eLearning Suite Launch Party! Join the Atlanta chapter of the ASTD and the Adobe Users Group of Atlanta for an Informative and Amusing Evening to celebrate the launch of Adobe Captivate 6.  Adobe eLearning Evangelist, Dr. Allen Partridge will share all the latest news and information about Adobe Captivate 6, the yet to be released Adobe Presenter 8, and the Adobe eLearning Suite 6, released on July 18th. The release of Adobe Captivate 6 has been heralded by eLearning professionals as the most significant upgrade to Captivate in history and the other Adobe eLearning products aim to match that sentiment.  You won’t want to miss seeing for yourself the latest mobile, video and out-of-the-box solutions in Adobe’s hot new eLearning software. Register here! Dr. Allen Partridge is the eLearning Evangelist for Adobe. In addition to his work for Adobe Systems, he serves on the doctoral faculty in the Communications Media and Instructional Technology program at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Allen has written several books and a host of articles on topics ranging from 3D game development to Instructional Design for new technologies. He is active in explorations of Immersive Learning as well as traditional multimedia enhanced eLearning and rapid eLearning. Allen works closely with the eLearning Suite and Captivate teams at Adobe, providing a channel to customer needs and concerns and helping facilitate communication among team members.Filed under: Adobe, Atlanta, Captivate, CS suite, eLearning, Meetup, Technology

Justin Mass demonstrates how quickly you can produce a demo video with Adobe Presenter 8 - 2 minutes to record, and 7 minutes to edit:- Filed under: eLearning

I’m speaking at Penn State University in June The title of this blog post is the same as my session for Web Conference. Following the recent security headlines at Penn State, the title of my session is either ironic or prophetic. I think I’ll go for ironic, since the security issue at Penn State encountered was not really like my title, but the FBI really did call! If you have not already gathered, I work for FireEye, the company that owns Mandiant, the company that the FBI introduced to Penn State to perform incident response. This blog post is not going to be about the Penn State’s security breach. I just wanted to establish some context. I have been working at FireEye for close to three years. I joined as an instructional designer, and now I am a manager running a team of 7 instructional designers. In the time that I have been at FireEye I have learned the most incredible things about network security, and the lengths that threat actors (the generic name we use for all the bad guys, be they nation state, criminal gangs, lone hackers, or groups like Anonymous) will go to in order to steal your data or interfere with your network. I expect that if you are interested in security you are still reading. Rather than talk specifically about my session, I thought I could share with you some tidbits that could come up in any presentation of mine, or dinner conversation after I’ve had half a glass of wine. I’ll include links for further reading for the motivated learners among you. Target Did you know that Target was breached through their HVAC contractor? Brian Krebs, a well known security researcher and blogger, published this report that goes into significant detail of how the breach occurred and unfolded. In short - the HVAC contractor was pwned when one of their employees fell for a phishing email that enabled the threat actors to steal credentials to Target’s network. Once the bad guys had that access, they were able to scan the network, learn the topology of the full network, and set about exploring servers, workstations and, most importantly, the POS (Point of Sale) terminals where millions of credit/debit card swipes occur daily. The most remarkable thing about this breach was it was the first time that our researchers had seen malware read card data direct from memory, thus bypassing any need to decrypt the data! APT1 - The Comment Crew In 2012, Mandiant published APT1: Exposing One of China’s Cyber Espionage Units. This explosive report describes, in great detail, the activities of a threat actor group that they codenamed APT1. The report tells the history of four main characters in the group, outlining their background and talking about their specific roles. It also pictures the building were 3,000 of China’s army are housed and perform worldwide hacking activities full time. And goes on to describe how China employs a total of around 300,000 soldiers in hacking activities. When I first read this report, the first thing I thought was "If this is what they are willing to disclose publicly, what else does Mandiant know that they cannot share?" Why are they called the Comment Crew Steve? Oh yeah - because they posted comments in online forums that were used by their malware to self-configure. So they installed malware on a victim machine, and the malware would at some point connect to the internet to discover its instructions for what to do next - download additional files, for instance. Interestingly, this tactic has been used more recently: Chinese Snoops Hid Malware Commands on Microsoft Technet Site. Clearly the notion of ‘hidden in plain sight’ is not lost on the bad guys. Clandestine Fox Operation Clandestine Fox, as it was named by FireEye when it was discovered, is a fascinating case study, and one that shows the importance of keeping your security patches up to date. In brief, users could be attacked through a crafted web page that contained a specific set of files, including a Flash file that exploited a vulnerability in Internet Explorer. The vulnerability actually existed in all versions of IE from 6 to 11, and was considered so serious that Microsoft issued a patch within 24 hours of FireEye discovering Operation Clandestine Fox, and patched IE6 in Windows XP, even though official support for XP was long-ago ended. Back to the Presentation What is the likelihood that something that you develop or admin becomes the vector for an attack on your future employer? We can’t say for sure. What’s the likelihood that something you develop or admin has a vulnerability that could be exploited? Probably 100%! Is there anything you can do to mitigate such a possibility? Well there’s lots, and that’s what I’ll talk about. Since this is a Web conference, not a network security/admin conference I’ll keep it fairly light and talk about some of your considerations for web and app development, with some general dos and don’ts, best practices and a few little stories thrown in. If you want to learn more about the kinds of things the bad guys do, and what you, as a web developer, can do to defend against them, then come and see my session.Filed under: eLearning

