66 EdTech Resources You May Have Missed–Treasure Chest June 5, 2011

by Jeffrey Thomas on June 5, 2011

Welcome to this week’s edition of Treasure Chest—66 EdTech Resources You May Have Missed.

It’s really difficult to keep up with all that happens in educational technology. This is my attempt to make it just a little easier. I post a Treasure Chest every Sunday!

Featured

Eric Sheninger: How Our School Adopted Social Media, One Small Step at a Time–We have seen many shifts in terms of instruction, communication, and learning at NMHS resulting in a transformative culture that is more in line to meet the needs of our students.
If you were on Twitter | Dangerously Irrelevant | Big Think–Dear educator, if you were on Twitter yesterday, you might have found: … But you weren’t on Twitter yesterday, so it’s likely that you saw none of this.
Why YouTube Adopting Creative Commons Is a Big Deal Online Video News–Mashup artists, your life just got easier. YouTube is now making it possible remix existing videos right within its online video editor. The site is also adopting Creative Commons licensing, immediately making more than 10,000 Creative Commons-licensed videos available for reuse. Both steps have wide-ranging implications.
Creative Commons For Kids « My Other Blog–There are a number of webpages and to a lesser extent videos exploring and explaining the topic on the web but this is one of the few cartoons directed at children that I’ve seen.
YorkRegion Article: Teachers behind curve when it comes to digital devices–Cell phones in the classroom may be distracting, but banning them is not the answer —
TED Blog | 100 Websites You Should Know and Use–Julius Wiedemann, editor in charge at Taschen GmbH, offered an ultra-fast-moving ride through sites in many different areas, from art, design and illustration, to daily news, blogs and curiosity.
It’s a Bird, it’s a Plane, No It’s Cybraryman! « Diary of a Public School Teacher!–One thing I have learned to do is to lean on others, and not try to do everything myself.
80 Online Tools, References, and Resources | Edutopia Group Discussions by and for Educators–We all know that teachers are always looking for tools, references, and resources for classrooms. Well, here’s 80 “must see” trial, free, and paid websites recommended by Edutopiacommunity members. Keep this list in your back pocket! It might come in handy. =)
Cool Cat Teacher Blog: The Problem with Facebook Is YOUR FRIENDS!–The primary problem as I maintained in Facebook Friending 101 is NOT you. Although there are educators who post innappropriate things on their walls all of the time, MOST of you IF you are using it with your students are not. These privacy options ARE NOT ENOUGH for the scenarios I’ve presented.
Hey Kids, Build Your Own Video Games With Stencyl–Although it’s getting a lot easier to build your own video games, many of the tools out there for doing so require you have a background in programming. Not so with with Stencyl, a new game creation studio that launches today.
Student: Why do I have to take a standardized test in Yearbook?–A high school student in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools writes about the district’s new testing regime in which students are taking experimentaql standardized tests in every subject, even Yearbook.
5 Things You May Not Know About Twitter.com–Twitter.com comes with a bunch of nifty features that are unused and unknown by many. Here they are.
10 Guidelines to do doing well on Twitter–Someone asked me if I could summarize our approach to Twitter and Social Media into ten rules. While I find that I’m always learning, and I didn’t put too much thought into this, I thought I’d share the response I…
The Insider’s Guide to Twitter Chats | The Creative Education Blog–Here are a few tips to help you get the most out of twitter chat sessions – a fantastic way to exchange ideas, and great fun too!
A School Without Walls | Connected Principals–Share We have started something that we can not control. Students are gradually assuming more responsibility and ownership for what they learn and how they learn it.
Tips, Apps, and Resources for Teachers on Twitter ~ Master Minds–Busy teachers may feel that taking the time to learn how to use Twitter isn’t worth the return for the students benefit, so that’s why this list of 100 tips, apps, and resources is worth browsing
5 Myths About Collaboration–I guess it’s collaboration day at ReadWriteEnterprise. Earlier today we looked at Jeff Jarvis’ thoughts on collaboration and left you with some questions to ponder
Tell Your Stories With Pictures | Ozge Karaoglu’s Blog–“Read the directions and directly you will be directed in the right direction.” said the DoorKnob. Digital storytelling is an exciting medium of telling…
Tell Your Stories With Comic Strip Tools | Ozge Karaoglu’s Blog–“But if I’m not the same, the next question is “Who in the world am I? Ah! That’s a great puzzle!” said Alice. Bubblr is a tool to create comic…
Download Angry Birds Game for your Windows PC–Angry Birds, the most addictive video game ever, is now available for your Windows PC as a standalone game. Thus you can play Angry Birds offline outside the browser and its much faster.

