The shrinking world

The use of web 2.0 tools has flattened the landscape as people begin to blog, twitter and skype etc more often. Many of the online environments I explore are still populated by many examples from the USA (eg You Tube videos) yet this has started to change, and with it a greater understanding that it's a whole new world. One of the websites I came across today, through twitter contact Angela Maiers was dotsub The thing I liked about this site was its ability to for you to translate videos into any language. The subtitles then appear when the video is played. As a New Zealander, I was thinking it would be great to read some of these in Maori. Or for students learning another language to add translations.

One of the examples is below. This video is an updated version of Karl Fisch's and Scott McLeod's 'Shift Happens'. It is called 'Did You Know?' It contains updated statistics and questions, and a new layout. You will see that you can add language subtexts at the bottom. Check it out...

Beyond 20th Century Education

Voicethread is a really useful web 2.0 tool. One of the voicethreads I came across today was a provocative question posed by Professor Stephen Heppell - "It simply isn't the 20th Century Any More, Is It? So Why Would We Teach As Though It Was?" The three questions posed in this voicethread are answered by educators from a number of different countries. It is worth listening to their comments and reading their thoughts.
Voicethread is a useful tool to use in all fields - business and education.

Leaders for Future Schooling

The ULearn conference highlighted the need for our schools to change and showcased many schools and clusters that are using information communication technologies to progress this.The following short video describes how school leaders need to develop the adult learners in their communities. This is the challenge for 21st century leaders. How can we be effective leaders of change through others rather than as the expert in all things...



This video is one of many appearing on EdTalks - a new site featuring short video clips for educators. Check it out at http://edtalks.org/ You can subscribe to these via itunes too!