The National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) is about to hold their annual conference.  This year’s conference is being held in San Antonio. The NECC is presented by the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) each year. You can visit either website for highlights of this year’s conference.

While it is obviously too late to attend the conference, you can gain a tremendous amount of insight into integrating technology into your classroom by visiting the two sites linked above including FREE downloadable handouts and papers, PDFs, overviews of new ideas and presentations, and LIVE STREAMING VIDEO FEEDS of speakers and presenters.

In short, by bookmarking and visitng the NECC and ISTE sites you can make it a virtual conference!

A great live feed of the NECC conference is EdStreamTV: http://edstreamtv.wikispaces.com/

If you would rather follow the NECC (pronounced “neck” by those in the know) via blog, direct your URL to:

http://center.uoregon.edu/ISTE/NECC2008/program/blogging_NECC.php

Podasting is another great option for following the NECC.  Apple is the official podcasting channel for the NECC.  You can follow it here:

http://edcommunity.apple.com/ali/collection.php?collection=2956

These sites will provide you with a tremendous amount of fantastic resources for integrating technology into your lessons and schools.  You can follow new tech trends in education as well.

You can watch webcasts of this year’s speakers and view an archive of webcast from previous conferences.  (NECC has been around nearly thirty years!)

Scour these sites for the treasure trove of riches they offer!  A must for every wired educator.

Imation released a new incredibly small flash drive today called Atom.  Atom, is the smallest flash drive Imation has every created.  It is barely longer than a paperclip!

Flash drives are nearly indispensable for educators. I’m always amazed at the number of teachers wanting to borrow mine. Sure our school has storage on the server and I even have my own internet storage location, but nothing works better to quickly move data, especially students’ work, from one computer to another than a small USB drive.

I have had my emails containing my lesson plans delayed in transit, and our server has gone down one too many times.  I do carry a great Lacie external drive, but I really like a  small flash drive for simple transfer operations.  Atom looks like a great companion.

Not only is Atom incredibly small, it has an aluminum shell, password protection feature, and more. Great for taking important documents from room to room, building to building, computer lab, or even home. If you seeking employment the drive is great place to keep your resume’ and teaching portfolio.

I have a flash drive on a lanyard that I use with our computer lab when a student cannot save, having other problems, or in rare cases needs to take something home to finish.

Works with Mac or PC.  (Special features for Vista Users included.) Prices start at $18 for a 1GB and end at $100 for an 8GB. (4GB and 4GB also available.)

Wired Educator Recommendation: I’m getting one!

Smart Technologies has launched Version 10 of it’s collaborative learning Notebook software for their popular Smart Board.  The new software boasts thirty new features to make creating lessons even easier and more creative and displaying lessons on your Smart Board even more fun and exciting.

The new software now includes access to more than 100,000 new works of educational material.  The software has a new updated teacher’s hub that connects teachers to hundreds of lessons and tools to better use Notebook Version 10.

The new Notebook Version 10 features are the result of feedback from teachers and students and include: a Table Tool to create rows and columns, Shape Pen to draw any shape that is instantly perfected, Page Recording that records the teaching lesson for later replay without repeating the opening menus or applications, Object Animation which allows any object with effects like spinning, flying or fading, Magic Pen which can magnify, zoom in on image or write notes that disappear in ten seconds, Active Alignment, Themes so you can change backgrounds, colors, fonts, and more in your lessons, and more.

This is by far the most powerful version yet.

You can check Smart Technologies website to see if you have an eligible product for a FREE upgrade to Notebook Version 10. If you do, you just enter the hardware product serial number, complete a customer information form, and then download Notebook Version 10 off of their website. Once the software is running enter your product key to activate the software.  From my reading of their eligibility requirements it sounds like if you own Smart Technologies equipment you are eligible, but you can check for yourself.

Notebook Version 10 will run on a Mac or PC.

Here is the eligibility list:

The following SMART hardware products ship with Notebook software 10 and are eligible for the upgrade:

  I am huge advocate of podcasting and the only problems I have encountered have been the obstacle of getting teachers in our district to create audio and video podcasts. I was thrilled when I read an article on eschoolnews.com about teachers earning bonus pay for creating podcasts.

In truth the article’s focus was about every student at a New Mexico school getting a Zune media player. (See: Schools Try to Reach Students Via Podcasts @ www.eschoolnews.com)

One hundred students at Fort Sumner High School were outfitted with a Zune media player.  A Zune is similar to an iPod.  Each teacher was given $400 bonus pay for locating twenty audio or video podcasts that related to their lesson or subject matter and creating five of their own.  What a great idea!

I know there will be critics of the bonus pay, however, I like the idea because schools will always have access to these lesson on audio or video podcasts.  As long as the podcasts are great lessons it would be no different than if the teacher wrote a chapter for a text book.  Some schools pay teachers to cover classes or tutor after school.  Podcasting, in my book, would be of equal or perhaps even greater worth.

Microsoft donated the $300 Zune players and requested data to verify if the devices improved test scores.

Anyone interested in podcasting should read the full article and forward it to your administrator.

I applaud Microsoft for the donations and encouragement.  I predict the schools will see improvement especially in their foreign language departments.  I prefer an iPod over a Zune, but the real importance here is getting podcasting equipment into the hands of excited teachers and encouraging them to create podcasts.  I personally do not seek or expect bonus pay for my podcasts.  I enjoy creating them and I see tremendous benefits in integrating them into my course work.  To me it is an extension of my teaching, however, I certainly do not discourage schools from encouraging or rewarding teachers for great podcasts.

This is great news for podcasters and wired teachers everywhere.

I have been podcasting for several years and introduced it to my school district. We have developed a very simple, yet effective approach to podcasting that does not interrupt the teacher’s day in the slightest.  Ninety-five percent of our podcasts are created by Keeping It Simple. A very small percentage of our podcasts are mixed and edited.

A new reading system by Leap Frog helps children learn to read in an exciting new way.

Video in the classroom is an excellent idea for both the teacher and the student.  I’m sure many of you have been using video for awhile.