Great infographic with mobile productivity tips and tools

We use our mobile devices more and more for work, business, school and more. Tony Vincent has a great site, Learning in Hand, where he has been posting information, tips and resources about using mobile device in learning for years, starting with the Palm PDA's.

He created a great infographic with his tips and tools for mobile productivity. It has some great information for teachers and students, and anyone else for that matter, for being more productive using mobile devices.

Here is the infographic and you can download it from his site. Also check out the other great resources his site has.

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Splashup - free online image editing

Splashup is a free online image editor that I learned about from a fellow webOS fan, Aaron Gallo, on his blog, Novacharter.

It is easy to use and even let's you "jump right in" and edit photos and images without needing an account. The controls and commands are similar to many other image editing apps so it's easy to get started. It's all online so there is nothing to download or install. It has a lot of great features and there is a light version with less features that is simpler to use. 

You can save your work or share it online with different services like Facebook.

It's another great image editing tool for teachers and students.


Related:

Great, free Image editing sites and software

Two Free Graphic creation and editing software

PicMonkey - free online photo editing

Two More Free Image Editing Resources

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Infographic on 21st Century Classroom - what do you think?

I was sent the following infographic about the "21st Century Classroom" this week. As I was looking at it, I found some interesting statistics and agree that Project based learning, social media, and technology are all important for education.

What do you think about the information presented below?


Components of a 21st Century Classroom - An infographic by the team at Open Colleges

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Social Media Guide and Resources for Educators

Social Media is an incredible resource for education. Educators can learn, share, connect and more with educators from around the world. They can collaborate and communicate with students, parents, and colleagues. There are many different social media networks, and lots of ways to use them. Here are some great resources for learning more about social media in education:

Social Media in Education - connect, share, learn, communicate and more

Social Media Cheat Sheets - free tips and more for social media sites

Create a Personal Learning Network

Twitter, Google Plus, Facebook - a nice comparison

Twitter, Facebook, RSS feeds, Email, Google+ - why/when I use each one




From: OnlineColleges.net

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Social Media Cheat Sheets - free tips and more for social media sites

Walyou, a great site for interesting information and more, has a great collection of cheat sheets that have tips, shortcuts, and more for social media sites. The sites include Google+, Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook and have some great tips for making them more useful and easier to use.

These are great for finding some cool new features or shortcuts and also great to help newbies get started.

Check them out here: http://walyou.com/social-media-cheat-sheets/


Related: 

Social Media in Education - Connect, Share, Learn, Communicate and more

Twitter, Google Plus, Facebook - a nice comparison

Google+ - more reasons it's great for educators

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Google Unit Conversions are now interactive

Google's OneBox, the search/URL/etc box in Chrome and search bars has been updated. You have been able to enter a conversion, say 5kg into pounds, in the box and get an answer, but now it's interactive where you can easily change the number and units in the results box itself.

I entered "5kg = ? pounds"

You can click on the "Mass" to bring up a drop down menu of different measurements, including temperature, velocity, volume, and more and clicking on "kg" or "pound" brings up a drop down menu to change the units.

This is a great resource for students and teachers needing a quick and easy conversion calculator anywhere.

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Cubby, cool file sync, share and storage service, offers big storage increase for referrals

LogMeIn is a service that allows you to remotely access someone else's computer (with their permission and cooperation, of course) so that you can help them fix a problem. It's much easier than having them try to explain the problem over the phone, or you having to drive to their house.

This past April they launched Cubby, a new cloud file sync, share and storage service. It's still in beta, but you can enter your email to get an invite. You can sync your files across all of your computers, tablets, and smartphones easily. You can share files and collaborate on them with others. You don't need to reorganize your files either. You can just select any folder on your device to by synced and make it accessible anywhere.

They have just announced that users can ear more memory, the free account starts with 5GB, by having friends sign up for an account. For every referral that signs up, you get 1GB of extra space. That's pretty good. Have a few friends sign up and you can easily end up with some serious storage space.

