Kirsten Haugen, MA
Some digital storytelling resources... Center for Digital Storytelling (Berkeley, CA) http://www.storycenter.org/ KQED Digital Storytelling Initiative http://www.dsi.kqed.org/ BubbleShare - lets you post photos w/ audio comments http://www.bubbleshare.com/
Slater Software (http://www.slatersoftware.com) very kindly offers a search window on their home page (and a Mac OS X 'widget') that lets you search their site for symbols that 'may be freely used for non-commercial projects.' They (like a lot of other vendors) also have a page of free stuff for educators and families that use their symbols.
'Widgets' are little mini-applications that sit in a 'Dashboard' in Mac "Tiger" (10.4) and above. There's also a widget driver for Windows, and for earlier versions of the Mac OS . Widgets range from look-up tools (dictionaries, address book, flights, yellow pages, google, etc.) to calendars, to games, and more. The best way to learn what they are is to visit the widget download pages at Apple ,...
For all low-tech lovers, Just stumbled across this free, online graph paper maker - makes pdf's of graph paper according to the parameters you choose - size, color, line weight and layout. You can choose squares, dots, triangles, hexagons, diamonds, horizontal lines with light verticals, and even 'axiometric perspective' (I had to ask, too.) If you scroll down further, you can also generate number lines, Cornell Note taking...
In a one hour introductory presentation, I think it's key to not go into too much detail, but to really drum up some "I could do that" kind of excitement, with some practical nuggets thrown in. Some strategies that I find helpful: (1) Share a few case studies/stories that include unique but practical ideas. One parent I know taught people how to walk behind her 4 year old...
There are so many tools for blogging, tagging, wikis, RSS and the like. I am testing them out (and very impressed by WordPress and Edublogs to begin with), and will post them as I find them. Look for Del.icio.us tags, tag clouds, too, and hopefully clear explanations of each.