I recently read a list of Clarence Fisher’s top ten tech tools, which made me wonder a bit about my own. The list is very fluid and can change dramatically from one year to the next but here’s my list of current tech tools. Some of these are personal tools, some are work related and most of them are both since I find, and many other teachers have agreed with me, that my personal life and work life aren’t as distinct from each other as they should be. Here’s my list: Firefox (sometimes Safari, and I’ve also been trying Chrome) – most of my tools are web based, so the browser is an important tool. I’ve been saying for a few years that my favourite OS is Firefox, because it supports a wide variety of plugins that are invaluable to … Continue reading »

Being the D’Arcy wannabe that I am, I’m following his lead into the land of simplicity. Maybe this is the blog equivalent of cleaning up the yard and putting away all the summer decorations before winter comes.  I’ve changed to a cleaner theme (Blueprint) and fewer widgets on the page. I’ve considered finding a bare minimum theme with just the blog title, subtitle and posts on the page but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be that austere. Interestingly, the site will now have more graphic presence when viewed on an iPhone/iPod Touch than if viewed through a regular web browser.

This is a repost from my work blog: Here’s a short video from the very clever folks at Common Craft on the topic of web search strategies: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWHPf00Jkqg&hl=en&fs=1] There are many other good search strategies. Here’s a video of Patrick Norton interviewing Google Engineer Matt Cuts, who describes various Google search strategies. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXHCcwS00bk&hl=en&fs=1]

I wish there was a program like Slife for the iPod touch. Slife is a really cool (and possibly quite frightening) application for Mac OS X (Leopard only) that tracks your time using different applications, at web sites and working with various documents. I’ve only just downloaded it, but I’m interested in seeing how my computer time is being used. I probably don’t want to know how much time I spend in Twitter! Until such a program exists, I’ll have to rely on my (admittedly faulty) memory. Here’s what I use my iPod touch for: Most often, I use it for web browsing. Google has done a great job of setting up their services to be iPhone/Touch friendly. Most frequently, I use it to check e-mail or peruse my google reader. I also check out twitter on the browser, but … Continue reading »

I’m lucky enough to be teaching one of the best classes ever this semester – Theory of Knowledge for my school’s International Baccalaureate program. ToK (as it is fondly known) deals with three fundamental questions – What is knowledge? What do we mean when we say that we know something? What are different ways of obtaining knowledge? What kinds of things can we know about? Uh- that’s actually four, isn’t it? The first two are semi connected so I’ll lump those two together. One of the activities I’m having them do this year is work out some of their ideas in a blog. I think that writing for a global, authentic audience will get them to think carefully, perhaps even deeply, about their ideas about knowledge. This will give them the chance to spread their analytical wings, so to speak. … Continue reading »

The Girl™ is taking two dance classes this year – ballet and musical theatre. She has taken dance classes for the past 5 years. But this year is different. This year is a milestone in her life. This year, she has to get to dance class on her own. Before anyone turns me in to the bad parent police, I should explain that the dance studio is right across the street from her school. Once the busses are out of the way, it is a relatively quiet street with most of the traffic the result of parents dropping kids off for dance classes. She has a few friends from her school who also take the same dance classes so they travel as a herd and cross the street together for added safety. I’m not concerned about her safety. She’s smart … Continue reading »