They have also announced some improvements to the iOS app and some other new features.

Read more about this announcement: http://www.engadget.com/2012/07/13/logmeins-cubby-offering-up-1gb-for-referrals-tells-dropbox-whe/

Read my full review here: 

http://educationaltechnologyguy.blogspot.com/2012/04/cubby-new-cloud-storage-service-from.html

Related:

World Backup Day - make sure your data and files are backed up! - lots of cloud file sync,share, backup services listed here. All with free options.

Zumodrive shutting down - here are some alternatives for file backup and sync

Sugarsync - file sync, share, backup service with some great features. 

Dropbox - another file sync, share, backup service with some great features. 

Android Resources for Education - apps, tips, resources, news and more

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eduClipper now available and up and running

eduClipper is a new app from EduTecher Adam Bellow that I wrote about last month. eduClipper is now available to use to those who signed up earlier. It provides a way to clip anything from the web and then share it with anyone.

It's free and allows you to clip and capture anything from the web including articles, links, videos, lesson plans and more. You then create a clipboard to organize what you have clipped and then you can share the clipboards with students, colleagues, the public or just keep it for yourself. Students can use it too and the clipboards are searchable. You can also share your clipboards via different social networks.

The social sharing aspect is what makes it different from other web clipping services and apps. You share what you have clipped with others and people can comment and discuss the clip.

You can still request an invite too: http://www.educlipper.net/

Adam has a nice YouTube video that describes eduClipper in more detail:

Related:

EduTecher - explore and share educational web tools

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iGoogle shutting down Nov 1, 2013 - here are some alternatives

iGoogle, Google's customizable start page, is shutting down and will not be available after November 1, 2013. Google has decided that iGoogle has outlived it's usefulness with the new apps and technologies that are now available. All of your data in your Google product widgets will still be there in the original product, like Gmail, Google Calendar, etc. Other gadgets you use probably have a way for you to export your data to another service and many of the gadgets exist as stand alone apps now.

I have used iGoogle for many years as my start page but have noticed that lately I am really only using it for the Google Reader. I have all of  my Google apps, and other apps that I use throughout the day, either launch in their own tabs when I start up Chrome, or they are on my Chrome homepage. I really don't need iGoogle anymore when on my own computers. As for having a place to go when on a shared computer, I'm setting up all of my links to my apps and services in an Evernote note for quick access and linking and I might make a Google Site with all the links and add any gadgets.

Some other alternatives to iGoogle include:

Symbaloo - recommended by Richard Byrne at Free Technology for Teachers

Create your own Wiki or Google Site with links to all of your apps.

Use an Evernote note, as I mentioned above, to have links to all of your apps and resources.

NetVibes and Protopage - from Life Hacker





Related:

Google for Education Resources

Evernote for Education Resources

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Zoho Planner being shut down

Zoho Planner is a service I wrote about this past April that was a very useful way to get organize and plan out your schedule and activities. It allowed you to create to-do lists, notes, upload images and files add email reminders and access your data anywhere.

I just received a notice from Zoho that they are shutting down Zoho Planner. The full notice can be seen below. Planner will remain online until December 31st 2012 but will switch to read only soon. Users will need to back up their data before the end of the year when all data will be erased. Zoho has a support site and email available and reminds users that they can use Zoho Calendar, Wiki and Tasks to replace Zoho planner.

You can also use Google's many services and Evernote to get organized and replace Zoho Planner.

See links to other services and the full shut down notice below.