Tools

6 Top Smartphone Apps to Improve Teaching, Research, and Your Life – Technology – The Chronicle of Higher Education–Here’s what I discovered when I put out a call on Twitter, as well as to a major e-mail list of college public-relations officers, asking about the areas in which professors and college officials are making the most of their mobile devices. Here are the six scenarios that people mentioned most often. I have highlighted the apps in each category that got users’ highest marks.
3 Chrome Extensions For Gmail That Help You Use Email Quickly–It is sometimes a chore to open up Gmail and compose an email. What one needs is a productivity hack that could short circuit the process by a few seconds. Here are three Chrome extensions designed for Gmail that looked like the perfect email productivity solution.
Innovative Online Image Editor- iPiccy–When it comes to image editing online there are some nice services like Mugtug, Pixlr and LivePhotoEditor. iPiccy is another online photo editor which is free
Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Top 10 Sites for Creating Outlines–Outlines are used all the time in education and everyday use to organize content and show relationships among items. While creating an outline is nothing new there are websites dedicated to increasing this skill and taking it to the next level.
7 Chrome Extensions That Help You Look Up Words & Meanings As You Browse–Looking up words for their meanings and definitions is no big deal. A glut of free online dictionaries has made it a matter of a selection and click. Helping you further are right-click context menu searches, browser add-ons and extensions like the seven we cover here.
Download CCleaner For Mac To Clean Trash And Junk From Your System–Piriform’s flagship tool CCleaner has finally been released for Mac. Currently in beta, CCleaner works just fine on Mac…

How-To

7 Search Tips You Probably Don’t Know About – How-To Geek–Not a day passes by without doing an online search. You may know of basic search operators like AND, OR, etc. but an increasing number of web applications support even more keywords that’ll help you fine tune your search to the core. Here are some you may have never heard of.
Tracking Blogs with RSS in Google Reader | The Whiteboard Blog–How to use Google Reader to keep track of all the blogs that interest you and save valuable time!
How to: Edit using Audacity–Audacity is free, easy to use, audio editing software. It allows you to edit out any mistakes and add music and sound effects to make your podcast sound really professional.
How to Stop Facebook from Suggesting Your Name in Photos–Did you know Facebook has a feature which will analyze photos uploaded by your friends and if it recognizes you in the photo (using its facial recognition technology), Facebook will suggest your name so your friend can more easily tag the photo?
25 essential Kindle tips and tricks | News | TechRadar UK–25 essential Kindle tips and tricks Play music, display maps, check your email and more : TechRadar UK
Maximum PC | Cheat Sheet: 10 Tips And Tricks For Evernote–But there’s more to Evernote than simple reminders: we’ve compiled 10 tips to help you squeeze as much as possible out of the surprisingly powerful application.
How to Create an Awesome Summer Reading List – Lifehacker–The days grow longer and the weekends more leisurely as summer approaches, making it a terrific time to catch up on reading. Whether your reading goal is to stimulate your mind, get lost in an adventure or romance, or learn something new, here are a few helpful tips for curating your perfect reading list this summer.

