Apple’s word-processing program, Pages, can now create ebooks. Files exported in the ePub format can be imported into iTunes which will cause them to show up in the Books section of iTunes. After you have synced your iPad, iPod Touch, or iPhone with iTunes, the ebook will appear in iBooks.

In order to create ebooks with Pages, go to Apple’s support page found here. Interestingly, in the section “More details on using ePub,” it indicates that video can be embedded in the document. What it doesn’t state is that audio files can also be embedded into your ebook.

If you decide to create an ebook using Pages, which states that you need to download the file, “ePub Best Practices.” You can use the document as a template or import the paragraph styles from the ePub Best Practices document into a new or existing Pages document.

One of the nice features about videos embedded in an ebook in iBooks is that you can choose to make the video full-screen.

In the “old” days of educational technology, we asked students to create Powerpoint or Hyperstudio files. But now they can create multimedia ebooks that can be read on an iDevice.

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The Pulse SmartPen created by Livescribe may be *the* thing for students to consider, especially if they take a lot of notes or if they can’t write very fast (or at least can’t keep up with the teacher). I recently purchased one and will give students turns in using it during a course. With this pen, files which contain the corresponding audio can be uploaded and viewed by others at the Community site.

Some interesting scenarios in the form of videos, including the ability of the SmartPen to translate words to other languages can be seen on this page called Sneekpeek.

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I’m becoming more interested in how video can be used in education and how to make it interactive. An interesting application that can be used is VideoPaper Builder, a free program produced by the Concord Consortium.

If there is video on the Web (i.e., You Tube, Google Videos, etc.) and you want to create some text or hyperlinks that relate to certain objects within the video, go to Asterpix to see how easily this can be done.

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If you want to learn more about Web 2.0, Atomic Learning has a series of videos on the topic, which can be found at http://movies.atomiclearning.com/k12/web20/

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Hyperstudio has been resurrected and is in version 5.0 now. There are some new features. Years ago, I used Hyperstudio instead of Powerpoint and before Keynote was out.

I wonder if you can still export the Hyperstudio files and put them on the Web? If I remember correctly, a plug-in had to be installed on the server but I don’t think the user (the person wanting to view the Hyperstudio file on the web) had to install anything on their computer. (I know they had to install a Hyperstudio viewer on their computer and I assume that is still the case.)

Unfortunately, the MacKiev website provides some information but I’d like to see a more extensive list of the features.

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What is Web 2.0. Let this video (from You Tube) illustrate it.

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This is a site that is looking at technologies that are part of Web 2.0.

TechCrunch Comparing The Flickrs of Video

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If you would like to create presentation slides similar to the appearance of Powerpoint, but are web-based (and a whole lot better looking than Powerpoint on the web), check out this free software.

S5: A Simple Standards-Based Slide Show System

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Want to put your Powerpoint files on your iPod Photo? Here’s how.

HOW-TO: Put PowerPoint on your iPod Photo – Engadget – www.engadget.com

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Macworld: News: Toast 7 includes DivX, iLife browsing, much more: “With Toast 7 Titanium, Roxio has added an iLife Browser that makes it possible to browse and drag and drop content from your iLife applications directly into toast. iTunes music and playlists appear, for example, as do iPhoto photos and albums. iMovie projects show up in that list, as do iDVD lists and Video_TS folders from DVDs you’ve ripped to your hard disk. What’s more, Toast 7 Titanium integrates with Elgato’s EyeTV PVR software, so you can drag and drop television shows you’ve recorded to your hard disk.”

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Want to add Quicktime to your web pages? Check this out.

PAGEot

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Need a video for a class? Go here to see what is available? You’ll also want to check on the Internet Archive’s section on movies – http://www.archive.org/details/movies

The Open Video Project

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Want to create your own video blog. Check out these video tutorials.

Freevlog: Tutorial

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Interested in doing a search to find out what topics will be covered on TV (google for TV)? Check this out.

blinkx video search

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If you need to store and transfer large files, check out this service. There are various pricing packages but the free package allows you store up to 10 GB of files, and download up to 100 Mb per month.
Streamload – Share Videos and Photos – Online MP3 Storage and Access

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This article might be worth reading regarding how to make animations for science courses.

Easy Animations – Paul Blanchard

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Need to create some texttrack in your Quicktime movie? Check out this online tool.

Quicktime Thingie

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According to the site, “SimpleVideoOut X converts any QuickTime movie into a FireWire stream, regardless of whether it originated with your digital camcorder, your hand-held camera’s movie function…”O’Reilly: Exporting QuickTime Movies with Simple Video Out X

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In addition to GCam (found at http://www.macmice.com/gcam.html, which is free), another piece of software that allows you to produce QuickTime movie from your webcam (e.g., iSight), is a product called CamSpinner, which costs $9.95. This product allows you to record both Quicktime and MPEG movies, and still images. This same company sells a Web authoring package called PageSpinner. If you purchase PageSpinner and CamSpinnner together, you save $9.95. The total cost of the two products is $29.95.
CamSpinner

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Do you use Skype, the free Internet service for making phone calls? If you are a Macintosh user with OS X, you can record your Skype conversations using the instructions given at this site:
Webcrumbs: Recording Skype Calls

This may be a nice tool to use in a distance education (or even a F2F teaching situation (as long as the students have a computer in front of them that has a microphone). After the discussion is finished, the file could be posted on a web page for later accessing, or posted in a Course Management System, such as Blackboard.

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You should really check out Flickr. There are some neat things you can do there. One of the neat things you can do is to put a Flash animation of your pics on your web site. Learn how to do this by going to www.flickr.com/fun/zeitgeist.

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SnapZ Pro is a nice product that allows you to capture an entire screen, a portion of the screen, or a window. If you pay more, you can get the version that allows you to create movies of the screen actions. You can get SnapZ Pro from Ambrosia.

[posted with ecto]

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