tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-149705332024-03-07T02:12:31.932-07:00Shawn Wheeler's Thoughts on Education & TechnologyThis Blog will house my various thoughts on Education, Technology and the role technology plays in educating our children.Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.comBlogger48125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-10178911124780267702007-12-29T13:10:00.001-07:002007-12-29T13:10:36.100-07:00A new home for my website and blogI did it. I bought myself a domain name and I have moved my professional website to a new location. I would like to welcome you to <a href="http://www.shawnwheeler.name/">Shawn Wheeler’s Digital Portfolio</a> located at <a href="http://www.shawnwheeler.name/">www.shawnwheeler.name</a>. This site will serve as a home base to the many projects I find myself involved as well as hosting my blog <a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/">Shawn Wheeler’s Thoughts on Education & Technology</a> which is now located at <a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/">http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/</a>. <br /><br />Thanks for reading and have a Happy New Year.<br /><br />ShawnShawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-63383857935448956592007-12-29T13:09:00.000-07:002007-12-29T13:10:12.696-07:00End of an era<span style="font-family:arial;">I have been in the technology side of education my entire career. First in the classroom with 7th and 8th grade students and now I work with adults. During the past ten years, I have seen a number of changes, including and probably the most significant, the explosion of the internet. When I first started, fewer people had access to the internet and there were even fewer web pages. We created pages in raw code using simple text or note pad. Finding a location to host a site was even more of a mystery and finding people who knew how to run a web server was nothing short of finding a needle in a haystack. These skills soon became a job necessity.<br /><br />Like most educators, I found resources (people and books) to help my educational process. When high-speed internet service came to my neighborhood, I signed up. I built a server (from parts) and began running a web server. Over time, I learned more and more about web servers, building web sites and how to bring web pages to the classroom where teachers could rule their own web site. In fact, I went so far as to document the process for others to learn from (</span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/learniis/default.htm"><span style="font-family:arial;">See The World Wide Web and Your School District</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">). I soon found myself as a network administrator in my own home. <br /><br />For eight years, I have operated a web, email and DNS servers from my home. Why… Because I could and it was fun. Overtime, these little humming machines transformed from learning tools to maintenance projects. Time for a change.<br /><br />-DISCLAMER- This is not a paid advertisement and I am receiving no compensation for this post.<br /><br />I began looking for new location for my web sites to live. I hit the jackpot with this little local company named </span><a href="http://www.godaddy.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">GoDaddy</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Through this company, I was able to move my domain registration which included DNS management for less money than I was paying to Network Solutions. (Check one, service I don’t need to run in my home.) I also discovered they would host my email service for $19.00 a year. (Check two, services I don’t need to run in my home.) Finally, I was able to move all of my family and new professional web and blog sites to Godaddy for $7.00 a month. (Check three, services I don’t need to run in my home.)<br /><br />With all of this content running on someone elses equipment, I no longer need a business class DSL service in my home. A phone call to Qwest netted me a six times faster connection to the web for a savings of $40.00 a month. <br /><br />I have no regrets for running all these machines in my home for so many years. They were great teachers and I have taken a wealth of knowledge from them. Don’t be afraid to try something just for the sake of learning and don’t be afraid to say thank you to one teacher and move to the next subject.<br /><br />Notice: Shawn Wheeler’s Thoughts on Education & Technology has a new home. Visit the new blog site at </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> or subscribe to the RSS feed at </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/?feed=rss2"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/?feed=rss2</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br />Shawn also has a new home for his digital portfolio. Visit his new site at </span><a href="http://www.shawnwheeler.name/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.shawnwheeler.name/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.</span>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-85128919755824228062007-12-29T13:05:00.000-07:002007-12-29T13:09:04.079-07:00Reading and Learning on the GO<span style="font-family:arial;">On occasion, I sit down and read a real book. You know the type with pages that you can turn, hold, smell and sometimes even injure yourself. However, most of my reading comes in the form of web sites, blogs, PDF files, email etc… A few years ago I bought an iPod so I could become a </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/My%20Pages/Adventures%20In%20PodCasting.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">podcaster</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. (Shhh don’t tell anyone but you don’t need the ipod. </span><a href="http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/Shawn_Wheeler/AdventuresNPodCastingpresentation/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Click here to see what you really need</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.) Not long after that, I discovered </span><a href="http://www.audible.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Audible.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Having been a longtime fan of books on tape this was a perfect fit for my new tool. <br /><br />Last month I went to the doctor for my annual physical. The doctor walked in, chatted with me for a few minutes then told me what I knew. Shawn, your blood pressure is up, your weight is up and I am betting so is your cholesterol. I can give you meds for you blood pressure but I think you can fix it if you would do something about it! In not so many words, my doctor told me to get off my fat (insert word here) and exercise. He also told me to push away from the table a little sooner. To think I paid for this abuse.<br /><br />I live a little over a mile away from one of the </span><a href="http://phoenix.gov/PARKS/hikphgud.html"><span style="font-family:arial;">Phoenix Mountain Preserves</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> where my daughter and I occasionally ride our bicycles. This past week, I tried something new. I went for a hike in the preserve and it is beautiful. However, my mind often runs 100 miles an hour and exercise doesn’t help slow it down, that is until fatigue kicks in. Then I start thinking about how tired I am as well as the pain in my legs, back and chest as I try to suck in more oxygen. Then my thoughts turn to stopping, heading back to the car. I know, I will walk to that next cactus. Did I mention I live in the desert! <br /><br />To combat that little voice telling me to stop, I put on my iPod. As I trek through the pristine urban desert, I occupy my mind with audio books and podcasts. Remarkably, I have found myself walking even further and further. Could it be I am getting in better shape or is my mind better occupied?<br /><br />If you are wondering, my iPod does have music on it but what would be the fun in that. <smile><br /><br />Notice: Shawn Wheeler’s Thoughts on Education & Technology has a new home. Visit the new blog site at </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> or subscribe to the RSS feed at </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/?feed=rss2"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://shawnwheeler.name/blog/?feed=rss2</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br />Shawn also has a new home for his digital portfolio. Visit his new site at </span><a href="http://www.shawnwheeler.name/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.shawnwheeler.name/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.</span>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-29184393563925209322007-11-04T12:44:00.000-07:002007-11-04T12:58:38.075-07:00Web Filters getting you down?<span style="font-family:arial;">Web Filters getting in the way of </span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/http:/www.youtube.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">YouTube</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and </span><a href="http://video.google.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Google Video</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> content.<br /><br />Now, I would NEVER tell you to circumvent your schools web filter or violate copyright. However, there really is some good content out there that has not been added to </span><a href="http://www.teachertube.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">TeacherTube</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> YET.<br /><br />The other day I stumbled onto a Windows application that will download </span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/http:/www.youtube.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">YouTube</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> or </span><a href="http://video.google.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Google Video</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> content and allow you to convert it into different formats. From there, you use the video in an educational setting. Cool don’t you think!<br /><br />Check out </span><a href="http://youtubedownload.altervista.org/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://youtubedownload.altervista.org/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> to download this application. There at no directions, that I have found and I have not created any. With that said, it will take you about 3 minutes to figure it out. It is cool.</span>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-67874014167564681872007-10-21T15:05:00.000-07:002007-10-21T15:15:08.145-07:00What is Personal Computing?<span style="font-family:arial;">I just got back from T+L 2007 and it is time to recall and document everything I saw worth remembering. This year, I lucked out because every presentation I attended was great. The one I am going to write about now was called “</span><a href="http://k-12.pisd.edu/c@es/Personal_Computing_T%2BL.pdf"><span style="font-family:arial;">Personal Computing: New Solutions for the Classroom @ Web 2.0</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">” and it was facilitated by Jim Hirsch of </span><a href="http://k-12.pisd.edu/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Plano Independent School District</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Just a couple items before we start, I am going to hit the points that caught my attention. However, I highly recommend you review his slide deck and the resources he has listed on the two web sites below. The slide deck Jim used during his presentation is linked </span><a href="http://k-12.pisd.edu/c@es/Personal_Computing_T%2BL.pdf"><span style="font-family:arial;">here</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and to the title of the presentation above.<br /></span><a href="http://k-12.pisd.edu/c@es/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://k-12.pisd.edu/c@es/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span><a href="http://k-12.pisd.edu/open/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://k-12.pisd.edu/open/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br />As Jim rolled through his slide deck, he pointed out the many differences between who we were as students and the students who attend our schools. In addition, he pointed out something I had never thought about. Back in the day, our TV heroes were individuals and now, our TV heroes are teams of people who have to work together and collaborate. Jim completed the point with a slide that read:</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><blockquote><span style="font-family:arial;">The Lesson from Version 2.0 heroes in TV and teaching?Collaboration – not just sharing – is the way in which our students expect to find in information, solve problems and create new understandings</span></blockquote><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Sitting in that room, I wrote the following on my note pad. “Individual learning is transforming (or should be) to team learning”. I thought to myself, we have been talking about this for several years but we still have yet to make any major jump<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Continuing through his slide deck, Jim started into Web 2.0 and he began with the video “</span><a href="http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=1a3f19d9ad0ac2196849"><span style="font-family:arial;">The machine is us/ing us</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">” by Mike Wesch and it is available on both </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">YouTube</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and </span><a href="http://www.teachertube.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">TeacherTube</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. As you watch this video for the first or fiftieth time, think about how long we have had access to this technology and how it has changed our day-to-day lives as well as what impact it has had on our classrooms.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><embed src="http://www.teachertube.com/skin/player/flvplayer.swf" width="425" height="350" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" flashvars="&file=http://www.teachertube.com/flvideo/3978.flv&image=http://www.teachertube.com/thumb/3978.jpg&location=http://www.teachertube.com/skin/player/flvplayer.swf&logo=http://www.teachertube.com/images/logo2.jpg&link=http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=1a3f19d9ad0ac2196849&linktarget=_blank&frontcolor=0xffffff&backcolor=0x000000&lightcolor=0xFF0000&autostart=false&volume=80&overstretch=fit"></embed></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">While you debate in your mind how our classrooms have changed for the positive or negative with all this digital and hyper data, consider these items Jim placed on the screen which connect our students.</span><br /><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Social networking</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Googlization of Everything</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">“Fingertip Knowledge”</span></li></ul><span style="font-family:arial;">Probably the most prevalent and contentious Social Networks we as teachers are aware of is </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Facebook</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and </span><a href="http://www.myspace.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">My Space</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Are these sites contentious because they are evil or is it we just don’t understand them? Should we as educators learn about them or ignore them and hope they go away? What should be we be teaching out students about these social networks? While you debate that concept in your mind, click these four links to the Peoria Unified School District web site. </span><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/19961113090337/http:/www.peoriaud.k12.az.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">November 1996</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> – </span><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/19981111183633/http:/www.peoriaud.k12.az.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">November 1998</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> – </span><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20021127190502/http:/www.peoriaud.k12.az.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">November 2002</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> – </span><a href="http://www.peoriaud.k12.az.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Today</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Did you know the </span><a href="http://www.archive.org/web/web.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">Way Back Machine</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> has </span><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/*/http:/www.peoriaud.k12.az.us"><span style="font-family:arial;">589 versions</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> of the Peoria web site? Do you think our students would be as apt to place “VERY” personal content on the web if they knew it may never go away?<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.googlization.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Googlization</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">? Is that even a word? Hardly a day goes by that I don’t “Google” something or someone and you may be the same way. My library had a card catalog now the world has Google!<br /><br />Fingertip Knowledge? I looked at my fingertips just now and asked them what they knew! While they didn’t speak to me, if they could they would have told me to Google it! We tend to remember less today because we know more. Yes, it sounds like an oxymoron but think about this point Jim made. We used to remember phone numbers. Lots of phone numbers, yet today if I want to know the number of my cell phone, I have to flip it over as the number is taped on the back. Is this really a new concept or just a new name? Thirty years ago I stood looking at a library of law books in my mother’s office. I asked her boss if he knew all the information in those books. He patted my head and said “No Shawn, I just know where to look.” The modern attorney does too, but now he/she looks them up online. Hmm Fingertip Knowledge! </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Continuing on with Web 2.0, Jim showed his Web 2.0 applications slide. While I don’t necessarily agree with running from our mainstream software applications, (A topic for a different blog post), we should be aware of these applications and realize more are being added to the world daily. Note: As I am looking up these sites I am using another Web 2.0 tool called </span><a href="http://del.icio.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Del.icio.us</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> which is a social bookmarking site. This is </span><a href="http://del.icio.us/shawnwheeler"><span style="font-family:arial;">my Del.icio.us</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> page and these links are tagged with Web 2.0.</span><br /><ul><li><a href="http://www.google.com/educators/index.html"><span style="font-family:arial;">Google for Educators</span></a></li><li><a href="http://www.zoho.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Zoho Office</span></a></li><li><a href="http://www.thinkfree.com/common/main.tfo"><span style="font-family:arial;">Think Free</span></a></li><li><a href="http://www.81nassau.com/apnews/"><span style="font-family:arial;">AP National News and Google Maps</span></a></li><li><a href="http://newzingo.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Newszingo</span></a></li><li><a href="http://wikimapia.org/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikimapia</span></a></li><li><a href="http://www.pandora.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Pandora</span></a></li><li><a href="http://www.askvox.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Ask Vox</span></a></li><li><a href="http://www.musicplasma.