Voice thread

VoiceThread is a web-based communications network for students and educators. It is a place for creating and collaborating on digital stories and documentaries, practicing and documenting language skills, exploring geography and culture, solving math problems, and it allows people to make comments in 5 different ways - using voice (with a microphone or telephone), text, audio file, or video (with a webcam) - and share them with anyone they wish. A VoiceThread allows group conversations to be collected and shared in one place, from anywhere in the world.

• It has an accountable environment where all users on the network are known users, responsible for their content and behavior.
• All content is created by registered members of the community.
• There are no Free accounts, students may only participate after being added by their teacher or school, and student email addresses are not required.
• Students participate in VoiceThread only after being added by an educator or administrator with a VoiceThread class or school subscription.

Vocethread is a creative, fun and educational tool that can be used to support all outcome learning areas, which allows the students to develop their language skills (from writing and), speaking skills (audio messages) and art skills (creating the voivethread). It is safe for teachers and students to use as a means of communication and expressing ones opinion. Voice thread is a great tool to assist in the students cognitive development and allows them to enjoy themselves in an educational setting, which motivates them to learn new concepts.

For more information on what and how to use Voicethread visit: http://voicethread.com/#home.b409.i848804

Hot Potatoes

Hot Potatoes is a software where teachers and students can communicate with each other, and allows the teachers to create worksheets for the students online. Hot potatoes is a simple and easy to use software that allows the teacher to educate students in all the learning areas in a fun and creative way. It acts as an educative tool to support learning rather then a means actually teaching a specific topic or learning area, which means that it can be integrated into the classroom effectively. Hot potatoes has six applications which enables the teacher to create interactive worksheets and allows the students to comment back to the teacher. the six applications are:

1. Multiple choice questions
2. Short answers
3. Jumbled sentence
4. crossword
5. Matching/ ordering
6. gap filling exercise

These areas help children in the development of several English skills such as writing, spelling and sentence structure. It is also effective in the classroom because it allows the students to immediately check if there answers are correct, so it allows them to 'have a go'. Hot potatoes is not only beneficial for the students in that it is a creative way to learn and communicate with the teacher, but it is also beneficial for the teacher because it is easy to upload the worksheets and they can organise the students grades and worksheets in one area. It also helps in several other learning areas such as maths, society and environment and technology and enterprise due to the activities that can be posted by the teacher to the student. An example of how Hot potatoes can be integrated into several learning areas and the classroom can be located on this website http://marshalladulteducation.org/student_lessons1.htm where it provides several worksheets on different topics for the students to fill out. Hot potatoes is a great tool that assists and supports teachers in educating the children about several different concepts in a fun, creative and interactive way.

Game Maker

Game Maker is a program that allows students to create their own games such as 'catch the ball' or catch the clown. This innovation topic allows the students to be:

• Creative- where they learn to create their own games
• Challenging- students have to think in more complex terms because the program is difficult to navigate however once mastered easy to understand
• Enhances the students learning in technology and software

It acts as a means of developing cognition because they have to challenge themselves in creating their own game and understanding the process of how to do it. The only problem with Game maker is that it can be time consuming and hard to navigate. However once the students become familiar with the program it does become easier to understand. This can be integrated into the learning area of technology and enterprise where the students learn about the process of enterprise and creating a game that can potentially become a popular game in society, which can lead to the students looking into advertisement, costing and 'running' a successful business.

Glogster