Technology A2Z Free Tech For Your Classroom (and home too!) Lori Feldman 2010
Animoto
Animoto is a web application that automatically generates professionally produced videos using their own patent-pending technology and high-end motion design. Each video is a fully customized orchestration of user-selected images and music. Produced on a widescreen format, Animoto videos have the visual energy of a music video and the emotional impact of a movie trailer. The heart of Animoto is its newly developed Cinematic Artificial Intelligence technology that thinks like an actual director and editor. It analyzes and combines user-selected images, video clips and music with the same sophisticated post-production skills and techniques that are used in television & film.
What is it? Bubbl.us is a simple and free web application that lets you brainstorm online. Why use bubbl.us? Because you can: • Create colorful mind maps online • Share and work with friends • Embed your mind map in your blog or website • Email and print your mind map • Save your mind map as an image
Classtools
Delicious is a Social Bookmarking service, which means you can save all your bookmarks online, share them with other people, and see what other people are bookmarking. It also means that we can show you the most popular bookmarks being saved right now across many areas of interest. In addition, our search and tagging tools help you keep track of your entire bookmark collection and find tasty new bookmarks from people like you. You will never lose your bookmarks again! No matter where you are in the world, you can access them via any computer.
Embedit
embedit.in is a new service that lets you embed files in your website. Just upload your files and click the Embed It button. After a quick login screen that lets you use accounts you already have (no registration required), you’re instantly shown the document or documents along with the code to embed it in your own blog, profile page, or website.
Free Technology for Teachers
About the blog: The purpose of this site is to share information about free resources that teachers can use in their classrooms. In 2008 Free Technology for Teachers was awarded the Edublogs Award for "Best Resource Sharing Blog." In 2009 Free Technology for Teachers was again awarded the Edublogs Award for "Best Resource Sharing Blog" and was awarded the Edublogs Award for "Best Individual Blog." Free Technology for Teachers is read by an audience of more than 21,000 daily subscribers.
Glogster (Education Version)
1. A creative, dynamic, and innovative digital outlet that captures learner's excitement for online creations, keeps learners engaged in course content, and makes teaching and learning more fun. 2. A private and safe platform, monitored directly by teachers. Teachers control all the activities of their learners. 3. A valuable teaching tool that integrates diverse core subjects including math, science, history, art, photography, music and more for individual learner portfolios, unique alternative assessments, and differentiated instructional activities.
How To Sites Do you need to know how to do something and you are visual? Try one of these sites and see if you can find an answer! • Instructables
• eHow
• Wonder How To
• Howcast
iPods in Education
Handheld computers are a way to have a computer for each student. Some handhelds can be outfitted with add-on keyboards for text entry, making them even more useful. Instead of taking up valuable time in the computer lab, handheld-using students can word process right at their desks, freeing the lab computers for more complex uses. Likewise, instead of using large, expensive computers to practice math facts, elementary students can cozy up in the corner of the classroom with a handheld and practice their multiplication tables. Handhelds tend to be simple to operate, allowing students to focus on their tasks, not the technology.
Jeopardy Labs
Keyboard Shortcuts (Mac) Dan Rodney, an Adobe certified teacher from Pennsylvania has shared many tips and tricks using shortcuts. You would be surprised how many amazing tricks there are that will make your life easier!
When you join, you create a profile that summarizes your professional expertise and accomplishments. You can then form enduring connections by inviting trusted contacts to join LinkedIn and connect to you. Your network consists of your connections, your connections’ connections, and the people they know, linking you to a vast number of qualified professionals and experts. Through your network you can: • Manage the information that’s publicly available about you as professional • Find and be introduced to potential clients, service providers, and subject experts who come recommended • Create and collaborate on projects, gather data, share files and solve problems • Be found for business opportunities and find potential partners • Gain new insights from discussions with likeminded professionals in private group settings • Discover inside connections that can help you land jobs and close deals • Post and distribute job listings to find the best talent for your company
Math Quiz Site – A.K.A That Quiz
The most accessible math test resource on the web today with over 25 million graded exams to date and over 500,000 participating students. What we believe in: Clean, quality, easily accessible, educational software for every school and child regardless of geographic location or economic class. What we don't believe in: Games, advertising, fees, spam or gimmicks. That Quiz is free for educational use. Copyright Š 2004-2010 Andrew Lyczak.
Notebook (Mac Application)
Options For Accessibility Mac OS X comes with a variety of assistive technologies to help those with vision disabilities, including a built-in screen reader, screen and cursor magnification, high-contrast settings, and more.
