The site provides “Remixable textbooks by expert authors. Free online and affordable offline”.

Have you heard about this? Remixable free online textbooks? Check out the introductory video:

Seems like a pretty awesome idea to me, yet there are only a couple dozen books published or in development on the site. The site is quite new though.

Flatworld Knowledge is another technology that it’s going to be interesting to watch, to see how it evolves, how quickly it is adopted, whether it really takes hold or not. I for one hope it sticks!

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
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Lecture Tools – another free, hosted LMS tool

Harvard Business School’s CIO delivered an engaging keynote address at the Campus Technology 2010 Conference. It included this set of recommended practices that all IT shops should strive to incorporate.

For this week’s post I’m taking off my Ed Tech hat, and swapping it for my ”IT Manager” hat. While I am undeniably an Education Technology enthusiast and advocate (alright, I’m a tech geek), professionally I am first and foremost an IT Manager. Mr. Laster’s presentation was inspiring, and it addressed many ideas that I feel strongly about as a technology manager, so I’m sharing some of them here in the hopes that others can benefit from them.

Hopefully this post finds it’s way to other managers, and aspiring managers, and reminds them of some of the things that can really impact the value we can deliver to the organizations we work for. If you are reading this and you are not a technology manager, there is still plenty to be gained by understanding these notions (and by passing this on to other managers that you work with!).

Below I list the 8 factors discussed by Laster - the explanatory language following each of these is mostly my own. I hope that my interpretations and suggestions do Steven’s “factors” justice – he did a great job of backing these up with specific points that that he elaborated on. I also find it easy to speak to these ideas since most of them are concepts I also espouse, and those that haven’t been part of my lexicon previously certainly are now because they just make sense.

1. Hire and mentor a great team. You’re only as good as your people. Hire people with a great attitude and the ability to learn. In addition to taking the time and effort to hire great people, be sure to bring them along with mentoring and professional development.

2. Run the shop as a business. In many ways, the IT shop is a “business within the business” (or within the “organization”, if the ‘b’ word makes you uncomfortable). Much of what we do can be outsourced or insourced – you should strive to differentiate which services your team can do better (more cost effectively, more efficiently) than outside vendors, and which they can’t. Communicate the business case that demonstrates what you do better to your executive team!  Then work to “get out those businesses you shouldn’t be in”. Just be sure to plan for the time and resources you’ll need to manage those relationships tightly – outsourcing doesn’t mean there isn’t still work to do.

3. Leverage planning and governance. Work closely with peers and senior executives to plan and prioritize – get them involved, consider a formal approach such as a Technology Steering Committee or similar platform. Also be sure to employ project management methodologies if you don’t already (it’s kind of scary how many small, and even some mid-sized shops, don’t). Also, learn a little about governance methodologies such as ITIL or COBIT and consider their use.

4. Take smart risks. Are you looking beyond the fundamental requirements and needs of your constituents and trying to innovate new solutions? It can be challenging, but it is critical that some time be set aside for innovation. Sort through new ideas and select a few to pilot. No one knows your environment like you and your staff do, and the creative, unique solutions that you can provide will really demonstrate your value.

5. Actively measure. Meaningful metrics are essential to identifying strengths and weaknesses, and enabling continuous improvement. They also play a fundamental role in communicating value added by your team. What is your uptime for critical systems? How effectively do you meet project deadlines and deliverables? What trends do your Help Desk ticket volumes identify? I’m also a firm believer in Time Tracking – this enables you to know your capacity for projects, and provides a lot of additional very useful information. Measure internal staff satisfaction too.

6. Capture the customer. It is so important to have an informed sense of the customer’s perspective, and not to work from unproven assumptions about their experiences and perspectives. Spend time with the customers. Survey them. Do focus groups. Understand what they need from you to help them do their jobs. Limit tech-speak in your interactions with them, speak their language not yours (save that for communicating with fellow IT staffers).

