the fuctionality of Elgg Learning Landscape, open source software and its functionality for blogs, e-portfolios and social collaboration. Elgg's stated goal is one of "connecting learners, instructors and resources creating communities of learning."
Elgg provides a personal presence online and a set of tools which facilitates interaction. (login with valid e-mail and experiment, obtain a hosted site or download source code and set up your own. Elgg provides all of the following "weblog, journal, store of files like photos and ... documents, communities, social networks." Elgg provides a personal space which can be shared with friends - sense of folksonomy.
Elgg is very exciting and is continually developing, making use of the functionality of Web 2.0 tools.
Elgg.net Radio has just been launched with a range of podcast discussions around emerging technologies, learning landscapes, online pedagogy ... with invited guests such as George Siemens, James Farmer, Helen Barrett and many more. These discussions promise rich and interesting dialogue - a must for your pod catcher.

Social Software highlighted on The Shifted Librarian

Just checked one of my favourite blogs and found this valuable resource: "The Library Social" conference presentation (pdf format) on social software from The Shifted Librarian, Jenny Levine. (Northeast Kansas Library System).
Includes comments on IM, SMS and other tools such as blogs, wikis etc and many examples of social software.
Comprehensive paper with useful links. Posted a link to my del.icio.us social bookmarks to share with others interested in social software, folksonomies.

Konfabulator widgets now in Yahoo! stable

The Konfabulator widget gallery is growing in popularity as more widget makers contribute their widgets, ranging from cool tools and utilites, incorporating RSS, webcams and the like to utterly useless and cute or geekie widgets. The ratings and numbers of downloads give useful clues. Some of the lowly rated widgets still have high download figures! Lots of widget fans must be keeping watch on the gallery judging by the numbers of downloads for some widgets within 24-48 hours of posting to the gallery.

The Loosley Coupled blog provides some thoughts on Yahoo's purchase of Pixoria and acquisition of Konfabulator for the ability of widgets "to feed live information directly to the desktop, bypassing the browser."
Download Konfabulator 2 for Windows or Mac from the Yahoo! Widgets site.

Buckyballs DownUnder

Schools Australia-wide will be participating in 'buckyball' workshops with Nobel Prize winner, Sir Harry Kroto, on 17th August, during National Science week. Workshops will be streamed live to their schools via technology provided by Centra Australia.

Wonderful use of technology to provide not only a series of face to face workshops but also a virtual experience with a world renowned scientist and hundreds of middle and senior school students.

EdNA Online provides additional information on Sir Harry Kroto. "In 1996, (he) won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry, for his discovery of the ball-like C60 carbon molecule, Buckminsterfullerene. This discovery has since had impact on the science of nano-technology." Autobography on NobelPrize.org and Wikipedia and details of his 1996 win in the field of Chemistry.

Wonderful world of web 2.0

Lots of interesting posts relevant to the revolutionary world of web 2.0 which is transforming the way we use the web. I like this posting "Posting, Subscribing, and Tagging" by VC (Fred Wilson) which I came across via a Technorati tag for web 2.0 and discovered how popular it was when I added it to my del.icio.us bookmarks along with 52 others! Blogs, feeds and tags and the new social collaboration or folksonomy are opening up opportunities not possible under web 1.0 but blossoming in the wonderful world of web 2.0.
Fred comments, "We are five years into the posting revolution, two to three years into the subscribing revolution, and maybe one year into the tagging revolution" and there's more to come. What's around the corner?
Another must read posting on web 2.0 is from Troy Angrignon's blog: "Shifting paradigms: The mental evolutionary process of moving from web 1.0 to web 2.0 in 17 steps."

Casting the Net collaborative space

EdNA Groups is hosting a Learnscope "Casting the Net" project in a collaborative space on "audio lessons, MP3 players, audioblogging and podcasting in education".
The focus is on "creation of audio materials" eg podcasting and audioblogging for learners with "low levels of literacy and with auditory learning styles".
Lots of useful resources and tools to provide opportunities for educators to share understandings.

GoogleMaps API

Exploring things geospatial and, thanks to the power of social bookmarking viz. my fabulous del.icio.us bookmarking tool, exploring the powers of the GoogleMaps API.

