ISTE Conference from the Comfort of Home

The ISTE Conference is coming up June 26-29, 2011. ISTE is the International Society for Technology in Education and their yearly conference is a great way to learn about new technology, tools, and ideas on how to use those things with kids to engage and help them learn. Many of the Ed Tech “Gurus” attend and present at ISTE so it is also a great way to connect with people from around...

Easy As Pie Videos Using Animoto

The edTech Ninja likes to take pictures of his class when doing fun activities. By the end of the year the Ninja has collected many pictures to share. He keeps them available online using Picasa Web Albums. Some years ago the Ninja wanted to step and give my students a CD with all of the pictures. The next year Ninja decided to create a DVD for each of his students. The DVD would include a video...

Creating Online Quizzes in Google Docs

Google Docs is a very cool online Office suite of apps. It includes a word processor, a spreadsheet, presentation software (like PowerPoint), and a online form creator. The form creator will allow you to create an online survey or even an online quiz for students to take. And that’s not all that Google Docs can do. As a bonus, it is all free! There are several video tutorials on how to...

Ask the Tech Ninja #2: PowerPoint to Notebook

Another frequently asked question is how to get PowerPoint files into SMART Notebook. The easy answer is to do a Smart Print Capture. First open your PowerPoint file and go to File and then choose Print. In the drop down menu tha allows you to choose which printer you want to use, select Smart Print Capture. Choose your other options for example do you want a note taking page with three slides or...

Storytelling

Two websites that I like to use for storytelling/story writing are Kerpoof and Big Universe. The first, Kerpoof, will allow students to choose a scene and then add characters to the scene. You can add motions and effects to the characters making for a really cool little “movie making” lite experience. The other allows students to create online books. Students can write story and then...