7. Communicate, communicate, communicate. You may be doing all sorts of great things, but if no one knows about it, then, well, no one knows about it. One of the key roles of the top tier of IT management is to communicate with the organization – market your plans, showcase the shop’s progress, seek out constructive feedback. Establish a regular process for communicating with the executive team, and market your team and your successes to the organization as a whole.

8. Leverage trusted advisors. This is one I’d like to do better with myself. I have a couple people I regularly seek advice from, but they are mostly internal to my organization. We would all do well to have a number of advisors to bounce ideas off of, and to learn from. Network – in person and via the ‘net, find people whose opinions you can trust, and establish a means of communication with them. Vendors can be another source of advice. I’m surprised by the reluctance some IT practitioners display in seeking outside advice. A lot of vendors will share a good amount of insight for free in initial consultations, so don’t hesitate to bring them in when you’re considering a new initiative. Chances are that every now and then you’ll find some vendor contacts that offer excellent advice and don’t charge you just to pick up the phone and talk – those kinds of contacts can help you, your organization, and your career.

So there you have it - a robust set of fundamental factors that can facilitate the success of any IT organization. Focus on these ideas and you can hardly go wrong. Thanks again to Steven Laster for sharing these ideas, and for giving me permission to share them with you.

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
Campus Technology 2010: Time and Money Well Spent
Let’s stop misspending education technology dollars
8 Engaging Videos Advocating Better Integration of Technology in Education

The cost of attendance has been more than justified by the learning, technology exposure, and networking opportunities.

I’ve been attending the Campus Technology 2010 Conference in Boston for the last few days, and I learned a good deal in most of the Conference Sessions that I’ve attended. I heard some folks gripe a bit about some of the sessions they attended, but I was generally quite pleased with the ones I sat in on (although, I will admit that a few presenters could have benefitted from some work on their presentation skills).

I also learned a lot at some of the vendor booths, and appreciated some of the “Technology Classrooms” that were offered (25 minute vendor presentations that provided insight into their solutions). Add to that an outstanding Keynote Presentation by Harvard Business School CIO Steven Laster, and you have an experience that was worth repeating (I intend to return next year).

Here are some highlights from my experience.

“Teaching with Web 2.0: Case Study and Analysis“ by Mihaela Vorvoreanu, Assistant Professor, Purdue University

Professor Mihaela Vorvoreanu presented a wonderful case study in which she and colleague Dr. David Sears compared outcomes in a Public Relations course which had several Web 2.0 tools and activities purposefully woven into the instructional process, versus a ‘control’ Communication Theory course which had minimal use of such tools. The Web 2.0 technologies integrated into the PR course were Twitter, Skype, and Blogs. The outcomes assessed were: Motivation, Learning, Teacher Relationship, and impact on Career Success (as measured several years after the course).

The analysis shows clear correlations between the use of the tools and positive outcomes in the measured areas. This study has not yet been formally published, and I don’t wish to do any disservice to Ms. V and her colleague, so I won’t share any more about it at this time.

“Forecast for Malibu: Cloudy with a Chance of Virtual Computing”, presented by IT Directors Gerald Flynn and Thomas Hoover of Pepperdine University

These gentlemen shared an informative presentation that reviewed three different virtualization efforts they have helped to implement, with varying levels of success. All of these solutions offered great cost savings opportunties, coupled with enhanced functionality for the user community.

Their most successful virtualization project involved the use of virtualized hardware solutions from NComputing. These solutions can be used to provide multiple user stations from one computer, utilizing one of their relatively inexpensive devices, plus monitors, keyboards, and mice. I’ve been hearing a lot about these types of systems lately, and will likely look further into them, and do a feature post on it in the coming months.

The next technology they tried was virtual storage from Xythos. While this was easy to implement and administer, adoption was lower than expected (they think they need to work more at spreading the word, and helping users get up and running with the solution), so they have not yet realized the returns they hoped for.

Finally, they tackled virtualized applications using Citrix’s Xenapp technology. This ended up being a good deal more complex to implement and administer than originally envisioned, but they are still moving ahead, and intend to move towards full virtual desktops in the future.