ZdNet commented on the value of open source power in an article, "Google map API transforms the Web." One example is the combination of GoogleMaps satellite imagery, RSS feeds from the BBC news, images and tagging to produce an uptodate, visual account of the London Terrorist Bomb attacks on geepster.
"Google Maps enabled open source journalism to get the story faster, and get it better, than the mainstream media."
Combination of using the javascript API, satellite imagery, RSS feeds, tags to develop a resource which is visual (multiliteracies), interactive, updated and engaging.

Potential for ICT integration in curriculum. Investigation of contemporary environmental, social, political, health and other issues and using Web 2.0 tools for collaboration, reflection, publishing.

Live 8 blogging and Technorati

Who could miss "Live 8" on the web, TV, radio and other media? I have been following the posts on Technorati (currently 11,060 current posts). An amazing world response to a global crisis and Make Poverty History campaign to influence G8 leaders.
Technorati is promoting world bloggers to participate and add to global voices to make a difference to world poverty through "debt relief, aid and trade justice for Africa."

This statement, from a link on Technorati, on Thinking without a box blog - "Live 8 where were you" refers to the one powerful message we hope to get across.
"But they'll only do it if enough people tell them to. That's why we're staging LIVE 8.
...... 10 concerts, 100 artists, a million spectators, 2 billion viewers, and 1 message ... To get those 8 men, in that 1 room, to stop 30,000 children dying every single day of extreme poverty."
Add your voice and make a difference!

Apple iTunes 4.9 and podcasting

The latest release of iTunes 4.9 makes downloading and organising podcasts and subscribing to podcast feeds much smoother than the previous version. This article from iPodlounge provides a quick overview tutorial and some additional links to resources. Download not only the latest 4.9 version but also the iPod updater (much larger file).

Eduscape blog

A link to my experimental blog, Eduscape. (cross linked from SouthOz E-Learning blog).
Latest posting on Eduscape extols the virtues of tagging and folksonomy made possible by site such as del.icio.us.

Blogging at NECC

Not able to attend NECC June, 2005 (tyranny of distance) but this link will prove useful in keeping up with education and emerging technologies via a number of blogging and podcasting sites.
Lots of presenters offering interaction especially on educational blogging, podcasting, handhelds and moblogging (mobile devices).

E-School News is also offering informal reports during the conference on its site.

Folksonomic discoveries

More on folksonomic discoveries from O'Reilly including commentary on social bookmarking and tags. He lauds the potential of Flickr and 43 Things in providing a self-tagging mechanism with tags to photos in Flickr and tags to personal goals in 43 Things.
"A context in which everyone can freely tag (and categorize things) has come to be called a "folksonomy". Put differently, a folksonomy is a bottoms-up taxonomy created by the people for the people rather than a top-down hierarchy constructed by experts - the usual model for a taxonomy."
Exploration of popular tags and public tags allows users to build and share knowledge and locate blogs and feeds associated with taggers of similar interests.
Gataga social bookmark search and exploration engine, searches a large list of sites including del.icio.us, furl, jots and more, providing the opportunity to save searches as feeds.

Badfruit plugin for iTunes

This item was posted on the Make blog.
Badfruit is a plugin for iTunes (Windows) that allows you to get podcasts through iTunes for your iPod. No need to wait for iTunes 4.9 as this download works with iTunes 4.8.

Tagging and del.icio.us

I have been busy adding to my tags in my del.icio.us account, exploring popular tags and tracking some interesting tags and blogs. Tags of special interest include social bookmarking and folksonomies.
Library Clips blog and The Shifted Librarian blog provide commentary and a range of resources on RSS, tags and folksonomies.
This article on folksonomies by Joshua Porter refers to "a new user-driven approach to organizing information" Such sites "include two basic capabilities: they let users add “tags” to information and they create navigational links out of those tags to help users find and organize that information later." Del.icio.us is cited as one example of such an organizational site.
Jon Aquino's Mental Garden blog comments on turning any feed into a podcast using Audiolicious with text to speech.
Tracking tags in tagcloud makes use of keywords in specified feeds (up to 250) but 50 would be enough. These hyperlinked tags are displayed in a visual interface with the largest fonts representing greatest instances of a keyword.
Trendalicious! provides a "near real-time view of website popularity trends" by displaying URLs "posted by a minimum of two people" within the previous hour and "ranked by the total number of recent posts".
View the most popular tags on del.icio.us.
Found some freeware tools, websites and blogs over the weekend which were posted in del.icio.us such as MediaMan, a free cataloguing tool for media such as DVDs, CDs, Books etc. Includes cool image import and barcode tools, ability to import information eg from Amazon, add custom fields, icons and subcategories, view in a virtual shelf, track or manage items eg on loan to friends and export (compressed) files.

