http://readingpower.wordpress.com/

Please go to new blog for “alive” links http://readingpower.wordpress.com/ 1. Improve readability of web pages http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/ Drag to bookmark bar. Click when you get to a page you want to read and useless stuff disappears, text becomes black on white in decent size, pick format (do that before dragging the tool to your bar). 2. [...]

Edublogs is great, but my free version is running out of room. Find instructions at http://lynross.wordpress.com/ and also has a fun write up on photfiltre. So far the transfer of text to http://readingpower.wordpress.com/ has been easy. I have not copied images yet. I am still working out reconstructing widgets and other multimodals as it is [...]

1. Youth Books-Cybils http://dadtalk.typepad.com/cybils/2010/01/2009-finalists-the-best-of-the-best.html Best Books, Movies of the decade – Barnes and Noble http://bit.ly/7zlWie Peachbook Award http://www.theunquietlibrary.libguides.com/peachbooks-readingbowl 2. Predictions 2010 http://deangroom.wordpress.com/2010/01/01/preditions-for-2010/ 3. Digital writing ning http://digitalwritingworkshop.ning.com/ 4. IWB ning http://iwbrevolution.ning.com/ 5. Engaging learners http://alalearning.org/2009/12/30/lx/ 6. ReadWriteWeb’s Top 5 Web Trends http://bit.ly/7FiWpz 7. Google Search Evolves http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/search_options_google_search_evolves.php 8. Future of Writing http://bit.ly/7bhR3z 9. Untweeping http://twittercism.com/untweeps/ [...]

1. Give Up! http://www.chrisbrogan.com/never-give-up-no-give-up/ 2. “Partial Agreement and Refocus” V smart comebacks http://community.tes.co.uk/forums/t/184713.aspx?s_cid=16 3. Twitter for Teachers in 15 minutes http://edbuzz.org/djohnson/2009/12/twitter-for-teachers-in-15-minutes/#edbuzz 4. Best teaching books of 2009 http://tinyurl.com/yky4ylq including free book download– “Teaching as a subversive activity” 5. Relevance? http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6699357.html?q=things+that+keep+us+up+at+night Is your Library a grocery store or a kitchen? http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/blog/1340000334/post/90032209.html 6. Humor- 2009 USA review [...]

1. Apple’s islate- The kindle killer ? http://www.jsmcdougall.com/2009/12/apples-islate-the-kindle-killer/ 2. Using Web 2.0 tools to teach “The Outsiders” http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=548 use of stupeflix to create Greaser culture – bit like Animoto- though it looks like its function of finding images for you is no longer working – copyright?. Used Penguin style action book maps using google maps [...]

Many of these resources come via twitter, so thank you to the generosity of those who post new resources there. 1. Nifty PowerPoint technique http://www.allaboutpresentations.com/2009/12/best-from-blogosphere-design-fresh.html 2. Orientation in Second Life -first half pretty much says it all – http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=446 18 mins 3. Blogging improves writing http://edu.blogs.com/edublogs/2009/12/blogging-improves-young-peoples-confidence-writing-reading.html 4. Create your own online magazine http://alltop.com/ Here is [...]

Great quote It’s not information overload. It’s filter failure.” – Clay Shirky 1. Using E-Books to Motivate Pupils Writing -students make ebooks and publish at myebook.com and easyspeak microphones http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=442 15 mins. http://www.yudu.com/ allows uploading a pdf file for conversion into an online magazine. Link to samples http://www.myebook.com/mr_hill_3-4H/ Colin Hill recommends http://penzu.com/ free online private [...]

Inspired by Cathy Nelson’s review of her professional year http://blog.cathyjonelson.com/?p=1002 , here are highlights of our Library year. Already, planning is underway for 3 major new projects for 2010… It was hard to draw the line to keep the list concise, so the many competitions and usual Library activities have not been specifically mentionned. February [...]

“Organisation Learning and Technology Collide” (short- 14 or so mins) Ben Grey makes some wise points about effective time use, though who needs other distractions when there is the internet? See http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=450 Argyris’s theories of action are not unlike UBD – plan and operate with the end in mind. Saving time and managing information – [...]