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">LivePlasma</span></a><br /></li></ul><span style="font-family:arial;">Next slide Web 2.0 content</span><br /><ul><li><a href="http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Home"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikimedia Foundation</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> (Jim made a very good point where he stated we should pay attention to </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikipedia</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and what is being said about our school districts. Yesterday I looked up </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peoria_Unified_School_District"><span style="font-family:arial;">Peoria Unified School District</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Sure enough, we had an entry so I took that opportunity to update a couple of items.)</span></li><li><a href="http://www.curriki.org/xwiki/bin/view/Main/WebHome"><span style="font-family:arial;">Curriki</span></a></li><li><a href="http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm"><span style="font-family:arial;">MIT Open Courseware Project</span></a></li><li><a href="http://creativecommons.org/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Creative Commons</span></a></li><li><a href="http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/index.cfm"><span style="font-family:arial;">New York Public Library Digital Gallery</span></a></li></ul><span style="font-family:arial;">If you have been clicking on these links you should be getting pretty overwhelmed. But wait, this is where is starts to get wild and/or frightening depending on your point of view. How do we connect all this to our kids and what does it have to do with personal computing? To move on, you might need to change what you consider computing. I am typing on a Sony Vaio desktop computer. Why, because I am comfortable with it. Could I have created this post on my HP IPaq? Maybe, but it would have taken me the rest of the year to get the text on the screen. What about that cell phone our students have glued to their hand? Our kids, SMS text message each other, listen to music, take and send pictures to each other and believe it or not, they sometimes even talk on them,(probably to their parents who still can’t text.), LOL. </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">The bottom line is personal computing is just that, it is personal and as long as designers and engineers are thinking outside the box, we will continue to see new personal computing tools. Even today, my daughter’s, Sony PSP has built in WIFI and a web browser. I have not looked for a while but I would bet there could be some applications that run on it now, too. How about all the smart phones that double as PDA’s and cameras and unless you just crawled out from under a rock, you have to know about the Apple IPhone which can now use Google Docs!<br /><br />Oh, and if you are one of those who want to be on the cutting edge by using a mobile device in education, take a look at </span><a href="http://www.rtrisk.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">RT Messaging 4 Education</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. They are working on applications which will interface with our phones.<br /><br />What do we do as educators? Do we outlaw these possibly deviant devices or do we embrace what they can do as a communication and education tool? The future battles over this concept are sure to be exciting and VOCAL. However, I will go on record saying the day will come when students will create content on these types of devices and we will consider that normal. For those who don’t believe me, that is okay, there were people who didn’t think paper would catch on either.<br /><br />In the future, if you ever get a chance to see Jim Hirsch speak live, do it.</span><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;"></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn+Wheeler" rel="tag">Shawn Wheeler</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web2.0" rel="tag">Web2.0</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/T%2bL2007" rel="tag">T+L2007</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Jim+Hirsch" rel="tag">Jim Hirsch</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-82701326846492857892007-10-20T23:43:00.000-07:002007-10-20T23:48:18.357-07:00KISS the Topic<span style="font-family:arial;">Have you ever heard the term KISS? Keep it simple stupid? Sure you have and that is exactly what I thought the first time I ever saw a </span><a href="http://www.commoncraft.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">CommonCraft</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> video on </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">You Tube</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Tonight I watch the newest (new to me that is) video on Social Bookmarking and specifically </span><a href="http://del.icio.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">del.icio.us</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Once again, Lee did a great job explaining a concept. More importantly to me, he did it low tech. Too many time I have seen others (okay you can include me here too) get so caught up in the glitter and wow factor, they lose site of the big picture. <br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">If you have not seen a </span><a href="http://www.commoncraft.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">CommonCraft</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> video yet. Click the link. The next time you need to explain something, remember to KISS the topic.</span><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn+Wheeler" rel="tag">Shawn Wheeler</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/CommonCraft" rel="tag">CommonCraft</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Del.icio.us" rel="tag">Del.icio.us</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-9239368362112119382007-10-20T14:57:00.000-07:002007-10-21T15:30:08.483-07:00Dave’s Top Ten!<p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial">This top ten list came from <a href="mailto:dmirra@staffordschools.net">Dave Mirra’s</a> of <a href="http://www.pen.k12.va.us/Div/Stafford/">Stafford County Public Schools</a> round table discussion (with 60 people in attendance) at the 2007 T + L conference in Nashville Tennessee. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;">I would have loved to have captured the audio as the discussion was great.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>In the end, most of this seems like common sense.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Even if common sense isn’t that common.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Whatever you call it, the list is worth reading and incorporating into your environment.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial">Top Ten List Legend<br /><b><i>Bold Italic</i></b> = Dave’s list.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span><br />Standard text = my commentary from notes and memory of the discussion.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><strong><em>Why </em></strong><br />- <b><i>Is it part of an overall plan or strategy</i></b>?<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Don’t buy it just because it is cool or new!</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>How MUCH?</i></b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span><br />- <b><i>What is the total cost of ownership?</i></b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Hardware and software is just the tip of the cost.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Consider professional development and ongoing support!</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Who are the cheerleaders?</i></b><i><br /><b>- Who is the primary advocate?</b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Who is the owner?</i></b><br /><b><i>- Who will provide support?</i></b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Example:<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Who owns the Human Resources Systems?<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>The tongue in cheek answer is…<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>If it is working, HR.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>If it is broke, IT.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Just because it runs on the network doesn’t mean IT is the owner but this needs to be worked out before hand.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Who is the teacher?</i></b><br /><b><i>- What is the training plan?</i></b> <span style="font-size:0;"></span>Often professional development is the first thing to be removed from the budget.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>This is a mistake.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>More money should be spent on training than equipment and software.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Plastic my boy plastics</i></b><br /><b><i>- Public Relations for the schools and community.</i></b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Put on a Technology Expo for your community.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Do it on a Saturday and demonstrate what technology is available and how it is being used and have students demonstrating whenever possible.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Traffic light management</i></b><br />- <b><i>Simple data management for school leaders.</i></b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Technology equipment needs to be refreshed (replaced based on a recycle or replacement plan).<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Having an easy to read database, or list will help school leaders, Governing Boards and the community understand what equipment is available, the age and when it should be replaced.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Red, Green and Yellow was recommend to help make the process more visual. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Field of dreams</i></b><br />- <b><i>Infrastructure considerations are vital!</i></b><span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Before you buy and implement the technology, consider the network requirements and its ramifications on the network. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>Give assigned seats</i></b><i><br /><b>- Organizational structure must support the operations</b></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><b><i>I’m Sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that.</i></b><br /><b><i>- Infrastructure limitation (Human and Technical)</i></b> IT shops don’t like to say no but they have to be careful of overloading their resources.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Can it be done with what is available or can staff in the schools be trained to help support themselves?</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="FONT-FAMILY: arial"><?xml:namespace prefix = o /><o:p></o:p>The best statement was from a school board member sitting in the room who said we all needed to pay attention to what Dave was saying and make sure this information is made available to our communities because we can’t do it without funding and we can’t get funding without their support.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>I believe she hit the nail on the head!</p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="MARGIN-LEFT: 0.25in"></p><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn+Wheeler" rel="tag">Shawn Wheeler</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/T%2bL2007" rel="tag">T+L2007</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Dave+Mirra" rel="tag">Dave Mirra</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/T+%2b+L+2007" rel="tag">T + L 2007</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-43196476222995119232007-09-22T13:18:00.000-07:002007-09-22T13:23:52.445-07:00I Woke Up an Old Dog (part 1)<p><span style="font-family:arial;">I really didn’t wake a dog nor am I an old dog. However, I woke up and realized I am now pushing the big 40 (I really have 13 months BUT STILL…) and a number of the people I see walking into my lab for New Employee Technology Orientation are younger than the truck I drive.<br /><br />Recently, I attended a committee meeting where I learned that ½ of our teaching staff had less than 5 years experience in my school district and many of these folks have less than 5 years experience period. That new knowledge caused my forehead to wrinkle while at the same time explained quite a bit.<br /><br />Let me give you a bit of background on the scene. Ten years ago, I sat in huge hall listening to the Superintendent tell all the staff that we were going to put a computer on EVERY TEACHERS desk in the next three years. My palms began to sweat and I thought “OH MY! How will we ever teach all these people how to use the computer?” Fortunately, I had a boss at the time whose problem it really was and I could do what I was told. Today, those types of statements are my problem to deal with and really don’t scare me. In fact, they are the types of challenges I thrive on.<br /><br />Over the past three years, I have seen a number of questions come to me in the form of phone calls or email and a few face-to-face asking, demanding and sometime begging for access to various web sites, software and equipment. I keep thinking to myself, don’t these people realize how good they have it and don’t they remember when we didn’t have any of this “Stuff”? Well, they don’t, because they were not here in the beginning.<br /><br />Back to today. While sitting in that committee meeting scribbling out the words 50% less than 5 years experience, I thought to myself, “Shawn, you became an old dog and you better learn a new trick!”<br /><br />What has to change?<br /><br />When I started teaching technology to adults I would literally hold up a mouse and explain what it was, left vs. right click and which finger to use when right clicking. I would also explain to them the CD Rom drive was not a cup holder and the proper way to insert a floppy disk. Most of my students were happy to be there and learn how to use this new tool.<br /><br />Today, I have students, (adults students), with multiple as well as wide spread technology skills. Many suffer from a phenomenon Linda Stone is calling “Continuous Partial Attention”. This phenomenon is common in the average classroom; it is somewhat new to those of us on the Professional Development side of the house. The question of the day or challenge is what to do? What to change and how to do this successfully? Like many questions, I don’t have an answer which is the reason for this post and the posts to come. My intention is to blog about this challenge, how my team and I work through these challenges and document what to and what not to do the next time. </span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Who are my students? </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Certified Teachers and Administrators </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Classified Staff (All areas) </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Age group 19 to 65 </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Extremely varied computer skills which cross all job classifications, age groups and genders. </li></ul></span><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Hello Houston, can you say challenge? Can you say, “Been there done that”? Looking at the above text, I can too. So what is so different this time? More on that in Part 2.</span> </p><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Technorati" rel="”tag”">Technorati</a><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="”tag”">Education</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”">K-12</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn Wheeler" rel=”tag”>Shawn Wheeler</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Linda" rel="”tag”">Linda Stone</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”">K-12</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Continuous" rel="”tag”">Continuous Partial Attention</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/CAP" rel="”tag”">CAP</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-4989797406518832812007-08-11T15:30:00.001-07:002008-11-12T22:12:44.178-07:00StarOffice 8 & Sun Weblog Publisher<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'><i><b><font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>StarOffice 8 & Sun Weblog Publisher</font></b></i></font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Way back in January, the 20 <sup>th</sup> of 2007 to be exact, I published “ <a href='http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com/2007/01/biggest-kid-in-school-aka-big-companies.html'>The Biggest Kid in School aka Big Companies</a> on my blog. <a href='http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com/'>http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com</a> This past May, I received an email from Danny Begonia from LPP.com asking if I would be interested in trying <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0</a> and the new <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a>. After I recovered from the initial shock of learning someone actually reads my blog, I said sure.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Today is Saturday, August 11, 2007. School starts Monday and I am hiding out in my air conditioned home office. A must have (air conditioning that is) when you live in Phoenix. Today is the day I test <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0</a> with the Weblog Publisher add on.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Conditions: I am working on a Virtual PC running Windows XP with 350 megabytes of RAM allocated to the virtual machine.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Software: Windows XP, Sun <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0</a> with the Weblog Publisher Plugin.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>As much as I would love to give you a full evaluation of <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0</a> today, time just doesn't permit that. Therefore, I am going to concentrate on what I was asked, evaluate blog Publishing with <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a>.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Starting at the beginning I installed <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0</a> from the CD supplied by Danny. Next I downloaded the <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a> from my e-mail. (This too was supplied by Danny.) This is where I hit my first challenge as there was a slight difference between the supplied installation instructions and how it really works. Have no fear, I will share with you what I have learned.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>To install <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a> for StarOffice 8.0 follow these steps:</font> </p><ol><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Install StarOffice</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Launch StarOffice Writer</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Click the Tools Menu</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <img width='274' style=';text-align:left' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihtVj1oYuV_U8ThUezC9f26M46gUPlJVqYoxZu4BohnFRSHmuANZNolzUA3541uuBjgQ58aIvzDKmlPLxnSGa0IG3muw256j1hy86rMsTqqqO5n4tyYQVdlomxyPAUuuWhG1Px/s320/htmlexport_htm_mdadf11c.jpg",<br /> "mainSrc": "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihtVj1oYuV_U8ThUezC9f26M46gUPlJVqYoxZu4BohnFRSHmuANZNolzUA3541uuBjgQ58aIvzDKmlPLxnSGa0IG3muw256j1hy86rMsTqqqO5n4tyYQVdlomxyPAUuuWhG1Px/s1600-h/htmlexport_htm_mdadf11c.jpg"<br /> <br /> , "photoId": '5097574020970069570'<br /> <br /> }<br /> <br /> setHiddenImageIDField('5097574020970069570');<br /> <br /> i++;<br /> <br /><br /> //--> </script> </head> <body class="ftpStatus-success"> <div id="body"> <div id="main"><div id="m2"><div id="m3"> <div id="progress"> <div id="loading-message"> <h1>Loading</h1> <h2>Your images are being published to your FTP server.</h2> </div> <img src="img/icon_inprogress.gif' name='graphics1' height='175' border='0'/> <br clear='left'/> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Select Package Manager (Note: This deviates from the instructions.) <br/></font> <br/> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Click the Add button.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Locate and select <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a> package file.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Click the Open button.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>The package will install.