• Voiceover • Screen Magnification • Cursor Magnification • High Contrast • View Options • Talking Alerts/Options
Photo Booth
Photo Booth is a fun application that makes it easy to take photos using the built-in iSight camera in your Mac. Just look into the lens, smile, and click. Before it snaps your photo, Photo Booth flashes your display with bright white to add more light to your face. Take a single snapshot or use the burst mode to take four quick pictures. Photo Booth is not just for pictures. Using your iSight camera, you can shoot video clips and send them to friends and family via email with just a few clicks. Backdrops and effects work for your videos, too. Sure, you can take regular photos, but the real fun starts when you use the cool effects and backdrops in Photo Booth. Snap a photo of yourself at the Eiffel Tower or in outer space. Twist and twirl your smile with the strange Twirl effect. Add an artistic look with the Colored Pencil effect. Experiment with all the effects to transform your look.
Quizlet Free online platform to create flashcards. Students may choose to learn, test, or play games using your flashcards.
RSS Feeds
Once you pick an RSS feed reader, it is time to subscribe to RSS feeds. To subscribe to an RSS feed: • Follow the instructions of your RSS feed reader. Each RSS feed reader is a little different. • On a website or blog with a feed, find the RSS icon or button, left click, and see if the RSS Feed has information to help subscribe. • On a website or blog with a feed, find the RSS icon or button, right click, copy link location, and paste the URL into your RSS feed reader. • On a website or blog with a feed, find the button for your particular RSS Feed Reader, click and follow instructions.
Spelling City SpellingCity is an innovative interactive educational site used to help children of all ages improve their spelling skills and expand their vocabulary. SpellingCity is widely used by teachers and parents to teach students how to spell by creating and saving individual and unique spelling lists. The approach of SpellingCity is to enforce the elements of Spelling through interactive learning.
SpellingCity offers over 41,000 words and sentences. Each of the words is spoken by a "real" human voice to offer the student more clarity. With each created list, a student has the option to: Teach Me, Test Me, or Play A Game.
TeacherTube
TeacherTube is an online community for sharing instructional videos. The site is a safe venue for teachers, schools, and home learners. It is a site to provide anytime, anywhere professional development with teachers teaching teachers. As well, it is a site where teachers can post videos designed for students to view in order to learn a concept or skill.
 
 
UDL Toolkit
Universal Design for Learning (UDL). UDL provides a blueprint for creating flexible goals, methods, materials, and assessments that accommodate learner differences. "Universal" does not imply a single optimal solution for everyone. Instead, it is meant to underscore the need for multiple approaches to meet the needs of diverse learners. UDL mirrors the universal design movement in architecture and product development. Think of speakerphones, curb cuts, and closecaptioned television—all universally designed to accommodate a wide variety of users, including those with disabilities. Embedded features that help those with disabilities eventually benefit everyone. UDL uses technology's power and flexibility to make education more inclusive and effective for all.
Voicethread
With VoiceThread, group conversations are collected and shared in one place from anywhere in the world. All with no software to install. A VoiceThread is a collaborative, multimedia slide show that holds images, documents, and videos and allows people to navigate pages and leave comments in 5 ways - using voice (with a mic or telephone), text, audio file, or video (via a webcam). Share a VoiceThread with friends, students, and colleagues for them to record comments too. Users can doodle while commenting, use multiple identities, and pick which comments are shown through moderation. VoiceThreads can even be embedded to show and receive comments on other websites and exported to MP3 players or DVDs to play as archival movies.
Wallwisher
Wallwisher is an Internet application that allows people to express their thoughts on a common topic easily. What is a wall? A wall is basically the 'web page' where people actually post messages. What can I do with Wallwisher? • Personal note taking • To-do lists • Party Invitations • Feedback Collection • Wishing people on occasions, like birthdays, anniversaries • Anything that might need input from a lot of people
Xtranormal Xtranormal’s mission is to bring movie making to the people. Everyone watches movies and we believe everyone can make movies. Movie making, short and long, online and on-screen, private and public, will be the most important communications process of the 21st century.
YouTube Video Converters Many schools block YouTube with their filters. There are numerous videos that are available, which will enhance classroom activities. In order to use the videos they must be converted and downloaded • Savevid
• Tubechop
• Youconvertit
• Zamzar
Zac Browser Zac Browser is a totally free software package. It is the first Internet browser developed specifically for children living with variants of autism spectrum disorders (ASD), Asperger syndrome, Rett syndrome, childhood disintegrative disorder, PDD not otherwise specified and PDD-NOS, also called atypical autism
Zac Browser is software that allows your child to access games (a lot of games) activities (based on diverse interests) along with videos (that allow a stimulating experience and encourages children to talk).