Your Nominations for the Top 10 E-Learning Tools

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Reuven Werber on August 22, 2007 at 1:02am

Hi Den,
I like much of what you have chosen & use iy as well.
In Addition:
Google Docs - use it for collaborative documents - particularly when planning and running collaborative online projects.

You Tube - Google Video & Revver - for uploading and storing student videos, Photostory 3 productions, etc.Occasionally I find videos to be used for instruction like this one that can spark a discussion on values:


FastStone Capture - I need this for doing captures of windows - objects, etc. for creating instruction materials.

MS Share-Point - Classerver - This is the environment we use to deliver our online content and assignments. Just came out with a new interface making it much more user friendly and verstile.

Wikispaces - Here we run many of our online collaborative projects - Free - Friendly - Supports Hebrew - Great user support.

Permalink Reply by Dennis O'Connor on August 22, 2007 at 11:01am

Reuven, YouTube! Of course, you're the maestro when it comes to making video connect with concept. (I've seen that safari video before. It is compelling isn't it? Cape Buffalo vs pride of lions...)

I use Snaggit on one of my machines and Faststone capture on the other. I think Faststone is a terrific shareware product, great for screen capture and just as efficient as Snaggit.

I've got a pile of content in google docs, but haven't used it for collaboration. I'm knee deep in a big ISTE project using Wikispaces to develop a Reviewers Training. I do like wiki-spaces, but like everything it takes awhile to get used to it.

I've thought for some time that e-learning tools, all software really, should be approached with the line from that old Crosby, Stills & Nash tune in mind: "If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with.."

8)

Den

Permalink Reply by Reuven Werber on August 23, 2007 at 10:55am

H i Den,
I have a version of Faststone capture from when it was given away for free. It's cool and a very tiny footprint.

I spent all day wrestling with setting up our Sharepoint Campus together online with our support team about 200 kms. from here. made some progress,
http://slk.sulam.org.il/k12/n_hana/Pages/Default.aspx

WE are now looking at a snazzy Flash environment for international collaborations - http://rafi.ki/

I blogged about it here (Classroom 2.0) I few weeks ago. Probably still accessible from my page here (Classroom 2.0).

I wish I had all the time I needed to check out what's available to support our education efforts.

Bye for now!
Reuven

Permalink Reply by James Picton on October 9, 2007 at 4:43am

Hi Den & Reuven,
Great discussion and I definitely agree with Snaggit and Moodle. I'd also like to suggest Zamzar (www.zamzar.com) for online file conversion. There are a few of these around, but this is the best IMHO.

As for educational resources, it's hard to go past Teacher Tube (www.teachertube.com) or Teachers TV (www.teachers.tv).

Permalink Reply by Ian Carmichael on October 9, 2007 at 6:16am

Zamzar looks smart!
The drawing tools - especially the solids and lighting effects in openofficeDraw are simply superb.
I think I like SharePoint - but it will cost me time!!
That leaves 7 in reserve.
I'd love to nominate a GIS, but they're too hard for most students.
And from sysadmin days, a spreadsheet (any - but I know Excel best) and its text functions - may not be great e-learning, but certainly is a fantastic productivity tool.

I'll keep my powder dry for the rest!

Permalink Reply by James Picton on October 9, 2007 at 6:37am

Thanks Ian, great follow-up.

I forgot to mention the wonderful online brainstorming / concept-mapping tool www.bubbl.us - the kids love this one and maps can be easily saved and printed online.

Permalink Reply by Ian Carmichael on October 9, 2007 at 8:46pm

Thanks James,

Just played with bubble.us Very nice. I've stayed well clear of Inspiration, because I couldn't get any simple productivity out of it. I'm also raving about (commercial) argument mapping software called Rationale. It seems to be a great tool for framing/visualising arguments and their structure, and then building a plan for an essay, web, wiki, presentation... from it. I think so many students are so poor at such planning this tool is nearly a must have. (I've looked at most of the open source materials,and they are just too hard to use.)

Permalink Reply by Dennis O'Connor on October 10, 2007 at 10:36am

Ian, concept mapping is a power skill for critical thinking. I think it needs to be actively taught as a study skill. I got into it after reading Tony Buzan's work. I used it extensively while taking my ID masters at Western Governors University. I found I needed a good deal of outside pressure to focus me on using these tools.

Once you overcome the learning curve and can work any brainstorming software close to the speed of your ideas it becomes a great tool. Still I need a large project (a new program or class design) to justify the ramp up time needed to become fluent with the tool. Right now I have a program called Concept Draw Mindmapping. It's a well designed powerhouse, but I don't think it has the easy collaboration built into bubble.us.

Den

Permalink Reply by Ian Carmichael on October 10, 2007 at 8:45pm

Agreed - but Rationale is an argument mapper, so allows the hierarchical description of a chain of reasoning. To paint a pretty picture the concept mappers are more geared to producing a web, net or cluster of related materials, the argument mappers are building pyramids (and from the top down, no less!)
For my students, if I can avoid much of the learning curve by a choice of well-designed software (when they are being consumers) I'm more than happy!

Permalink Reply by Dennis O'Connor on October 9, 2007 at 12:16pm

James, I've played a bit with bubbl.us and it makes perfect sense that a brainstorming tool should add a collaborative web 2.0 interface.

I suppose it says a lot about my process that I think of brainstorming as a solo affair. Most of my writing these days comes down to reviews, course design, and email. Still I can see a place for the wild style collaborating in writing classrooms linked by collab. Thanks for getting my mind bubbling!

Den

Permalink Reply by Dennis O'Connor on October 10, 2007 at 10:40am

Hey James, I accidentally deleted one of your replies in this thread. You were talking about pdf conversion in open office. I'm not a big fan of Adobe's products. They seem so heavy handed, seizing control, taking forever to install, and constantly pushing you toward the more expensive Acrobat platform.

I was unhappy when Adobe swallowed Dreamweaver too. Ah well, just one man's opinion.

Den

Permalink Reply by Dennis O'Connor on October 9, 2007 at 12:14pm

Ian, I just bookmarked Zamzar & openofficeDraw in my del.icio.us account (network name: wiredinstructor )

Zamzar looks handy since I don't intend to convert to Vista until I have to. (Hope to learn enough about linux to just skip it.)

Haven't used many open office products. Somewhere along the line I heard they hogged a lot of memory and produced large file sizes. Am I wrong?

Thanks for the input!

Dennis

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