Besides playing music and video, iPods can display photos, run games, display notes, store data, play podcasts, and more.

Australian teacher Jonathan Nalder shows many uses of an iPod classic in his two-part video, The iPod in Education. The video is a great overview for teachers and is very visual. Jonathan uses one of the newest iPods so you might notice the screens are slightly different than previous generations of iPods.

Part 1 of The iPod in Education covers setting the master volume, coverflow,
audiobooks, iQuiz maker, and exporting quizzes to iPod.

Part 2 shows podcasts, iTunes U, adding your own video, world time, and stopwatch.

Jonathan obviously put lots of time into the video. Thanks Jonathan! I often think that my podcast about iPods should be video. The problem is I don't have the time to produce regular videos, so I stick with audio.

Labels: ipod

The OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) Foundation's XO laptop was designed for learning and targeted at children in third-world countries. You might have heard of it by its original name: The $100 Laptop. Currently it costs about $188, but if the foundation can get more governments on board, the price per unit will go down.

The XO laptop has a 422 MHz processor and a 1 GB hard drive space. Its 7.5 inch screen is designed to be completely readable in direct sunlight. The laptop runs its own version of the Linux Operating System. XO is probably smaller than you might expect. Check out this size comparison photo.

Doug Johnson, an educational technologist, received his XO and wrote about it in his blog: OLPC - Follow-Up and Another OLPC Follow-Up Posting. He writes about the Operating System:

This is a VERY different operating system. Nothing is in
the same place you'd find it in a Linux, Windows or Mac OS. The learning curve may be longer for adults with computer experience than for kids with no tech experience at all.

BBC News has a piece about 9-year-old Rufus Cellan-Jones. Rufus has been using an XO and loves it. Check out the short video (via YouTube) with Rufus talking about his XO laptop.

A Child's View of the $100 Laptop (the article with Rufus) mentions EToys. Here's how OLPC describes it: "EToys is a media-rich authoring system aimed at helping children learn by doing. They can explore their ideas by creating models, simulations, and games complete with text, graphics, sound, and video." Sounds like a much more sophisticated version of Sketchy for handhelds. Besides EToys, there are many other free software programs for the XO. The applications are for exploring, expressing, and communicating. Some are Turtle Art, Web Browser, TamTam Jam, and Memorize. There are thousands of developers working on software for the XO, so many more applications will be on their way. I'm hoping these open source programs will run on other kinds of computers as well.

It is possible to emulate the OX's Operating System on a Windows, Mac, or Linux computer. However, installation seems to be too complicated for me.

U.S. consumers can purchase an XO laptop from OLPC through their Give One Get One program. For $400, you can purchase a laptop. The cost also pays for a second laptop to be given to a student in a third-world country. Give One Get One ends December 31, 2007.

Although it was originally meant to be in the hands of developed-world children, Birmingham City Schools has ordered 15,000 XO laptops from OLPC. They will be the first schools in the U.S. to put the XO to use.

The XO laptop is not the only small, low-cost laptop around. Intel's Classmate PC runs Windows XP or Linux and is developed for students in "emerging markets."

Furthermore, there's the $300 ASUS Eee PC. The Eee PC is not designed exclusively for education--it is a commercial product and not specifically aimed at the third-world. In fact, Fresno Unified School District in California recently purchased 1,000 Eee PCs for $464 each. The total includes Windows XP and other Microsoft software. The districts Chief Technology Officer said this about the Eee PC:

We wanted a laptop with a keyboard that was under $500 and was small enough to sit on a desk alongside the books or papers.

With quick boot times, flash memory, Wi-Fi, compelling software, and small size, ultra-portable laptops are becoming very inexpensive, nearing the cost and features of Palm handhelds and Pocket PCs.

Labels: handhelds, laptops

It's time to share some podcasting resources I've recently encountered.

Voices.com has a section titled Podcasting - How To Podcast and Podcasting Tutorials. While light on the tutorial part, the menu of items on the right of the page explains the basics (and not-so-basics) of podcasting. The guide explains audio engineering vocabulary like "multitrack recording" and "channels." It also provides useful advice for planning your podcast, including talking to your audience and developing a style. Podcasters should check out the Mastering Your Podcast page for some useful advice about exporting and organizing audio files. The Voices.com guide is not written specifically for education, but so much of it is relevant to student and teacher podcasters. Even the Brand Your Podcast page can give educators insight into developing a name, theme, and visual appeal.

Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal has an interactive recording studio where users combine instruments to create their own music. The mixer is like simplified GarageBand software but in your web browser. Supposedly a song can be saved as an MP3 file, but each time I tried to save a song, it failed. Be sure to read the Terms and Conditions. I'll leave it up to you to decide if the wording below gives permission for use in podcasts:

General Mills hereby grants you a personal, non-exclusive, non-assignable, revocable, non-transferable license to use and display, for noncommercial and personal use only, one copy of appropriately limited portions of the Materials and/or software that are downloadable from this Site, including, without limitation, any files, codes, audio, or images incorporated in or generated by or in conjunction with the Site and/or General Mills, provided that "General Mills, Inc., 2005. All Rights Reserved. Used With Permission" or "(c) 2005 General Mills, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Used With Permission" accompanies all copyrightable Materials and other notices are properly maintained. You agree not to reproduce, modify, create derivative works from, display, perform, publish, distribute, disseminate, broadcast, sell, decompile, reverse engineer, disassemble, or circulate any Materials to any third party (including, without limitation, display and distribute the Materials via a third party website) without General Mills' express prior written consent.

iPods aren't the only devices that can play podcasts. Microsoft's iPod competitor, Zune, has been updated to support podcasts. Podcasting is now built into Zune Marketplace (Marketplace is to Zune as iTunes is to iPod). There's a software update for folks who had a Zune before podcasting support was included. I find it interesting that Microsoft embraces the term podcast. Seems that word is here to stay.

You're probably familiar with one-click subscribing to podcasts with iTunes. Podcasters might consider offering one-click subscribing for Zune Marketplace. Podcasting News has a short article on how to create the one-click link.

Video podcasters should put their videos into .mp4 format. This format will play in QuickTime, iTunes, and on iPods, iPhones, and Zunes. What's confusing is that there are different kinds of .mp4 files and iPods play only specific types. To be sure a video will play on an iPod, podcasters can use an online converter service. I often use Zamzar.com. There's also Movavi Online. Simply add a video from your desktop and supply an email address. Within 24 hours Movavi Online will email you a link to download the converted video file.

Labels: podcasting