Cloud Computing

Folks,

Last week I listened to a piece on Cloud Computing that I thought I ’d share with you. It’s from the end of a podcast episode from the BBC World News Service entitled “The World Technology Podcast.

This podcast is produced and hosted by BBC World Technology correspondent Clark Boyd and distributed in the U.S. by PRI (Public Radio International). This segment was taken from the end of podcast #224, posted on Friday, December 19, 2008. The piece talks about the concept of cloud computing in rather general terms, but it does mention Google Docs, Google’s web-based office suite, and also web-based e-mail services such as hotmail. For some additional examples, you can visit http://www.google.com/options/ where you’ll find a great list of Google’s free goodies. Some of these apps are web-based, and some require you to download and install a client application on your PC, but virtually all of the data is stored and accessed from the “cloud,” meaning that’s out there on the big Internet somewhere. Precisely where is really of no consequence; it could be on a server in the next room or half-way around the world – it really doesn’t matter!

You can subscribe to an RSS feed of the BBC World Technology podcast by going to http://www.theworld.org/rss/tech.xml. You can also subscribe to it on iTunes as follows:

Open iTunes > then, select iTunes Store > then, type “PRI’s The World: Technology Podcast” into the search box in the upper right - without the quotes, of course, and hit Return.

That’ll do it for now. Have a safe and happy holiday!

John Spencer
Technology Training Specialist
USU Brigham City Regional Campus
john.spencer@usu.edu
435.734.2277 x252
435.757.8395 (Cell)
435.797.1784 x252 (From USU Campus)

Tech-Tuesdays, December 16, 2008

Hey All,

I was recently asked about the current prospects for using a class response system such as iClicker in an interactive broadcast environment. In that regard I want to talk about two class response products , Web Clicker and Poll Everywhere.

Web Clicker:

been encouraging our instructors at USU Brigham City to give it a try in their face-to-face classes, and a few instructors have used it successfully during the last year or so. As good as the iClicker system is, it does have one obvious limitation, which is that it only supports face-to-face classes. Recently the folks at iClicker have been promising an expansion of their product line to include an application they’re calling Web Clicker. This product will support interactive broadcast classes and accept responses from the iClicker hand-held remote or any other web supported device, such as a web-enabled cell phone. iClicker plans to offer a beta test version of Web Clicker beginning spring 2009. There’s more information on Web Clicker at: http://www.iclicker.com/dnn/OurProducts/webclicker/tabid/156/Default.aspx

Poll Everywhere:

If you want to get started right away, I suggest you take a look at Poll Everywhere. They’re at http://www.polleverywhere.com.

With Poll Everywhere, your class doesn’t need specific hardware such as individual clickers or a classroom receiver. The system is fully supported via the web and cell technology so the hardware is already in place. Students can send responses by texting from their individual cell phones or any web-enabled device such as a laptop, iPhone, iPod Touch, etc. You can imbed a live graph into a PowerPoint slide and display polling responses in real time which can then be viewed by all of your students, both in the local classroom and at remote sites via the IVC interactive broadcast system. Pretty cool!

Displaying PowerPoint via the Web:
Hey, just a quick follow-up on an item I waved in front of you a while back. As you’ll recall, my friend and colleague Mike Stucki steered me onto a site called Slideboom that lets you share PowerPoint slide shows via the web. Recently I’ve stumbled across a couple of similar sites that offer the same service. Check out http://280slides.com/ and http://www.slideshare.net/.

Need help with class? YouTube Videos Await:
One last item: check out this article about YouTube videos. Who knew that there was actually something useful on YouTube? Check out this article from the MSNBC web site:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28200197/

OK – that’ll do it for this week. Pray for snow and have a great Christmas break!

John Spencer

Technology Training Specialist
USU Brigham City Regional Campus
john.spencer@usu.edu
435.734.2277 x252
435.757.8395 (Cell)
435.797.1784 x252 (From USU Campus)

Streaming Video: Linking and Embedding

Facilitators - How To Set Up a Student Presentation

This video screencast is intended to give USU Brigham City facilitators a quick look at how to set up a student presentation in an IVC receive classroom, using a student-supplied laptop and a connection to the IVC system.

...a couple of late additions to the video: (1) make sure the student laptop is off when you attach the video cable, and (2) if you're in one of the rooms that uses the Tandberg 1700 desktop system, remember to unplug the audio cable from the Tandberg at the end of the presentation.

We Stink at PowerPoint

Tech Tuesdays: 7-1-08

Good Folks,

For this Tech-Tuesdays segment, I want to stay on the subject of podcasting in education. Actually, at the risk of “working a good horse to death,” I’m planning on posting at least one or two additional pieces on the subject before moving on to other items. Specifically, I’d like to share some insights on creating and posting video podcasts, and I’d also like to explore some good resources and methods for locating and downloading educational video clips.

Future of Podcasting

The video clip below is a short piece on the future of podcasting from the Future Tense podcast from American Public Media that was posted back in February of this year. Here’s the link to the post on the Future Tense web site:

http://www.publicradio.org/columns/futuretense/2008/02/06.shtml

It’s also posted on the Regional Campus and Distance Education Association wiki, at http://rcdea.wetpaint.com/.

Weekly Web Sighting(s)

This week I want to direct your attention to two pretty decent resources for podcasting and teaching with hand-helds (of which podcasting is a subset):

1. http://learninginhand.com/ - this is a great resource for teaching with hand-held devices, and it contains a great section on podcasting. There’s also a learning-in-hand podcast that you can subscribe to in iTunes.

2. http://techintegration.cciu.org/index.html - the home page is entitled “Instructional Technology Resources.” Again, this is a great starting point for information on podcasting, and teaching with technology in general.

Hey – as always, please don’t hesitate to contact me with any concerns, questions, or suggestions you may have concerning Tech-Tuesdays, or anything dealing with the use of technology in teaching. Thanks!

John Spencer
Technology Training Specialist
USU Brigham City Regional Campus

Future of Podcasting

This is a short audio piece from the Future Tense podcast dealing with the future of podcasting. It was posted back in February, 2008.