ZamZar.com

Convert files from your desktop or a URL, free. ZamZar sends the converted file to your email. Very convenient.

Mrs Brown's Galaxy

This Eric Idle ditty happens to also contain some amazing factoids.

http://dingo.care2.com/cards/flash/5409/galaxy.swf

This is just for fun!

--Elizabeth

TeacherTube

Live Action English Interactive at TeacherTube

TeacherTube is a very safe-looking site where you can upload instructional video for students and/or fellow teachers. This is a sample from the Live Action English Interactive CD.

You can limit your audience to a group you create. You can also use tags to help sort your videos to the correct audience. Teachers can report any video that appears to be inappropriate for the educational audeince. There are currently many fine, almost-professional quality instructional videos at the site on a wide variety of topics, e.g., raps for teaching geometry and fractions, a discussion of pbwiki, how to use templates to create a newsletter, etc. Most videos go way beyond desktop recordings. You can also upload supporting documents/files--nice.

An interesting feature of home-made video instruction by teachers: it's spot on. (And a big thanks to Jacqui Cyrus in Guam, who tipped me off on this one!)

ChangeDetection.com

I had been looking for some equivalent to RSS for Web pages that were not set up with an XML feed, and finally came across

ChangeDetection.com

After registering, you can enter any number of Web page addresses and
ChangeDectection will send you an email when changes are made to them.
(Like Feedblitz does for RSS-capable pages.) Nice little bot.

Excuse me...Getting Directions

Mike Marzio has a clip on Google Video that is super! The American version will be coming out soon (we hope!)


ESL/EFL - Giving Directions - "Lost in England" - Closed Captioned version

Creating a (e)Learning Environment

Recent podcast by Michael Coughlan contains a number of ideas for supporting teachers who want to use technology. My personal favorite: forget the closed circuit stuff and get it all out on the Web.

Making a feed connection

While browsing through Vance Steven's ESL-Home pages (an excellent list of links), I discovered that Bob Palmer (in Japan, I believe) had used Virtual=Real (this blog), as an example for his instructional video on creating an RSS feed connection with Bloglines and with other methods. Talk about "Old Dutch Cleanser" cans*!

Thanks, Vance and Bob.


*For those unfamiliar with that reference: in the old days, a cleanser can had a picture of a Dutch girl holding the same cleanser can in her hand, ad infinitum. (You had to be there...)

Weblog portfolios in an intensive English program

This is a nice article with great links to a number of resources on electronic portfolios.

http://www.siu.edu/~cesl/teachers/pd/wp.html

Written in preparation for TESOL 2007 in Seattle: eFairs Classics, Electronic Village, by Thomas Leverett, CESL, Southern Illinois Univ., Carbondale IL USA.

Video Academic Session at TESOL

This is my wiki-based presentation, Trends in Digital Media - 2007, for the Video IS Academic Session. There are lots of links.

I found using the wiki for the presentation instead of PowerPoint was much more flexible. I was able to add and rearrange things up until the last moment. My only concern was having a good Internet connection in the room, but that turned out to be no problem, so I could use the links directly on the wiki page, rather than opening all of them as tabs in my browser.

It was a bit disappointing that so few people showed up--don't know if it was the time of day or the topics, but there were some really interesting presentations.

EVO Presentation at TESOL 2007

Just a very short video of the EVO presentation in Seattle, March 21, 2007. To see the slideshows and other presentation material, visit our wiki, CALL IS Electronic Village Online Communities.

Unfortunately, it was very early Wednesday morning, the first day of the conference, and so there were only 30-40 people attending.

Most of the participants on the panel were also Webheads. The entire Web cast recording can be heard at Webheads at Worldbridges.

Web 2.0 ... The Machine is US/ing US

Excellent video graphically depicting the transformation of the Web.

Web 2.0...The Machine is US/ing Us

The Free Dictionary by Farlex

This is a nice learning site that could be used for a student's homepage. The Free Dictionary has the following cool educational stuff:

• Word of the Day with audio
  
• Quotation of the Day - build a quick lesson around understand the
  meaning--equivalent in L1?
  
