Soft Reset

Fort Smith Public Schools has nearly 20 classrooms using Eee PC netbooks. George Lieux, technology professional development specialist, gathered up nine classroom teachers to talk with Tony Vincent about their use of the mini laptops. Tony speaks with these elementary, middle, and high school teachers who all share valuable classroom management tips as well as great curriculum integration ideas.

Dale Ehrhart joins Tony and Mike. He is a preservice teacher who has taught himself how to program for the Palm Operating System. He shares his insights into programming and tells about some of the over one-dozen software applications he's developed, including Double Digit Multiplication, Observe, Change Counter, and Jumbler.

Tony brings you audio from two recent conferences: The Cartwright Schools District's Science and Technology Conference in Phoenix, Arizona and the Northwest Council for Computers in Education Conference in Spokane, Washington. Both conferences were held in March 2007 and had podcasting workshops with Tony. The first half of this episode has five segments about the podcasts you might be interested in. The second half has several tips about using Audacity, GarageBand, and podcasting. Enjoy!

Nearly 40 educators met at Wisconsin's CESA #4 to learn about iPods and podcasting. Although they had limited time, groups of three or four produced short segments about educational podcasts. It's quite noisy in the background, but I think listeners will enjoy hearing about some of the great programs podcasting has to offer.

Quizzler software works with Palm handhelds, Pocket PCs, Windows, Macintosh, iPods, and the web—so just about everyone can put the software to good use. John Covele, the developer of Quizzler, joins Tony and Mike to tell about Quizzler's new features.

There are a growing number of tools to make the Mobile Internet a friendlier place. In Soft Reset #17 Tony and Mike discuss using the Web on handheld computers and mobile phones. Searching, blogs, news feeds, bookmarks, and homepages are the topics. Although the focus is WiFi connections, accessing the Internet through Bluetooth is also addressed. Be sure to listen for the intro and outro voice--it's someone that knows Mike very well.

Twenty-five fantastic educators met at the DuPage County Regional Office of Education in Illinois to learn about podcasting from Tony in a whole day workshop. They learned about finding, subscribing, and listening to podcasts. Then they worked in groups to create segments for this program, which feature segments about great educational podcasts. Audacity and GarageBand were used to record and mix the segments. Listen to short segments about some wonderful educational podcasts.

Tony and Mike answer email questions about common and not-so-common issues with Palm handhelds and Pocket PCs. Then listen to summer conference-goers explain what they learned about handheld computing.

Over 40 educators from Paradise Valley Unified School District in Phoenix, Arizona learned about podcasting from Tony in a six hour workshop. They learned about finding, subscribing, and listening to podcasts. Then they worked in groups to create segments for this program, which feature segments about great educational podcasts. GarageBand was used to record and mix the segments. Enjoy hearing about some of the 22,000+ podcasts that are now online! Just keep in mind that these new podcasters had only 40 minutes to write, record, and post produce their segments.

Tony and Mike attended the 2006 National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) in San Diego. They discuss a variety of things they noticed and learned from the conference. Go to learninginhand.com/softreset for Show Notes.

Tony and Mike share probeware, spreadsheets, participatory simulations, and reference programs for Palm and Windows Mobile that help with science instruction. Your hosts also share applications that teachers use for other subjects, but can also be used for learning science. The episode ends with audio from the U.S. Virgin Islands. Be sure to listen for the harsh consequence if a student in Miss Prince's school loses a stylus! Go to learninginhand.com/softreset for the Show Notes.

Educators from Valparaiso Community Schools in Valparaiso, Indiana learned about podcasting from Tony in a six hour workshop. They learned about finding, subscribing, and listening to podcasts. Then they worked in groups to create segments for this program, which feature some great educational podcasts and podcasting ideas. Audacity for Windows was used to record and mix the segments. Music is from ACIDplanet.

Listen to find out where in the world is Mike Curtis. Then eBook enthusiast Midge Frazel joins Tony to talk about electronic reading in her very first podcast.