Using ICT in Further Education

Camtasia Studio (version 5) is an excellent piece of screencasting software from Techsmith costing $299.

However, Camtasia Studio (version 3) is currently available for download for free! Having downloaded this demo version, register your copy here to receive the registration key. This converts the demo into the fully functioning version.

Snagit (version 7) is the companion screen capture program from Techsmith and is also available for download for free! Once downloaded, register your copy here to receive the registration key. Snagit (version is the current version going for $39.95.

This info is ‘hot off the press’ from the blogs of Tims Gates and Amit Agarwal!

Cool Timer is an excellent count down clock that can be used for any timed class assessment. Cool Timer comes in two sizes – regular and ‘really big’ which is idea for display on a classroom whiteboard. You can change the default colours of the interface to suit your own preference.

Cool Timer can be set to play any audio file that you choose when the time is over. Audio formats are restricted to wav, mp3 or midi. The audio file may be set to play once or looped to play continually until you switch it off manually.

Cool Timer also allows you to save and reload frequently used time lengths as presets so you don’t have to enter them manually each time. All in all – a handy little tool!

Downloadpedia is “a web-based, free content software encyclopedia project“. Downloadpedia is written collaboratively by volunteers from all around the world and it’s contents can be edited by anyone with Internet access. Software lists are included for three different platforms: Windows, Mac and Linux.

Downloadpedia can only get better and better as more and more lurkers turn to contributors and extra software references are added! My first contribution, this week, was to add a reference for Alice – a “teaching tool designed as a revolutionary approach to teaching and learning introductory programming concepts“.

Downloadpedia is a real treasure chest first discovered on Paul Hamilton’s blog, where you will be able to find many more treasure chests!

xtimeline is a useful social tool that enables you to built timelines about any subject. Many historical events and ’celebrity’ personal profiles are available to view at xtimeline. The timelines are visual and include relevant images and concise information.

First came across xtimeline thanks to Mike Qaissaunee’s post.

Here’s an interesting one about the Nobel Peace Prize Winners (comprising 115 events!).

Looking for CC licensed work? A great starting point is the Creative Commons Search Site. This site will help you find  photos, music, text, books, educational material, and more that is free to share or build upon using Creative Commons.

You can also browse specific repositories of Creative Commons licensed content by clicking on the Content Directories tab. Currently, the directories includes audio, video, image, text education and geodata.

Spoken Text (found via Stephen Downes) lets you create speech files from ordinary text files. The recordings can be created from plain text files, Acrobat PDF, Word files, PowerPoint files, emails, web pages or text entered directly. File upload size is restricted to 981KB so large files must be split and recorded separately.

At present two voices are available – Dave (high quality) and Bob (low quality). Spoken Text is currently working on providing a female voice option. The final recording is made available at Spoken Text for seven days. You can, however, download your own copy of the file in MP3 or m4b (iPod) format.

There is quite a difference between the quality of Bob and Dave as you can judge from the two snippets below (taken from a recording of a four page PDF file). The Dave recording used the default speed of 170wpm.

Here’s Bob…….

Here’s Dave……..

Also came across vozMe (thanks to Judy O’Connell). In vozMe, you simply type in the text (or copy and paste) and select the ‘Create mp3′ button. You can then download the resulting mp3 file to your computer!

vozMe also enables you to add voice to your website through the use of plugins and scripting.

The Backup to Email software enables you to send any file to your email account. Once the Backup to Email software is installed, ensure that you change the “outgoing server” option to either the smtp of your ISP or the gmail smtp (smtp.gmail.com). If you are using the gmail smtp then you may also have to enable secure authentication.

To backup a file, simply right click on the file and then choose ‘Backup to Email’. When backing up a folder, the software automatically zips the folder and sends it to the email account. A copy of the zipped folder is also left on the computer. There is no limit to the size of file transferred although files bigger than 10MB will be split into 10MB slices.

Backup to Email also allows for management of multiple email accounts and a very useful user guide is provided on the website. This is a very handy way for students to submit class assignments or exams as it really is just a two click process!!

Bonjour, Buon Giorno, Dia Duit, Guten Tag, Hola!

Want to learn a new language? This might just be the time. Mango Languages, an online language learning system, is currently undergoing Beta testing and is offering free registration.

Mango Languages offers very useful features including, among others, colour coded translations, audio from native speakers, unlimited repitition (both individual words and full sentences), phonetics and memory building exercises.  Both male and female voices are used for the audio. A forum for each language has also been provided – due to popular demand from current users.

Mango Languages is another site found via Zaid’s blog. So all I can say is Gracias, Merci, Grazie, Obrigado, Danke, Go raibh míle maith agat, Спасибо, Ευχαριστώ!

Also found Livemocha (thanks to Nancy McKeand) -  another site undergoing Beta testing!

Livemocha provides an online language-learning community as well as structured lessons and promises access to a team of passionate language tutors who are “available 5 days per week to chat one-on-one or to answer questions“.