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Close the package manager window.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Close <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0</a>.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Re-launch <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>StarOffice 8.0,</a> notice the Weblog tool bar on the screen and in the menu bar.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Your are done. Almost.</font> </p></li></ol><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Before you can publish your blog post, you must setup StarOffice 8.0 with your Blog software. To do this...</font> </p><ol><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Click the Weblog menu and select Settings.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <img width='333' style=';text-align:left' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo6W9PTzNMdGGP8MrauriLSu5Y7DhHekaJpj9KgKdt94uZOo0fJehViugyDrrQe9xS2uFgpxn4umZK-FLjZ_JI_QGPoAdhyphenhyphenN9StdtSAwmhnDqTI_1D_RIRmfNA6SiOTurkVDmC/s320/htmlexport_htm_6eab562f.jpg",<br /> "mainSrc": "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo6W9PTzNMdGGP8MrauriLSu5Y7DhHekaJpj9KgKdt94uZOo0fJehViugyDrrQe9xS2uFgpxn4umZK-FLjZ_JI_QGPoAdhyphenhyphenN9StdtSAwmhnDqTI_1D_RIRmfNA6SiOTurkVDmC/s1600-h/htmlexport_htm_6eab562f.jpg"<br /> <br /> , "photoId": '5097574029560004178'<br /> <br /> }<br /> <br /> setHiddenImageIDField('5097574029560004178');<br /> <br /> i++;<br /> <br /><br /> //--> </script> </head> <body class="ftpStatus-success"> <div id="body"> <div id="main"><div id="m2"><div id="m3"> <div id="progress"> <div id="loading-message"> <h1>Loading</h1> <h2>Your images are being published to your FTP server.</h2> </div> <img src="img/icon_inprogress.gif' name='graphics2' height='182' border='0'/> <br clear='left'/> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>In the Weblog Setting dialog box, click the Add... button. <br/></font> <br/> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Choose the type of blogging software you use in the Type drop box</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <img width='293' style=';text-align:left' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhts_T_d4dOtNbCQm4NZnhMA3RiYEP6z0PCeJ7Jf6VZQ5hc1yLgWmAj7HhrfRE5tAdCPWYlwgtd-18oQxqHJFXQdw9swHTQGecJ8MCCLTx3zlvoKiUUpPfAK2ISySGjY1hVaM4w/s320/htmlexport_htm_m46b70b9c.jpg",<br /> "mainSrc": "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhts_T_d4dOtNbCQm4NZnhMA3RiYEP6z0PCeJ7Jf6VZQ5hc1yLgWmAj7HhrfRE5tAdCPWYlwgtd-18oQxqHJFXQdw9swHTQGecJ8MCCLTx3zlvoKiUUpPfAK2ISySGjY1hVaM4w/s1600-h/htmlexport_htm_m46b70b9c.jpg"<br /> <br /> , "photoId": '5097574051034840674'<br /> <br /> }<br /> <br /> setHiddenImageIDField('5097574051034840674');<br /> <br /> i++;<br /> <br /><br /> //--> </script> </head> <body class="ftpStatus-success"> <div id="body"> <div id="main"><div id="m2"><div id="m3"> <div id="progress"> <div id="loading-message"> <h1>Loading</h1> <h2>Your images are being published to your FTP server.</h2> </div> <img src="img/icon_inprogress.gif' name='graphics3' height='238' border='0'/> <br clear='left'/> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Type your user name and password in the appropriate fields and click Ok. <br/></font> <br/> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>You will soon see your weblog(s) available to you. <br/></font> <br/> </p></li><li><p style=''> <img width='352' style=';text-align:left' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0hTzOKJwZJdrXV_rOKxdDd7U7CS9zZoffzllTmvhijdyH3Ms1ft_9pmTJcD6NOkMK1x-4QhEUt4Qy2eYnkMaY8efYRjWbyqq5ibRc_W8U_D25pA4SnSbfxgNB3eWTBdoIwKW-/s320/htmlexport_htm_5ed0ab0b.jpg",<br /> "mainSrc": "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0hTzOKJwZJdrXV_rOKxdDd7U7CS9zZoffzllTmvhijdyH3Ms1ft_9pmTJcD6NOkMK1x-4QhEUt4Qy2eYnkMaY8efYRjWbyqq5ibRc_W8U_D25pA4SnSbfxgNB3eWTBdoIwKW-/s1600-h/htmlexport_htm_5ed0ab0b.jpg"<br /> <br /> , "photoId": '5097574059624775282'<br /> <br /> }<br /> <br /> setHiddenImageIDField('5097574059624775282');<br /> <br /> i++;<br /> <br /><br /> //--> </script> </head> <body class="ftpStatus-success"> <div id="body"> <div id="main"><div id="m2"><div id="m3"> <div id="progress"> <div id="loading-message"> <h1>Loading</h1> <h2>Your images are being published to your FTP server.</h2> </div> <img src="img/icon_inprogress.gif' name='graphics4' ismap='ismap' height='173' border='0'/> <br clear='left'/> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Click the Ok button.</font> </p></li><li><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>You are set.</font> </p></li></ol><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>At this point, you are ready to create your blog post and publish. In a nutshell, all you need to do is click Send to Weblog under the Weblog menu and wait.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>What did I like about the <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a>?</font> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>It is just easy to use. I set my formatting the way I wanted in StarOffice Writer 8.0 and published. The formatting came across in the blog along with my hyperlinks. That doesn't always happen when I paste my entries in using the <a href='http://www.blogger.com/'>blogger.com</a> interface.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>What didn't I like about the <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a>?</font> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Really I have only two complaints about this product and the first is so minor it is not hardly worth mentioning. However, I did say I would evaluate this product.</font> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>The directions for installation were not clear. They were close enough that I was successful with a bit of hunting but that could be a frustration for some. The second thing that bothered me is the fact my images didn't publish. In reality, I published this post twice. The first time to see the process so I could write about it. The second time was the finished product. What I discovered is my images, which were screen captures, didn't upload. That is some what frustrating considering the image on the Sun Web site shows a person publishing a picture to their blog. (See image below. :) )</font> </p><p style=''> <img width='369' style=';text-align:left' src='../../Temporary%20Internet%20Files/Content.IE5/YGNPC4H4/blogger_illu_08c1_white%5B1%5D.png' name='graphics5' height='250' border='0'/> <br clear='left'/> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>If my opinion mattered... I would like to see this product give the option of adding <a href='http://www.technorati.com/'>Technorati</a> tags to the post as part of the publishing process.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <font face='Verdana, sans-serif'>Overall rating, you can spend $10.00 in far worse ways. If you are a blogger and you are using <a href='http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp?cid=94708'>Staroffice 8.0</a> you will find <a href='http://store.digitalriver.com/servlet/ControllerServlet;jsessionid=08347b8f007d468fbf76b70d2d2ca41a?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&SiteID=sunstor&id=ProductDetailsPage&productID=50984800'>Sun Weblog Publisher</a> worth the investment.</font> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><p style=''> <br/> </p><br clear='left'/></div>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-51644505219219096002007-07-27T22:31:00.000-07:002007-07-27T22:34:33.691-07:00Say it Again… Improving Student Learning through PodcastingFor almost two years now, I have been running a Podcast titled <a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/My%20Pages/Adventures%20In%20PodCasting.aspx">Adventures in Podcasting</a>, which is about Podcasting and RSS in the <a href="http://www.peoriaud.k12.az.us/">Peoria School District</a>. Like many things I become excited about, I share what I have learned with anyone who will listen. Some of those people come willingly, while others I hold by their own belt. (Just kidding, I use duct tape to hold them.)<br /><br />Knowing that many people do not remember everything they hear during a workshop, I have been recording my presentations and making the audio of the presentation along with the Power Point file available for the audience to download and listen to again. Hence, Say it Again… Improving Student Learning through Podcasting. After several presentations, I realized I was posting the same PPT file with different audio files and really the only thing different in each audio file was the crowd’s reaction to my jokes. Why not just make one presentation for the web? That is exactly what I have done.<br /><br />I would like to share with you <a href="http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/Shawn_Wheeler/AdventuresNPodCastingpresentation/">Say it Again… Improving Student Learning through Podcasting The Web-based Presentation</a>. This site contains the same presentation I give to a live audience including the audio. One you click the arrow to get started, just sit back, watch the screen, listen and hopefully enjoy.<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Technorati" rel="”tag”">Technorati</a><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="”tag”">Education</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”">K-12</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn" rel="”tag”">Shawn Wheeler</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Podcast" rel="”tag”">Podcast</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Podcasting" rel="”tag”">Podcasting</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/PUSD" rel="”tag”">PUSD</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/RSS" rel="”tag”">RSS</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”">Web 2.0</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”">Web 2</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-7103845103684186332007-07-04T20:55:00.001-07:002008-11-12T22:12:44.243-07:00Blogging in Paradise<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2x-1hg5jblUKAEGJQsbEEhQb3Nfvhicc3fRx-GFfN5FiJsSW9K70khaIa1H4TQBsYWRKBcC8CuTfbcTKJqCfroQi19sAtZIF1GkW8wNkrsiUPcjaSDRgQ8osORgBNtP_2VslG/s1600-h/Jolly+Roger+Lake+Powell+2007+356.JPG"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5083556902540506466" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2x-1hg5jblUKAEGJQsbEEhQb3Nfvhicc3fRx-GFfN5FiJsSW9K70khaIa1H4TQBsYWRKBcC8CuTfbcTKJqCfroQi19sAtZIF1GkW8wNkrsiUPcjaSDRgQ8osORgBNtP_2VslG/s320/Jolly+Roger+Lake+Powell+2007+356.JPG" border="0" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;">It is 104 degrees, the wind is blowing at a soft 5 miles an hour from the northeast and I am sitting in the shade atop a 65 foot house boat along with the favorite beverage of Jimmy Buffet. A 12-year old young man just walked by with a digital camera in hand saying, “This should be good, my mom is going to ride the 550 Jet Ski.” The kids with us do not realize we adults were once young too. 300 yards out, “Mom” stood up and rode across the lake. Much to his surprise, he said, “She did better than I did.”<br /><br />You may ask yourself, why is a person sitting at Lake Powell writing a blog? Easy, I have time and I have discovered I enjoy writing. Over the next several days, I will hide out atop this boat and blog or write articles to post on my blog when I return home.<br /><br />As you know, I try to keep my blog focused to Education Technology and I will try to stay true to form over the next few days. However, I am reserving the right to stray a bit right now. <smile><br /><br />One of the first things that struck me before we even left town was the amount of technology we needed just to take this trip and it made me wonder how we did it in the past. This post will focus on technology used on this trip and maybe at some point I will be able to pull all of this together and again focus on Education Technology.<br /><br />As we left town the first tool we needed to communicate was a cell phone or should I say phones. A common tool to most people today, we actually used this device to communicate the location of the five families. In years past, the only way to communicate was the use of the “wired” telephone and this only worked while you were at home. Once on the road, it was the Citizen Band (CB) radio that allowed us to communicate and those were only good for 5 miles or so. While none of these tools turned out to be perfect, it sure beat sending up smoke signals.<br /><br />Once on the road, I found myself making the statement I have heard from my father so many times in the past. “Don’t give me a reason to pull this car over” Ironically, each child had their own portable DVD player sitting in their lap while mom and dad drove shuffling songs on the video IPod.<br /><br />In years past, we would have never left home without a suitcase full of cassette tapes and recent years a notebook full of CD’s. Shh, do not tell anyone but we still have a notebook of CD’s on the boat. Some people are just not early adopters.<br /><br />Then there is the case of the portable DVD players. What parent in their right mind would buy DVD players for each kid. Ones who take long car rides is who!<br /><br />Six hours later, 15 phone calls, three movies a the trip to the infamous Mc Donald’s in Flagstaff and KFC in Page, we were just waiting for the sun to come up before we set out on our waterbound adventure.<br /><br />The houseboat, while 15-years old has all the modern convenience one would expect. It has a ship to shore radio, two refrigerators, a deep freeze, AM FM radio, CD player, TV with VCR and DVD player, generator, hot water, gas pump, shower, two sea going toilets and Air Conditioning. Where we are currently anchored, we even have cell service. Rugged, we are not!<br /><br />Even with all the comforts of home, we still found something to complain about. As we compared house boating with motor homing, we noticed that the black water holding tank didn’t have a level meter. (For those of you who do not know what “Black Water” is, I will try to describe it as gently as possible. When you wash your hands or take a shower, you produce gray water. When you do that other thing people do in a bathroom, you create black water.) Because of this inconvenience, you have a choice, use the bathroom until it is full and you find out the hard way or take it to the pump station. We chose not to wait.<br /><br />Now most people do not associate technology with anything other than computers or electronics. However, if you look around a bit, you will find technology everywhere. Even at a black water pumping station 34 miles up the lake. On this lonely floating sewer, you will find two impressive technologies. The first of course is the pump itself. I will not go into details, just understand it removes black water from the houseboat. Are pumps new technology? Not at all, they have been around for years. Never the less, old technology or new technology, it was still an advancement for its day. However, in 2007 we complained that we had to pump the lever manually. The other technology on this floating island was the fact it had lights. Mounted on the roof you will find several solar panels, that charge the batteries to power the lights, which allow you to find this island in the dark. With all of this technology, why then am I hand pumping sewage? Okay, I will stop complaining, I am at the lake. <smile><br /><br />24 hours later; I am again atop this houseboat and I am watching another old school piece of technology jet across the water operated by a child who is younger than the ski she is riding. For those not familiar with personal watercraft they have changed quite a bit the past 30 years. The old school stand up ski this young woman is riding is of 1985 vintage, the fact that it is running is a testament to its quality. Sitting on shore at the moment are three new school sit down skis which are less than two years old. What is technical about either of these types of machines? Don’t ask that question to a mechanical engineer!<br /><br />While it is true, these two machines run on a water-jet technology and they have similar running characteristics, they also differ quite a bit. The old ski, has a throttle, choke and a start and stop button. If you want to see how much fuel you have left, you have to remove the hood and look at it visually. The new school skies have tachometers, fuel gauge, miles per hour and a heat sensor. I found that out the hard way. The new skis also run over 50 miles per hour. A speed we only dreamt about back in 85. By the way, 50 miles per hour on water is similar to 100 on a motorcycle. I will not go into that story, after all, this post is about the lake.<br /><br />It is now two days from the last time I typed words on this keyboard. It is also the last day of the trip, the sun is setting and I am trying hard to get words down before the sun sets. Not that I don’t have lights on this boat, I just want to go fish.<br /><br />In the past two days I have been most thankful for yet another piece of old school technology and new school as well. First off, I am most thankful for the generator aboard this boat. It is old and tired but it does run and it kept the deep freeze cold along with several of our meals. It also ran the blender for which I will not go into the reason I am happy. <smile>The other piece of technology I am grateful for was the portable DVD players. (Note that was plural.) These little machines sent down from heaven kept our little ones (seven of them under 8) busy for a few hours each day. Okay, truth be told it was 20 minutes here, 20 minutes there.<br /><br />The final item of technology I am grateful to have with us was the marine two way radios which allowed us to tell the marina we had a motor which no longer ran. It also allowed us to communicate between two of the boats as we looked for a place to camp on our last night here.<br /><br />The sun has now fallen on our last day of vacation and I hope I have given you a chance to see just how much technology is used in our daily lives and what we often take for granted.<br /><br />As I make an attempt to tie this back to Education Technology, I think the best message for anyone to read here is this.<br /><br />Technology is all around us and it has been around in many forms for many years. We as educators need to look beyond the computer, Smartboard, digital cameras or the latest flavor of “Cool” software on the market. We also need to take the time to point out tools that were once cutting edge and are now common. By looking at our past, we have a better understanding of our future and certainly a better appreciation for the present.<br /><br />Thank you, and good night.</span>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-79188280670923977692007-07-04T20:40:00.000-07:002007-07-04T20:49:10.629-07:00How I blogged at Lake Powell<a href="http://www.keytools.co.uk/keyboards/images/alphasmart_neo.gif"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://www.keytools.co.uk/keyboards/images/alphasmart_neo.gif" border="0" /></a> <div><span style="font-family:arial;">I didn’t want bring a laptop computer to the lake and I really didn’t want to try and write by hand then transcribe the chicken scratch I call writing. So how did I manage? I used the </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/k12/K12_Products/neo_K12.html"><span style="font-family:arial;">NEO</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> by </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and I have to tell you it is one impressive little machine. This particular machine I have had for a few years but have never used it much. Mostly because I have access to power for my laptop, where ever I am. However, at Lake Powell, power was an issue but not for this little machine.<br /><br />I will not go into all the technical details but I will provide a link to the </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> web site. With that said, the machine sports a full “normal” keyboard as well as 40 characters by 4-row LED display. The only thing it does not have is a backlight, which is okay; I shouldn’t be blogging in the dark anyway.<br /><br />In a day or two I will plug this machine into my computer at home, pull off this article along with the other I wrote and post them on my blog. I may even add another paragraph or two, to give you the full picture of how this machine can be used. However, at this point, I would say to anyone reading, if you think you or a student cannot write on an </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, you have not tried.