Weekly Tech Tip - Jan. 14, 2013

Happy New Year to you all!

This week's tech tip comes from a magazine that I frequently receive. Tech and Learning (www.techlearning.com) recently published the "Top 100 sites of 2012." So, take some time to sift through this site as you think about incorporating technology into your curriculum.

http://www.techlearning.com/magazine/0007/top-100-sites-of-2012/53330

When you click the link, you will get an advertisement from the magazine, it will send you to the page in a few seconds or you can click the link to "Continue to Page."

As always if you have any questions, please let me know.

Thanks and wishing you all a wonderful 2013,
Gregg

Weekly Tech Tip - Dec. 17, 2012

 This weekly tech tip comes from the NETA big deal book - a digital subscription that I get.

3DToad - A website that stores 3D images. Viewers can zoon in and out and rotate images 360 degrees. The galleries include images from history, geology, chemistry, skeltons, fossils, and much more.

Teaching Kids News - A news site that is written on level that students can comprehend. Each story also includes a ste of discussion questions, writing prompts, reading prompts, and vocab words.

Education Closet - Lessons for free that focus on arts integration, common core standards, 21st Century Learning Skills, and technology. 

I hope you find these web sites useful.

I wish each and everyone of you a very Merry Christmas!

Until next year,

Gregg

Weekly Tech Tip - Dec. 10, 2012

Looking for music to calm students, enhance some movement, just some sing alongs, or some relaxing music at your desk. Well, then this tech tip is for you.

As I was reading one of my journals, "Learning and Leading with Technology", I came across an article that featured websites with free music. As with any website, you should take some time to sift through it and read the "About" section or find out more about why these sites are listed as "free music sites". You can also use this music with student projects, such as creating videos or using them in the background of a slideshow.

Please check them out - some great music for any age group

http://www.purple-planet.com

http://www.soundjay.com

http://www.royalty-free-music-room.com

Another article that is worth mentioning was a website referring to student interactive storybook apps. These are great for an iPad, as we have lots of those going out within our service area.

http://www.wanderfulstorybooks.com

Until next time,

Enjoy,

Gregg

Weekly Tech Tip - Nov. 28, 2012

I've enabled Google+ on the ESU 4 google domain, so you should all be able to access it now.

What is Google+? Google+ is a soical networking tool, much like Facebook. For our domain, that would not be the intended use. What it offers for you and for others, is the ability to create what is called a hangout. A hangout will use your microphone and web camera (if you have one) and will allow you to have a virtual meeting.

So, instead of traveling many miles to confer with others inside ESU 4, you can use this as a resource for video and audio. More importantly, you can also share your screen.

If you would like for me to help you out with this, let me know. I can invite you to a hangout and show you how it works.

In order to get started, you would have to create a profile. If you go to http://plus.google.com, it will walk you through the steps. After you are done creating your profile and have finished setting up your account, then you will see a +You button when you login to the ESU 4 domain. Please note, that this account is still managed by ESU 4. And, if you want to connect with others, they must also have Google+ enabled.

Here is a little help tutorial on using google+

http://support.google.com/plus/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1215839&topic=1651547&ctx=topic

Enjoy,

Gregg

Weekly Tech Tip - Nov. 19, 2012

I've been having some webinars on using websites with different grade levels. Last week, I was able to organize some of my favorite elementary web pages. These are links to other web sites I feel can be of benefit for those who work with elementary students. I placed all those on my blog and that link can be found here:

http://grobke.blogspot.com/p/elementary-sites.html

And...while I am talking about websites, each of our cadres are listed on the home page. Each cadre, we share web resources with those that come to our workshop. These are all wiki pages that are created for anyone who wants to view them. So, go to our homepage and check out our wikipages. You might also find some great resources there.

http://www.esu4.org

Weekly Tech Tip - Nov. 5, 2012

I just received my NETA newsletter in the mail and I cannot begin to tell you how many things can be learned by reading this newsletter. You do not have to be a member to view the newsletter as it is download-able from the NETA web page.

http://netasite.org/documents/Newsletters/2012/Nov2012.pdf

On page 12, you can see how enriching a google document can be. So, open a google document and start typing something. Now, with your document open, Go to the "Tools" menu and click the "Research" option. A pane should open on the right side of your google document allowing you to research right within your document. So, I typed "George Washington" in the search box and I did get back some images of George as well as some web sites to visit. With the images, if you drag them over to your document, the document will automatically site the source and place that infromation at the bottom of the page. If you want to use a link from a webpage, you can insert the link right into your google document. How cool!

So, refer to page 12 if you want more google tips and tricks. There are many other articles to read and browse, all for free. So, check it out!

Enjoy,
Until next time,
Gregg

Weekly Tech Tip - Nov. 1, 2012

Welcome to November! Wow! Hard to believe we are that far into the school year.

So, as I was reading some things from past meetings, I came across a link and thought I would give it a try. And, it worked, so I am passing it along to you.

It is called Google Takeout and all it does is allow you to login with your google account information. It then takes all your documents in google and downloads them as a single file to your computer (archives them). "Why is this important?" you say. Well, for one, this is an easy way to back up your google documents. So, create a task or a calendar item and do this once a month. Then, if you lose a document in google or it accidentally gets deleted, you will be able to restore it.

Google takeout will archive more than documents, but that is the main reason for using it. When you follow the link, you can see what else it will archive for you.

Please note that it does not backup any of your email.

Give it a try...and archive your documents today.

https://www.google.com/takeout/

Happy Goog'ling,
Until next time,
Gregg