Physics and Chem Simulation Software - free

Here is a screenshot of the start page for the free sim software available from crocodile clips. The list of fully functional demo sims includes: waves, distance-time graphs, and exothermic and endothermic reactions, you may click the image for the full list. The website for crocodile clips provides a variety of modeling and simulation software for education. The full list of sims and packages available for purchase is extensive.

Google Earth, IB Notes, Catalysts and Connections, and Plagiarism from Wikipedia

Catalysts and Connections, a blog and website about music education, the subtitle is "Expanding Dialougue in Music Education. Looks interesting. An example of the posts is "online instrumental mentors".

The IB Notes site is a usefull collection of websites and resources for teachers and students in IB courses. In the new section the Savita Paul and Chem site has a lot of review material as well as topic notes for IB Chem students.

Many students are turning from Google to Wikipedia to research their reports. It is a peer written and peer edited on-line encyclopedia. Quck checks for plagerism for a particular report or essay might start here.

I searched one link for using Google Earth in the classroom and came up with so many links that I will have to make a Google Earth posting. Here is a selection of sites and resources:
-Google Earth educational resources and ideas at the Shambles.
-From Juicey Geography, putting Google Earth into your lessons quickly and easily.
-Google Earth Lessons from Google Earth Lessons, home page link. The image is from this site.

PowerPoint Jeopardy Templates

Use a PowerPoint template provided by M. Schimdt to create a PowerPoint Jeopardy game for your classes. The site will give you templates for single and double Jeopardy as well as instructions for the use of the template and instructions regarding how you can create your own PowerPoint templates.

Using Excel for Marks (and here's a tutorial)

Here is a sample excel file to help to keep track of Group IV IB Internal Assessment. Here is a Lifehacker link to an excel tutorial.

Educational Resources on the Web through Lifehacker

A recent visit to Lifehacker, worth a visit on its own, lead to the discovery of this set of links for free educational resouces. I have found the courses offered my MIT to be useful as they often offer many good links. There is also the growing trend for universities to offer lectures in podcast format and in particular, the wealth of material found at the Berkeley site for podcasts.

Using Blogs as Class Pages

Here is an example of how a blog, sample homework blog, with minimal changes can be used for a class. The moderate comments option would be turned on so that all comments are emailed to the teacher, who can then post or delete comments.

Setting up a Moodle Account

Please note that as of August 29, moodle was not live to the web, it should be soon. If you would like a new account please contact Derek Parker or Alan Dick.

Open another webbrowser, or internet explorer window, and follow the steps listed below.

You will start the moodle program by simply typing "wilson" into the address bar for your web browser.

The school's moodle website, KESPER, will appear.

A login box will appear below the calendar on the right of the moodle start page.

Click on "login" and use your first initial and your last name as your username and use your username as your initial password.

After you have logged in, go tothe upper right hand corner of the screen or the login box where you logged in and select your name and on the next screen click on the button that says "change your password."

You have likely been given creator permission and so you may now go to a course category and create your course. Please use the name on the report card when naming a new course, if you are unsure of the name please contact Derek P.

Presentation Ideas from the Web

While trolling the web looking for a blog who's address I had lost, I came across several blogs/sites of interest. The first is Technology Enhanced Learning and it is just that. That website lead me to Presentation Zen, a good site, well actually a set of sites by Garr Reynolds. He presents a set of presentation tips that includes creating and presenting in PowerPoint - or without it. Image below is from one of the postings at Presentation Zen.

Using PDF Files and Making PDF Files

Most of us use PDF documents, but we may not realize that we can copy and paste parts of PDF documents and that we can make PDF documents using the school photocopier. This first fact means that you can make tests and work sheets more quickly and the second means that you only need to photocopy (scan) something once and it is emailed to you as a PDF file to use.

To copy a part of a PDF document in Adobe Reader, click on the camera button and then select the image or text that you wish to copy, You may then copy and paste as normal. In Adobe Acrobat, you follow a similar procedure and you can capture images, or text. In the case of copied text, it may be pasted into a word document and then edited.

Derek P. can set up an account for you with the school photocopier that will allow you to access the scanner options.

