Recently our school district, well, actually our entire state has gone to Microsoft Live @EDU. Microsoft has a lot of lesser known useful tools that educators might find useful as part of their Windows Live Essentials and other software.. I wanted to share those here.
Windows Live Writer 2011 - This software is intended to provide a place to write blog post off of the web. It can be integrated to Blogger, WordPress, LiveJournal and others (Not sure about EduBlogs). It provides the ability to add videos, pictures and a Bing Map.
StickySorter - This program is similar other post it note type sites but with many more features. You can categorize and organize (sort) your notes into groups. You can also import data from other files like Excel. You could easily use this site to organize dates, events, people, etc in a class assignment/discussion; especially if you are using a SMARTBoard.
ZoomIt - This is a tool for screen-casting that also allows you to zoom in to particular areas of the computer screen for technical presentations. The program runs from the hot tray and uses customizable hot keys to activate for use. It also allows you to draw on the zoomed in area.
I'm not an educationist - but I first got to you on something technical which was helpful and have stayed tuned to you through Twitter. Thank you for the Microsoft Live info. Just this week I got on to Live Writer, courtesy of another blogger. It looks like being a great advance for me and, I think/hope, will sort out some of the problems I have with posting directly on Blogger. Blogging from Word never did the trick either. So thank you for this review - and I will stay tuned for the useful info that is applicable beyond the classroom.
ReplyDeleteBlessings and bliss
Brigid
Melbourne, Australia
How are you liking these tools? I am assuming they aren't free.
ReplyDelete