<br /><br />At this point, I am even considering keeping it with me so I can capture thoughts in my head as they happen. With a 15-second boot time, I think it might just work.<br /><br />Now that I am home, I pulled the </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> out of my backpack to download or transfer the two articles to my desktop computer. I turned on the </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, opened the file I wanted to transfer, plugged in the USB cable to my computer then to the </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Next, I launched Word 2007, then pressed the Send button on the </span><a href="http://www.alphasmart.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Alphasmart</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. As I sat back, I watched my words appear on my screen. Talk about cool!<br /><br />Once Word had my writing captured, it was re-read, edit and publish.<br /><br />As a parting comment, I have to give this little machine kudos for cool and convenient. Powered by 3 AA batteries and its quick boot time, this will become a very convenient tool for me to put my thoughts about Education Technology down on cyber paper. Now if I could come up with some thoughts.</span><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="tag">Education</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Technology" rel="tag">Technology</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="tag">K-12</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K12" rel="tag">K12</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn+Wheeler" rel="tag">Shawn Wheeler</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/AlphaSmart" rel="tag">AlphaSmart</a> <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/" rel="tag"></a></div>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-7075003906684135062007-05-05T19:56:00.000-07:002008-11-12T22:12:44.685-07:00Good Idea, Bad Implementation<span style="font-family:arial;">Every once in a while I have what I think is a great idea that doesn’t turn out to be so great. A few weeks ago, I setup a </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> for a professional organization to which I am a member. My thought was to create a place where members could share information concerning Education Technology as well as what they have learned at our regional conferences. Sounds like a good idea right? Right!<br /><br />The problem was not with the idea but with the implementation of the Wiki. You also have to realize that I am very uptight about file management. I like to have files organized by categories and/or types. Perhaps this is from too many years of building and maintaining web sites.<br /><br />To help set the stage, I created a </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. (</span><a href="http://aztea.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://aztea.wikispaces.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">) Next, I created a new page for each of the four chapters in the organization. Each chapter host a conference throughout the year so I thought a page for each conference would be a good idea. Next, I created a page for the </span><a href="http://aztea.wikispaces.com/WOW+2007+%E2%80%93+What+I+learned+%E2%80%93+Workshop+Discussions"><span style="font-family:arial;">Way Out West Conference for 2007</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> this included future links to pages for each conference session. (See the diagram below for the page link structure.)<br /><strong></strong></span><div><div><div><div><br /><br /><div><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Click the Image to see full size.</strong><br /></span></div><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5061277068690697570" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjamUWo2a8-UQ_7k2DO5A3s2FSFWpQQE_GqBbsJJN8OzBzgM1n65QxaZO0f2dFUApcF1IOqXdDfRyQwVEeZTYFl43tuWavHmlGdMmRM1WpmFzyUOxLARmaxSWCWa7qzB8s-6elv/s320/Slide1.JPG" border="0" /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfluLM9ix1_nwRoEUuD2w6WXsVDNht0eFACAXfRnc4QmI8V8H8vHealnv7OryjwCvWjU-HpQqANil8akQHlsNOu6AvVBHM55i93gywHaaWlCyGw9b14HzOYr11k9QOjp8AirVQ/s1600-h/WikiList.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5061278279871475106" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfluLM9ix1_nwRoEUuD2w6WXsVDNht0eFACAXfRnc4QmI8V8H8vHealnv7OryjwCvWjU-HpQqANil8akQHlsNOu6AvVBHM55i93gywHaaWlCyGw9b14HzOYr11k9QOjp8AirVQ/s320/WikiList.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div>Once the basic </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> was created, I recruited Peggy George to help me create and link the conference session pages. As we chattered away over </span><a href="http://www.skype.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">SKYPE</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, we create the 40 conference session pages. With each new page, I noticed the list of available pages to link to was growing. </span></div><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><div>While these new pages are not a major issue at this time, I could see this continual growing list become a huge problem for future AzTEA conferences. Consider this, the Way Out West conference add 40 pages </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and to the list. If each of the other chapters added 40 pages to the </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, the list would grow to 160 items, thus making it a challenge to find the correct page to link. Adding to that challenge was the realization that 160 links would only take care of this particular year. Each year AzTEA could add an additional 160 pages to the </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> along with the 160 links in the list.<br /><br /><em>Is there a solution? Absolutely!</em><br /><br />A better way to handle this challenge is to analyze the problem. As stated above, I have too many pages creating an issue when linking pages in the </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and this problem will be exacerbated each year. However, if I were to create a new </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> for each years conference, the list of links would not grow out of control.<br /><br /><strong>Click the Image to see full size.</strong></span></div><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5061277369338408306" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsKCD2GRhrfwnbR_dQElPHzQe9YeVk-edTEikCwznwFXM5jpaIxKlLDBcmwqpzZ-Gm-JZfMNfp6LZcqAl9GD8SmGd1DH1yg8v_utrFJD5vg-F0pG8Mb9AU0bLsw-CgkPZsPQwk/s320/Slide3.JPG" border="0" /><br /><div><span style="font-family:arial;">Does this solution have a few design flaws too? YES it does. In our current </span><a href="http://aztea.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">AzTEA Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> environment, we are able to invite members to the main </span><a href="http://aztea.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">AzTEA Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. This will allow members to participate in any page within the </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Creating a new </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> for each conference will require participants to be members of each </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> to add content. We could also not require membership to participate in the </span><a href="http://www.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Wikispace</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Some may find that to be a not to be an option. However, I am willing to give it a try.</span> </div></div></div></div></div>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-16514525722296202722007-04-29T19:02:00.000-07:002007-04-30T12:21:24.206-07:00It’s Not What You Say but HOW YOU SAY IT<p><span style="font-family:arial;">Many years ago, I watched my father trim the hedges outside our home. Being too little to run the electric hedge trimmers, I was told to stand back out of the way until it was time to rake up the clippings. Feeling left out (I wanted to trim something too), I grabbed the hand clippers and went to work on the rose bushes. I might add they were in bloom. Within minutes, I had managed to trim the bushes into beautiful thorny stalks. As I, stood back to admire my work, I was so proud to view the symmetry and alignment these bushes now had. That is, I was proud until my father walked around the corner of the house. I quickly learned that I was not correct. He told me that rose bushes do need to be trimmed but I had done it wrong. I felt horrible and more so when my mom came out to view my handy work. To this day, I do not like to trim rose bushes.<br /><br />So, what does this have to do with Education Technology? I recently had a chance to listen to a speaker discuss the uses of technology in education (I am being polite with the word discuss.) Over the course of 90 minutes I began to get that same sick feeling, I had with the rose bushes so many years before. The longer the speaker talked, the more the use of technology was criticized. To be clear, the person was not criticizing the technology per say but more the methodology of how we were using it in our classrooms.<br /><br />Any good educator will reflect (self-criticize) on their classroom noting what worked well and what requires improvement. Any good educator will also seek council from colleagues, books, seminars, conferences, classes etc… with the end goal being to improve student learning.<br /><br />Criticism when used in a constructive manner can be quite valuable and the constructive part of the criticism is most important. Just telling a person they are not doing something correctly doesn’t help them. Helping a person see there is a more effective way does. It takes a skilled person to tell a person they are wrong, help them improve and make them feel good about themselves while they are improving. Done incorrectly, a person will shut down, become withdrawn and refuse to try anything in the future.<br /><br />While I am on this soapbox of criticism, I had better practice what I am preaching. So, here are the things I would recommend to anyone presenting information on education technology or anything else for that matter:</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">State the topic or the message the audience will be learning about today. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">How the topic or technology was utilized in my (the speakers) environment. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">State what mistakes (the speakers) were made along the way.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">State what would be done differently next time?</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Provide some guiding questions to help the planning process for others.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Provide some guiding questions to help others reflect and evaluate projects or processes currently in place.<br /><br /></li></ul></span><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Information conveyed in this manner will help people understand they may need to improve (change) things they have done without making them feel like failures. In the end, it is not what you say but how you say IT. </span></p>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-20045728982282880862007-04-04T00:19:00.000-07:002007-04-04T00:22:23.050-07:00Don’t you just love satire?I love satire and this video is pure satire. I have spent my career helping people lose their anxiety when it comes to working with a computer or computer related technology. Last week a friend of mine showed this YouTube video to me and I had to laugh as I have had this person in class. In fact, I have had this person in class today. Enjoy.<br /><br /><object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/pQHX-SjgQvQ"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/pQHX-SjgQvQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-82297874731042195612007-03-19T12:03:00.000-07:002007-03-19T19:46:34.310-07:00BubbleShare? Why Not?<table border="0" width="100%"> <tr><td>I started out building web pages using simple text and notepad back in the days we dreamt of doing cool things on a web page. For several years, I chased the “cool factor” looking to one up the next page with some effect that WOW my audience. (Gee, as I write this, I sound like a kid learning to use the effects and transitions in PowerPoint. <Smile>) Like many people it dawned on me that content is king and I went back to basics. Text on the page that said something and I was happy. I also have be fair and point out the fact I have no artistic talent, which meant I was quickly outclassed when some of the new tools starting hitting the market. </td></tr></table><table border="0" width="100%"><tr><td valign="top">The last few years, we have seen a plethora of new social tools hit the market, (Blogs, Social bookmarks, image libraries etc…) during this time, some of us have sat on the side line watching these develop while other have jumped in and started playing. Where are you?</td><td valign="top"><span style="text-align:center;width:279px;display:block;"><embed FlashVars="size=268x201&rss_feed=http://www.bubbleshare.com/rss/125491.909a5a688a1/feed.xml" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" bgcolor="#ffffff" height="237" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" src="http://www.bubbleshare.com/swfs/player.swf?3094" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="279"></embed><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:9px;display:block;"><a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/editor" style="font-size:100%;">This album</a> is powered by <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com" style="font-size:100%;">BubbleShare</a> - <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/share#add_to_blog" style="font-size:100%;">Add to my blog</a></span></span></td></tr><tr><td valign="top" colspan="2">I am one of those folks that look at some of this stuff and have to ask WHY? I can see it is cool, easy to use and even fun, but still ask why and how long will this remain free? (Side note - I lived through the first .com bust <sad face> and it was not fun.)</td></tr></table><table border="0" width="100%"><tr><td><span style="text-align:center;width:380px;display:block;"><embed FlashVars="rss_feed=http://www.bubbleshare.com/rss/125491.909a5a688a1/feed.xml" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" bgcolor="#ffffff" height="189" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" src="http://www.bubbleshare.com/swfs/slider.swf?3094" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="380"></embed><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:9px;display:block;"><a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/editor" style="font-size:100%;">This album</a> is powered by <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com" style="font-size:100%;">BubbleShare</a> - <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/share#add_to_blog" style="font-size:100%;">Add to my blog</a></span></span></td></tr></table><table border="0" width="100%"><tr><td valign="top">Recently on a Skype call with friend Peggy George, I learned about <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/">Bubbleshare.com</a>. As she told me about it, I said it sounds much like <a href="http://www.flickr.com">Flickr</a> and I was wrong to a point. I do like <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/shawnwheeler/">my Flickr account</a> and the fact I can post images online and easily share them with the world, Bubble share does allow me do this too, plus a few other things like place a hat on my daughters head or put up a silly comment in a comic book style thought bubble. If that was not enough,<a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/">BubbleShare</a> gives me four different ways to share my album on my Blog or any other web site, and do this easily.<br><br>Would this be possible to do without <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/">BubbleShare</a>? Sure, I could take the image into Photoshop or some other image editing software and make my edits. I could find some script on the web that would allow me to create some of the affects that <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/">BubbleShare</a> allows. Then I could post these on my ISP’s server and update my web page to display these cool new items. But… I wouldn’t do it because it is just too much work. </td><td><span style="text-align:center;width:112px;display:block;"><embed FlashVars="rss_feed=http://www.bubbleshare.com/rss/125491.909a5a688a1/feed.xml" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" bgcolor="#ffffff" height="380" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" src="http://www.bubbleshare.com/swfs/bubble_slide_vertical.swf?3094" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="112"></embed><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:9px;display:block;"><a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/editor" style="font-size:100%;">This album</a> is powered by <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com" style="font-size:100%;">BubbleShare</a> - <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/share#add_to_blog" style="font-size:100%;">Add to my blog</a></span></span></td></tr><tr><td valign="top" colspan="2">If you just read that paragraph and are wondering what I just said, you are not alone and that is the reason some of these tools exist and why they are so popular.</td></tr></table><table border="0" width="100%"><tr><td valign="top"><span style="text-align:center;width:280px;display:block;"><embed FlashVars="rss_feed=http://www.bubbleshare.com/rss/125491.909a5a688a1/feed.xml" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" bgcolor="#ffffff" height="215" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" src="http://www.bubbleshare.com/swfs/album_mini_bouncy.swf?3094" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="280"></embed><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:9px;display:block;"><a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/editor" style="font-size:100%;">This album</a> is powered by <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com" style="font-size:100%;">BubbleShare</a> - <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/125491/share#add_to_blog" style="font-size:100%;">Add to my blog</a></span></span></td><td valign="top" width="472">So why did I write this today? I sat down and started playing with <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/">BubbleShare</a> this morning and thought it was cool. Once I had my album created, I wanted to share it with the world. </td></tr><tr><td valign="top" colspan="2">My blog seems like a good place to do this. Why the text? Well,it would just be strange to post only images on a blog entry. Or would it?<br><br>If you have not explored <a href="http://www.bubbleshare.com/">BubbleShare</a> or <a href="http://www.flickr.com">Flickr</a>, give them a look. I know I have left out a few other tools in this post, if you know of any, please comment and share the your knowledge. </td></tr></table>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-74668113442700899962007-03-05T21:39:00.000-07:002007-03-05T21:45:32.204-07:00Go Ahead… Make My Day!<div><br /><div><p><span style="font-family:arial;">And that is just what Chris Smith of </span><a href="http://www.shambles.net/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Shambles</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> fame did today. <a href="http://www.shambles.net/images/shanim.gif"><img style="WIDTH: 114px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 28px" height="38" alt="" src="http://www.shambles.net/images/shanim.gif" border="0" /></a></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">We all know a friendly or memorable URL can make or break a web site and let’s face it, there was nothing friendly about </span><a href="http://goodbaduglyoftheinternet.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">goodbaduglyoftheinternet.wikispaces.