:) pic.twitter.com/jm3dk17rIU — Science Porn (@SciencePx) June 9, 2014

On behalf of the entire team at WCET, I’m very pleased to share two big announcements. As of August 2, WCET became the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education (WICHE)'s Cooperative for Educational Technologies. We continue to be known as...

Here is an end-of-the-year roundup of eLearning and related articles you might find helpful, interesting or enjoyable. They cover all kinds of topics. 12 Top Notch Online Presentation Tools Almost everyone has to give a presentation at one time or another. Whether yours are formal or informal, this list of online presentation applications  from SitePoint might be useful to you. 65 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Your eLearning Budget This free eBook from the eLearning Guild has 65 tips from experienced eLearning professionals. You will need to register with the Guild, which enables you to become an Associate Member for free. Agile Learning Design These eight articles by Donald Clark describe an approach for agile learning and training design. This link takes you to the final article, so you can see the list of previous ones. It also includes the Periodic Table of Agile Learning. How cool is that? Arguments For Informal Learning Jay Cross lays out some excellent reasons for organizations to incorporate informal learning into their overall training strategy in this article. Brief History of Social Media Want to read something fun? Brett Borders has written a history lesson of social media that may surprise you. Field Guide to Learning Management Systems In this free download from the ASTD, Ryan Ellis introduces readers to the many criteria to examine when you’re organization is in the market for an LMS. Learning Styles, Multiple Intelligences and Web Tools Here’s an interesting article by Jil Wright that matches varied web tools to an individual’s inclinations and strengths. LinkedIn Guide for Knowledge Workers Tony Karrer thinks knowledge workers should be getting more out of LinkedIn. His robust list of resources link to articles and guides for using this service more effectively. Rapid and Collaborative Authoring Tools Janet Clarey filtered the Authoring Tools Knowledge base from Brandon Hall Research for rapid, collaborative content development tools that can be used by developers and SMEs in different locations. This is a link to her valuable list. Review of 2009: 100 great resources Jane Hart lists her favorite resources of 2009. Stated in her own words, "I have selected 100 resources—articles, postings, PDFs, presentations, videos, etc.,— about (workplace and academic) learning, tools or technologies that I found of interest or practical use or made me think!" Top 25 Webinar Tips If you design, implement or lead webinars, these 25 tips should come in handy. Happy New Year to those using the Gregorian calendar. And to all visitors, may your dreams be fulfilled in the coming year. Best, Connie Post from: The eLearning CoacheLearning Around The Web Tweet This! Share this on Linkedin Share this on Facebook Buzz up! Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Email this to a friend?

So I’ve begun my summer professional development.  I love learning so much and there’s just so much out there to learn I tend to get overwhelmed.  Such a great feeling! This week, I attended one of the 19 eLearning conferences being offered by the State of Indiana this summer.  I spent 2 days in Lowell […]

Work on the K4STEMLAB continues accelerating at incredible … (dare I say - ludicrous?) speed. Key classroom and learning management system components are quickly falling into place. The day started with work on our Google Apps for Education domain, preparing over 1,000 user accounts for their first use.  That was before breakfast. We successfully tested multiple features in our Haiku Learning test domain, including embedded Google forms and Glogsters, use of assignments and the drop box, even a simple exam-based assessment. Everything worked perfectly. Our Classlink Launchpad environment is nearly complete, providing secure, cloud-based access to network files and shares on any device with Internet connectivity. The screenshot below shows me logged in with my home folder ready for use: We installed Splashtop Remote and now my iPad can run the SMART Board, which should be great fun for students to control for presentations or game playing. I will be using it as well. And, our foam cube seats arrived - these will be used primarily in the area around and near the SMART Board. (They were generously donated by the Northfield Education Foundation.) Flexible seating is a key element in our "agile classroom" design philosophy. It was a very productive day even though we did not mount the Z-Rack as I’d planned (we’ve reached the most critical part - drilling the mounting holes - and I am procrastinating out of fear.) Now I have to decide if I am going to "play hooky" and go to Livingston, NJ tomorrow for the NJTEA’s free STEM Boot Camp … or work in my classroom some more. Decisions, decisions… G’night all!

Dr. Kim Hyun Deok Foreman, Professor at San Francisco State University, pastor’s wife and missionary to Rwanda, passed away after an auto accident near the town of Gitarama, Rwanda. I still have a hard time looking at those last words...

Class starts today! (June 23)   Starting my Entrepenurial Educator MOOC today! https://t.co/lWn33HVen2 #edtech #education #ISTE2014 #virutuallearning — C. S. Stone, M.Ed. (@csstone1161) June 23, 2014

