The Teacher Toolbox

Do people really want a computer or do they just want the things a computer can do? Here are 26 apps that suit the way I work. They aid my creativity, connectivity and work flow & all from the comfort of where ever I choose to be – couch, park, bed. Nice.

1. Atomic Web Browser - I like my browser to have one touch tabs and a full screen option. I spent the whopping $1.19 to buy the full version because I wanted to be able to set my homepage to my Pageflakes account. The other feature I like is the ability to save a webpage so I can read them later. Great for traveling on planes.

2. Mail ( the default) – hooks all my webmail accounts into one spot. Too easy.

3. TweetDeck – Twitter: informs me, keeps me in touch with people who are knowledgeable in my field all around the world, allows me to argue, helps me refine thoughts, entertains me, challenges me, inspires me and provides support in times of need. All for free and in real time.

4. Simple Sense – OK I’m an Adsense publisher and this app let’s me check the stats.

5.  The App Store – I especially like the free part of the store and so does my son

6. Evernote – Miss 4 has been waking between 4:30am and 5:30 for almost a year now. My partner is a midwife and my son is 11. So once Miss 4 awakes and I’ve set her up with a quiet activity, ‘…until the sun comes up’ I can work on my latest project in Evernote until the rest of the family arises.

7. Notes – Often I’m not in range of a wi-fi networks so I jot stuff down in Notes. I also find this tool handy for everyday stuff that I don’t want ‘cluttering up’ bigger projects eg I don’t want a list of apps to check out in with draft readers’ theatre scripts.

8. Stanza – Download free books from Project Gutenberg so when you have a quiet moment you can do a little light reading. Currently there is a rather eclectic mix residing on my machine – Mark Twain – ‘How to Tell Stories’, ‘The Sayings of Confucius’, ‘The Creative Process in the Individual’, ‘The Dhamapada’ and Thoreau’s ‘Walden’.

9. Facebook - I still don’t ‘get’ Facebook but there are a lot of the kids I’ve taught over the years who have accounts and it is nice to catch up.

10. Kindle – The Ipad provides a very ice reading experience so I’ve been downloading sample books from Amazon to check them out. My first purchase is not too far away.

11. NPR – This is a news app. I love the ‘Arts & Life’ section as well as the ‘Music’ section. Excellent for finding interesting stuff.

12. The Australian Braodcasting Commission - ABC – WOW!!! This is pure brainfood. Listen to radio and podcasts. Watch TV shows – ‘Media Watch’ & ‘Catalyst’ are current favorites. Check it out to see what works for you. It is HUGE!

13. Youtube – Youtube is one of the first places I turn when I want a solution to a problem. This week it has helped out with solving the Rubik’s Cube, using the Dragon Age Toolkit, getting the run down on the NSW DET blogging platform and some cartooning workshops.

14. CoolIris – for the photographer in me this is a wonderful way to view art and photographic images. Completely clutter free!

16. Feeddlerss – Hooks straight into my Google Reader account and delivers the latest posts from all the blogs I read straight to me. Quick, clean and efficient. Just the way I like it. Shame the free version doesn’t allow you to add subscriptions to blogs inside the app, you have to do that from your Google Reader account.

18. Google Earth is beautiful on the Ipad. That’s all. Simply stunning.

19. Ebay – If ever you want to buy something, check out the price on Ebay first. This week I bought a heap of rechargeable batteries for almost half the price I normally pay. I’ve also picked up some second hand books I’ve been meaning to read for for a while now. Even with the postage the books were cheaper than in our local book store chain.

20. Cloudreader – Displays comic book/graphic novel *.cbr files (comic book reader). I like to keep up with some of what is happening in kid and counter culture so I’m looking to read some Naruto, Manga and Tank Girl.

21. Dictionary & Thesaurus – so much quicker than looking for the books and then doing the whole alphabetical order thing.

23. Apps Mosaic – I don’t like the way the App store for Ipad doesn’t have a way to see the most popular free apps. Apps Mosaic shows you what is free and popular. It’s nice just exploring what’s out there.