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. In fact, after I set up the site, I started looking at the URL and even called myself a few choice names <smile>thinking I should have come up with a name that would roll of your tongue. Thanks to Chris Smith, we can now do just that. Can you remember </span><a href="http://www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info/"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">? (</span><a href="http://www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info/"><span style="font-family:arial;">The Good Bad Ugly Internet .Info</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">) You sure can and guess where that address will land. That is right. Smack dab on “The Good the Bad and the Ugly of the Internet” Wiki site.<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">So… What should you do now? </span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Click the link </span><a href="http://www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info/"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and of course book mark it. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Those with a </span><a href="http://del.icio.us/"><span style="font-family:arial;">del.icio.us</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> account please book mark it there as well. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">If you are apt to blog about it, I am asking Bloggers to use GBUI as the tag for the site.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Join the </span><a href="http://www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info/"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Wiki and help build a resource we can all benefit from.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Last but not least… Tell your friends about </span><a href="http://www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info/"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.thegoodbaduglyinternet.info</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.<br /></span><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="”tag”">Education</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”">K-12</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn" rel="”tag”">Shawn Wheeler</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Chris" rel="”tag”">Chris Smith</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shables" rel="”tag”">Shambles</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/GBUI" rel="”tag”">GBUI</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”">Web 2.0</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”">Web 2</a> </li></ul></div></div>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-63365122524181166402007-03-03T19:54:00.000-07:002007-03-03T20:03:20.737-07:00Welcome to the Good the Bad and the Ugly of the Internet<span style="font-family:arial;">Recently I was reading a few of my favorite blogs when I came across a post on the blog site John Evans (</span><a href="http://nlcommunities.com/communities/joevans"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://nlcommunities.com/communities/joevans</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">) titled </span><a href="http://nlcommunities.com/communities/joevans/archive/2007/02/19/120265.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">RSS Information</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> where John spoke about the newly create Image Wall on </span><a href="http://www.bloglines.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Bloglines.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and his concern over some of the content on this site. Fortunately </span><a href="http://www.bloglines.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Bloglines.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> listened to the many concerned people who use this site and created a new domain name for the image wall (</span><a href="http://www.bloglinesimagewall.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.bloglinesimagewall.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">). John published another post titled </span><a href="http://nlcommunities.com/communities/joevans/archive/2007/02/25/122019.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">A Bloglines Update</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> which got the two of use talking. Our comment went something like this:<br /><br /></span><span style="color:#ff0000;"><blockquote><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#ff0000;">John said:</span><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#ff0000;">Thanks Shawn for the heads up on this. I hope this<br />implementation by Bloglines does what they claim it will do. I have yet to test<br />it on our school filters. What still concerns me is the fact that while it may<br />be blocked by school filters, the Image Wall is still accessible from<br />non-filtered computers such as their home computers. It brings to the forefront<br />our need to educate our students and their parents on the safe use of technology<br />in their daily lives.</span><br /></span></blockquote></span><br /><br /><span style="color:#6666cc;"><blockquote><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#6666cc;">Shawn said:</span><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#6666cc;">John, I think you hit on the most important part.<br />Filters serve a purpose but the most important thing we can and need to do<br />it educate our children and I am beginning to think their parents about the<br />internet. Sure, they know about the web but can they (students and<br />parents) discern factual information from exercises in creative writing? </span><br /><span style="color:#6666cc;"></span><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#6666cc;">I know most of us have enough items of our plates, but<br />what would a community service class for parents and students on internet tools<br />look like. Call it “The Good the Bad and the Ugly of the internet.<br />How to find the roses among the manure” content could include searching<br />strategies and techniques, Web 2.0 tool, Social Network site etc… </span><br /><span style="color:#6666cc;"></span><br /><span style="color:#6666cc;">Random thoughts before I head off for work. </span><br /><span style="color:#6666cc;"></span><br /><span style="color:#6666cc;">Shawn</span><br /></span></blockquote></span><br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;"><blockquote><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#ff0000;">John said:</span><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#ff0000;">Shawn, You have the beginnings of a great idea. Wonder<br />how we and others could collaborate on a session such as that? Perhaps put it on<br />a wiki or find something that someone has already done. I know Wes Fryer has<br />done many workshops with this theme included in them. </span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;"></span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">John</span><br /></span></blockquote></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Later that day, a new Wiki was born. I would like to invite you to view and participate in “</span><a href="http://goodbaduglyoftheinternet.wikispaces.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">The Good the Bad and the Ugly of the Internet</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">” Wiki.<br /><br />This site is JUST coming out of the ground so we are looking for people to contribute to the space.<br /><br /></span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">K-12</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">,</span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Shawn Wheeler</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/John" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">John Evans</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Bloglines" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Bloglines</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Students" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Students</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Web 2.0</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Web 2</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Filtering" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Filtering</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/On-line" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">On-line Safety</span></a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-70397396394555920252007-02-18T10:41:00.000-07:002007-02-18T10:44:43.720-07:00The Thin Client Diet<p><span style="font-family:arial;">One of the cool things about my job beyond the teaching aspect is problem solving. Now, I am not an engineer or a mathematician. No, I started out to be a shop teacher, woods to be exact. But the times changed and I found myself teaching computers. Back to my point; I often have opportunity to look at new or in this case updated technologies to evaluate their relevance in education.<br /><br />This past October, I was fortunate enough to speak at the T + L show in Dallas. Once my speaking duties were complete, (See "</span><a href="http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/Shawn_Wheeler/presentations/T+L2006/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Say it again… Improving Student Learning through Podcasting</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">"), I was able to enjoy the show and see what I could see. As my boss Larry and I perused the floor we came across a tiny booth with 4 monitors, keyboard, mice and one PC. Each of the three monitors, keyboards and mince were attached to a small black box roughly the size of my wallet. We began reading the single page brochure sitting on the table as the one and only representative walked up to the booth to tell us about his product.<br /><br />Introducing (On this blog anyway.) the X300 PCI XTenda multibox. This slick little device basically turns a single PC into four workstations through the use of the software and a PCI card. (</span><a href="http://www.ncomputing.com/ncomputing/images/product/x300_pic01.gif"><span style="font-family:arial;">Click this link to see the topology</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">) To be honest, I thought this device was cool and had potential at home, but I was skeptical about it at a school. That is until I had a chance to see it in action.<br /><br />When I returned home, I began the process of getting a demo unit. nComputing was good enough to provide me with the X300. I installed the X300 card in a Dell Optiplex GX240 with 1 gig of RAM then connected three keyboards, monitors and mice to XTenda multibox. Next my staff and I began to test this device. (Remember there are now 4 people working from one PC.) We opened MS Word, Outlook, etc… After about 15 minutes of various activities and applications, we decided to really abuse this device. The four of us opened MS </span><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/photostory/default.mspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">PhotoStory</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, created and rendered 4 videos. As expected this test put the Optiplex on its proverbial knees. However, we did have four videos rendered in less than ten minutes. This little box has potential.<br /><br />Test with students… Next I took the Optiplex with X300 over to one of our schools (Temporality replacing four 6-year old Dell GX110’s.) to test with 7th and 8th grade students. By the end of the next day, the teacher sent an email stating the students request that I leave the X300 with the XTenda boxes and replace the rest of the lab with the same setup. The students did experience one problem with our Punch Pro software as it requires access to the CD Rom. The CD Rom does work on any station trying to access it. However, only one person can access the drive at a time. Basically, the first person to click on the CD wins.<br /><br />My opinion… Do I think this device is the Holy Grail for Educational computing? No, it does have a few limitations so we will still have a need to purchase full systems in some situations. Nevertheless, at $200.00 the X300 and the XTenda multibox can make one PC do the work of four. In situations where the computer will be performing basic tasks, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, email and searching the web, this device deserves consideration.<br /><br />Links to look at…<br /></span><a href="http://www.ncomputing.com/ncomputing/index.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">nComputing</span></a><br /><a href="http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_27/b3991411.htm?chan=tc?campaign_id=rss_tech"><span style="font-family:arial;">The Next Cheap Thing</span></a><br /><a href="http://www.demo.com/demonstrators/demo2006fall/79903.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">nComputing Demo Video</span></a></p><p></p><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Technorati" rel="”tag”">Technorati</a><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="”tag”">Education</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”">K-12</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn" rel="”tag”">Shawn Wheeler</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/nComputing" rel="”tag”">nComputing</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Thin" rel="”tag”">Thin Client</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-50078504226705919212007-02-10T23:31:00.000-07:002007-02-10T23:37:17.896-07:00What is RSS ?<span style="font-family:arial;">One hot August afternoon last year I was catching up on some of my blog reading when I came across a post from David Warlick “</span><a href="http://davidwarlick.com/2cents/2006/08/11/what-is-rss/"><span style="font-family:arial;">What is RSS?</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">” where he gave his 2-Cents on explaining RSS to people who are still trying to understand it. Of course I chimed in with my comments as did several others. In fact, I chimed in with a post of my own on this blog, [see </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com/2006/08/in-response-to-david-warlicks-post.html"><span style="font-family:arial;">In response to David Warlick’s post (What is RSS cont.) </span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">]</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Prior to posting that entry, I like many others knew we needed a better way to introduce the topic of RSS. Being an educator, there is nothing I enjoy more than a live audience. Give me a room full of students and computers, we would live RSS. Remove the computers, okay, I can demonstrate. This works as long as I have time, location and an audience… Now you see the problem. Those three components don’t often line up.What I needed was a video. Well, it only took a year but it is done. Below you will see the video created to help PUSD community members learn about RSS and how the Peoria Unified School District is using RSS in our schools.<br /></span><br /><p><span style="font-family:arial;">If you would like to download a copy this video is available in both:</span></p><ul><li><a href="http://podcast.peoriaud.k12.az.us/WhatISRSS/WhatIsRss.wmv"><span style="font-family:arial;">Windows Media WMV </span></a></li><li><a href="http://podcast.peoriaud.k12.az.us/WhatISRSS/WhatIsRSS.mp4"><span style="font-family:arial;">Quicktime Media MP4</span></a></li></ul><br /><embed style="width:400px; height:326px;" id="VideoPlayback" align="middle" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-2154007197186326820&hl=en" quality="best" bgcolor="#ffffff" scale="noScale" salign="TL" FlashVars="playerMode=embedded"> </embed><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">I want to publicly thank Dave Collie, for his time and creativity. I had an idea what I wanted this video to look like. Dave delivered a video that is beyond my wildest dreams. Thank you Dave!</span><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Technorati Tags" rel=”tag”>Technorati</a><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel=”tag”>Education</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel=”tag”>K-12</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn Wheeler" rel=”tag”>Shawn Wheeler</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/David Warlick" rel=”tag”>David Warlick</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/PUSD" rel=”tag”>PUSD</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/RSS" rel=”tag”>RSS</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web 2.0" rel=”tag”>Web 2.0</a>, <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web 2" rel=”tag”>Web 2</a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-46912832036257717192007-01-20T13:17:00.000-07:002007-01-27T09:59:24.905-07:00The Biggest Kid in the School aka Big Companies<span style="font-family:arial;">I stand 6 foot 1 inch weighing in at a very portly 250 lbs. While my weight has snuck up on me over the years, I have always been tall. Growing up one of the biggest kids in the grade level had a number of disadvantages. The worst of, (in my day anyway), which is every new boy that entered the school had to prove himself. What better way to prove himself by taking a shot or two at the biggest kid in the school. Sometimes these were verbal but more often than not, it was a smack across the jaw. (Ouch) This caused me to grow up with an interesting perspective on the world.<br /><br />I have looked at a number of productivity software, (word processors, spreadsheet and presentation), applications over the years. With each new version, they get more powerful. In recent years, there has been an influx of open source and web based productivity applications. </span><a href="http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp"><span style="font-family:arial;">Star Office</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> was one of the first I looked at and I thought <a href="http://www.microsoft.com">Microsoft </a>should pay attention. Last summer I looked at </span><a href="http://docs.google.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Writely</span></a>,<span style="font-family:arial;"> (</span><a href="http://docs.google.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Now renamed Google Docs.</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">), and my jaw dropped onto my keyboard. This product looked and felt like MS Word and even saved as a .doc file type. As an educator, I thought this is great for all the students who do not have a copy of Word at home. Oh and it was web based. Two weeks ago, I loaded Open Office to see what it looked like. While I haven’t given this product a thorough test, it has familiar look and feel. Again, I thought Microsoft should pay attention.<br /><br />This week I walked through the office and noticed one of the IT supervisors was installing </span><a href="http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Solaris</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> on a machine. Being a </span><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Microsoft</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> shop, I had to stop in and tease him. <smile>I said, “What is the world coming to? You are installing Solaris and I bought a Macintosh server.” We chuckled as we began talking about some of the open source tools now available. He said with all the great “Free” software out there, no one would ever need to buy Office. That statement again, made me think of being the “Big Kid” having shots taken at me.<br /><br />I remember when computers were not interoperable between platforms. I remember when my word processor wouldn’t open the document you sent me because the two applications were not compatible. For the past several years, we have enjoyed interoperable computing and Microsoft has enjoyed an enormous market share. This is the time when some people start taking shots at the “Big Kid”. Words like monopolist, giant, big bad begin to appear in the same sentence with the “Big Kids” name. Is this good or bad? That is for you to decide.<br /><br />This time also provides a catalyst to some very talented programmers who begin to develop their own version of software. Some of them work alone while other works together as a worldwide community. This is collaboration at its best and these individuals should be applauded for their efforts.<br /><br />We also need to stay focused on the companies, large and small, that shape the world. These companies were built on the minds of brilliant individuals with the spirit and determination to make a difference. Not very different from the open source world, noting these companies intend to turn a profit.