oSkope

oSkope is a visual search engine where you can search ebay, amazon, flickr and youtube sites. The results appear as images and the design of this website is very slick and graphically clear.

I found it really good to use when searching youtube and flickr but a bit strange with the other two. I really liked the layout of the images and the added bonus that if you roll over an image it also gives you the image information. Below shows the beginning images that were retrieved using oSkope for cats in flickr.

No Humour…

While at school last night I was trying to find the dates for Rhys Darby’s comedy gigs in Auckland. On clicking on comedy.co.nz I was greeting with this familiar sight that made me laugh… No humour allowed apparently.

Gotta love filters!

One For The Debate.. Is It Worth It?

In one of my last posts I posted the following article; Teachers Warned About Myspace Profiles but didn’t have the time to write anymore about it.

Following the post I recieved 2 interesting comments in relation to the article I posted. In one comment it was deemed a debate for the ‘internetually challenged’. But I see it is a debate that at the moment, I want to follow as whether we like it or not there are the ‘internetually challenged’ teaching among us.

It in essence comes back Ewans comments about the public and private spaces that we have. Many people have come forward and said that they share their facebook and myspace with their students, while others such as myself keep my spaces to my friends/family. I have contemplated opening a bebo site so that I can have social networking space with my students… many of them have tried to add my area to theirs already. Within the above article it seems as though maybe some of these teachers do not have a ‘public/private face’ or it is the medias attempt to scaremonger?

For me it is a debate that intrigues me…

If we have a networking connection in the classroom how much is this different from a social networking site such as bebo. If I can leave comments on my k-net page for my students and vice versa, once again, how is this different? It is just transferring this network onto the internet and a larger social networking ring.

Interestingly the debate was continued the other night, with a group of teachers, at a workshop I ran about flickr. The discussion came up about safety and what are kids can and can’t see and also the skills and lack of skills that they demonstrate on the internet. Many of the teachers at this session had not thought of this debate from the ‘other side’ of their own thinking. That being the side of the educator who see’s that this is the world of our students and these are the sites they are using, the skills they are needing… so why aren’t we as educators teaching them the skills to keep them safe online and to tread successfully in a digital world?

If we are educating our students for their forthcoming life and these are the skills they need (and are using outside of school already), why aren’t these skills and ideas being addressed in school rather than hiding them? It made some of them think past their own perceptions.

But interestingly one of the teachers brought up the fact that she herself, in fact did not know about some of the elements of web use i.e. keeping herself and her identity safe. We had an interesting conversation where the 2 different sides of the debate were highlighted and a range of people and skills shown.

As David said “If we are using the Internet to teach and we should, then it is beholden upon us to know what the benefits and drawbacks are for using this resource and crucially how to use it.” But the fact is that within the education system we have teachers who are not internet or tech-savvy (yes they need to develop these skills) but at the moment there is a group who are not ‘there’ and some who are not willing to. While this is the case, the debate will continue.

There is no quick term solution, there are people who will scaremonger and there are people who will share their point of view. So, I do watch in interest to what others have to say…

Rememble Part 2

I have posted about this site before but I really enjoy this!

This is a great site where you can post all your ‘remembles’ or memories. Your posts can take the form of comments, photos, videos and what’s even cooler is you can put your flickr photos or your tweets from Twitter!

It’s such a great way of keeping track of all those things you want to remember… so far I have events such as birthdays, gigs, festivals, family events and more all remembled in my ‘memble line’.

The site is so user friendly and easy to use that it would be easy for a range of ages to use. At the moment i’m only using it for personal use but would really like to trial it in the class. You have 3 options for viewing your membles from a long membleline to a more in-depth memble line through to a one memble at a time view (see more in my last post).

A new(ish) feature is to be able to add your latest membles to your blog (but I can’t get it to work at the moment!). You can add friends and your friends can leave comments and information about each of your membles.

I am slightly addicted to this site… let me know if you give it a go and how you found it! I would love to have some more memble mates!

Another One For The Debate…

And the personal/private spaces debate continues… Thought this was an interesting article.

Teachers warned about MySpace profiles

I Think I’m In Love…

Well actually, no.
I know i’m in love.
Cheesey I know but what can I say. Sadly though… it is a website and the many mashups that have arisen from this site.
Flickr is my one true love at the moment and I know that I am only on the edge of the possibilities of this site.