“Virtual Support Center for Geographically Dispersed Faculty and Students”, by JoAnn Gonzalez-Major, Senior Instructional Designer, University of Anchorage (her colleague Amanda Albright, who is a partner in the work discussed, was unable to attend)

Ms. Gonzalez-Major and her colleague have done an impressive job of putting together an array of services and training opportunities to support the 1200+ geographically dispersed faculty who in turn support the 20,000+ students spread across the University of Anchorage’s multiple campuses.

One of the training and support solutions that really struck home was the web based tutorials and FAQs that they have developed and deliver via Moodle. Faculty and Students have a robust set of tutorials at their disposal, and can (and do!) use the FAQ system to self-help themselves to answers to many questions. When they can’t find answers there, they access Tier 1 support, and if they can’t help, the request is passed onto Tier 2 – any support issues that make it that far result in the development of a new FAQ!

JoAnn explained that while this may seem like a time consuming process, the time saved by enabling the community to self-help themselves clearly outweighs the effort that goes into documenting these solutions. The time saved can then go into further proactive training and self help solutions generation.

I intend to write feature posts about one or more of these sessions, so there’s more to follow. I’ll start by reviewing the excellent Keynote Presentation that HBS CIO Steven Laster conducted on Wednesday morning, “The Road Ahead: Driving Innovation in the ‘New Normal’“. A key take-away from this presentation was Mr. Laster’s “8 Factors For Success”. These ideas are fundamental concepts that can help ensure the long term success of IT Management in any institution, and I look forward to sharing them here (with sincere gratitude to Mr. Laster for granting his permission to do so).

In the meanwhile, if you’ve already attended a Campus Technology Conference, perhaps you are already sold on the value. If you haven’t, you would do well to budget some some funds and set aside the time to attend next year’s session (which will also be held in Boston, in July).

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
Let’s stop misspending education technology dollars
This year’s major U.S. Education Technology Conferences
5 Reasons Why Educators Need To Embrace Internet Technologies

These online resources provide plenty of great ways for students to stay on top of their math skills, or to build on them, over the summer.

This is the kind of thing I really love about the Internet - easy to access and use sites and tools, many of which are free, focused on a specific need. The need in this case is the desire to keep student math skills from deteriorating over the summer months. These resources can also be leveraged to enable students to build on their skills sets and get ahead of the curve for the material they’ll be tackling in the fall.

Free Online Educational Game Sites
Most kids love playing online games – what a great way to entice your children to work on their math skills while having some fun! There are so many game sites on the ‘Net, and many of them are free. In this post last year, I provided links and information about 10 of these free site. Here’s a few games sites that have math-specific sections (each of these sites also has games covering different academic areas as well):

• Funbrain’s Math Arcade (Grades K through 8): This popular site from Pearson Education features 25 different math games, customized to your skills level (grade).
• FunSchool Kaboose Math Games (Pre-K through Grade 6): 33 Math Games here. Click on over and check out Action Fraction, Farm Addition, Fishing for Numbers, Monster Numbers, and more.
• Sheppard Software’s Math Games (Grades K through 8): A couple dozen games here, grouped into 8 sections including: Basic Operations, Fractions, Telling Time, and Pre-Algebra.

Free Online Video Tutoring
There seem to be countless free video tutorials on the Internet, for just about any subject you can think of – a quick Google Search will generate a slew of results to investigate. I hope I’ve saved you some time by providing these three sites that are all about education and are loaded with math tutorials:

• Free math tutorials from Brightstorm.com: Hundreds of well produced videos, delivered with a highly functional interface. Categories include: Algebra, Algebra 2, Calculus, Geometry, Pre-Calc, and Trigonometry.
• The Khan Academy (1000+ free tutorial videos): Salman Khan has earned engineering, computer science, and math degrees, and he could be pulling in a sweet salary from gainful employment in the corporate world, but instead he quit his day job in Sept 2009 to record educational videos for his self-started Kahn Academy. His non-profit organization has a mission of providing a high quality education to anyone, anywhere (I wrote this post in march about Mr. Khan’s impressive work). To view tutorial math videos, just scroll down the home page for a subject of interest – these include very advanced topics such as Linear Algebra and Differential Equations.
• WatchKnow’s Math Videos: There’s over 2500 math tutorial videos on this site, grouped into hundreds of subcategories, ranging from ”For Youngest Learners” to Calculus (86 Calculus videos). Learn more about Watchknow.org in this post, or just click through and check it out for yourself.