Wow. There are so many cool ways to learn online now. The whole world is a school. This list is meant for continuous learners and for procrastinators looking for distractions in the coming year. 1. Learn through Visual Search Engines How would you like your search engine to show results in a collage? Spezify does just that. It’s a visual search engine that draws content from all over the Web, particularly social media sites. Your collage might show a book from Amazon, a YouTube video and a page from a blog or web site. You drag the results to navigate the page and then click the graphic to view the media. Although the results might not be as robust as with conventional search engines, it’s a lot more fun. Other visual search tools include: viewzi, Kart00 and search-cube. 2. Learn from Word Clouds How can you search for something on a site when you’re not sure what’s there? Though Word Clouds aren’t new, have you used them as a learning tool? If you go to Wordle and enter a site’s url or feed url, you can use the word cloud as an index to the site. Look for words of interest and then search for those articles or pages. You can also use word clouds as the basis for writing a poem, for studying another language and for comparing two pages of information. Janet Clarey compared two articles from this site using word clouds. You can also create tag clouds with TagCrowd and you probably figured there had to be a tweetcloud. 3. Ask a Question Although Question and Answer sites aren’t new on the Web, we’re now at a point where there are enough experts online and enough Q&A sites to make finding an answer more feasible. Some sites crowd-source the answers while others use mentors to answer questions in their area of expertise. These sites are also great for browsing through when you’re in procrastination mode. Here are a few: Amazon’s Askville, Yahoo Answers, Answerbag, Gotta Mentor, BlurtIt, and WikiAnswers. For answers to eLearning related questions, try one of the LinkedIn eLearning Groups with a high membership, like The eLearning Guild or Instructional Design & E-Learning Professionals’ Group. FYI: You can always shoot me a question through the contact page and I’ll answer or crowd-source it. 4. Think Visually One of the best ways to learn is to look at things from a new perspective. Prezi can help you do this. It is one of the most innovative tools for creating nonlinear presentations. Check out their Showcase. Expressing and organizing your ideas in mind maps is another approach to expanding or changing your perspective. Try these free online mind mapping tools, some of which are collaborative: Mindmeister (check out their Public Mind Maps), Xmind and Mindomo. 5. Hang Out with Professors We now have lots of options for taking free online college courses. Imagine a great lecture with no tests, papers or deadlines. That’s right. Check out UC Berkeley Webcasts, which has a mix of video and audio lectures and MIT’s Open Courseware, which consists of PDF lecture notes and some multimedia presentations. OpenLearn has a Learning Space with lecture notes and discussion forums. You can also reuse and remix their content to create your own courses in their Lab Space. Other open university courses are at Carnegie Mellon and Tufts University. Don’t forget the lectures from University of Oxford and Stanford on iTunesU. 6. Watch Documentaries If you like to learn from documentaries, you can catch some free ones at Get Docued, Free Online Documentaries and Free Documentaries. 7. Tune In to Big Ideas Discuss, watch and get inspired at some of the sites that promote new and innovative ideas. You’ve probably seen the videos at Ted, but what about Big Think, Fora.tv and Ideas Project? 8. Learn through Twitter Do you ever search through tweets to discover the latest resources and conversations? Real time search is very now. For example, I just searched for ‘elearning’ (I know I’m boring) and got directed to a great discussion about how to help learners get the most from eLearning. You can search directly on Twitter, but they say the results are less than stellar. Other real time search engines that get better reviews are Twazzup, Tweetzi, IceRocket (searches other social media too) and TweetScan. 9. Hop Into a Debate Learn about all sides of an issue through online debating. Debategraph uses a visualization tool to show the complexity and multiple aspects of world issues. You can start at the Gallery to pick an issue. Then select Stream View (the small print below) to see the visualization. You can then explore the issue and add your own viewpoint. Also, check out Debate.org, where you read the debates and vote on a winner. 10. Create a Mashup Mashups let you combine and remix information, media, content, web applications and services. Making a mashup helps you perceive information in new ways and is a learning experience in itself. Two mashup platforms are Pipes and Scrapplet. Pipes is an aggregator tool for manipulating and remixing content and data from around the web. Scrapplet uses a drag and drop approach for mashing up content, particularly from social media sites. How do you plan to learn online this year? Post from: The eLearning Coach10 Ways To Learn In 2010 Tweet This! Share this on Linkedin Share this on Facebook Buzz up! Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Email this to a friend?

Took a "day off" yesterday to attend the 2012 NJTEEA STEM Boot Camp in beautiful Livingston, NJ. Met my erstwhile colleague Dave Zirkle at the GSP Cheesequake rest area around 7:15 am for the final leg of the trip. Rolled up to Mount Pleasant Middle School at 8am and the place was already buzzing. Well over a hundred educators of all kinds - science teachers, math teachers, technology educators, administrators and curriculum people from all over the state were there. The agenda for the day was a mixture of presentation/lecture and crazy hands-on building. I learned something in every session. I am still waiting for the DropBox link with presentation resources but as soon as I have it, I’ll share. Takeaways There were so many, particularly in Chris Anderson’s session. Here are a few: The Committee of Ten <= these folks didn’t listen to John Dewey, who advocated we NOT build schools around subjects in silos. Awesome. Thanks guys. Assessments of prior knowledge can be crazy fun. Don’t start a lesson without one! STEM was coined by the National Science Foundation and was originally SMET. It became "STEM" at some point (gee, wonder why?) and took off. iSTEM is not an Apple device, it refers to "Integrative" STEM, where the philosophy and approach work their way into every aspect of the school, not just instruction. I am totally joining the NJTEEA. Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work (recommended reading!) It was an amazing, fun, energizing day full of exploration, learning, collaboration and making new friends. Exactly what I want for my classroom.  Here are some pics I took. Have to close with this. Chris also showed two videos. One, by Chris Rogan, which I can’t share, and the one below. In it, Ioannis Miaoulis, the president of the Museum of Science in Boston (home of the Engineering is Elementary program) advocates for the study of engineering in K-12. It is the most powerful expression of the driving force behind our K4STEMLAB initiave I could ever hope for. Ok, gotta get back to work!  

So, first things first.  This is VERY different from Google Voice.  Don’t confuse them!  Where Google Voice is a personal, auditory device you can use in the classroom in various ways (see my pilot here), Adobe Voice is more about the visual.  It kind of reminds me of Voice Thread, without the communal chat attached. […]