Web 2.0 Expo SF 2008 Videos

Matt Mullenweg (WordPress) at Web 2.0 Expo SF 2008 - Web2Expo on blip.tv: "

Web 2.0 Expo is a global annual gathering of technical, design, marketing, and business professionals who are building the next generation web. Web 2.0 Expo features the most innovative and successful Internet industry figures and companies providing attendees with examples of business models, development paradigms, and design strategies to enable mainstream businesses and new arrivals to the Web 2.0 world to take advantage of this new generation of services and opportunities. Web 2.0 Expo is co-produced by O'Reilly Media and TechWeb."

You may want to check out Tim O'Reilly's presentation. He coined the Web 2.0 term and discusses the core of Web 2.0 and some deep trends:

The first one is that the Internet really is becoming the platform, a global platform for everything, everything connected, and the nature of that platform is this amazing tool for harnessing collective intelligence. It's not just about participation. It's about literally we are building a platform to make the world smarter, to make businesses smarter, to make ourselves smarter. This is an amazing revolution in human augmentation. We're at a turning point akin to literacy, or the formation of cities. This is a huge change in the way the world works.

The home page for the conference can be found on the O'Reilly site and is well worth perusing.

Blogging helps encourage teen writing

Top News - Blogging helps encourage teen writing:

"Most students (82 percent) believe that additional instruction and focus on writing in school would help improve their writing even further--and more than three-quarters of those surveyed (78 percent) think it would help their writing if their teachers used computer-based writing tools such as games, multimedia, or writing software programs or web sites during class."

The Power of Educational Technology

The Power of Educational Technology: AC-CENT-TCHU-ATE THE POSITIVE

Using Web 2.0 tools in education!

When Young Teachers Go Wild on the Web

When Young Teachers Go Wild on the Web - washingtonpost.com

More information on Facebook and MySpace teacher profiles and what states and districts are doing.

TED | Talks | Hector Ruiz: The power to connect the world (video)

Hector Ruiz: The power to connect the world (video):
Hector Ruiz talks about his commitment to expanding access to the Internet throughout the world. Ruiz is the CEO of AMD, and through AMD's 50x15 initiative, Ruiz and his company hope to connect 50 percent of the world to the Internet by 2015. Sharing his own extraordinary life story, Ruiz makes the case that access to education and new ideas is life-changing!

TED | Talks | Brian Cox: What really goes on at the Large Hadron Collider (video)

Brian Cox: What really goes on at the Large Hadron Collider (video)

Rock star physicist" Brian Cox talks about his work on the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. Discussing the biggest of big science in an engaging, accessible way, Cox brings us along on a tour of the massive complex and describes his part in it -- and the vital role it's going to play in understanding our universe.

American Association of School Administrators - Blocking the Future

The School Administrator - Blocking the Future

From another blog:

Once again, Dr Scott McLeod has a post that I think should be read by every School District administrator. At the very least it is EXCELLENT food for thought. Here it is: http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2008/05/blocking-the-fu.html. In it he points to this article: http://snipurl.com/blockingthefuture (Now I know that many of you won't be able to use that link as it's a snipurl link and someone has decided to block that, so you'll have to read this at home.)

Now, here's the thing. This is an excellent article, and it's especially important to those districts that block blogs because, "We don't allow blogs in our school." You need, then, to access this post from home. And when you're done reading the post, ask yourself where your district falls with this statement: "[S]chool district leaders have a critical choice to make: Will their schools pro-actively model and teach the safe and appropriate use of these digital tools or will they reactively block them out and leave students and families to fend for themselves?"

Google For Educators

Google for educators is a landing spot for classroom resources that incorporate Google products like Google Earth, SketchUp, Maps, and Sky. The site offers everything from simple links to the aforementioned products, to classroom activities for various K-12 grade levels.

There are downloadable PDF posters covering Google search tips for kids, Google Scholar, Book Search, and Google Earth, and there are activities that utilize various media like PDFs, wikis, podcasts, and websites. These activities are organized by grade level: K-5, 6-12, and "all levels."

The Google for educators site also links to their "teacher community" which is a Google group filled with threads about using the many Google offerings in a school classroom.

35 Useful Source Code Editors

35 Useful Source Code Editors Reviewed | Developer's Toolbox | Smashing Magazine:

"To edit HTML- and CSS-code you only need a simple plaintext-editor — the rest depends on your skills and your creativity. However, to make your life a little bit easier, you can use some more comfortable source-code editors with advanced editing features. These features can effectively support you during coding, debugging and testing. Powerful modern editors provide developers with syntax highlighting, diff, macros, plugins, code-snippets, preview-option and an integrated FTP-management tool. Some editors go even further and offer a complete integrated development environment with numerous features and functions."

Tom Chapin - Not On The Test

Tom Chapin - Not On The Test:

Song and video to download from Tom Chapin:

"It’s no secret that American industry has outsourced most factory jobs to other countries to take advantage of cheaper labor costs. So why are we putting so much effort into a form of education in which there is no creativity? This is the time that our youth should be taught to think ”out of the box,” not be put into a tighter one! "

I saw Tom play with his brother, Harry Chapin, over in Milton at one of the wineries on a Labor Day weekend. I think it might have been 1976 or so. Fantastic show with proceeds of most of the sales going to Harry's Fight Against Hunger campaign. A few years later, in 1981, Harry was killed in a car accident on the Long Island Expressway but his work goes on. His work on hunger included being widely recognized as a key player in the creation of the Presidential Commission on World Hunger in 1977.

