Cloud Software Blog : April 2013

E-Portfolio Software

All our first year students create an e-portfolio using Mahara ( server was managed by DIT) - This allows the student to create a portfolio of work throughout their college years. This is particularly beneficial for our Digital Media Students as they can showcase ther graphics ability with website links , photoshop images, videos they have created etc.

mahara.bluebrick.ie

Our second year software students also used foliofor.me , a cloud based eportfolio software ( also from MAHARA)
This eportfolio can be easily converted to a HTML web page & continued to be used by the student - our students created some great eportfolios & converted them to web pages.

foliofor.me

Other software we have used .......

Linked-in - social networking website for people in professional occupations. As of January 2013, LinkedIn reports more than 200 million acquired users in more than 200 countries and territories (LinkedIn, 2013)

My Profile link : http://ie.linkedin.com/pub/annette-cosgrove/18/33b/64

PebblePad - commercial eportfolio system and as such requires payment of an annual fee.

http://www.pebblepad.co.uk/cs_documentation/overviewpebble/overviewpebble.htm video showing main features

Google Sites

https://support.google.com/sites/?hl=en#topic=1689606

are provided as part of the suite of free tools to Google account holders. Google sites has a variety of templates, all of which are suitable to use for eportfolio development. The beauty of Google sites is that it is free, integrates well with all other Google services such as Docs, Picasa and Blogger, has no requirement to be associated with an Institute and is available for life.

Wikis and Blogs

Although not designed specifically for use as an eportfolio, Wikis and blogs have all the features needed to be utilized as your own personal eportfolio system. You can upload and share files, link and embed online resources, blog, discuss and share.

So hopefully after this module you will all have excellent e-portfolios & technical blogs ....!!!!

Social Networking Tools

Social Media apps

HOOTSUITE. http://hootsuite.com/
Useful for managing all social media applications on your desktop

YAMMER . Create a college /business social media page, using company logo ( alternative to Facebook for business)
https://www.yammer.com/

WILDFIRE by Google http://www.wildfireapp.com/
Social media marketing software

Schoology

Useful for collaboration with students /communities

Twitter - useful education tool/ Conference blogging/Information posting etc
YouthVoices
Google+ the next facebook?
Ning create your own community

Brain Storming Software

Gliffy

Students found Gliffy very useful for group brainstorming sessions - stored on the cloud , all members of groups could collaborate from home - resulted in much better results - Some groups used MindMeister and preferred its interface - try them out and letus know your feedback - other brainstorming sware listed below .....

Web Services and Apps for EDUCATION

Great Resources for Finding Web Services and Apps

http://shrd.by/htOgs6. -worlds largest resource of online tutorials
http://ow.ly/mhc7k -apps for small business, good examples fir students developing/ writing their first app
AlternativeTo.net
Cool Tools for Schools
Cool Apps for Schools
Digital Writing Tools
Web 2.0 Ed Tech Toolbox - Excellent resource for education & cloud software links - my students find this link very useful !
Ted talks

Curating Software

Curating involves pulling information from various sources on the internet & putting them all together in one place

Diigo electronic highlighting facility for the web - excellent for students

Scoop.it similar to twitter interface & feeds
Pinterest where you put all of your "favourite things" together in one space eg twitter feed, news feeds
Storify allows you to create your own story by pulling in feeds from various sources - useful tool for education
Paper.li - Allows you to create your own daily or weekly newspaper with all the info that you are interested in - We created a "Digital Media 2 paper" and had links from a lot of interesting educational resources - this kept students up to date with digital media throughout the year -

Timeline Cloud Software

For Timelines - our class mostlly used Timeglider

Timeglider

Students used this for Media projects

Capzles -

first years used this as part of social media Yr 1

Dipity
xtimeline
Timeline JS

Cloud Software to Create Word Clouds

Word Clouds are a useful way of making a presentation or a website more interesting .........
Wordle and Word It Out are the 2 that we have used most in class.....

Other Word Cloud Software include:

Cloud Software Links for Infographics

Infographics applications are a fantastic way of accessing data & presenting it in a professional, more interesting format - I mostly use Ease.ly and Visual.ly - but try some of the software below & let me know which one you prefer ............

Cloud Software Links for Presentation Software

Prezi

Cloud Presentation software - ideal for media presentation - more powerful graphic capabilities than Powerpoint
Just create an account & access your presentation from any device - Year 2 Computing students used this for their presentations this year and did brilliant presentations using PREZI
Link :

www.prezi.com
Lots of sample presentations here to give you some ideas on how best to use PREZI

Other Cloud Software that we have used for presentations are the following : Use them and let me know which one you prefer

Google Presentations

http://www.ewcpresenter.com/ includes excellent infographics facility

CLEARSLIDE ( was SLIDESHARE) - very easy to use & navigate
https://www.clearslide.com/

ZohoShow

280 Slides

Powtoon

Glogster.edu

Vuvox

Museum Box

Profile