Firefox Tip

Kim Komando's helpful article about Firefox vs. IE includes some great tips. One that I recently learned to use involves tabbed browsing.

What's different is Firefox's tabbed browsing. Tabs let you switch between several sites in the same window. No matter how many sites you're looking at, there's just one Firefox window. That puts less clutter in the Windows taskbar.

Tabs are also great for reading stories full of links or for searching. You could read a news story and open interesting links in tabs. Tabs open in the background, so they won't interrupt your reading. Then you can switch between tabs by clicking them. Or you can cycle through them by pressing Ctrl+Tab.

Open links into tabs by holding Ctrl when you click the links. Or you can right-click a link and select "Open Link in New Tab."

You can also do a trick with tabs for your daily routine. Do you visit the same sites every morning? You can load them all with one click. First, open your favorite sites in tabs. You can make new tabs by pressing Ctrl+T. After you've got your sites, click Tools>>Options. On the left-side menu, select General. Under Home Page, click the "Use Current Pages" button. Then click OK at the bottom. Your sites will all load in tabs when you press the Home button. They'll also load when you start Firefox. If that's too much, you can use the same procedure but with only one Web site.

The" putting less clutter on the Windows Taskbar" really applies to me - right now I have four open Word Documents, four Firefox windows open, some with multiple tabs, one Inspiration document and my Outlook folder. I hope you find this beneficial as well. If you have any other suggestions, please let me know.

Racing to Catch My Cheese!

So many new things to learn! As my cheese keeps moving, it's become a race to stay on top of new discoveries and new information. What an exciting time to be an educator and have access to tools to create content in brand new ways. I am learning so much from Brian Grenier and his blog, Bump on the Blog. With about 20 others, we were part of a Skype cast that looked at Educational blogging. What was especially exciting about this Skype conversation was the fact that there were so many of us participating on an international level and simultaneoulsy discussing Web 2.0 tools for our students.
Another free download that I have been exploring is Springdoo. This is free video or audio email that is incredibly easy to learn. The company includes a brief online instructional video. An excellent application for differentiated instruction for students with output difficulties is to have the students record their homework, schedule or reminders and reduce copying from the board. Once they are home, they can listen to the email and use what they need. There are many other applications as well. This is just one idea to get you started.
I also just learned about edublogs which offers free blogs and wikis for educators. I can now post documents online that can be easily downloaded by anyone looking for information. Today I added my "Text-to-Speech in Microsoft Word 2003" document to my wikispace. Click on the link check it out if you need that information.

Technology and Literacy

I'll be teaching an enrichment course after my vacation entitled, "21st Century Writing: Extreme Edition," and this is very exciting for me. I've done a great deal of preparation and had fun exploring new sites, new tools and new strategies. It's all about helping students to enjoy learning and feeling successful as they build upon their strengths and skills. As someone who continues to learn new things, I hope that the hunger for knowledge acquisition that I model will be infectious.
In any case, here's a great link called, "Five Ways that Technology can Promote Literacy." I haven't had a chance to check out every link mentioned but intend to explore as many as possible especially in the section, "Publishing Student Work."

Summer Reading

The NECC posts have been keeping me busy trying to keep up with all that happened out in San Diego. But I'm also reading Mel Levine's The Myth of Laziness which addresses the numerous causes of output failure that impact students. Output failures typically manifest themselves as difficulties with written expression but there are other issues as well. He does an outstanding job helping the reader understand where the breakdown(s) can be and describes how crucial it is to "demystify" the learning struggle with the student. He then addresses how to deal with the neurological breakdowns. You know that student in your class who, "If only he tried a little harder," or "just gives up."
Great summer reading!
I have two more suggestions:
Teaching Every Student in the Digital Age by Rose and Meyer
Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms by Will Richardson

Which makes me ask, what do others recommend for summer reading in preparation for the next school year?

Feel free to leave recommendations!

Wikis as Educational Tools

The ability to use wikis as instructional tools fascinates me. The potential is enormous and Dan McDowell, a high school history teacher, presented on this topic at NECC 06. He made his handouts and an online PowerPoint presentation available to everyone. Dan gives us examples of the Web 2.0 in action in his AP World History course and it's worth exploring further.

NECC 2006 Updates

Although I'm unable to attend NECC 2006 in San Diego, it's been very exciting to follow what's happening out there through the Web 2.0. Check out Dave Warlick's Hitchhikr conference blog for frequent updates. These include Flickr images and the latest blog postings. And you can participate in a global Skypecast Saturday, July 8th at 9:00 EST to discuss the latest trends and technologies that were discussed at the conference.
San Diego isn't so far away after all!