• Immediate links to a dozen or so dictionaries/thesauri
  
• News items with vocab linked to dictionary
  
• Quick Match Up test of 5 words and their meanings
  
• This Day in History - talk about historical events (past tense)
  
• Today's Birthday (historically famous people)
  
• Hangman game
  
• Local weather -- talk about the weather (present and future tenses)
  

Internet4Classrooms: Useful instructional Web pages

This collaborative project has lots of ideas for using not only Word
(Microsoft Word Modules), but a bunch of other common classroom tools.

(Published originally in Learning with Computers.)

Dutch MPs visit Second Life

This was posted to Webheads in Action by Gavin Dudney. I suspect the MPs had considerable tech help from Delft Univ. in setting up their avatars, etc.

The considerable amount of time avatars spend typing in air indicates a real need for a stable audio feature in Second Life.

Avery & Grandma 3

Avery & Grandma 2

Avery and Grandma at YouTube

Avery and Grandma in Palo Alto, October 2006

Second Life and Baldric's Presentation

Spent Sunday morning (5 AM for me) at Second Nation and later EduTech. Naturally, I got a little lost and only arrived at Baldric Commons' presentation after it was over. As other Webheads mentioned, getting lost is one of the disadvantages, but now I've created landmarks of the various places most likely to be used, e.g., the Webhead Hut and the EduNation Seminar Room. (I also keep a cheat sheet with the coordinates at hand on paper.) One of the frustrations of SL is that the names of buildings are not searchable. Even finding someone who was in the correct place was hard, as the teleport only gets you into the vicinity (around 200 m.) I expect familiarity (and landmarking) will resolve these problems.

We also tried to use Skype at EduNation as a means to voice chat simultaneously, but I had the usual difficulties with getting into Skype. At last I seemed to have my computer settings match up with Skype's expectations, and joined the Skype conference. In the meantime, I had missed getting to EduNation to see Baldric's presentation. (Another frustration--learning everyone's SL name and deciding which name to use at any given moment. In voice chat we ask, "Can you hear me now?" while in SL we ask, "Who are you in 1st life?")



Thanks to Candace Pauchnick for the photos of Sunday morning at her Website: http://henry.sandi.net/staff/cpauchni/Webhd2LF.html
Since I wanted to see people, I failed to notice the sunset! So another tip--it pays to look around.

I got some new duds from Baldric. Dare I ask what he was doing with high-laced, high-heeled boots and a denim mini-skirt in his inventory? (He-he.) I wonder what percentage of time men vs. women spend in shopping for clothes? Though men do seem concerned about getting the right body image, facial hair, etc. Vance was quite pleased with his (muscle) T-shirt. I'm sorry Sus Nyrop wasn't there, as she has one of the more imaginative costumes I've seen--well, except for the woman with black wings...

Kids Vid

This is a great site from Gladys Baya over in REO:

Kids' Vid ..."an instructional Web site to help teachers and students use video production in class to support project-based learning." The site also has examples from a recent competition.

Second Life Update

I've been exploring a bit in Second Life. I met Sus Nyrop there (avatar=SuNy Foss), and she teleported me to Dove's (128,128,0), where you can get new outfits for free. I couldn't seem to pick up the free iPod, however.

I made the mistake of passing up on the offer of 250 Linden dollars (the local currency), so I am stuck with my present avatar body. I did learn how to change the color and style of my sweater, though I wish it covered up my belly button. For now it's me in jeans.

I got lost after Sus signed out, and thought for awhile I would never get back to EduNation (70,49,23). I felt like my 10-year-old self when I got on the wrong bus and couldn't find my way home one Saturday afternoon. I wound up at the entry to an "Adults Only" site that felt really creepy (in SL, I mean).

So Doug Coleman is right--the virtual has to feel real to make it authentic.

I also seemed to be unable to find EduNation in the SL >search window. Bummer. Finally, while clicking around I found an "educational" region of SL, and by going there I eventually found the link to EduNation. I ran upstairs in the Webheads beach hut (noting how nicely the palm trees swayed out the windows, and how the moon was just rising beautifully low in the sky), sat down on the couch and had that perpetually steaming cup of coffee on the table--or wished I could, anyway. (How do you pick up the cup???)

So here's my avatar--Babette Hanson.