24. Adobe Ideas (Ipad only) – hmmmmm, still a little out on this one. I love the vector graphics feel but it is a little hard drawing with your finger. Maybe pen and paper is a better option but I’ll continue to tinker.

25. Shazam – play a sample of music into the microphone and Shazam will compare it to its database and let you know the title, artist, album and sometimes a Youtube video. Shazam!

23 & 24 – Videos & Itunes – Video is beautiful on the Ipad. I use these apps to view my TED videos and listen to Utunes podcasts. NB I find the iPod is a much more convenient way to listen to podcasts.

25. Mobile Photoshop Express – a graphics manipulation program that can crop and adjust colour. I find it a handy app for if you want to drop something into your Twitter feed but I do prefer to do my serious photo editing on my laptop.

26. Wikipanion – the feature I like best in this app is the ability to navigate the article sub-headings in the side bar. Big timesaver for me.

Expanding Learning Horizons is one of my favourite Australian conferences. There are heaps of great ideas, heaps of people with their heads screwed on the right way and it is sooooo good to catch up with old friends as well as meet people in the flesh I know virtually.

This year my son and I will be presenting a four and a half hour workshop we’ve called, ‘Doing it Different’. The crux of the session is how we can use ICTs to learn, to do things not previously possible in classrooms and to create ‘beautiful things’ (thanks Dr Jim)

Here is the blurb of our session.

Our workshop is a combination ‘Hands On, Minds On’ experience. It is based on software and processes we have used over time and know work. The session begins with a brief motivational talk that outlines our ICT journeys, our everyday uses of ICTs and our projects. We then move into a series of explorations that will give delegates ‘a brief feel’ of the variety and power of free educational software and web tools. We aim to equip teachers with the necessary skills to ‘work smarter not harder’ when adding to their digital teaching toolbox. Throughout the course of the day Adrian will explore co-learning & creative processes using a variety of software. He will also touch on organisational strategies which enable teachers to implement Information and Communication Technologies in highly creative, effective and engaging ways. Samuel will take several mini-sessions throughout the workshop. He will focus on software he is currently using and digital learning strategies he uses. He will be available throughout the session to answer questions and to offer assistance with tasks. Course participants will leave this session with a plethora of great teaching ideas, an incredible amount of inspiration and realistic goals to implement back in their schools and classrooms.

Software and Areas of Focus – Video game creation – Atmosphir, Kodu & Unity 3d, Digital Story Telling – Audacity, Soundsnap, Comic Life, Movie Maker, HarvestSounds – Machinima – Spore, FRAPPS & Photostory. Digital Art – Artrage, online art tools, Paint.NET, Wacom tablets, Inkscape, Google Sketchup. Digital Music Making – online tools, Ejay, Sonar  – Microsoft’s Worldwide Telescope & Fractalus – Online Personal Learning Network Tools & Collaborative Web Project tools.

Feel free to check out the entire 3 day program for ELH and consider registering. It really is worth it!

Oh, and here is a lovely letter one of the delegates who attended our session last year wrote about Samuel’s presentation. Makes a geek dad proud

I firmly believe the mark of a person is not what they do when they are knocked down once and get back up. It is what they do when they are knocked down a fifth, sixth & seventh time.

I tip my hat to all the educators who are fighting the good fight to make Education relevant to our children in the face of massive ignorance on the part of government & traditional media.

‘Where do we just go Wow!’

Artrage – Use ‘tracing image’ you can only use diagonal brush strokes.
- Interpret a famous artwork using the tracing image function

3d Fractals – Mandlebulbs

Traditional Fractals – Fractalus

Deviant Art – Artist Comunity

Flickr – Think of some Art terms

Pageflakes – ‘Holly Skye’ & ‘Only a Fading Conception’

Cooliris – Make a gallery in your browser.

Inkscape – Digital Drawing Software – Look for tutorials & examples

-          My first examples – http://www.adrianbruce.com/stressbusters/stressbusters.htm

Online Tools – Try the Art tag on my blog –

http://adrianbruce.com/teacher-toolbox/category/art/

Here is a big Collection – http://mrssmoke.onsugar.com/45-Websites-Students-Create-Original-Artwork-Online-3442983 for the kids to explore with you.