Online Math Help & Tutoring Resources
I wrote an article listing 15 Online Math Help and Tutoring Resources in December of 2009, including 9 paid resources and 6 free ones. If you’re willing to invest a little money in staying sharp this summer, click over to the article and check out the great sites listed there. For free help, here’s some of the free resources cited in the article:

• CliffNotes.com: The Cliff Notes web site provides free study help in many math areas, including advanced topics.
• Coolmath.com: This colorful site provides lessons for arithmetic, pre-algebra, and algebra.
• Math.com: There really is a Math.com? Yes, there is. This site provides some free practice and review resources. They have a lot of ads, but that’s often the “price” of free.
• Onlinemathlearning.com: This site provides helpful explanations and illustrations of math concepts in a wide range of math subjects. Some of their help pages include instructional videos.
• Webmath.com: This site allows you to enter equations and have it solve them and show you the solution! The automated problem solver may include some irrelevant information, but the sophistication of the site, at no charge, is pretty cool. The site covers a wide range of math subjects. I used it with some of my son’s 7th grade algebra homework, and it was spot on.

Free eBook, resource guide, Wiki, and more Critical Thinking educational resources announced.

This week at the International Society for Technology in Education’s (ISTE) annual conference, Microsoft announced that they have worked with the ISTE and Howard Rheingold and created a various materials and a curriculum that helps to teach kids how to evaluate information found online. This knowledge is becoming a critical part of the basic Internet literacy that kids should learn at a young age, to help them avoid the tendency to simply copy information from the Web.

Among the resources announced are the following:

• An educator’s resource guide that gives an in-depth view into how use the curriculum they’ve developed.
• A free eBook with many resources and information that can be easily applied in the classroom.
• Rheingold’s Critical Thinking Wiki and Critical Thinking Discussion Group.

These resources are great examples of the ever growing wealth of free useful technology resources on today’s Internet. Click on through and have a look!

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
30 Posts About Free Education Technology Tools & Resources
5 Reasons Why Educators Need To Embrace Internet Technologies

We’re finding the popular, free voice and video conferencing solution to be very useful in the classroom. How about you?

This year, there have a been a growing number of cases where we are being asked to set up Skype in our classrooms and provide webcams to facilitate video calls.  This free application makes it easy to connect for free over the Internet, and coupled with a webcam, the free video conferencing capability can really extend student’s and teacher’s reach – the potential applications are limited only by your imagination!

So far, we’ve used Skype to enable home-bound students to offer presentations and to bring guest speakers into the classroom, and we’re considering using it to let people on campus connect when they can’t abandon their posts.

I’m sure we’re not the only educational institution putting Skype to use. How about you? Does anyone have a Skyping-in-School story to share? We’d love to hear it!

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
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A Dozen Great Free Online Video Lecture Sites

Indaba Music is a wonderful example of how Internet based tools can raise “collaboration” to a level far exceeding what has been possible up to now.

Alexandra Stewart from Indaba Music reached out to me and introduced me to this site. I was instantly intriqued, as I am an amateur musician (here’s an example of my work - I wrote this, played the guitars and sang it, and created this silly way-low-budget video to help tell this sad tale of love gone bad!). I’ve often thought, “how cool would it be to be able collaborate with other musicians using some sort of online tool – I’m surprised I haven’t come across good apps for that”. Well I have now. Indaba enables collaboration and much more.

