Thursday, November 20, 2008

23 Things for Learning - Post #6

#12 thing Creative Commons

Creative Commons is a copyright license that allows us to choose to share intellectual property. By acknowledging the original authors, they have given permission for you to share.  Watch a short video on CC here:
http://mirrors.creativecommons.org/wannaworktogether/wannaworktogether.mov
One place for good information about what's going on with the Creative Commons is Lawrence Lessig's blog. Lawrence Lessig is one of the Creative Commons developers and a Stanford University professor."

Search Creative Commons http://search.creativecommons.org/.  This search will help you find photos, music, text, books, educational material, and more that is free to share or build upon utilizing Creative Commons enabled search services at Google, Yahoo!, and Flickr. Find some content that you would like to post on your blog. Create a blog post with your find. Be sure and include the correct CC Marker on the post (the same attribution that is on the original materials.)

#13 thing Take a look at an online productivity word processing tool

One major benefit to web-based applications is that they eliminate the need to worry about different software versions or file types as you email documents or move from PC to PC. Another bonus is that they easily accommodate collaboration by allowing multiple users to edit the same file (with versioning) and provide users the ability to easily save and convert documents as multiple file types (including HTML and pdf). And, you can even use many of these tools, such as Zoho Writer and Google Docs to author and publish posts to your blog.

It’s this type of integration with other Web 2.0 tools that also makes web-based apps so appealing. For this thing, you are asked to take a look at a web-based word processing tool called Zoho Writer, create a simple document and then document your discoveries in your blog. If you are up to the challenge, you might even export your document as an HTML file or publish it through Zoho to your blog. With Zoho and web-based applications, the possibilities are endless.

Create a free account for yourself in Zoho Writer
Watch a tutorial

Video found at WeShow
Explore the site and create a test document or two.
Try out Zoho Writer’s features and create a blog post about your discoveries.
If you’re up for the challenge, try using Zoho’s publish options to post to your blog.
 
#14 Take a look at LibraryThing and catalog some of your favorite books.

Are you a booklover or cataloger at heart? Do you enjoy finding lost and forgotten gems on the shelf to read? Then LibraryThing may be just the tool for you. Developed for booklovers, this online tool not only allows you to easily create an online catalog of your own, it also connects you to other people who have similar libraries and reading tastes. Add a book to your catalog by just entering the title or connect with other users through your similar reading tastes. There are lots of ways to use LibraryThing. You can even view your books on a virtual shelf, add a widget to display titles that are in your catalog (see sidebar for sample), or install a LT Search box on your blog.

Students could create a LibraryThing catalog of your classroom library. This is also a great way to teach organization skills, sorting, cataloging, etc. You can have the students decide how to best organize those materials. Have your school teacher-librarian help explain why libraries catalog using the Dewey System. Create alternative systems and see how they work. This assignment can work at all grade levels; just create your lesson around the skill and ‘big idea’ level you’d like to work with. This lesson could also be used with CD titles. [In the old days, we used records for this assignment!]

Take a look around LibraryThing http://www.librarything.com/tour/ and create an account. http://www.librarything.com/
Add a least 5 books to your library.
Blog about your findings and be sure to link to your LibraryThing catalog. How popular were your books?

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