Related:

Zoho - suite of on-line business, productivity & collaboration apps

Alternatives to Google's web services and apps

Google for Educators Resources

Evernote for Educators Resources

Important Notice Regarding Your Zoho Planner Subscription

First and foremost, we want to thank you for being a Zoho Planner user. From time to time we need to review our wide portfolio of services, and make sure they are performing to our, and our customers', expectations. As a result of that, we have decided to discontinue our Zoho Planner service. We realize that as a current user, this change directly affects you today, which is why we wanted to inform you of this decision today before making it public. Though soon the product will be removed from our Zoho.com homage, you will still be able to access your data by logging in directly at planner.zoho.com. Don't worry, Zoho Planner will remain online from now until December 31st, 2012. However, it will soon switch to a read-only mode. That should give you plenty of time to back up your data, as after that date we will erase everything related to Zoho Planner from our servers. For any product-related questions during this time, you can continue to contact us at support@zohoplanner.com, where we will be happy to help you. Although Zoho Planner is going again, you should know that most of what you can do with it today, you can accomplish through a combination of other services, like Zoho Calendar, Zoho Wiki and Tasks (part of our Zoho Mail suite). So we certainly plan to keep you in the Zoho family! We thank you for being our user and we're sorry we can no longer provide this service. At the same time, we're refocusing our efforts on some of our other Zoho applications, and we're very excited about what the future holds for them. Sincerely, The Zoho Team

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181 Google Tricks that will save you time in School - updated

181 Google Tricks that will save you time in School - updated is an article that has, as it's title suggests, some great tricks for using different Google apps and resources in education.

The tips include improving your search and finding what you need, using Google Scholar, iGoogle, Google Groups, Google+, Google Docs, Gmail, Google Calendar, Chrome and much more. 

If you use Google's apps and resources, this is a must read. 

Related:

Presentation on Google for Educators

Why I use Google's Products as an Educator (and how)

Google Groups - connect, share, communicate, discuss - great for education

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Discovery Education announces updates to it's Science Techbooks

Discovery Education has a lot of great resources for educators, many free (over 30). They also have fee-based services such as DE Streaming with thousands of videos, audio files, images, lesson plans, and much more.

The Discovery Education Science Techbook is more than a digital textbook. "It’s a different way of thinking. Thinking outside the box, perhaps. Or more appropriately, thinking outside the book." "The Techbook not only provides awesome content aligned to each state’s standards (there are currently Science Techbooks available for most grades K-8 in 30 states across the U.S.), but includes a model lesson for teachers to use with every concept, assessment questions for each standard, a teacher’s guide, and DVDs for when the Internet is not available. Resources such as the virtual labs, reading passages, video segments, science sleuths, explorations, and interactive glossary, etc., are packaged together to follow the five E model of instruction. Teachers have found an easier and creative way to build lessons using technology resources and content, as well as differentiating their classroom."

They have just announced Techbook 2.0 is available. This is an update to the Techbook based on feedback and suggestions from educators, including a group of well known and well respected educators who reviewed Techbook at a summit Discovery Education hosted. You can Register to attend a webinar to learn about the new layout, features, and enhancements.

links.discoveryeducation.com/sciencetechbook



Related:

25 Free Resources from Discovery Education

Discovery Education’s Science Techbook: Scientific Explanations in Action

What I Want from a Digital Textbook

TechBook Extravaganza

Apple Announces iBooks2 E-Textbooks - my initial thoughts

What I use with Physics classes instead of textbook

Resources to Replace Textbooks

Free Textbooks - online, download, iPad, Kindle

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Gooru - collections of free study guides and resources

Gooru is a site I wrote about this past February that was in private Alpha. I just received notice from them that they have now launched their Beta site and it's open for use.

Gooru is a search engine for education and learning. It contains study guides, aligned to standards and personalized, on topics in 5th - 12th grade math and science. Resources include videos, animations, links, digital textbooks, and more. All of the resources have been organized and reviewed by teachers or content experts.

Here's a small sample of what a search for "physics" returns:

It also contains a social aspect with a community to discuss topics and ask questions. There are also self-assessments that Gooru suggest resources and study guides to help you.

Check it out and share with your students: http://www.goorulearning.org/gooru/index.g#/home

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