Technology in the Education Arena

A thank you to Google for all the “free” tools they have made available for educators.  I have been putting together a presentation for the Accelerated Schools Plus National Conference, wherein I will be presenting on 25 Ways to Use Technology in a Powerful Learning Environment.  Google Tools will definitely be included in my presentation. 

Google has a Blog Search, a book Search, a catalog search, and a Directory Search.  Students find Google Earth engaging and with the new version (beta right now) you can click on two points and get the mileage, google has Blogger to create your own blog, Calendar which you can use to share with staff, students, parents, Google Docs and Spreadsheets allows you to collaborate online in a document, google mail, Picasa for editing and sharing your photos, SketchUp which allows you to create 3D models which can be integrated with google earth, Translate to view web pages in other languages – and that is only some of them.

Being in an elementary school, rather than use Google search, we use Google for Kids & Teens as one of our Search Engines.

So, thank you to Google for all the great “no cost” tools made available to us as educators.  You can also check out the Google for Educators page.

Lastly, now in beta testing is SearchMash.  One interesting point about Search Mash are the images located at the bottom of the screen.  If you click on these images, you are taken to additional information.