ePirate

The web today, commonly known as Web 2.0, is about accessibility, remixibility and participation. SlideShare is one such tool that enables this to happen. A social networking site, it allows the user to share Powerpoint presentations with others. Free of charge, it consists entirely of user-generated content that is shareable, searchable, and often downloadable. As its name suggests, slideshare hosts slideshows; and anyone can create a free account and upload their slides which can include PowerPoint presentations and pdfs.

Maybe you think YouTube is just another MySpace or Facebook- one of those sites where students go to goof off. But the educational potential of the site should not be ignored. That's not to say that YouTube offers anything radical or revolutionary in web design. In fact, the actual quality and resolution of YouTube content is pretty low, and the overall look and function of the site, even at the current height of its popularity, is still very basic. But then again, YouTube has always emphasized "user-friendly" simplicity, not technical advances. Its power lies in its sheer convenience and accessibility. The site has basically become, for media, what Google is for text. It has become the go-to audio-visual search engine.

Lulu is web-based self-publishing service. Users can design, publish and print original material, including books, brochures, reports, calendars and posters. Users can also create digital content, such as audio files, videos, graphics, or e-books. EDUCAUSE recently published an article about Lulu and its application for education that you can read about here.

Mashups are web-based tools that combine information from several different sources into a single product. The term is derived from the musical technique of taking more than one musical piece and combining the pieces in an original way to create a new song.

Mashups can be used in a variety of subject areas, including geography, math, earth science, literature, political science, and history, to name a few. For instance, using the Google Earth application, students can access a wealth of information about a particular topic, such as holocene volcanoes, by viewing images of actual volcanoes, seeing their location on a map, viewing the topography of the area, etc. See the Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program (http://www.volcano.si.edu/) for more details!

(Image obtained from Google Earth Lessons - http://gelessons.com/)

What is a Wiki? Here is a brief video produced by The Common Craft Show explaining the tool in plain English!

For additional information on Wiki's, and ideas on how they can be incorporated into the courses you teach, please contact your Instructional Designer.

This is a fun web site that will assemble your favorite words or tags from delicious, flick or blog. Its free to use so check it out at http://wordle.net/ The image below was created from a delicious account.

Diigo is a Web 2.0 tool that allows you to highlight and share your web references. This is a great research tool and makes it easier to retrieve specific information on web pages. With Diigo, you can go beyond bookmarking and saving favorites. To learn more, watch the following video:

At one of our recent Technology Summer Series days, Developing Critical Thinkers ... Chris Shamberg called my attention to a free tool that is a plug-in for Microsoft Office PowerPoint called authorPOINT LITE. This application will allow you to share your presentations online through a free online presentation sharing platform called authorSTREAM. Through this process, your PowerPoint presentation is converted to a Flash format. You have the options to make your presentation "public" or "private". The private option lets you share presentations securely with only registered users that you invite through a web link. Of course, registration is free.