What's a Wiki?

"Simply put, wikis enable anyone and everyone to create content online using easily understandable tools. The most famous wiki is Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia created by users from around the globe... Not surprisingly, K-12 schools are also taking advantage of the opportunities for "collaborative construction" that wikis provide." (Wild about Wikis 2006)

I am trying out PBwiki and WikiSpaces (here's the start of a school tech ideas wiki) for use with my classes. The second site, WikiSpaces, has ad free wikis for educational use and the wikis support pictures, customization, and permit restricted access. They also have some great (and less than 2 minute) tutorials with video and voice for setting up a wiki.

A full article about wikis, their uses, and great links, is available at TechLEARNING.

We should also be able set up wikis within Moodle once it is up and running.

Using Windows Movie Maker and Flickr

I recently tried out Windows Movie Maker. Here is an example that will open in a new window of what I created for a first attempt one afternoon using photos from class, ESY Views of Nature (wait for it to load and the transitions are a little too quick). The program may be useful as an instructional tool; I may use it as part of lab instructions, as background for a simulation or investigation, or have students create 10 to 30 second videos. I think you could create videos just like the movies from BigPicture SmallWorld presented in the past post without too much difficulty.

The Flickr website may also be a useful place to post pictures or host pictures for a blog that does not support a lot of images. It seems to work well and the controls seem to be fairly intuitive, but then I've only used it once to upload and group one set of photos. I have put the links for both in the posting for the "Views of Nature" Posters posting on the room A207 blog site.

On-line Reources: BigPictureSmallWorld, GEO Data Portal, and Exploring the Environment

Here are the links to on-line resources:

BigPicture SmallWorld movies such as "World in 10 Seconds", "Environment in 10 Seconds", and "Increasing Humanity". UN sponsored and can be shown live from an internet connection with a computer.

"The GEO Data Portal is the authoritative source for data sets used by UNEP and its partners in the Global Environment Outlook (GEO) report and other integrated environment assessments. Its online database holds more than 450 different variables, as national, subregional, regional and global statistics or as geospatial data sets (maps), covering themes like Freshwater, Population, Forests, Emissions, Climate, Disasters, Health and GDP. Display them on-the-fly as maps, graphs, data tables or download the data in different formats."

Exploring the Environment Modules Page. This site provides complete resources and instructions for ill-structured problems for a variety of subjects: geography, history, environmenal science, and other disciplines. The site can be used as the only resource for an ill-structured problem investigation, or it can be used as a starting point.

PCU, Personal Computer Use, and LoTi, Levels of Technology Integration Information

The LoTi connection has a great set of handouts that illustrate levels of Personal Computer Use (PCU) and well as Levels of Technology Integration (LoTi). Other pages on the same site have teacher questionnaires and links to LoTi resources for educators.

Learning Tools from UBC Arts

There is a set of learning tools provided by UBC and this includes: a timeline tool, a multimedia learning object authoring tool, a vocabulary memorization platform (includes flashcards and games). I have not used the tools yet, but they look good. Send me an email to see how they work.

Using Blogs to Document Class Activities

You can use blogs to document class activities in photos and in text as I have done with room A207. I have turned off the comment function.

You can also use blogs to post students' work, with the correct blog security functions of course. For example, the teacher would ask students to comment on the question placed in the blog. With the moderate comments function enabled, the teacher is then emailed a response from each student, checks it, and then has the comment post to the blog.

Let me know if you have other uses.

Starting a New Moodle Account

Open another webbrowser, or internet explorer window, and follow the steps listed below.

You will start the moodle program by simply typing "wilson" into the address bar for your web browser.

The school's moodle website, KESPER, will appear.

A login box will appear below the calendar on the right of the moodle start page.

Click on "login" and use your first initial and your last name as your username and use your username as your initial password.

After you have logged in, go tothe upper right hand corner of the screen or the login box where you logged in and select your name and on the next screen click on the button that says "change your password."

You have likely been given creator permission and so you may now go to a course category and create your course. Please use the name on the report card when naming a new course, if you are unsure of the name please contact Derek P.

Good Luck