Videoblogging

Videoblogging has taken a step closer for the masses with this downloadable FireAnt Not TV RSS video aggregator and player program for Mac or Windows. Excellent glossary of terms and 'how to's' for first timers with screencasts to get started.
Other useful sites include http://freevlog.org/ with tutorials on creating vlogs with a step by step guide on setting up a videoblog.
Mefeedia.com is a free aggregator for videobloggers (subscribe and tag videoblogs)
All these tools are free, adding to the potential to publish and share rich content on the web.

Going mobile

How to create a podcast
Tutorial on How to Create a podcast using Garage Band and iTunes.
Create the MP3 and the RSS / XML file for the podCast.
Updated June 2, 2005.
Downloaded podcasts aplenty, now ready to experiment with creating podcasts and explore educational use. Added some links to revisit.

Also experimenting with iPodcast Creator program and dabbling with Garage Band.
Another useful resource from Mike Hall's blog is a tutorial on adding a podcast to your pocket PC using Feederreader. (RSS Aggregator with podcast listening and enclosure support for Windows Mobile/ Pocket PC)
Lots of experimentation to do.

Firefox and SAGE 1.3

Firefox and SAGE 1.3
Sage is a lightweight RSS and Atom feed aggregator extension for Mozilla Firefox browser. Live bookmarks integration is now possible in the Firefox browser using SAGE, which can be installed from this site. Sage can interpret Live Bookmarks, allows the user to subscribe to feeds using an auto-discovery process while browsing with Firefox. Sage has a nifty built-in 'Discover Feeds' function which provides a boon for savvy educators.

EFL (Livejournal, Flickr and Moodle)

Interesting reference from Scott's weblog on an approach (by AP Campbell) to teaching an elective EFL course in Kyoto "Internet Communication", where Japanese students use social networking tools for community building for international communication to progress their language learning. This involves integrating Moodle, Flickr, mobile technology and blogging tools (moblogs). An innovative approach with a few hurdles where the student group is more used to teacher-centred instruction.

Emily's World: Tagging bookmarks with del.icio.us

This is an excellent posting from Emily on her blog about sharing bookmarks of websites via tags. The power of collaboration using new tools and new literacies for professional learning! Emily provides a clear explanation of the role of tags in the popular del.icio.us service with a number of examples of relevance to educatos and students. Also available as a RSS feed.

Example of a tag;
http://del.icio.us/tag/podcasting
and here is the RSS feed to enter into your feedreader ...
http://del.icio.us/rss/tag/podcasting

LAMS Moodle integration

Two open source products, LAMS and Moodle, getting closer together. This posting, by Derek Morrison on Auricle, highlights the differences between the drag and drop stryctured learning sequences of LAMS and the constructivist Moodle learning environment. This walkthrough link provides a cue to the LAMS - Moodle integration i.e adding a LAMS sequence to a Moodle course as an activity or linking to a Moodle activity from within a LAMS sequence.
This link suggests that the integration between Moodle and LAMS is simply a URL link. Future developments are flagged for advanced tools integration.

Room 208 school site with podcasts

Mr Sprankle's Room 208 site contains examples of student podcasts, news from the students and a blog. Obviously a lot of interest in students podcasting as it has been cited in a number of areas, including a reference to the "pod kids" and a link from EPN (Landmark). Subscribe to their feed and keep up to date with the work of the students from Room 208. Well done!

elgg personal learning landscape

Elgg is an open source product under the GNU General Public License. It is a "Personal Learning Landscape" which is easy to use and provides a webspace allowing users to create an online digital identity with functionality such as weblogs, RSS, file storage and sharing, keyword tagging, social networking - personal profiles and FOAF. It creates a community learning environment.
Apcala is a free and hosted service based on Elgg. It provides blogs, RSS feeds, 20Mb file storage, ability to upload photos and podcasts and keyword tagging.
eTeach portfolios (UK) is also based on elgg. It offers a free electronic portfolio, weblog and social networking system, connecting learners and creating communities of learning.

e-portfolios slideshow on Flickr (Scott's weblog)

I have been fascinated by the development of e-portfolios reading Scott's weblog.
This slideshow uploaded to Flickr is from a presentation on e-portfolios at the University of Sydney (May 05).

