Week 5 - Online Applications

http://www.Google.com

Richardson's information about Flickr was good, although I thought it could have been better illustrated.I felt like there was too much "busy work" this week.  It was difficult to keep all of the applications straight with the exceptions of the standouts, like Flickr.

I think evaluating and "playing" with 13 online tools was overwhelming for one week.  I would have liked to focus on less of the same and only the best of what's available.

http://www.writer.zoho.com

Of the word processing tools (Google, Zoho) Google Docs is my favorite.  In addition to using it for word processing there are other benefits, such as the reader to review all your RSS feeds, the calendar, presentation, spread sheet, templates etc.  I like the clean simplicity of Google.

http://www.flickr.com

The conversion tool was simple and easy to use, I especially like how easy it was to convert a spread sheet to a document and a document to a pdf file.

When evaluating Doodle vs. Google calendar my preferred calendar would be Google.  I can do everything and more in Google vs. Doodle.  I felt like Doodle was really vanilla and unfinished.

I really enjoyed using Animoto.  I liked how easy it was.  I can see lots of collaboration projects between students and teachers.  It would be 

http://www.zamzar.com

a great tool to use to compile photos from a class trips or to put on a wiki, blog or use as an RSS feed for school news.

Using StumbleUpon as a random web finder was in my opinion a huge waste of time.  I would use a good search engine hands down over randomly stumbling over websites.

I enjoyed using Rollyo.  Rollyo lets you build search rolls by creating a list of websites.  I though this was a good tool to keep students focused on their research, rather than using Google and getting lost on the web.

http://www.jingproject.com

I liked the Jing animation application.  Being able to use this application to capture what you are doing on screen to create self-guided studies and tutorials is an excellent use of this application.  I would also use this to capture screen prints to create handbooks for the self-guided studies and tutorials.  Jing can also be used as a professional development tool.  I would create tutorials for teachers who would like to learn about something on their own time at their own pace.

http://www.animoto.com

One of my favorite applications was Animoto. Animoto can bring photographs to life by creating a beautiful visual presentation set to music. Animoto also gives you the ability to incorporate video within your presentations.

http://www.dumpr.net

Dumpr was another good tool.  Dumpr gives you the ability edit photos with ease. I especially liked the photo to sketch option.  I can see collaboration between art and technology teachers.  Dumpr has many different effects to choose from such as turning a photo into a puzzle, or a Rubik's cube!

I hope you have enjoyed a tour through these 13 application.  Some are free, some are not.  Some are free with a paid upgrade.   Some are worth the price of an upgrade some are not.  I'll let you decide.

http://www.bighugelabs.com/flickr

Below you'll find images for all the applications that we've discussed in this post.  Please notice that I have also supplied the internet address under each image, it will make it easy to copy and paste so you can check it out! 

Have fun!

Find new things!

http://www.stumbleupon.com

Create a survey!

http://www.surveymonkey.com

http://www.voki.com

Create your alias!

http://www.rollyo.com

Create customized search lists!


                                         Create org chats!

http://www.bubbl.us

                                                                                  Doodle away!

http://www.doodle.com/main.html