How did you learn what colors ‘go together’?

-          Kuler – What colours ‘go’ together?

-          Painting Lessons – hues, tones, tints

-          Color in Motion – What can they be used to represent? Middle Door

Andrea Photomosaic – Combine with fund raising

‘Shakespeare dies every day in a high school classroom all over the world’.

This is my first page/attempt/draft/experiment with Gary’s Mod to create a cartoon version of Bill’s ‘Scottish Play’.

My plan is to have the ‘cartoon’ give the reader a quick overview of the play’s structure and complexities before they launch head long into the original text. I aim for the work to be a sort of scaffold.

What do you think?

Adrian

NB I should be working on four presentations for a rather large Aussie ICT conference tonight but just can’t get motivated so I’m embracing my procrastination and am being REALLY, REALLY productive

My brother Damien died when I was eight. He died on his forth birthday and today is his anniversary. Ever since then, whenever I find myself lamenting getting older or am going through a bit of a rough patch, I just think that every day I get is one more than he did.

How lucky are we to be  alive on this amazing planet! What are you doing with the time you’ve been granted? What are you doing to make sure you leave the ‘campsite’  just a little bit better than when you came?

A few years back after giving a keynote to a rather large group of educators, one of the ‘invited officials’ beckoned me over.

“I like you & I especially like your quote,  ‘Subversion is a major part of innovation and it is our job to subvert’. Come sit by me.”

This conversation has always reminded me of Dorothy Parker’s, ‘If you don’t have anything nice to say, come sit by me.’

In the coming weeks I’m flying off to Mackay to run a whole day Gifted & Talented workshop on machinima.

I’ve been working on ideas for this workshop for the last few months and am just about to launch an online image bank that will not be blocked by school filters.  (If you know what I mean hehehe).

I’ve already completed a collection of Dawn of War, Second Life and, thanks to JoKay, World of Warcraft images. I anticipate that these collections will go live in the next few days.

Call for Help - If you can help out with PG rated images from your favourite video game feel free to email them to me so anyone can have a go at this type of story telling.

I recently took my son to a ICT in Education Conference where he led a group of
teachers through three half hour workshops on video game making, stop motion
animation & movie making using a Flip video.

Whilst I had a few reservations about this the experience turned out to be a
wonderful learning opportunity. Real audience, sense of purpose, connection,
planning, rehearsal, networking, value of his talents and soooooo much more.



He received some great feedback from those that attended his session and here is an email
a delegate sent to his school and to me.

Good Morning

I attended a National Computer Conference ( ELH ) in Lorne over the weekend. I am from a
school in Perth Western Australia. There were 250 professional teachers and technicians
attending from around the country. The conference is a well known and very highly regarded
by professionals in the area on Education and IT. One of your students Samuel Bruce was
co-presenting with his father Adrian. The presentation went all day from 9.30 - 5 pm
and he was inspirational. Samuel demonstrated programs and assisted IT teachers in many
of the applications he has used and mastered. I was in awe as this young boy spoke with
authority and passion about his presentations. He and his father's presentation was one
of the best at the conference sessions and I would love it if you could commend Samuel
with a merit award or commendation in front of his peers.

It made me reflect on my own teaching and how I can accommodate children like Samuel
in my class sessions when they have far better skills than I have and can teach us
all so much.

Thank you for allowing him to attend. 

Mrs Jo P

The computer is the most powerful learning tool ever created. So why are the majority of my professional dialogues centred around strategies for getting teachers to turn them on?

Teachers should be the epitome of what it is to be a learner. They should model self directed learning. They should model life long learning, critical thinking and insight. Teachers should possess insight that extends far beyond the capabilities of the hardware into the realm of learning & creativity. It is not a matter of ‘making the time to learn this stuff’, it is what we do by definition!

Embrace these disruptive tools people and use them to transform and educate!