A short movie about podcasting

4 Minute movie about podcasting on the Lisa Williams, "Learning the Lessons of Nixon" blog.
This 4 minute movie provides a quick introduction to podcasting for anyone who wants to find out more about this rapidly developing phenomenon. Lisa has been blogging for many years. Read her 'bio' on her blog with the curious name.

Yahoo Groups has a new Podcasting and Education group which provides a useful avenue to share information. It's descriptor states... "Information and discussion regarding podcasting as an educational tool in today's classroom".

Education Podcasting Network (EPN)

Education Podcasting Network or EPN is a new site which aims to "bring together in one place, the wide range of podcast programming that may be helpful to busy teachers looking for content to teach with and about, and to explore issues of teaching and learning in the 21st century."
Provides some useful tips and a wide range of links to explore.
Links from Landmarks for Schools project.

Name Voyager - what's in a name?

Name Voyager (requires Java) is an amazing online tool. Trace the rise and decline of popular names from the 1900s to the present (US data) and search for names and derivatives. The associated Baby Name Wizard blog contains a fascinating range of posts on naming conventions, international differences, factors which influence naming and other posts about a "cultural accelerator" phenomen and popular culture triggers.

A wonderful resource for educators and schools for creative minds.

Personalised learning and learning environments

A series of seminars arising from a collaboration between Futurelab, Demos, Becta and Toshiba provide thought provoking papers and reports with well documented examples and references.
The focus is on personalised learning and future learning environments. The three seminars explore different models of personalisation, learner voice and new approaches to assessment.
The three topics are:
1 Learner Voice:
How can technology be used to support learners to shape and direct their own curriculum?
2 Designing Learner Environments:
The virtual and the real - can technology help students shape their learning environment?
3 Assessment, Technology and Learner Voice:
How can we involve young people in determining the focus and means of assessment systems?
A 'must read' for school administrators, leaders, teachers to read, discuss, reflect and plan for the future.

Blogpoly

Blogpoly is based on a bloggified Monopoly board with hyperlinked squares to a range of sites pertinent to the blogosphere. It includes suggestions on playing the game. Another variation on Monopoly, devised earlier by Aaron on his blog, Aaron's CC is Blogopoly. Check Littlesolo's blog which comments on the similarity of ideas and defends charges of plagiarism. Check them out!

Aussie Mooters Gather 2005

"Aussie Mooters Gather 2005" is the name of a 2 day conference to be held at Technology School of the Future in Adelaide, South Australia (July 9 and 10). This will be a gathering for Classroom Teachers, Educational Leaders and e-learning Specialists to meet and discuss the latest in e-learning and classroom learning management systems. (A separate technical workshop will be held at the Chifley Hotel on Friday 8th)

There is growing interest in Australian schools in using Moodle. Speakers include Martin Dougiamas (WA), Gary Benner (NZ) Gerry White – CEO education.au (EdNA) , Dr Stanley Frielick (NZ) , Kevin Richardson (SA) and Dr Kathryn Moyle (ACT). A great opportunity for Australian and NZ educators to network and share understandings.

The Simple Machine Blog

This Simple Machine Blog is another example of schools using blogs.
It involves grade fours from The Academy at King Edward and grade tens from Jasper Place High School. Their blog explains how "the fours are studying simple machines ... (science curriculum) and will be drawing ... their favourite machines. The tens will then communicate with the fours via the blog to discuss how the drawings will be animated. The animations will ... be displayed ... beside the drawings!"
Check out their examples.

Primary school minilegends blog

Al Upton and his Primary School class have developed this Mini Legends blog "to communicate and collaborate online ... and have fun learning at the same time." It includes some experimental activities, lots of activities for his Year 3 mini legends, useful links and how to's. His legends think it's cool and they have a collaboration activity with a UK school.
Well done, Al!