Check out Tom's web site: www.tomchapin.com/

Technology Center: Bernie Poole: Essential Microsoft Office 2007

Education World ® Technology Center: Bernie Poole: Essential Microsoft Office 2007: "The tutorials, with skill consolidation exercises, are designed to teach Word (including mail merge), Excel (including graphing and charting and Lookup Tables), Access (including searching, sorting, and reporting), and PowerPoint in the context of the K-12 classroom. They also include a lesson on the Office 2007 drawing and
diagramming tools."

Rachel Boyd

Rachel Boyd's Blog
Why teachers should blog, why her students blog, and links to her award-winning class blogs.

Biology Corner -- Teaching Resources

Biology Corner -- Teaching Resources

This particular virtual biology "corner" is maintained and updated by science educator Shannan Muskopf. On the site, visitors will find labs, worksheets, and various classroom activities. The "webquests" feature on the site is particularly interesting; this type of exercise requires students to peruse several websites that address a certain theme or topic.

What I Want to Talk About - Practical Theory

What I Want to Talk About - Practical Theory: "I'm giving a keynote in Oregon tomorrow... and I know my role... talk happy about SLA, about pedagogy, be positive..."

Read it.

26 Learning Games to Change the World

26 Learning Games to Change the World | Mission to Learn:

Take some time and go through this page. It includes links to 26 online learning games such as:

- Ayiti: The Cost of Life
“What is it like to live in poverty, struggling every day to stay healthy, keep out of debt, and get educated? Find out now in this challenging role playing game created by the High School students in Global Kids with the game developers at Gamelab, in which you take responsibility for a family of five in rural Haiti.” From UNICEF with Microsoft support.

- Free Rice
An addictive vocabulary game that promises “For each word you get right, we donate 20 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program.” More than 29 billion grains donated as of this posting.

- Darfur is Dying
Darfur is Dying is a viral video game for change that provides a window into the experience of the 2.5 million refugees in the Darfur region of Sudan. Players must keep their refugee camp functioning in the face of possible attack by Janjaweed militias. Players can also learn more about the genocide in Darfur that has taken the lives of 400,000 people, and find ways to get involved to help stop this human rights and humanitarian crisis.” From mtvU in partnership with the Reebok Human Rights Foundation.

- World Without Oil
“WORLD WITHOUT OIL is an alternate reality event, a serious game for the public good. It invites everyone to help simulate a global oil shock.

- The Incredible Adventures of the Amazing Food Detectives
“There has been a mysterious outbreak of unhealthy habits hitting too many boys and girls. If we don’t solve these cases, and fast, kids might not make the right food and exercise choices as they grow, and that could be trouble!

Marc Prensky.com

Marc Prensky.com

If you don't know Marc Prensky, you need to read his articles and blogs.
From his site:
Marc Prensky is an internationally acclaimed speaker, writer, consultant, and designer in the critical areas of education and learning. He is the author of Digital Game-Based Learning (McGraw-Hill, 2001), the founder and CEO of Games2train (whose clients include IBM, Nokia, Pfizer, the US Department of Defense and the LA and Florida Virtual Schools) and creator of the sites www.dodgamecommunity.com and www.socialimpactgames.com .

Marc has created over 50 software games for learning, including the world's first fast-action videogame-based training tools and world-wide, multi-player, multi-team on-line competitions. He has also taught at all levels. Marc has been featured in articles in The NY Times and The Wall Street Journal, has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, PBS, and the BBC, and was named as one of training's top 10 "visionaries" by Training magazine. He holds graduate degrees from Yale (Teaching) and Harvard (MBA).

READ ONLINE BY MARC PRENSKY: (To encourage spread of the ideas, you are also free to download, print, distribute and link to the articles at no cost. However if you do this, I would appreciate your letting me know at marc@games2train.com . Many thanks. )

Postcrossing - Postcards Traveling The World

Postcrossing - Postcards Traveling The World:

Join...send a postcard or a few..Get some back from around the world:

49,242 members
180 countries
56 postcards/hour
556 members online
1,042,711 postcards received
41,201 postcards traveling
5,699,147,216 kms traveled
142,212 laps around the world

Desktop Wallpaper Calendar: May 2008 | Graphics | Smashing Magazine

Desktop Wallpaper Calendar: May 2008

Want some different desktop backgrounds? You should be able to find something here to fit the bill!

20+ Free Web Design Ebooks And Guides

20+ Free Web Design Ebooks And Guides

The following list of free web design ebooks and guides will get you started building accessible, usable, and useful web sites in no time.

Professional Web Design Forums

Professional Web Design Forums | How-To | Smashing Magazine

Web design-related forums are a place where you interact with other designers, exchange ideas or discuss your first drafts. When you have a problem, you can post the issue, and then receive feedback on possible design or coding solutions from community members. This interaction is a great way to establish contacts and build relationships. Forums are used for networking and marketing purposes. They are practical places to solve problems and can serve as a form of social diversion.