My first indulgence into this site started after a day session with Ewan McIntosh. I don’t think he realised what a huge influence a by-passing statement was to have on my personal hobbies and my classroom. I had used flickr before but only as a place to store my photos.

After the session with Ewan I dived into the world of flickr and the 5 frame storytelling group. I had a look around, a few conversations with the moderator and the participants and so the first project began. My students and I went through the process and completed some amazing 5 frame digital storytelling that allowed my main learning intentions in oral, visual and written language to be met and by-passed (you can read more about that in earlier posts). In consultation with one of the moderators I have now started a 5 Frame Digital storytelling group for kids on flickr. Please join, pass it on and get yourself/your kids to add in their 5 frame stories and view/comment on other kids work!

Then I learnt more about roll over notes and created roll over images for our syndicate as we were studying books this term. The roll over notes have so much potential in themselves.

But then I learnt about mashups. Thanks goodness!

Mashup - “…which seamlessly combines tools or data from one or more online sources into a new, integrated whole.” (Robin Good)

If you Google ‘flickr mashups’ you come up with 7,660,000 results, so here are some of my great picks for mashed-up flickr funtimes…

Phreetings - Create your own greeting cards from flickr pics. Type in a keyword and images come up for you to use. Add in your greeting and press send to send it via you’re email programme or copy and paste the URL. Here’s my first Phreetings card used with the keyword blue.

Bookr - Like iPhoto books for flickr but super cool because you have access to all the flickr images. Great writing tool for kids as they can write and publish their own books easily. Here’s my quick un-exciting example.

Splashr - A great way to show photos in different formats. On an interactive whiteboard I found this to be one of the best ways to display images off flickr. A large range of options for you to play with.

Retrievr - Interesting site where you start drawing a picture and it find images that match what you are drawing on your sketch pad.

Tiltviewer - This site is so pretty and is one of those sites you can get stuck on for hours and not realise. I love this for the random photos that it brings up and the smooth, seamless way in which it works. Great for using with kids as part of oral language and written language. How can you connect up the photos shown to create a story? Note: You would need to preview selection before working with the kids!

Bubblr Search for a photo and then add speech and thought bubbles to your photo. Very cool layout and easy to use.
You could also try captioner for a similar thing, but I like the style of Bubblr!

Oh there is so much more to come…

P.s. If you’re new to flickr and want to know more, CogDog has a cool flickr page with lots of answers and ideas so check it out.

Learn to spell… with Flickr

At the moment I’m loving flickr and all the cool mashups that you can get to do with flickr.

Spell With Flickr
I was reading on jlietze’s blog about the teaching of spelling and Spell With Flickr is one site that would be really cool to use with the kids as a change up to spelling. It has a really simple interface where you type in your word then you are taken to a page that uses letter images from flickr to spell out the word. A cool feature of this website is that you can click on each individual letter to get a new one if you don’t like it or want to practice your spelling. A great tool for your visual learners!

Here’s my nickname as an example…

Musicovery

Woah… this is cool.

I love my music and love to hear new music.
Musicovery is great for exactly this. You choose the style of music you want then you can choose from the mood you want - dark, energetic, positive or calm amongst other choices. Click away and then a song will play for you. It gives a fantanstic visual line with other songs to try as well. You can also choose from hit music to non-hit music if you are after something mainstream or something new.
Either way if you’re after some good music, this is a interesting way to find some.

Free Rice

Passing on the good things in life…
This site is a tad bit addictive. Especially when you find out that you are doing good for someone, somewhere in the world.
Free Rice is a website that donates 10 grains of rice for every vocabulary question you get right. The site starts straight away and asks you a multi-choice vocabulary question. You answer it and if it is correct 10 grains of rice appear in your bowl. The cool thing is that these grains of rice aren’t just pretty pictures but represent 10 grains of rice that will be donated via sponsoring companies to United Nations and on to the people that need it.
Pretty cool. It would be a great warm up activity at the start of writing or reading for the older kids. But for me… i’m just addicted to getting more rice bundles!
So what are you waiting for?

Free Rice