The folks at Indaba are also working to promote the many ways in which their tools can work in educational applications. What’s that you say? A hobby (writing, recording, and playing music) that speaks to my heart and soul, combined with a hobby (blogging about ed tech) that speaks to my intellect and professional life? Well that’s just too good to pass up!

So I started sinking my teeth into IndabaMusic.com. Indaba is a rich suite of tools for the modern musician. These tools can also have a profoundly positive effect in the classroom by augmenting engagement and providing cost-effective solutions to a range of musical services. [Note: Yes, I did borrow from some of the marketing materials sent to me by Indaba to create some of the text in this post, but only after I spent time there validating what I read!]

The Online Classroom
There are several ways to conduct class and track assignments online using the Indaba environment, including:

• Groups provide a centralized meeting place for your students where you can post announcements, have discussions, create events, and attach blog posts and songs.
• Indaba’s session platform is ideal for posting assignments, recording classes, sharing class projects, the organization and storage of audio examples, and tracking student progress. 
• In-song commenting allows for critique directly on the waveform of any song. This provides an effective way to point out specific passages that need work, or to note places where important musical events occur. 
• The robust text and video chat system allows for extra-scholastic “office hours” while students are home working on assignments. 

Teacher Resources
To help support the use of Indaba in instructional applications, they’ve put together the Teacher’s Resource Center and Teacher’s Corner. The Teacher’s Corner is basically a group, with a corresponding page where group members can communicate in a forum.  The Resource Center is a place where you can “share your lesson plans, audio examples, student performances, and anything else you’d like to share”.

Online Recording
One of the coolest things about Indaba is it’s ability to facilitate online recording and collaboration.

• Indaba’s proprietary, browser-based, online recording software Mantis allows you to record CD quality (16 bit, 44.1 KHz) audio directly onto our servers. 
• Sharing is a breeze- the session can be accessed from any computer, allowing students to edit with real time effects from home or in the classroom without needing to download additional software. 
• Mantis is ideal for Podcasting; recording lessons; band, orchestra, and choir rehearsals; and recording lectures in class. 
• Once you bounce down the audio, you can comment on the track and note what needs to be worked on or items in the recording for students to observe. 

Cost Effective Solutions
Indaba comes with three levels of membership, starting with a free option that provides some very useable functionality. Pick what works for you.

• A basic package (best for students) is free. 
• Pro membership, which offers 13 sessions, including 3 private sessions and 500MB storage per session (among other perks) is only $5 a month or $50 a year. 
• Platinum membership, which offers an unlimited amount of sessions and storage (along with access to full site functionality), is only $25 per month or $250 a year.    

Next?
I’ve become an Indaba member at the basic (free ) level. I look forward to putting the tool to use in the coming weeks and months. As always, if I think that what I learn is informative to my readers, I’ll probably be discussing it further here. I think this exciting application and collaboration environment may very well play a great role in my continued growth as a musician. I also believe it has some nice application for music education, and is something older students who are getting serious about their careers will benefits from being aware of.

In the meanwhile, I’m working on a post for next week in which I’ll discuss a trial of the Mimio Bar – a unique, low cost, portable Interactive White Board tool. I hope you’ll stop back and learn with me!

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
Music Education Technology Resources
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These new summer programs bring an Online Education twist to “summer bridge” programs.

I recently learned about these relatively inexpensive online summer math programs, to help students refresh and practice their math skills over the summer. Definitely an interesting alternative to the summer bridge books my kids have used. Will some students be more engaged with the material if it is online and interactive? 

TenMarks summer programs look like a great way for students to stay on top of math during the summer and avoid the “summer slide”. Students practice one topic at a time with interactive worksheets. Video lessons are available for help when needed. 

The workshops cost $39.99 for the entire summer. You can choose from: 

Step-up programs – “Get ready for the next school year by reviewing and practicing math concepts from the last school year – and previewing the next years.” 

Foundation programs – “Refresh core concepts like Algebra, Geometry, Fractions, Math Operations and more – ideal for introductory and advanced learners.” 