Future VLE (Visual version)

Dave's weblog provides comment on a "Roadmap for the Personal Learning Landscape" with a link to a downloadable pdf and visual version of a Future VLE created by Scott Wilson. Dave and team are working on Elgg "a fully featured electronic portfolio, weblog and social networking system, connecting learners and creating communities of learning." You can create an Elgg account (free) and experiment. Elgg allows you to easily create your own weblog and groups, provides an access privileges function, lets you upload files eg photos and docs and share with friends (FOAF) and has a useful tags and keywords feature . It has a cool tutorial.
Elgg adds another avenue into the ever expanding range of tools which facilitate personalisation, customisation and social collaboration.

Blogtalk Down Under Conference May 2005

BLOGTALK DOWN UNDER Conference
Sydney – 2 workshops on the 19th May plus Conference on 20 21 22 May

Podcasting and Vodcasting paper

I came across this downloadable resource - a White Paper on Podcasting and Vodcasting from the University of Missouri (March 2005) via a feed from Stephen Downes OL Daily.

This pdf is one of the best resources I have seen to date in this emerging technology. It includes definitions, metaphors, resources, how to's, pedagogical implications of how these technologies can be used in school and higher education supported by clear diagrams and a range of resource links.

An interesting article on self directed student learning blog by Eric Wilson (Apr 5, 2005) on the rise of 'Net Gen learners' in Unis. This refers to a clash of cultures between the new "wave of young people empowered to create knowledge, not merely absorb it" and traditional ways. This new generation has been dubbed the "Millennials."

Here is an extract from the blog.
Individuals raised with the computer deal with information differently compared to previous cohorts: "they develop hypertext minds, they leap around." A linear thought process is much less common than bricolage, or the ability to or piece information together from multiple sources.

The major differences as outlined make very interesting reading.
The book, "Educating the Net Generation", has been published by Educause.

Pew Report on popularity of podcasting

The Pew Report , "Podcasting catches on" (3rd April 2005) provides some interesting statistics on the growing phenomenon of podcasting in the US. See Podcasting Directory for examples.

The Pew Report states that ...
... 22 million American adults own iPods or MP3 players
... 29% have downloaded podcasts from the Web
... more males than females own such devices

Odvard Egil Dyrli in an article, "Do-it-yourself radio is spreading across the Internet like wildfire," provides a perspective and some URLS on schools and podcasting.

Check the latest chart of internet activities on the Pew Report site. It ranges from a high 90% for using e-mail, 73% getting news, 62% making travel reservations, 36% paying bills online, 10% creating blogs and &% making a phone call online.

The incredible growth in the blogosphere in such a relatively short time should make interesting reading when updated statistics are next published.

A "swarm of interest"

Another gem from Robin Good refers to a "swarm of interest" in online resources points to some online tools with the tasty names such as Trendalicious and Populicious, which make use of the more well known del.icio.us (social bookmarks manager site). Clever?

Blogger credibility

Robin Good's item on his MasterNewMedia "How To Measure A Blogger's Popularity And Reach: The Big Jump" provides a list of key indicators to use to determine what credibility and authority one can apply to any in the burgeoning ranks of bloggers, news reporters et al. This includes a check on their Technorati standing.

Videoblogging wiki

Excellent wiki reference on videoblogging. Includes links to mefeedia service which creates a RSS feed (with enclosures) for your videoblog. Check the videoblog worldmap for a global pattern.

Harnessing Technology

A UK e-strategy, Harnessing Technology: Transforming Learning and Children’s Services outlines a goal for the effective use of interactive technologies in education and more personalised learning . This includes the notion that "every student and learner has a personal online learning space" to "store their own course materials and assignments in digital form, and record their achievements." The report extols the virtues of more flexible e-learning resources and the ability of teachers to adapt the curriculum to their learners’ needs
and interests and integrate e-assessment.
The ability of ICT, used imaginatively, would help engage more learners in
the excitement of learning. The report envisages the role of e-learning to blend more easily with life and work, bridging the boundaries between formal and informal learning.
The strategy identifies a number of priorities across school, post compulsory and higher education sectors.

Demo of embedded xml from eSchool News

View this demo page here. This made use of RSS Express Lite service.

Some of my favourite blog sites

WebLogg-Ed has an educational focus and is updated frequently. I read postings in my feed reader.
Other useful sites include Stephen Downes OL Daily

Taking up the challenge

My posting is the start of a challenge to create a useful blogging space.