Another excellent presentation from the k12 conference. Konrad Glogowski discusses (30 mins) how teacher Professional Development must be reflective and classroom based to be effective, and teachers need to learn WITH other teachers and their students. Every classroom must be seen as organic and places of inquiry where teachers research their own practice. http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=504 Teachers [...]

With library budgets shrinking, open source library management software is of increasing interest. These sites discuss open source options. Koha, Evergreen, OPALS plus others http://www.eschoolnews.com/resources/21st-century-library/21st-century-library/index.cfm?rc=1&i=58176 V-library from Library Solutions http://www.librarysolutions.com.au/5.products.html

Web 2.0 tools can be used to help with editing and proofreading. An important part of editing and proofreading can be listening to how work sounds. It appears text to speech has been removed from Word 2007. This interesting literacy site suggests a plugin to fix this http://attipscast.wordpress.com/ at http://www.wordtalk.org.uk/Home/ More at http://udltechtoolkit.wikispaces.com/Free+text+to+speech which highly [...]

New 21 Century Research (Information Literacy) Skills – What does it look like? Joyce Valanza’s “the Wizard of Apps” presentation exemplifies new information literacy directions. Here is the presentation with singing http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=443 Here is the corresponding slideshare version http://www.slideshare.net/joycevalenza/wizard-of-apps Please click here for a file with notes http://tinyurl.com/WizApps from the presentation and the websites for [...]

Mag+ from Bonnier on Vimeo.

Well, I got there – have completed the Moodle Course Creator Certificate, with its 80 percent pass rate – the final step, after completing the substantive moodlebites coursework of narratives, demonstrated competencies and forum posts, which are prequisites for sitting the exam.

As you can see from this site, I am fond of widgets. I have just added retaggr and card.ly widgets to the right sidebar for comparison, and have not decided one which to keep. They have slightly different standard add-site options – retaggr does not have google as a standard choice – how strange. These [...]

Big Google Change http://searchengineland.com/googles-personalized-results-the-new-normal-31290 Edublogs Awards Announced http://blog.cathyjonelson.com/?p=1044 Edublog Nominations http://edublogawards.com/2009/ 21 Century Libraries http://www.eschoolnews.com/resources/21st-century-library/

The K12 Online conference : Bridging the Divide, is currently happening online and has some excellent presentations. http://k12onlineconference.org/ For example, The Virtual Heroic Journey shows how to use graphics, animation and google maps to stimulate writing heroic stories. There are also great presentations on geocaching uses in education, and OpenSims which is open software similar [...]

This year I used wordle with students to help analyse the poem “Dulce et Decorum Est..” The oucs site below is also interesting and highlights analysis of how words are located in relation to other words. http://www.georgehwilliams.net/tutorials/using-wordle-net-to-help-analyze-and-compare-poems/ http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/education/tutorials/analysis/clouds.html http://ict-adventures-in-poetry.wikispaces.com/Conference+paper+

The following video is a wonderful example of putting Web 2.0 in practice in a Year 7 Asia unit. You may need to sign up first at http://k12online.ning.com/ http://k12online.ning.com/video/bridging-history-using-web-20-1 Jean Moore and Robin Beaver show a unit that combines glogster, gmail webchat, and a webquest, with the video created in prezi. They also show a [...]

This post title is attributed to a quote from from the Manager Library Services, Ed QLD (http://hubinfo.wordpress.com/ Post titled BER in Queensland: New Libraries But No Books or TLs? ) So who will determine what the role be like in the future and how can teacher-librarians contribute to these determinations? The Hub also reports: … [...]

Issuu.com is one of Time magazine’s 50 best websites for 2009. http://issuu.com/signupfindpeople Upload any PDF file and it will be instantly transformed into an online publication; your creation can then be embedded into your blog or profile using Issuu’s ready to go viewer. It presents like a magazine. Another option is scribd which is bigger [...]

If you click on the image, it will take you to photobucket, then click the image again to obtain a clear picture, or alternatively try the link below. Or http://tinyurl.com/AHSmap1