Custom program – “Create your own personalized summer program based on an Assessment.” 

You know the drill here on EmergingEdTech – if you have any experience with this topic and want to share, we’d love to hear it. Educators – do you know anyone who has used similar “summer help” programs? Have they worked well? Parents - is this something you think is worth trying? Have any of your kids tried any similar approaches, and if so, do you think they were worth the price of admission? We’d love to hear from you. 

The Internet Is Rich With Free Tools for Educators. Here’s A Bunch.

I’ve been meaning to put together this list of the many free apps that I’ve blogged about, and make it available as a tabbed section on the site. I’ve got the list mostly together now and realized it would make for a nice mid-week post.

All of the articles below reference free technologies and/or resources. The posts are simply listed in alphabetical order (I haven’t quite decided how best to organize them otherwise). I hope you find something fun and useful here!

• 10 Examples of Useful Second Life Resources for Educators
• 10 Free Educational Game Sites
• 100 Ways to Teach With Twitter
• 6 Free Online Interactive White Boards
• A brief look at WiZiQ.com
• A Dozen Great Free Online Video Lecture Sites
• Checking out Podcasting in Education
• Collaboration & Brainstorming Tools (Part 1)
• Comparing 12 Free Screencasting Tools
• Connecting A Million Minds (to after-school STEM programs)
• Creating brief instructional videos (and more) with Jing
• Do You Use Evernote?
• Doodle – a quick, easy, and free resource for creating polls
• Education Related Blogs & Blogging Resources
• Education World’s Technology Integration resources
• Exploring the Classroom2.0 Website
• Eye Witness To History (dot com)
• Fun tool for the classroom – simple Crossword Puzzle maker!
• Google Apps for Education vs Microsoft’s Live@edu
• Learning a language online, for free!
• Learning about Moodle – a leading open source LMS
• Low (or No) Cost Online Project Management Tools
• New Web Site WatchKnow.org (1000’s of Free Educational Videos)
• PowerPoint Jeopardy in the Classroom
• Screencasting with Debut’s Lite Version
• TeacherTube, and other YouTube alternatives for instructional use
• The growing use of Wikis in education
• Using Google Sites to create e-portfolios for students
• Using Internet story telling tools in education
• Using Second Life for Educational applications

Of course, the king of free tech for educators is blogger Richard Byrne and his “Free Tech For Teachers” site. Be sure to check it out and tap into a continuous stream of free ed tech resources and ideas about how to use them.

Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
5 Reasons Why Educators Need To Embrace Internet Technologies
8 Engaging Videos Advocating Better Integration of Technology in Education
5 Educator Guest Posts This Week on Microsoft’s Teacher Tech Blog

“Remember Everything!”

I had heard of Evernote before, but hadn’t looked at it until today. My interest was peaked by repeated references to it that I came across on the Internet and from co-workers over the last few days.

Evernote is a free application that enables you to capture text, snapshots, web clips, or audio, and store, categorize, and index this captured content for easy retrieval from computers and mobile devices. This introductory video is a nice teaser for Evernote’s capabilities.

Sounds like a great tool to take for a test run and then share my experience here. Are any of you using Evernote? Please comment and tell us a little about it!

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A special welcome to readers of The Official Microsoft Blog!
After having received the most views as one of 5 education technology guest posters on Microsoft’s Teacher Tech blog a few weeks ago, I was honored with a guest post on The Official Microsoft Blog. My post, “Education Technology – Changing the Nature of Education, and Building a Bridge to Tomorrow” was published today (Wed., May 19). [Here's my guest post from the Teacher Tech blog, “5 More Internet Technologies Educators Should Be Aware Of"]. My thanks to Microsoft for these great opportunities to share my Ed Tech thoughts and vision!
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Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
Collaboration & Brainstorming Tools (Part 1)
Google Apps for Education vs Microsoft’s Live@edu
10 Ed Tech Apps That I’m Thankful For