“29 Years of Shuttle Launch Videos” | Free Technology for Teachers
Free Technology for Teachers: Ascent - 29 Years of Shuttle Launch Videos
"Ascent is an incredible video, produced by NASA engineer Matt Melis, documenting 29 years of space shuttle launches. The video is narrated by Melis and another NASA employee, Kevin Burke. Not only is the footage spectacular, but you also learn a lot about the technical aspects of shuttle launches."
“Teaching 4th Grade Students using Wolfram|Alpha” - Wolfram|Alpha Homework Day: Teaching 4th Grade Students using Wolfram|Alpha
Wolfram|Alpha is an amazing resource...
YouTube - Wolfram|Alpha Homework Day: Teaching 4th Grade Students using Wolfram|Alpha
(Via Wolfram|Alpha Blog.)
Moving Windmills: “The Boy Who Harnessed Wind”
William's work is inspiring and uplifting...
"Using Energy described how windmills could be used to generate electricity. Only two percent of Malawians have electricity, and the service is notoriously unreliable. William decided an electric windmill was something he wanted to make. Illuminating his house and the other houses in his village would mean that people could read at night after work. A windmill to pump water would mean that they could grow two crops a year rather than one, grow vegetable gardens, and not have to spend two hours a day hauling water. “A windmill meant more than just power,” he wrote, “it was freedom."
(Via Boing Boing.)
Entire Cities Recreated with Flickr Images
This is very cool!
Entire Cities Recreated Using Thousands of Flickr Photos
"A group of researchers with University of Washington’s graphics and imaging laboratory (GRAIL) wanted to see if they could build a piece of software that would search the web for images of a particular place and recreate that place in 3D in under a day.They succeeded, and the team, lead by Sameer Agarwal, created a simulation of Rome using 150,000 images harvested from photo-sharing website Flickr, and build a virtual model within a day."
(Via The Next Web.)
“Future of Learning” Video
I like how they mix in old footage and commentary of classrooms from decades ago and the diverse range of uses for technology and learning that go beyond only replacing printed text with digital text (video, audio, etc.). Below is a picture I snapped yesterday at a historical school house building at our local county fair. Some things are very different from today, while some are the same...
“The Importance of Urgency”: Interview with John Kotter
Without a true sense of urgency, any change effort is doomed. Watch John Kotter discuss the need for urgency and how managers create and sustain it in their organizations."
Shiny Eyes
The other day my wife, son, and I traveled upstate to spend some time with our family. Along the way we listened to a couple TED talks. These talks are free to download via the TED website or you can subscribe to a feed through iTunes. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, and Design and their annual conference brings together some of the most interesting speakers from around the world. These individuals range from famous politicians to scientists doing some amazing work. They are given 18 minutes to give the "talk of their lives." Often I look for talks related to education or technology but somehow a talk on classical music slipped in.
We had finished listening to four other talks when I decided we should give the last one a listen.
We listened and we loved it.
The talk was given by Benjamin Zander and the most memorable part of the talk is when he speaks about "shiny eyes". He relates his experiences as a conductor and his personal realization that he wanted to consistently "awaken possibilities in other people." In order to assess how he was "awakening" these possibilities all he had to do was look at their eyes to see if they were "shining".
"Who am I being if my players eyes are not shining?"
For parents, relatives, and teachers...
"Who am I being that my children's eyes are not shining?"
As a parent and a teacher this caused me to pause and think about what I do daily to awaken possibilities in my son's life and the lives of my students. Often we can get caught up in the daily grind leading to the simple things and glorious opportunities passing us by.
Take a listen to the talk and enjoy. We loved it and I hope you do too!
Internet Video and Copyright Infringement: Be careful!
I am evil...at least in the eyes of the music industry. For my evilness they have slapped my wrist.
1 year and 8 months ago I made a video containing short clips of my son's first four months. I also added in 5 minutes of Lynryd Skynrd's song "Simple Man" as a background track. I shared the video with family members and on a whim decided to add it to Youtube along with clips of my son's first Halloween and first words. This is where I messed up. It is a mistake many make, and probably do not realize they are making.
I foolishly thought my little video would be seen only by my own family and the friends they shared the video with. I knew the risks. I knew online videos are open to everyone unless the user makes their videos private. But I decided to fight the law and see what would happen. (In reality, I was just naive, and did not feel there was a threat to my video).
Even after I started learning more about content online and copyright issues, I did not take the video down because I was curious to see if it would be noticed.
Almost two years later my video has performed as I predicted...
With 300+ views I can tell you that 90% were from my own mother showing the video to her friends. Regardless, this does not excuse my usage of protected works.
Today I received notification from Youtube that this video had been found to contain music belonging to Universal Music Group. Or at least, I assume "UMG" stands for Universal.
Here is a screenshot of the email that was sent to me...
As you can see my punishment is weak. Their claim allows them to include advertisements on my video page. At first I was relieved my little video could still stay up. This seemed very fair, until I visited my page and saw this...
I have since removed the video and hope to hear from others. Has this happened to you?
How can we as educators share an experience such as this with our students as they venture out and create digital projects?
Microsoft’s WorldWide Telescope: “Google Earth” reversed!
I have used tools such as Celestia and Stellarium before but this one truly looks like I can slide these two to the side. Excitement aside, we will just have to wait and see how it works once it is released and how it can be integrated into a learning environment.
When you visit the TEDTalks website there is a little button on the bottom for downloading the video as a Mp4. I have already popped it into iTunes so I can show some teachers at school today!
TED | Talks | Roy Gould: WorldWide Telescope
"Science educator Roy Gould gives an astonishing sneak preview of Microsoft's new WorldWide Telescope -- a technology that combines feds from satellites and telescopes all over the world and the heavens, and builds a comprehensive view of our universe. (Yes, it's the technology that made Robert Scoble cry.)"
(Via TED Talks.)
So what do you think?