<br /><br />Please don’t mistake this entry as I am against open source or business. I love the open source software I use each week. I love the computer and the software I am currently using. I love fact that my job pays my bills and affords me the opportunity to sit at McDonald's and write this article so I can freely share my opinions with you. I am merely a much older big kid with a different perspective.<br /><br />Oh, on a final note, I did have a chance to spend a couple hours this week with </span><a href="http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word/FX100487981033.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">Word 2007</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. Microsoft was paying attention and they again have raised the bar. While it does pose a few challenges for network people and compatibility with older files, it changed the user interface, in my opinion, for the better. </span><br /><br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Technorati" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Technorati Tags</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Education</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">K-12</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Shawn Wheeler</span></a>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-1168824025381006152007-01-14T18:16:00.000-07:002007-01-15T09:03:19.053-07:00Is professional development just smoke and mirrors?<p><span style="font-family:arial;">Recently I attended a meeting with a group of tech trainers, coordinators, IT bosses and such. The topic of staff development came up and some of the methods we were using and/or looking at in our respective districts. Most of the time these conversations are interesting and I can usually find some new ideas to improve training in my district. However, the conversation on this day was directed more toward how we are going to shift duties around so we can do more with less as budget cuts loom over all our heads.<br /><br />From here there were two prevailing thoughts. </span></p><ol><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Cut spending so one person will now do the work or two or three people.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Cut programs which top level administration feels can be removed.<br /></span></li></ol><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Neither of these two thoughts are fun to deal with, furthermore; it sends a frightening message to three groups of people.</span></p><ol><li><span style="font-family:arial;">The people doing the job tend to feel there work is not appreciated or even noticed.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">The teachers in the classroom who rely on these experts to help them improve learning opportunities for their students. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">The community may question why these jobs were added in the first place and certainly will question why they are being brought back when the budget crisis is over. </span></li><br /></ol><p><span style="font-family:arial;">While administrators work through the process balancing the budgets, those who work in one of the jobs on the preverbal chopping block vie for position. Worse human nature can kick in and finger pointing of which program is more important becomes not only counter productive. It becomes a cancer on the organization driving moral down.<br /><br />I will not toss stones at my colleagues in the professional development world but being a tech geek myself I of course will always state that professional development is necessary. However, let’s keep content areas out of the discussion. In fact, let’s take the conversation away from education for a moment and consider a few thoughts:</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">You require a medical procedure to be performed. The new procedure dramatically increases your chances of survival. Do you want your doctor to be properly trained?</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Tax time is around the corner. Do you want your tax accountant to be up-to-date with the current tax codes? </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Last year you paid $38,000 for a new vehicle which has a specialized transmission. Today the car is shifting funny and requires repair. Do you expect your mechanic to know how to work on your vehicle?</span></li><br /></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;">The answer to all of these questions is yes. We expect professionals to be knowledgeable in their field and we expect them to be current with best practices and techniques.<br /><br />Shifting back to education, parents and community members have the same expectations of our teachers. What is not often realized is vast number of changes and requirements placed upon our teachers. The burden of keeping track of these changes and providing in-services to our teachers along with best practices for implementation falls to the teachers who work in these professional development assignments. Once these professional are removed from their position or find themselves doing two or three jobs, the burden will fall back to the classroom teachers. Time spent preparing engaging and rigorous lessons may fall prey to budget cuts.<br /><br />While there is no simple solution to this problem, the teacher in me feels that educating our parents and community about the implications of loosing these jobs is the first step. Maybe we should call it Parent & Community Development.</span></p><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Education" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Education</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/K-12" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">K-12</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Professional" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Professional Development</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Shawn" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Shawn Wheeler</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br /></span>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-1168674432033169192007-01-13T00:09:00.000-07:002007-01-13T00:47:12.063-07:00Podcasting in Peoria: How is podcasting being used in one school district<p><span style="font-family:arial;">This entry was written for the second edition of Coming of Age: An<br />introduction to the NEW worldwide web.<br /></span><a href="http://www.terry-freedman.org.uk/db/web2/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Download your copy of version one here</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.<br /><br /><hr /><br />Over the past ten years there have been a number of “new” technologies to hit the market that caused me to become extremely excited. I am sure it is no shock to read that one of my first passions with the computer was the ability to edit video. In fact, I was so enamored with this technology I gladly gave Apple Computers 3000 of my hard earned dollars for a Macintosh Performa 6400 with an Avid Video card. After making only a few videos, I began to lose interest.<br /><br />Was the technology bad? Of course not, in fact it was outstanding. However, I discovered that it required a substantial amount of effort to produce a product and it really didn’t fit into my curriculum. Let’s face it, edited or not, Christmas morning videos are still not exciting.<br /><br />Several years later, </span><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/moviemaker2.mspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">Movie Maker 2</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> from Microsoft emerged on the market. I was back into video editing like never before. However, I still had my same reservations with video. My colleagues in the district were clamoring for this technology and I wanted to help develop an army of Spielbergs and Coppolas. For several years, we facilitated workshops teaching teachers how to create movies using Movie Maker in their classroom. To be honest, a number of wonderful projects were created. Unfortunately, the process is time consuming and video production began to slow.<br /><br />A year later, Microsoft gave us </span><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/office/powerpoint/producer/prodinfo/default.mspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">Producer</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> which marries PowerPoint with video and/or audio. I thought we had the next killer application for educational technology. This product should have taken off. Maybe we as technology educators just failed to embrace it. However, one very interesting item came to our attention as we facilitated workshops on Producer. The participants wouldn’t get in front of the camera for their project. Oddly enough, when we told them they could instead use the microphone on the computer and record audio only, the excitement for the product grew.<br /><br />With all this background it still took the creation of the RSS enclosure tag for the “light bulb” to click on. What is so special about the RSS enclosure tag? It was the birth of Podcasting.<br /><br />In my mind, we have discovered the Holy Grail of Education Technology. It has taken millions of dollars in equipment, software and infrastructure for us to come full circle back to one of the first forms of mass communication… Radio! However, in our, “I want it when I want it, not when you want to allow me to have it”, world, this generation may become known as the </span><a href="http://www.tivo.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">Tivo</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> generation, radio just doesn’t cut it. We want our content when and where we want it. The mode of radio that fits this model is Podcasting.<br /><br />This publication is loaded with several great explanations of Podcasting, for this reason I will not go into the technical specifics of Podcasting. I will share some of the ways teachers in my district are using Podcasting, as well as some of the processes involved in building excitement for the concept.<br /><br />How is Podcasting being used?<br />When I first became excited about Podcasting, (October 2005), I am ashamed to say that I had a horrible case of tunnel vision. In fact, I only saw two major uses for the technology; the first being the obvious, remediation, the second communication with the community or staff by the school administrator.<br /><br />This past June, I was able to facilitate two Podcasting classes for 28 teachers in the Peoria District. (I had only intended to teach one; however, I had so much interest that I ran two separate classes.) During each of these 3-day workshops, I was very pleased to see the level of excitement pouring from these educators. Equally impressive was the dialog that took place in the classes. One person would state how they intended to use Podcasting in their environment; another teacher in the room would say “Oh wow and then you could do…” Toward the end of the class I asked them to post on the class </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/sites/Services_and_Training/Lists/PUSD%20Podcasters/AllItems.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">discussion board</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> how they intended to use Podcasting in their environment. The following are some of their comments.<br /></span><blockquote><p><span style="font-family:arial;">I will definitely use it to record major lectures for English 1 students. That way, those who are absent or those who want to review the information may do so at their convenience.<br /><br />I will use podcasting on my staffweb page to keep parents and students informed of what is going on in my classroom. What better way to get the word out about curriculum, assignments, and upcoming events. I also hope to add podcasting to our school website that I'm going to work on this year.<br /><br />I have three immediate uses:<br /><br />1) Record meetings for those who cannot attend<br />2) Record information on selected professional development topics<br />3) Personal use on an oral family history project<br /><br />I would like to post class discussions of important topics so that students can listen to the discussions again or absent students can hear the discussions. I would also like to have students create "radio show" type broadcasts. I am sure many other ideas will come to me as I begin to investigate this type of media on the web.<br /><br />Oh boy, where do I start? Audio clips will become a huge part of the DSS, (Decision Support System). On every page found in the DSS, there will be audio "help" instructions, (i.e. what data is found by clicking on "state tests", when new data will be posted, how to interpret the data, etc). My vision is a teacher who can examine the data while listening to the above steps. This eliminates having 5+ documents...<br /><br />Career & Technical Education (CTE) will use podcasting in multiple ways:</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">provide directions and information to CTE teachers on special<br />projects and initiatives </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">provide information to students on the student zone </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">provide information to parents on the parent zone </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">provide information to the media about CTE in PUSD</span></li><br /></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Creating "study guides" for the students to listen to and write answers. This is great for kids who don't have anyone at home to quiz them. They can listen to the questions, and write down their answers.<br /><br />I have already started a Podcast Club for students at Desert Harbor. I also have students recording our school newsletter articles. This year I am also teaching a podcast elective and anticipate learning some advanced techniques with my students. Additionally, I have also been uploading Podcasts for our administrators and hope to help them...<br /><br />I think this technology will be used in many ways in my classroom and school. A few ideas worth sharing will be encouraging my principal to make a monthly podcast message to post on our website. I will be using it in my classroom to, among other things, record our weekly spelling words so the students can practice taking the spelling test just as it will be presented on testing day, homework assignments...</span></p></blockquote><p><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">As you have read, these classes bled excitement which only fueled my passion for Podcasting. Quick, download Audacity, pick up your microphone and start Podcasting!<br /><br />Don’t be the only Podcaster in your school.<br /><br />The best way I have found to build excitement for technology is to be a practitioner and an evangelist. Of the two, I would rate practitioner the most important. Review what you do in your classroom or school. Ask yourself where your students or community would benefit from audio content. (You may come up with several areas so keep a list.) Next, pick one topic and get started. Wait until you are comfortable with the first topic then worry about moving on to the next topic on the list.<br /><br />After you have posted a few shows, it is time to put on the evangelist hat. Talk to your friends, colleagues and most importantly, your students and community about your Podcasts. Ask for feedback from those who have listened to your show and don’t get discouraged if a person says something you consider “not nice”. To this day I still have people tell me I am wasting my time, or it should be called Podlame, Podboaring etc… I smile, tell them they mock what they don’t understand and show them the statistics of my Podcast site. (I must also note, these same people have never listened to my Podcast.)<br /><br />The most important part of building excitement is to be excited yourself; don’t be afraid to let your passion for Podcasting spill on other people. Once they start asking questions, your Podcasting classroom is open and it is time to start teaching the value of this most powerful technology.<br /><br />In closing, I would like to leave you with the following: The fact that you are reading this book tells me you’re interested in making a difference with your students and community. The topics discussed in this book make a difference in lives of our students. Podcasting may not be the best fit for you where blogging or other Web 2.0 topics are better. The important part, you are willing to learn about the new technology. Find what fits for you, embrace it, learn it and use it. The quest for knowledge is a journey which we should never allow to end.<br />Welcome to the New Worldwide Web.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><hr /><br />This chapter contained several links attached to words. If you are reading the print version of this book, you may find the actual URL helpful. </span><p></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Producer - </span><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/office/powerpoint/producer/prodinfo/default.mspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.microsoft.com/office/powerpoint/producer/prodinfo/default.mspx</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Movie Maker 2 - </span><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/moviemaker2.mspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/moviemaker2.mspx</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Tivo - </span><a href="http://www.tivo.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.tivo.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Discussion Board - </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/sites/Services_and_Training/Lists/PUSD%20Podcasters/AllItems.aspx"><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/sites/Services_and_Training/Lists/PUSD%20Podcasters/AllItems.aspx</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> <br /></li></span><br /></ul><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web" rel="”tag”"><span style="font-family:arial;">Web 2.0 Booklet</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br /></span>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-1168668764205411522007-01-12T23:03:00.000-07:002007-01-16T09:09:11.843-07:00Cool tools for RSS & Podcasting: A round-up of some of the coolest things we've come across for RSS and Podcasting<p><span style="font-family:arial;">This entry was written for the second edition of Coming of Age: An introduction to the NEW worldwide web. </span><a href="http://www.terry-freedman.org.uk/db/web2/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Download your copy of version one here.</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br /><strong>RSS and Podcast Tools</strong><br />A desire to share our knowledge with others is a guiding force that draws people to education. Web 2.0 is allowing us to remove the constraints of the classroom and share our knowledge with the world. Sharing that knowledge is the essence of this chapter.<br /><br />For the past nine months I have hosted a podcast which archives the events of teaching and sharing information about RSS and Podcasting within my district. Over the next few pages, I will share with your some of the “Cool” tools I have stumbled on during this adventure. Where I have personal knowledge of the tool, I will add my comments. In addition, I need to apologize to the Macintosh users as many, (not all), of the tools I share in this chapter are aimed at the PC. Finally I would like to note this is not a definitive list and I do not own stock in any of the products.<br /><br /></span></p><span style="font-family:arial;"><hr /><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>RSS Tools</strong><br />Arguably one of the most important facets of Web 2.0 would be the RSS or XML feed which syndicates information throughout the world. While it is possible to create a RSS feed using a text editor, it is also time consuming, a commodity that most educators don’t have any to spare. For this reason an RSS editor is highly recommended. Let’s take a look at a few.<br /><br /><strong>Feededit</strong> an RSS 2.0 Syndicated feed editor by Steve Banhan<br />I actually have extensive experience with this software as it is my Feed editor of choice for my podcast. (Visit </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/My%20Pages/Adventures%20In%20PodCasting.