Web 2.0 tools

In the olden days we had 'Web 1.0'. Information was 'out there' and we accessed it using our web browser. Nowadays when we use the internet we expect to be more involved. We create information and post it, to be shared with others. There are online tools to help us create content. Some of these are better than others. Some are free to use, others require a free registration, yet more ask for a subscription. This process of using the internet to create and share information is characteristic of a new age in internet use, and is called 'Web 2.0'. To save you the trouble of searching for 'Web 2.0' tools to use in school there is a wiki where a directory of resources has been collected. I'll be trying some out over the next few weeks, but if you'd like to dig around yourself then here's the link.

Online Word Fun

There is so much fun to be had using online programmes that it is a wonder we ever buy software! Once you have had enough of wordle you can try making word mosaics. And please, can we all stop using the rainbow effect WordArt now?

Teachers TV goes to iTunesU

With Christmas around the corner those people at TeachersTV, with no reports to write, have been busy uploading a whole load of content to iTunesU. There are no other British bodies represented yet at Primary level, but the number of resources uploaded for free download at iTunesU is growing all the time. Do check it out!

So who trusts the security of the cloud?

Er... Los Angeles State Governors for one. They've just joined a long list of US States and businesses moving into the cloud to improve security and collaboration, and to cut costs.
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/cloud-apps-big-city-la-goes-google.html

Blogging on the move

I'm not always close to my computer when inspiration strikes so BlogPress, a free iPhone app, is just the job. I'm using it now. All I need now is an iPhone! (this is just a humble iTouch - still a great tool). That brings me on to another thought. In school I've stopped buying IWBs. For the same money I could get 10 iTouch units. Which would invigorate my lesson more?

Is FUN important?

These people think so:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbEKAwCoCKw

Digital Visions in Education

'Jeeves,' I recollect saying, on returning to the appartment, 'who was that fellow who on looking at something felt like somebody looking at something? I learned the passage at school but it has escaped me.'
'I fancy the individual you have in mind, sir, is the poet Keats, who compared his emotions on first reading Chapman's Homer to those of stout Cortez when with eagle eyes he stared at the Pacific.'
'The Pacific, eh?'
'Yes, sir. And all his men looked at each other with a wild surmise, silent upon a peak in Darien.'
'Of course. It all comes back to me. Well that's how I felt this afternoon on being introduced to Miss Pauline Stoker.'

There is no doubting that teaching in ten years' time will be very different to how it is today: mobile internet access for every pupil; cloud computing; preparing pupils for jobs we currently only dream of. Change is happening in the real world at a rapid pace, and as a busy teacher it can be hard to keep abreast of current trends and ideas. We teachers stand, shoulder to shoulder with Cortez and his men. What can we see?