Actively Learn is a new site for Reading/Comprehension that I just found out about from Free Technology 4 Teachers.  This site reminds of EDpuzzle, but instead of taking a video and making it your "own" a student/teacher can do it to a Reading passage/article.  All a educator has to do is sign up and then create their class.  Once that is done a student joins by a unique code (think ClassDojo).  Teachers can then upload or select a Reading passage for their students to read.  These Reading passages are arranged by subject, grade, and Reading level and some of them even come w/ comprehension questions.  Best of all, a educator can create their own comprehension question and collaborate w/ students through text messages.I highly recommend checking out Actively Learn by clicking here!!!

FlashSticks is an interesting new site/app for learning a foreign language.  The way this works is a user prints out a color coded (blue - masculine nouns, pink - feminine nouns, green - other words) flashcard and then hovers their mobile device over it.  A brief video pops up of a tutor showing how to pronounce the word.  Flashsticks are ideal for learning any number of languages such as: French, English, Spanish, and more.I highly recommend checking out FlashSticks by clicking here!!!Below is a brief demo...For my Pinterest board on Foreign Language click here.

Carrot Rewards is an interesting new easy to use reward system for students.  It combines customized printable rewards (i.e stickers, certificates, etc) w/ online digital ones.  The way this works is once a student receives their printable reward on the back will be a 6 digit code they enter online to go into their "digital" MyStickers locker.  Best of all, an educator can manage/monitor student accounts to maintain all digital rewards rather then have to rely on the students to do it.  This is ideal for schools that don't want to give out physical rewards and rather stick w/ those that are digital.  Carrot Rewards is a great way to keep students motivated in a fun an engaging way.*Carrot Rewards is for UK based schools.I highly recommend checking out Carrot Rewards by clicking here!!!

ClassDojo the world famous behavior/positive reinforcement manage system for schools has just released their new "group" feature.  This highly requested feature will allow teachers to award points to not only an individual but a group as well.  This is ideal for educators who like to put their class into groups or teams to spark collaborative learning. Here is how it works...ClassDojo Groups enables teachers to group students any way they like: table groups, readinggroups, house teams, project groups and more. Teachers can easily encourage a team for anyskill important to their classroom with just a single tap. Each group will keep its own runningtotal, which students love to maintain a sense of accomplishment and a desire to keep going!Group points will still show up on student profiles alongside their individually award points, sothat students can see their progress from home and so can parents without any extra work.DevicesClassDojo Groups will work and sync across any iOS/Android device and any computer.I highly recommend checking out ClassDojo Groups by clicking here!!!*ClassDojo is an advertiser of Technology Tidbits.

