Online Tools

Click "continue reading" for some great examples of free online education and collaboration tools.


Student Collaboration

VoiceThread.com - Multimedia collaboration space. Have people comment verbally or in writing on documents, images, video, etc. Can be open to anyone or only to a specific group.

WikiSpaces.com - A place to host portfolios of student work that can be seen and commented on by others in the class or grade.

PBWorks.com - Anther place to give students a place to post their work, as well as collaborate on projects. Could be used for teachers to collaborate, as well. Similar to Google Sites. Click here for more instructions, examples, and how-to videos on PBWorks.

http://www.piazza.com/? - Collaborative Q&A design interface where students can collaborate on answers and see which ones the instructor approves.

Presentation Tools

Prezzi.com - Powerpoint on steroids; take a look at the video below!



http://www.gliffy.com/ - make diagrams and flowcharts online really easily

http://animoto.com/ For putting photos into a dynamic slideshow

MyBrainShark.com - Add audio to slides, documents, or video, posting; tracking who views.

For Audio Accompaniment in or out of class:

http://www.poducateme.com/ Learn all about making podcasts for education

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ Audacity is a free program for recording

http://ccmixter.org/ for Creative Commons (legal) music to accompany projects and videos

Study Tools

StudyStack.com - Make your own or use their flashcards for many subjects. Other study games too.

Tips: Switching to Mac

For those of you exploring your Mac with enthusiasm, you can check out the following list of free mac programs that do various handy things: http://lifehacker.com/5826449/lifehacker-pack-for-mac-our-list-of-the-best-free-mac-downloads (I highly recommend VLC (plays a lot of different video files) and Unarchiver (opens compressed files, like .rar; Mac is already equipped to zip and unzip for you, just right click and hit 'compress').