Free SLR Camera - sort of.

As part of my media class many moons ago we would give the students a go with the schools' one and only SLR camera. I only had basic knowledge of it and passed on something about depth of feild and the rest but like all film cameras - how are you supposed to know what settings you took when the prints come back weeks later (I worked in a remote country school).

With the new digital cameras - even the DSLR's there is a tendancy to leave it up the the camera to work out the best settings for fear of missing the moment.

I've just stumbled across "CameraSim" a virtual SLR that we showe you in an instant what setting will effect what in the photo.

Free Video Editing - Industry Standard

I wrote about this before but I've actually tried it out now.
Lightworks has released their industry standard software (it was used for the Oscar award winning "The Kings Speech") as free software - and they are soon to open up the code as well.

This is a great way to do basic editing - but it also has a slew of realtime effects you can add to the workflow.
I like the way you can set up more than one mixing desk so you can work on different parts of a project separately.

If you want to try it out all you have to do is register and you can have it for free.

Solar System Explorer

I've written before about two of my favourite IWB programs - Celestia and Stellarium - both for astronomy. But these are downloaded programs and you may not have permission to install them onto school computers (it depends on where you work).

I've just stumbled across a fantastic interactive website called SolarSystemScope - not only does it show the solar system in 3D like Celestia, but also from a panoramic from the Earth surface.

Lots of controls to manipulate and view. so you can represent the system as either real size and distances or an easy to understand schematic.

My jaw dropped when I saw this and it is definitely one of my new demonstration sites for when I demonstrate how to use technology in the classroom.

Free Virtual Pop Up Book Maker

I just came across ZooBurst. A free and paid for service that lets you make virtual pop up storybooks and they even have an augmented reality browser for it as well.

There are teacher and student sign ons so you can set up your whole class to make their own pop up book.

This is a great language activity as well as for languages other than English.

The free version lets you put together 10 pages on unlimited books and will let you upload your own art work or you can use the open clip art they have linked to.

Check out my book below - took about 3 mins

Google Sketchup Teacher Resources.

I'm always amazed at how many teachers don't know about Google Sketchup. when I go to schools it is one of the first programs I show that work brilliantly on an interactive whiteboard.

In case you don't know - google sketchup is a free 3D drawing program from google that makes 3D drawing simple and easy. Great for Maths, Design and technology and even S+E.

Well it seems I'm not the only one - I just stumbled across this website.
3Dvinci

This is a teacher guide to using sketch up in the classroom with PDF lessons, Tutorials and sample files.

Primary Science Conference

For the last two days I have been at the primary science conference organised by STAWA (Science Teachers Association of Western Australia).

I really look forward to the science conferences - these conferences are really hands on stuff and they pull out all the stops to make it fun and engaging.

I was lucky enough to be asked to present a workshop about integrating IT into the primary science classroom. I brought along Visualisers, microscope cameras, data loggers and and IWB to show how these pieces of hardware could be used to extend primary science.

I wish I had of seen this before going in...

Makeuseof.com - one of my favourite websites has this great article listing/linking a bunch of environmental science games and activities on the web... I could have based my whole talk on that.

Free eBooks and Asimov

You can blame Asimov for my science fiction collection of toys, books and props. If it wasn't for Foundation and the Robot Stories I don't think I would be the owner of a Darth Vader helmet or a replica light sabre.

You have to admit the guy could see into our near future - have a look at this video and see what I mean- the first few seconds are important.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZmFEFO72gA

As one of the commenter's on YouTube said - Kahn Academy! (see post below).

I can think of many more examples. And this leads nicely onto this RSA animate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U


Then there has been the explosion in my state of the use of iPads in education and the "need" for eBooks or more importantly eTextbooks. Publishers are scrambling to figure out how to make money from this but they are going to find it hard with the e-books directory.