Otus the excellent and easy to use Learning Management System for schools has just released a new polished design for their free classroom mobile app and web portal.  This new design, allows for easier to functionality, a brighter customizable color interface, and real-time analytics and third party integration (i.e. Khan Academy).Here is a list of their updated features...Cleaner Interface: A polished, streamlined functionality lets users more easily navigate existing features including polling for instant feedback, a real-time assessment center, blogging capabilities and classroom organization tools.Real-Time Analytics: A comprehensive analytics dashboard integrates a wide range of performance indicators into one place, including content from select third-party apps like Khan Academy. Teachers can link data to Common Core State Standards or integrate their own custom standards to report on. Otus tracks a variety of data like attendance, participation, student blogs, assessments and grades. In addition, teachers can also create and track meaningful behaviors like grit, leadership and staying on task through Otus ‘Recognitions’. Because Otus logs all student activity in real-time, teachers can quickly gauge their impact on student growth and provide timely, constructive feedback.Toolbox:  Otus functions as an open, interoperable educational ecosystem allowing teachers to integrate and quickly access the third party apps and content that they use everyday in their classroom. Any Otus user can access free third-party apps or content. If third-party apps and content require a subscription, the subscriber must simply link their account to Otus and they will never have to sign-in to access it again.Colorful Work Environments: Now teachers and students can choose from a variety of theme and background color options to create a more personalized, vibrant work environment.Below is a brief demo...I highly recommend checking out Otus by clicking here!!!For more information check out Otus on Technology & Learning.*Otus is an advertiser of Technology Tidbits.

Buncee the innovative site for creating beautiful presentations, projects, greetings, and more... has been getting quite a bit of well deserved press lately.  Besides the unveiling of their new "beta" user interface, they have developed an exciting new relationship w/ Haiku Learning.What does this mean?It means that users of Haiku Learning can now embed a buncee inside of it.  Think of it as a place holding frame where users still have the same interactive control of their buncee (all links, animations, etc still work).  It's simple to do (just paste in an embed code) and still maintains the high quality beautiful looking "buncee" that they are known for.More information can be found here.I highly recommend checking out Buncee for Education by clicking here!!!*Buncee is an advertiser of Technology Tidbits.**Also, they've recently won an award for one of the tops apps from the American Association of Librarians in the "Content Creation" category.

Trending Words feature lets data guide teachers in 21st century vocabulary instruction.Last summer BoomWriter introduced WordWriter (http://www.boomwriter.com/WordWriter), which lets teachers conduct short interactive application activities allowing them to access and enhance their students' understanding of key terms, figures, phrases, and dates.  BoomWrtier is now adding their Trending Words(http://boomwriter.com/WordWriter/TrendingWords) feature to BoomWriter, allowing teachers to select from top trending vocabulary used by other BoomWriter teachers while displaying the most popular words being taught for that month, in real-time, on a grade-by-grade basis.The most common way for a student to learn vocabulary words and strengthen their comprehension is through mundane "drill-and-practice" exercises.  However, WordWriter lets educators take a student's vocabulary experience to the next level by creating a collaborative platform in which student's can learn and vote on the Vocabulary process.  Trending Words aids in this process by supplying teachers w/ the most popular words by subject and grade level.  This is ideal for new teachers, ones that have switched grade levels, and for those looking for a "NEW" way to guide their students' instruction pertaining to vocabulary.  This innovative process not only helps students learn vocabulary words but strengthens their comprehension skills as well."There's an obvious correlation between students' vocabulary levels and academic performance. WordWriter and our new Trending Words feature lets teachers deliver an engaging and interactive vocabulary development experience that their students are sure to love and benefit greatly from."  Ken Haynes,  Co-founder of BoomWriter I highly recommend checking out Trending Words by clicking here!!!*BoomWriter is an advertiser of Technology Tidbits.