EDUCEDGE,

howdy friends,

I am so excited about this that I’ve got to share.

You mostly realized by now that you must pay for a professional account on SurveyMonkey in order to get unlimited questions for your surveys (otherwise limited to 10 questions).

This also allows you to request for the html to be activated on your account (only professional accounts get it). Just email SurveyMonkey and they do it within the hour (I found the activation request link when I looked in the FAQs and click on ‘how to add html in my survey’). This means -among other things- that you can embed a video in your Survey! For that, go to your video hosting location, YouTube, Veoh, whatever, collect the html code (i.e., copy from the ‘embed’ window provided by the host), paste it in your SurveyMonkey window (in the edit page of course). save. et voila.

Your students now do not need to exit the Survey in order to watch your video (or listen to your podcast, view a picture, etc.). Once they are done, they can continue to the post survey or whatever else you need them to do.

Isn’t this excellent? no need to build a website! It’s all confined to your survey page!

ok, that’s for my discoveries today. And thanks again Lorah.

http://www.flamingtext.com/net-fu/forms/flaming-logo.html

Cool little thing to create your own flaming logo.

http://tomuse.com/online-storage-backup-software.html

as of 12/03/08, there are about 40+ locations listed on this chart.

http://www.elearningyellowpages.com/blog/2008/10/ditch-the-backpack-100-essential-web-tools-for-virtual-students

The latest discussion on the SLEd attracted my attention since I’ve been particularly cautious about that specific web2.0 info management tool: fear of getting addicted to information in general, fear of losing control over my productive time, fear of possible info overdose. But MUVEnation has re-ignited the decision process since RSSfeeds are tools that we’ll have to use. I created a netvibe page 2 days ago, but have not touched it yet….until this SLED post today. Need I mention the fact that it was Fire Centaur’s discussion with ShamblesGuru Voom about netvibes.com being outstanding in managing rssfeeds and ning.

RSSFeed readers that are mentioned:

SAGE news reader
http://www.feedreader.com/
Bloglines
PageFlakes (very similar to netvibes.com)

So since I can’t resist resources, I figured that this would be a great way to get my netvibes page started with SL-related blog on/for Education.

Fire Centaur lists some great blogs:

Fire (me) http://englishvillage.asia/blog/
Blog Hud: http://feeds.bloghud.com/
esl-secondlife http://esl-secondlife.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
secondlifeinsider http://www.secondlifeinsider.com/category/business/rss.xml
Sloodle Coffee Shop http://www.sloodle.org/moodle/rss/file.php/3/589/forum/25/rss.xml
Beth’s Blog: http://feeds.feedburner.com/bethblog
RezEd Blogs: http://www.rezed.org/profiles/blog/feed?xn_auth=no
Digital Strawberry Girl: http://blogs.ipona.com/chris/Rss.aspx
In a Strange Land with Joe Essid http://slbeat.mytimesdispatch.com/index.php/slbeat/rss_2.0/

Open Sim: Naked Imagination: http://robsmart.co.uk/feed/
Hatters Island Blog (Teen Grid): http://hattersisland.blogspot.com/
Ramapo Islands (Teen Grid): http://ramapoislands.edublogs.org/
PacificRim Exchange –Stan Trevena (Modesto): http://pacificrimx.wordpress.com/
AJ: http://sorry-afk.blogspot.com/
Cathy Arreguin: http://instructionalmuse.com/blog/
Ruth M: http://educasecondlife.blogspot.com
Elizabeth Clarke: http://4rxt.wordpress.com/
Aldon Hynes: http://www.orient-lodge.com
Ina Centaur: http://blog.SLshakespeare.com
sLENZ Project: slenz.wordpress.com
Clare Atkins: http://arwennastardust.wordpress.com

Other places to look for info and providing RSS services:

EBSCO
Science Direct

You can insert your voki anywhere. voki.com provides you with the codes depending on the destination. Very easy. However if you need any help, my suggestion is to touch all the options on the voki.com page to see what’s there. Also, check Sue Waters Edublog page on how to add the voki to a wordpress blog and her reference to Helen Otway post for usage suggestions:

“Here are some ideas for using Vokis in an educational context in your classroom which Helen Otway summarised from a Classroom2.0 discussion :-

1. Students can create avatars that are similar in looks or personalities and record a message that tells about themselves.
2. Students can exchange these avatars with e-pals either within their own setting or anywhere in the world.
3. Students can generate questions to ask their avatar e-pals.
4. ESL (English as a Second Language) students can use the speaking avatars to practice and listen to their speech. They may use the computerised voice first then record their own voice when they feel more comfortable. Writing, reading and pronunciation are all practised.
5. Students can create an avatar that resembles a character from a story, add a setting and give it speech. The speech could be from the story or a creative point of view (POV) from the character on an event.

Go ahead and add your ideas of Voki application in a class2.0 practice.

re-post from my RezEd blog: http://www.rezed.org/profiles/blog/list?user=2qi5tvpwy0crk

Nice looking app. Not sure it provides anything new to the social networking world, but it’s a good looking application. Make sure to choose a background theme that’s not too busy otherwise you are bound for a major migraine.

well…me and my educational aspirations were thoroughly annoyed at the application that promises to support great collaboration.

OpenHUddle is not ready. Far from it. Better splitting your screen between a Skype webcam session and a Google doc and you’ve got yourself something that OpenHuddle does not offer. Anything you open with OpenHuddle, opens outside your room’s screen, and is not manipulable by anyone. So frankly, I don’t care much going through all the technical trouble to get this thing going (no tutorials either or glossed icons) and create more internet junk (archives that you can’t delete or organize) if the webpage, the document, the picture or the ppt I open to share shows up static. At least the link you  share on Twitter are hot, not pictures of the webpage you want to show.

So I might keep an eye on the application, but it is not ready at all for educational applications.

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Not that I am THAT cheap, but since I am getting serious at trying out serious post-production editing with my Machinima, i am looking for music I can add to my videos without running into copyright issues. Eventually, I’d like to promote in-world artists. In the meantime:

http://www.mp3.com/free-music/

Jeremy Kemp generously informed the SLED community on July 11, 2008 that he received inside info on Lively. Here is the link to his interview with ASU EdTec Sandra Andrews:
http://amazon.sjsu.edu/html-jkemp/SandraA_ASU_Lively.mp3

In this 30-minute interview she outlines general features, strengths and weaknesses of Lively as a teaching and learning tool and just a few hints on what’s next.

Other links of her projects:
http://whatscool.asu.edu
http://beta.asu.edu/myworld
http://alti.asu.edu

Some more background on this:
There were early rumors of this work in September:
http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2007/09/google-testing-.html

Also related: Google Sketchup models were rezzed in Multiverse in October: http://tinyurl.com/2fl88b

And don’t forget the Linden Lab CEO/CTO gave a bare-all demo on Google campus back in March ‘06:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5182759758975402950

More mock up of what a 3D gadget MIGHT be like:
http://googledesktopapis.blogspot.com/2008/07/gadgets-in-another-dimension.html

Also among the Google goodies, lively connection via cellphone (new cellphone OS: http://code.google.com/android