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">Adventures in Podcasting</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.) Originally, I chose this software when I was learning about RSS because it was free. I continue to use it today because it is a stable piece of software and it works very well.<br />Web site - </span><a href="http://www.banham.cc/feededit/feededit.htm"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.banham.cc/feededit/feededit.htm</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br /><strong>FeedForAll</strong> – RSS software for the PC & Mac<br />FeedForAll is very nice software with a clean user interface. I did download and test the demo version of this software and if you are looking for a solid RSS editor with features beyond the basics give FeedForAll at try. At $39.95 U.S, it is worth the money.<br />Web site - </span><a href="http://www.feedforall.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.feedforall.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Podcast RSS Buddy</strong> – RSS software for the PC & Mac<br />If you are looking for a RSS editor with support for iTunes tags, make sure you look at Podcast RSS Buddy. I have also installed and tested this application. It too works very well. However, don’t take my word for it; visit the web site to view the online video tutorial. If you like what you see, download the demo version. For $19.00 U.S., this software can be yours.<br />Web site - </span><a href="http://www.christolley.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.christolley.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>RSS Readers</strong><br />Whether you are creating your own RSS feed or just keeping up with your favorite web log, an RSS reader is a must have tool. What does an RSS reader do? Great question… In short, the reader has two main functions. </span></p><ol><li><span style="font-family:arial;">The reader will visit every RSS feed you subscribe to on a regular basis (Usually every hour). During the visit, the reader will look for any new content published on the RSS feed. If the reader finds new content, it will notify you with a sound and/or an alert window on the screen. If you miss the alert notification, the new items will be displayed in your reader with the font style set to Bold. (Similar to email.) </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">The reader will convert the RSS feed into a format that the average person can read. RSS feeds are a XML files with a format similar to the code behind a web page. Just as a web browser, (Internet Explorer, Safari, Firefox etc…), processes HTML code into a viewable format, the RSS reader also formats the RSS feed, (XML code), to a viewable format. (See the two examples below.) </span></li></ol><p><strong><span style="font-family:arial;">RAW RSS Feed (The XML code)</span></strong></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="266" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/140/355537785_a8eafb9314.jpg?v=0" width="372" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="266" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/166/355537788_a9be711d1f.jpg?v=0?v=0" width="372" border="0" /> </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">RSS readers come as installable applications, web based and browser based versions. Let’s take a look at a few of available readers.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Installable RSS Readers<br /></strong>Over the past nine months I have installed several RSS readers; however, I have primarily used RSS Reader and Sharp Reader. The two PC based applications work quite well and I have had no trouble retrieving feeds in either product. For some in inexplicable reason, I like Sharp Reader the best. I suspect it is the color scheme of the application. However, I currently have RSS Reader running on three of my computers as my primary RSS reader. Suffice it to say, you can’t go wrong with either of these RSS Readers.<br /><strong>RSS Reader</strong> (</span><a href="http://www.rssreader.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.rssreader.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">)<br /><strong>Sharp Reader</strong> (</span><a href="http://www.sharpreader.net/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.sharpreader.net/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">) </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Online RSS Readers</strong><br />If you are a road warrior, multiple computer user or just nervous about installing applications on your computer, you may want to consider an online RSS reader and there are several online tools at your disposal.<br /><br />Why an online reader over an installable application? Yet another good question. While some will have a compelling argument why one is better than the other, I do not. I will however share some reasons I like the online reader over my installed application. </span></p><ol><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Web base = anywhere accessibility. Unlike my installed reader, I can access my Bloglines.com account anywhere in the world, (Provided I have an internet connection of course.) </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Shared Feeds - In addition to being able to access my online reader all over the world, I can also share my feeds with others. As a teacher, I see an enormous value in this feature. For example, if I want my students to review the writings of several bloggers over a period of time I could:<br />· Give them a list of blog sites to visit and review each day for new content.<br />· Create a web page with a list of links to these blog sites.<br />· (My favorite) Make my online RSS subscriptions available for public viewing and give that URL to my students. Visit my public Bloglines.com page to see an example. </span><a href="http://www.bloglines.com/public/SWheelerBloglines"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.bloglines.com/public/SWheelerBloglines</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogroll"><span style="font-family:arial;">Blogrolling</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> - According to Wikipedia, a blogroll is a collection of links to other blog sites. This is a very “slick” feature that allows you to place a list of your subscribed blogs on a web page of your choosing. This list is created based on the blogs you subscribe to in your online RSS reader. For example, above I shared a link to my public Bloglines web site. Since Bloglines.com supports blogrolling, I have placed code, (supplied by Bloglines), on my personal blog site. This code places the blogroll, (links), from by Bloglines page on my blogsite. While you are thinking “So what, anyone can place links on a page.” You have not heard the best part. Each time I subscribe to a new feed on my Bloglines page, the blogroll on my blog site is updated. Slick right? Visit </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Shawn Wheeler's Thoughts on Education & Technology</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> to see an example. </span></li></ol><p><span style="font-family:arial;">If you search for an online reader you will find a number of options. Listed below are three different online readers for you to consider. </span></p><ol><li><span style="font-family:arial;">RSS Reader by Google - </span><a href="http://reader.google.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">reader.google.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> I briefly tested this reader several months back and found it to be friendly to use. However, Terry Freedman wrote a very extensive review of this product on his site in April of 2006. </span><a href="http://www.terry-freedman.org.uk/artman/publish/article_644.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">Visit his entry Google RSS Reader</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Netvibes - </span><a href="http://www.netvibes.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.netvibes.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Netvibes has very distinctive newsletter format which I find appealing. Signing up for this service takes about 30 seconds, (including fixing my own typos). Once my account was created, I was able to move the modules to different locations on the page. I was even able to create multiple pages or rather tabs in the browser. Just for fun, I went to a different computer and signed on to Netvibes… Just as expected, my custom pages were displayed on the screen. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Bloglines - </span><a href="http://www.bloglines.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.bloglines.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> You may have notice based on my examples above, I like Bloglines. This too is inexplicable. However, I suspect it has to do with the fact the screen loosely resembles the RSS reader I have installed on my computers. Bloglines allows me the option of making my subscriptions available to the public as well as supporting blogrolling.<br /></span></li></ol><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Note: The above online readers are free.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>RSS via eMail<br /></strong>One of the biggest challenges I have faced the past nine months is explaining RSS and what it can do for you. Unfortunately, I have not been 100% successful. Oddly enough, the most prevalent problem has been understanding how the Reader software functions. (I will take the blame for the poor explanation… I have to; as I am usually the one giving the explanation. <smile>) In a few of these cases, the person told me they like the concept, but they are just not comfortable installing a reader or using an online version. However, they would like to receive notification of the updates. Fortunately, there is an option for them. Enter RSS via eMail.<br /><br />While I am certain there are a number of RSS via eMail services in cyberspace, I can share two examples to look at.</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Feedblitz – </span><a href="http://www.feedblitz.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.feedblitz.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">R-Mail – </span><a href="http://www.r-mail.org/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.r-mail.org/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Each of these tools allows a person to subscribe to a feed by entering the URL of the feed along with the persons email address. Once the person has subscribed and confirmed their subscription, (done via email), the person can relax and wait for the emails to be delivered. See the Feedblitz example below. </span></p><p><strong><span style="font-family:arial;">Example Feedblitz email</span></strong></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="266" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/129/355537783_d30e8bb6a8.jpg?v=0?v=0?v=0" width="372" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">For the blogger, these tools are equally cool for the simple reason they provide the blogger with HTML code for their blog site. The code allows a visitor to subscribe to the blog via email without leaving the site. The example below is a screen shot from the Adventures in Podcasting site.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="108" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/154/355537780_f27cd32de0.jpg?v=0" width="333" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">If you are a veteran of RSS or just gathering information, give one of these tools a try.<br /><br />Note: FeedBlitz and R-Mail are free.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Podcasting Tools<br /></strong>If it is important enough to say to the class, it is important enough for the class to hear it again... Say it again with Podcasting!<br /><br />The above statement has been the lighthouse that has kept me on course for the past nine months as I have promoted podcasting with the educators in my district and other educators who tuned into, (Sorry… downloaded), my show each week.<br />(Visit </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/My%20Pages/Adventures%20In%20PodCasting.aspx"><span style="font-family:arial;">Adventures in Podcasting</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">)<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">In the following pages I will share with you some tools you may use in your own podcasting adventure. The information will be grouped by:</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Locating and Listening (Podcast Indexes) </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Creating a Podcast (The Tools)</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Microphones & Recorders</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Recording Software</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Podcast Hosting Services</span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Locating and Listening (Podcast Indexes)</strong><br />If you are considering podcasting, I would recommend listening to a few podcasts first. Doing so will give you opportunities to hear how others begin their shows, format, use of music, humor, web sites, show notes and their general style.<br /><br />There are also a couple items you need to realize before you listen. There are thousands of podcasts on the web with the number growing daily. These podcasts are unregulated and not all content is appropriate for all ears. (I about fell out of my chair the first time I heard a person say the “F” word on a podcast.) Other podcasts are not worth the bandwidth they consume. Having stated all of this, there are a large number of wonderful shows that are well worth your time. After a few weeks of listening to various podcasts, you will find yourself watching less television, listening to less live radio and even look for things to do just so you can listen to a podcast. (I raked the yard in 100 degree, (Fahrenheit), weather just to give me an excuse to put on my iPod and listen to a podcast.)<br /><br />The best way to locate a podcast is through a podcast indexing service. My first search was through Podcast Alley where I searched several different topics as well as listened to different podcasts. Then I searched the education genre to see how teachers were using podcasting. (I was hooked!) </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Listed below are a few podcast indexing services available on the web.<br />General Purpose podcast index: (These indexes include an education genre.)</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Podcast Alley – </span><a href="http://www.podcastalley.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.podcastalley.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Yahoo Podcast Search - </span><a href="http://podcasts.yahoo.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">podcasts.yahoo.com</span></a></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">iTunes – Requires iTunes to be installed on your computer. </span><a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.apple.com/itunes</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Education focused Podcasting </span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">The Education Podcast Network - </span><a href="http://www.epnweb.org"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.epnweb.org</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Pod catchers or Aggregators</strong><br />Once the podcast is located, the next challenge is to get the podcast to your computer and possibly on your MP3 player. This is where iPod owners have an advantage since support of podcasting is built into iTunes. If you own a different MP3 player, don’t distres, there a few options for you as well.<br /><br /><strong>iTunes</strong> – </span><a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.apple.com/itunes</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Being the owner of an iPod I have extensive experience with iTunes and it’s ability to search for and retrieve podcasts. I find the application to be outstanding and what I would expect to see from Apple. Note: You do not have to own an iPod to use iTunes<br /><br /><strong>Juice</strong> - </span><a href="http://juicereceiver.sourceforge.net/"><span style="font-family:arial;">juicereceiver.sourceforge.net </span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">This multiplatform, (PC, MAC & Linux), open source software is a solid application and quite intuitive. I have tested this product on my PC and it works very well. If you have a MP3 player or just want to download podcasts, visit the Juice web site.<br /><br /><strong>Win Podder</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.winpodder.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.winpodder.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> WinPodder has to be one of my favorites of the pod catchers I have evaluated. The application like iTunes and Juice is solid and uncomplicated. Like Sharp Reader, WinPodder has an interface that just clicked with me. Maybe it was the images displayed with the Podcast information, album art when the podcast was playing or maybe it was the fact that WinPodder supports RSS news feeds as well as podcasts in one tool. Whatever the reason, this application clicked with me, it is worth your time to click on the link above and visit the WinPodder web site. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Creating a Podcast (The Tools)<br /></strong>When creating a podcast, there are a few tools that you must possess. The first is an input device; this is generally a microphone which can be connected to your computer via a wire or a wireless system similar to those used with video camera recorders. The other option is to use a separate recording device. Years ago, this would have been a tape recorder. However, today the device is a digital recorder.<br /><br />Once you have an input device, you need a software application to record or import the audio from the digital recording device, edit and export the final MP3 product.<br /><br />Let’s take a look a few of the items I have stumbled on the past nine months. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Microphones & Recorders</strong><br />Many computers come with built-in microphones and these work fine. However, there may be times when a microphone that picks up less background noise is desirable. You can pick up a good wired microphone at your local electronics store for $20.00 to $50.00 U.S. Listed below are a few microphones that I have personal experience with for podcsting.<br /><br /><strong>Logitech USB headset/microphone</strong> - USB headset microphones are available through a number of vendors with similar functionalities. I chose a USB microphone for convenience as I didn’t want to crawl behind my computer every time I wanted to use my headphones. It also doubles nicely for SKYPE use. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="128" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/161/355540548_f22a55de31.jpg?v=0" width="111" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Audio-Technica Pro 88W VHF Wireless Microphone System</strong> – I purchased this device so I could record content presented in my classroom. This device works very well as does the Sony WCS-999 wireless microphone which I have tested with equally successful results.<br /><br /><strong>Olympus VN-960-PC Digital Voice Recorder</strong> – This is actually my favorite device for classroom recording. It is portable, easy to use and very small. With it’s built in condenser microphone and leveler input, this device is a must have for podcasting. When connected to the computer, it can even be used as a microphone. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="140" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/160/355540551_5ccfccb3a4.jpg?v=0" width="75" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Recording Software</strong><br />Recording software is the second must have tool to be a podcaster. Speaking into a microphone will do no good if you can’t capture your voice and create an MP3 file for your listeners to download. Listed below are some of the tools I have found. Some are free while others will have a small cost.<br /><br /><strong>Audacity</strong> – </span><a href="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/"><span style="font-family:arial;">audacity.sourceforge.net</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Audacity is one of the most popular recording applications for podcasters. One major reason for this is the fact the software is open source and runs on Mac, PC and Linux. It allows for multi-track recording, editing and is easy to use. Personally, I have tested the demo version of several other podcast recorders but always return to Audacity.