Posts made in September, 2008

Twitter Handbook

Posted on Sep 29, 2008 in Interactive Whiteboards | 0 comments

Continuing my diversion from IWB’s into the world of Web 2.0 I have just stumbled upon a very interesting handbook to using Twitter

Twitter Handbook — How good people make BIG things happen – FAST! via kwout

It’s called the Twitter Handbook (no suprise there!) and you can sign up for your free copy from here: http://twitterhandbook.com/

I have been using Twitter for a few months and I have found that the network you can access via the site has been invaluable in many ways. There are some very knowledgeable people out there who are only too happy to answer questions and share good things that they have found on the Internet.

Hopefully this guide will help others get into the world of Twitter too!

Setting up your Blog

Posted on Sep 23, 2008 in Tutorials and Guides | 0 comments

From my blogging and podcasting session, here’s a guide to setting up a WordPress blog.

Web 2.0 Tools

Posted on Sep 23, 2008 in Interactive Whiteboards | 2 comments

Been rather busy this last week or so. I’m currently preparing for a new training day I am offering on Web 2.0 in the classroom – and in particular focusing on Blogging and Podcasting.

Hopefully I can share some of the handouts once I am happy with them.

Here is a quick presentation I am going to use to quickly introduce some different web 2.0 tools to teachers.

ActivStudio 3 Toolbars

Posted on Sep 15, 2008 in Interactive Whiteboards, Promethean, Tutorials and Guides | 4 comments

Here’s a very quick helpsheet I have written for a training day that covers the main buttons from the ActivStudio 3 toolbar.

This is the first time I’ve used Scribd to distribute a document, but it looks quite useful. If you also need it, I’ve uploaded my Smart 10 toolbar sheet there too.

Elearnr

Posted on Sep 15, 2008 in Interactive Whiteboards | 0 comments

Just a very quick blog post to direct people to a new blog that offers some good advice on using ICT in the classroom, which already has some great tips on Whiteboards. It’s called Elearnr, and you can find it here: http://elearnr.edublogs.org/

If it’s not already on your list of blogs in your RSS reader, then I suggest you add it immediately

As a reminder – I’ve linked to quite a few good blogs in my sidebar to the right of this blog. I heartily recommend all of them in the list.

Spore

Posted on Sep 12, 2008 in Games and interactives, Science Resources | 6 comments

This week, I have been playing a lot of Spore. Purely for educational reasons I can assure you OK, I’m playing it as a game geek – but I think there is some potential there for some use in the classroom.

A long time ago, I remember a colleague of mine using Sim Life in the classroom to introduce the idea of adaptation and survival. It wasn’t the most sophisticated game by todays standards, but was kinda fun.

Spore takes all this to a whole new level. The game itself has been sold as an “evolution game” but to be honest it’s not really evolution. The fact that you are in control of designing your creature through a lot of the game and can add and remove body parts at will makes it more “Intelligent Design in a Can”

I’m currently in the Space stage of the game, having taken my mini-cellular creature all the way into space. This stage is taking ages to play and there’s no way it could be done in the classroom.

The aspect of the game that could be useful in class could be the Creature Creator. You can download a standalone version of this for a £5 or a trial version of this for free.

The creature creator lets you design different animals which you can then put into your world. It would be good to ask pupils to design a herbivore – or the perfect carnivore. Design an animal for a hot climate or a cold climate etc. They could then take a screenshot, paste into a word processor/presentation tool and explain why they designed it the way they did. What features make it a good herbivore/carnivore etc.

In the meantime, here’s a little widget that shows you all my Spore creations.

I’ve been messing about trying to recreate the Starship Enterprise and an X-Wing fighter. Battlestar Galatica is more of a challenge Here’s my Spore profile page.

Holiday

Posted on Sep 2, 2008 in Site Stuff | 0 comments

I’ve had a few weeks break from blogging. I’ve been visiting in-laws and attending a conference. Term started again yesterday after the summer vacation, so I hope to be able to get back to normality.

Expect some new posts here soon. Until then, don’t forget the Whiteboard Challenge.