iOS

250 best iPad apps: education – Telegraph–Here are the best learning apps for iPad users of all ages.
Right Tools Can Unleash iPad’s Creativity – NYTimes.com–Inexpensive apps and third-party peripherals make the iPad an excellent device for photographers, artists, writers and bloggers to create original content.
App for That: How to teach kids to write | TiPb–There are hundreds of thousands of iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps for just about everything — so how come the one you need, the one you know just has to…
How to edit spreadsheets on an iPad | Tablets | Working Mac | Macworld–It’s a cinch to view spreadsheets on your iPad, but when you want to create or edit them, things get a bit more complicated
iWork Apps Pages, Keynote, and Numbers Now Available for iPhone–iPhone: Apple’s entire iWork suite is no longer constrained to the larger proportions of the iPad, as all three of its apps (Pages, Keynote, and Numbers) were updated yesterday and are now compatible with the iPhone and iPod touch as well.
Top 100 Best Free iPhone 4 Apps–With more than 350000 apps available for iPhone, iPod and iPad the iOS 4 has really created the buzz with keeping the major chunk as free. We have collected…
iChromy: Bookmarking Service Diigo Releases A Chrome-like iPad Browser–I doubt that Google has plans to bring its Chrome browser to the iPad anytime soon, but for fans of Chrome, there’s a new app you might want to consider: iChromy.
Four iPad Screencasts for Beginners–I am trying to create a bank of video tutorials covering all the aspects of using the iPad that I take for granted. I recently discovered a friend who had…
4 Free iPhone Apps for Making Home Movies–We’ve gone ahead and compiled a list of video-sharing/-creating apps to help you document this, the best summer of your life
iPod Touch & iPad Resources–A collection of resources for educators who are interested in using the iPod Touch or iPad with students.
Esquire Challenges iPad Owners to the Hardest Puzzle Ever–Esquire has released an iPad app the publication is calling “the hardest puzzle ever.”
Video: Top 10 free iPhone apps | News | TechRadar UK
Apps in Education: Browse the Internet Faster and Easier on iPad–There is nothing worse than spending half your lesson time just trying to get all your students actually connected to the net. This is not a magic wand but it is a list of tips for setting up your procedures for the iPad so your students do not waste valuable class time. Check it out to see if it gives you quicker access.
10 Powerful & Useful iPhone Camera Apps To Help You Take Better Pictures–Right behind the Nikon D90, Apple’s iPhone 4 is the most popular camera in terms of pictures taken and uploaded to the photo sharing site, Flickr. While this

Miscellaneous

11 Interesting Ways to Teach Reading Comprehension in the Classroom
Teacher training in math doesn’t help — Joanne Jacobs–Intensive, well-designed training didn’t improve seventh-grade math teachers’ knowledge or their students achievement in a federally funded study by the American Institutes for Research and MDRC.
30 Interesting Ways to Use Audio in your Classroom
LiveScribe in the Classroom Livebinder–Resources and ideas for implementing the LiveScribe smartpen in the classroom
41 Websites for Teachers to Integrate Tech into Your Classroom « Ask a Tech Teacher–This list has a little bit of everything, and will kick-start your effort to put technology into your lesson plans:
10 Interesting Ways to use Mobile Phones in the Classroom
5 Online Tools for School Administrators — Thinking Learning–As an administrator, how do you even begin to navigate this ever-changing technological landscape? In this ASCD 2011 interview, Steve Anderson discusses the five tools he recommends that administrators start using now.
Fraboom–Fraboom is the world’s first LIVE interactive online children’s museum. Fraboom is ideal for children ages 6-12.
Backchanneling101 Wiki
8 MORE Knowledge Websites With Free Online Video Lectures–The online video world is more than music videos and somebody’s cat chasing a laser pointer. It is also a treasure trove of knowledge nuggets and crowd wisdom. Our fixation on YouTube shouldn’t allow us to miss out on some other great video sites out there.
10 Newly Discovered Websites You Should Try Out | Free and Useful Online Resources for Designers and Developers–In this round up of 10 we look at some really cool newly discovered websites for you to try out, so that you don’t have to wander to look for them, and they are just not cool they live up to the purpose they are built for.
4Teachers : Main Page–4Teachers.org: Helping Teachers Integrate Technology into the Classroom.
Free Technology for Teachers: Using Google Earth in Mathematics Lessons–Real World Math is a great resource for teachers who would like to explore uses of Google Earth in mathematics lessons.