<br /><br /><strong>Garage Band 3</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.apple.com/ilife/garageband"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.apple.com/ilife/garageband</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Recently, I had an opportunity to evaluate a MacBook Pro which included iLife with Garage Band 3. Like any software application it takes a little time to get used to using. Sitting down behind a Mac after an eight year absence, took me a bit longer. In the end, Garage Band 3 is an impressive tool. Garage Band 3 also comes with a number of pre-built loops that allows you to create your own intro and exit music. With Garage Band 3 you can create enhanced podcasts which include chapters with their own artwork, embed hyperlinks into the podcast, (Viewable in iTunes or QuickTime), and you can even set your ID3 tags inside the software. If you own a Mac, this is a must have. If you own a PC… Sorry, this is a Mac only product. To view an example enhanced podcast, visit Adventures in Podcasting – </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/Lists/Adventures%20in%20Pod%20Casting%20Journal/DispForm.aspx?ID=53&Source=http%3A%2F%2Fportal%2Epeoriaud%2Ek12%2Eaz%2Eus%2Fpersonal%2Fswheeler%2FMy%2520Pages%2FAdventures%2520In%2520PodCasting%2Easpx"><span style="font-family:arial;">Podcast 35 Enhanced</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.<br /><br />The remainder of this list contains links to other recorders I have found but have not personally evaluated.</span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Castblaster - </span><a href="http://www.castblaster.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.castblaster.com</span></a></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">MixCraft - </span><a href="http://www.acoustica.com/mixcraft"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.acoustica.com/mixcraft</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">PodProducer </span><a href="http://www.podproducer.net"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.podproducer.net</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Propaganda - </span><a href="http://www.makepropaganda.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.makepropaganda.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Sound Studio (Mac Only) </span><a href="http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/audio/soundstudio.html"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/audio/soundstudio.html</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Hosting and Podcast Services</strong><br />After you have your podcast recorded, it is time to publish. What are some options? My first thought is to look at the school or district in which you work. Is there a web server where you can upload your podcast and does it have sufficient storage capacity? Your best bet is to contact the IT, (Information Technology), Director for this information. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">If your district doesn’t work out, the next best option is a free service. There are several choices in this area, however, a couple of them really stand out.<br /><br /><strong>Yahoo</strong> – </span><a href="http://podcasts.yahoo.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">podcasts.yahoo.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Yahoo’s Geo Cities provides 15 megabytes of storage with 5 megabytes of transfer per hour. You may upgrade to a faster service for a fee.<br /><br /><strong>Gabcast</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.gabcast.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.gabcast.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Gabcast, (free service), allows you to create and distribute audio content via a telephone or VOIP session. Gabcast also provides a Pro and Premium service for a monthly fee.<br /><br /><strong>Podomatic</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.podomatic.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.podomatic.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Podomatic, a wonderful free service that looks and feels like a blog with a twist; Podomatic allows you to upload your podcast to their server and post an entry related to the podcast. The best part, Podomatic creates your RSS entry for you. It really doesn’t get any easier. Podomatic also allows you to create your podcast using their software which is embedded in their web site. Did I mention this is free? This site was used with version one of this book when we made it available as a podcast. Visit </span><a href="http://comingofage.podomatic.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://comingofage.podomatic.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.<br /><br /><strong>Gcast</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.gcast.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.gcast.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Another nice tool from the makers of Garage Band. Gcast can host podcasts you upload to their server. However, that is not the most amazing feature. Gcast also allows you to call, (yes by telephone), into their server. Once connected, their server will record your message and post it as a podcast. It also automatically creates and updates your RSS file. Additionally, Gcast allows for subscribers to be informed of new podcasts via the built in email notification service.<br /><br />Gcast not only makes a great podcast tool, it is also a great method for teachers to inform parents what is going on in their class each week. One phone call… Many parents.<br /><br />If you would like to see and listen to an example, visit this web site. </span><a href="http://www.gcast.com/u/swheelerpusd/main"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.gcast.com/u/swheelerpusd/main</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><br />If your needs require more than these free services can provide, the following two links are fee based services I have found. See the corresponding web sites for details.<br /></span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Solidspace.com – </span><a href="http://www.solidspace.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.solidspace.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> A fee based hosting for around $13.00 U.S. per month. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Blogmatrix - </span><a href="http://www.blogmatrix.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.blogmatrix.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Blogmatrix offers several different hosting plans.<br /></span></li></ul><strong></strong><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Royalty Free Music</strong><br />A jazzy introduction and exit will really dress up your podcast. Garage Band makes this task rather easy. However, there are web sites that contain music that you may use on your podcast. The term for this music is Podsafe.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Podsafe Audio</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.podsafeaudio.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.podsafeaudio.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Artists who post music on this site have released their music under the Creative Commons license and agreed to allow their music to be used by you in any way and form for webcasting, as long as you don't take credit for the original work.<br /><br /><strong>Magnatunes</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.magnatune.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.magnatune.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br />Magnatunes allows podcasters to use music published on their site in your podcast legally without paying any fees. Magnatunes does require you to register your podcast.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Other Cool Tools<br /></strong>This final list contains miscellaneous tools which can be used in podcasting.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Text to Speech<br /></strong><strong></strong></span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>TextAloud</strong> </span><a href="http://www.nextup.com/TextAloud"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.nextup.com/TextAloud</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br />Instant podcasts with text to speech software. Simply type or paste in text, and save as an MP3 for instant podcasting.</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>TextAloud</strong> Text-to-Speech Conversion - </span><a href="http://www.topdrawerdownloads.com/archives/000013.html"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.topdrawerdownloads.com/archives/000013.html</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Autocast</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.autocastsoftware.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.autocastsoftware.com/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Autocast creates MP3 audio files from RSS feeds.<br /></span></li></ul><strong></strong><p><strong><span style="font-family:arial;">Skype Recording</span></strong></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Skylook</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.skylook.biz/"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.skylook.biz/</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Skylook is a recording application which integrates into Outlook and can record Skype VoIP calls to MP3 format (both inbound and outbound.)</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Audio Hijack Pro</strong> – (Macintosh) </span><a href="http://www.rogueamoeba.com/audiohijackpro"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.rogueamoeba.com/audiohijackpro</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Power Gramo</strong> - www.powergramo.com Free and Fee versions available. </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>FreeCorder</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.applian.com/freecorder"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.applian.com/freecorder</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li></ul><strong></strong><p><strong><span style="font-family:arial;">Music Loop Software</span></strong></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Sony Jam Trax</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.sonymediasoftware.com/products/showproduct.asp?pid=985"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.sonymediasoftware.com/products/showproduct.asp?pid=985</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>Super Duper Music Looper</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.sonymediasoftware.com/products/showproduct.asp?pid=535"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.sonymediasoftware.com/products/showproduct.asp?pid=535</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span></li></ul><p><strong><span style="font-family:arial;">Embedded Media Software</span></strong></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong>CoffeeCup Web JukeBox</strong> - </span><a href="http://www.coffeecup.com/web-jukebox"><span style="font-family:arial;">www.coffeecup.com/web-jukebox</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> Web JukeBox is a music player for your Website. It comes with over 20 cool players that will match any websites design. With just a few clicks of the mouse, you can add your MP3 files. See an example at the Adventures in Podcasting site. Look for the iPod on the right hand side of the screen. </span><a href="http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/shawn_wheeler/podcast"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/shawn_wheeler/podcast</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;"></span></p><span style="font-family:arial;"><hr /><br />Now that you have finished this chapter, you may be feeling a bit overwhelmed, take a deep breath and relax. My first podcast was a success with three tools. </span><p></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Microphone</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Auadacity (Recording Software)</span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Feededit (RSS Editing Software)<br /></span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:arial;">The toughest part of choosing an RSS reader is finding one that appeals to your personal taste.<br /><br />Good, now that you caught your breath. Find a friend to discuss what, you just learned and how it could make a difference for you and your students learning process. Then get started using some of these tools.<br /><br />I will leave you with an African Proverb….<br />"Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must outrun the fastest lion or be killed. Every morning in Africa a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve. So whether you're the lion or gazelle, when the sun comes up, start running."<br /><br />In relation to technology literacy… Are you a lion or a Gazelle?<br /><br /></span></p><span style="font-family:arial;"><hr /><br />This chapter contained several links attached to words. If you are reading the print version of this book, you may find the actual URL helpful. </span><p></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Adventures in Podcasting - </span><a href="http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/shawn_wheeler/podcast"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://staffweb.peoriaud.k12.az.us/shawn_wheeler/podcast</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Blogrolling - </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogroll"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogroll</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Shawn Wheeler's Thoughts on Education & Technology - </span><a href="http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://shawnwheeler.blogspot.com</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Google RSS Reader - </span><a href="http://www.terry-freedman.org.uk/artman/publish/article_644.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://www.terry-freedman.org.uk/artman/publish/article_644.php</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family:arial;">Adventures in Podcasting – Podcast 35 Enhanced - </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/Lists/Adventures%20in%20Pod%20Casting%20Journal/DispForm.aspx?ID=53&Source=http%3A%2F%2Fportal%2Epeoriaud%2Ek12%2Eaz%2Eus%2Fpersonal%2Fswheeler%2FMy%2520Pages%2FAdventures%2520In%2520PodCasting%2Easpx"><span style="font-family:arial;">http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/Lists/Adventures%20in%20Pod%20Casting%20Journal/DispForm.aspx?ID=53&Source=http%3A%2F%2Fportal%2Epeoriaud%2Ek12%2Eaz%2Eus%2Fpersonal%2Fswheeler%2FMy%2520Pages%2FAdventures%2520In%2520PodCasting%2Easpx</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span><a href="http://portal.peoriaud.k12.az.us/personal/swheeler/Lists/Adventures%20in%20Pod%20Casting%20Journal/DispForm.aspx?ID=53&Source=http%3A%2F%2Fportal%2Epeoriaud%2Ek12%2Eaz%2Eus%2Fpersonal%2Fswheeler%2FMy%2520Pages%2FAdventures%2520In%2520PodCasting%2Easpx"></a></li></ul><br /><br /><p><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Web 2.0 Booklet" rel=”tag”>Web 2.0 Booklet</a></p>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14970533.post-1168145317930278982007-01-06T21:28:00.000-07:002007-01-20T07:08:14.310-07:00I have been tagged!<span style="font-family:arial;">My friend </span><a href="http://terry-freedman.org.uk/artman/publish/article_958.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">Terry Freedman</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> from across the pond recently tagged my blog. Thank you Terry and I loved </span><a href="http://terry-freedman.org.uk/artman/publish/article_958.php"><span style="font-family:arial;">reading about you</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">. I would have never guessed your hair was that long. <smile><br /><br />Just so you know, here are the rules for being blog-tagged:<br />1. You have to say 5 things about yourself that may not be apparent from your blog.<br />2. You have to tag 5 other people.<br /><hr /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">Now for five things you don’t know about me and wouldn’t know from reading my blog.<br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><img height="168" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/126/348533665_49888be5e2.jpg?v=0" width="211" align="right" border="0" /></span> <p><span style="font-family:arial;">I am married and have two daughters. To keep peace in the house, I will only show a picture of the girls. <smile><br />Meet Victoria and Fredreka.<br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><br /><img height="145" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/126/348533657_d0f91198ff.jpg?v=0" width="192" align="left" border="0" />When I began college I wanted to teach woodshop. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, I started too late. Due to the timing I transfered into Technology Education which in those days looked much different. I still like to build things and every once in a while I have the time and the money to do so. My last project was a playhouse for the girls. </span><br /><a href="http://www.quadwheeler.com/pages/The_Clubhouse.htm"><span style="font-family:arial;">You can see all the images here</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">.<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="158" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/135/348533663_8a7da3b52d.jpg?v=0" width="125" align="left" border="0" /></span><span style="font-family:arial;">In my younger and much skinnier days I was a technical rock climber. If you are not familiar with technical climbing it is the type that requires rope, protection and a desire to have fun. I still have the desire to climb, just not the desire to loose all the weight I have gained the past 15 years.<br /><br /></span></p><br /><p> </p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">When time permits I like to hunt and fish. If you are not pro hunting, have no fear.<br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="133" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/135/348533660_b0981af933.jpg?v=0" width="181" align="right" border="0" /></span><span style="font-family:arial;">First off I am very bad at finding animals and when I do find them, I am such a terrible shot they have nothing to fear.</span><span style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span style="font-family:arial;">However, I am a very talented (Sarcasm) fisherman. Just look at the lunker I pulled in on my last trip to the lake (Yes that fish hit my lure). </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><br />I do enjoy being out in the sticks away from the “Wired” world. However, I do get the shakes if I don’t touch a keyboard after a few days. </span><br /></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><img height="110" src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/160/348533653_f2eb568200.jpg?v=0" width="191" align="left" border="0" />For my 21st birthday I bought this truck. Seventeen years later, it is still running and I am still driving it. Victoria (pictured here) told me she wanted it once. Who knows, maybe I will buy a new one by the time she is old enough to drive.<br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;">Last but not least… </span><a href="http://nlcommunities.com/communities/joevans/"><span style="font-family:arial;">John Evans</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://elgg.net/mechelledc/weblog/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Mechelle De Craene</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://123elearning.blogspot.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Julie Lindsay</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;">, </span><a href="http://edu.blogs.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Ewan McIntosh</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> and </span><a href="http://integratenowclub.blogspot.com/"><span style="font-family:arial;">Amy Chayefsky</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;"> you have been Blog-tagged! <smile><br /><br />Technorati Tags<br /><a href="http://technorati.com/tag/" rel="”tag”">blog-tagged</a></span></p>Shawn Wheelerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08826636055424147538noreply@blogger.com1