Archive for May, 2009:


Lessons learned webcasting over Ustream with a Nady wireless microphone

I was delighted with the results of my continued experiments with webcasting this morning, this time using a Nady Wireless lapel microphone for the first time. Use of this microphone yielded by far the highest-quality audio recordings I’ve been able to achieve using Ustream.tv to date. The image below shows the equipment I’m using for

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Monetizing Blogging via Amazon’s Kindle

Following the lead of Chris Duke this evening, I created an account as a publisher on Amazon’s Kindle Publishing for Blogs website and submitted “Moving at the Speed of Creativity” as an available blog. After submitting all the requisite details, I was informed: Your blog will be available on the Kindle Store in 48-72 hours.

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Is the Obama Administration Dooming Us to HyperInflation?

According to today’s English WikiPedia entry, “hyperinflation” in economics is: …inflation that is very high or “out of control”, a condition in which prices increase rapidly as a currency loses its value. Definitions used by the media vary from a cumulative inflation rate over three years approaching 100% to “inflation exceeding 50% a month.” In

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National Cyber Summit on 21st Century Skills

Thanks a tweet I learned today about “The National Summit on 21st Century Skills” scheduled for June 12, 2009, in Washington D.C., and the “Cyber Summit on 21st Century Skills,” scheduled for June 1st-12th. The Cyber Summit is a free event held online, and will provide opportunities for insight and input into the face-to-face national

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Whitelist for next week’s OKCPS Tech Day Presentations

I’m presenting three times next week at Oklahoma City Public Schools’ annual “Tech Day” conference. This is the list of websites I’ve requested be “whitelisted” on the district content filter (at least for the day) so I can share them during my sessions. My sessions (on Wednesday, June 3rd) include “Digital Storytelling on a Shoestring,”

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Educational vendors supporting Linux?

Does anyone know of educational vendors who are supporting Linux-based 1:1 laptop initiatives for schools? This was a question I posted today as a comment to Zachary Saale‘s post, “Linux Is The Future! Or Not?” You raise good points, Zachary. The low comfort level of many (if not most) college professors with technology is a

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Thank you, President Obama, for banning torture and working to uphold U.S. Constitutional values

It is a sad day indeed when everyday citizens of the United States actually debate whether or not torture should be blessed by the U.S. President, our military, and our various security forces operating abroad and at home. Having served in the U.S. military, having studied the U.S.-led war in Indochina extensively (including the plight

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WordPress plugins for a new blog

Published by in blogs on May 28th, 2009

I setup a new WordPress blog today for a writing project, and used the following plug-ins. My somewhat out-of-date list of WordPress plug-ins I’m using here “Moving at the Speed of Creativity” is available on my about page. AddThis http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/addthis/ Feedburner Plugin http://www.google.com/support/feedburner/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=78483 No Revisions http://www.hostscope.com/wordpress-plugins/norevisions-wordpress-plugin/ PhotoDropper http://www.photodropper.com/wordpress-plugin/ PodPress http://www.mightyseek.com/podpress/ ReCaptcha http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-recaptcha/ Riffly audio video

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Merit Pay, Teachers and Lion Tamers

Doug Noon shared some very timely and thought provoking commentary as well as quotations in today’s post, “Retro reform idea – Merit Pay.” My favorite quotation is the one he starts with from Al Shanker: The idea that if you’re paid more you’ll work harder may apply to selling encyclopedias. If you’re a lion-tamer, you’re

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We’ve come so far, so fast – And we need more digital witnesses in the Oklahoma panhandle!

It’s amazing to realize how dramatically and quickly life has changed in many parts of these United States. Consider the following paragraph from Timothy Egan’s fantastic book, “The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl,” on pages 41-42: In the fall of 1922, Hazel saddled up Pecos

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Slidecast of Part 2 of 2: Storychasing – Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses

This evening I uploaded and synchronized an audio recording my keynote Saturday for the Webheads in Action Online Convergence 2009 Conference, publishing a Slidecast on Slideshare: Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses (Part 2 of 2) View more Microsoft Word documents from Wesley Fryer. I apologize for the rather poor audio quality of the recording at

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A ready-made slideshow of great education quotations

Next time you have an opportunity to share some quotations with a group of educators, parents, or others interested in learning and school change, consider sharing a slideshow of the images in the “Great quotes about Learning and Change” Flickr group. Just be sure to check if Flickr is accessible in the location where you’re

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Slidecast of Part 1 of 2: Storychasing – Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses

This morning I created a Slidecast using Slideshare of my keynote address from the PodStock conference several weeks ago, shared in Wichita, Kansas, on May 1, 2009. This presentation is part one in a two part series titled, “Storychasing: Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses.” A Slidecast includes multimedia slides synchronized to a mp3 audio file.

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Exemplary digital stories by educators in Stilwell, Oklahoma

Last week I helped facilitate a 2.5 day workshop on digital storytelling in Stilwell, Oklahoma, as part of our statewide Celebrate Oklahoma Voices project. Stilwell is located in Adair County, just seven miles from the Arkansas state line in extreme eastern Oklahoma. The following three videos were created by educators in the workshop, and are

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New technology on top of the old

This was our presenter computer setup in Stilwell, Oklahoma, last week for a Celebrate Oklahoma Voices workshop held at Maryetta School. The room where we held the training was outfitted with a Lightspan projector, which can receive a video signal wirelessly from a computer running special Lightspan software. Unfortunately, Mac software was not available to

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Why Storychasing is relevant for all educators – Contextual learning about copyright is important

I am in the midst of discussing keynote topic options for an educational technology conference in 2010 with the conference organizer, and wrote the following paragraphs recently in response to the question, “How does StoryChasing: Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses speak across the spectrum to many disciplines?” The organizer wanted to know if my keynote

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Burning a DVD of a web-based video quick

This morning my 8 year daughter wants to share her International Cooking Show video on baking banana bread with her music class, which has been having a low key “talent show” this week as school wraps up. Since virtually all blogs, social media sites and video sharing sites are blocked on her school network, the

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Podcast318: Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses (Storychasing Part I – PodStock09 Keynote)

This podcast is a recording of my keynote address for the 2009 PodStock conference, held in Wichita, Kansas, on May 1-2, 2009. This part 1 of a 2 part series on Storychasing: Empowering Students as Digital Witnesses. Part 2 will be presented online this weekend on Saturday, May 23, 2009, at 1900 GMT (2 pm

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BoxBe Courtesy Messages Discontinued

Published by in edtech on May 17th, 2009

After signing up for the free BoxBe email filtering / mail screening service recently, I didn’t realize lots of folks (maybe everyone) who was emailing me was receiving a message FROM me via BoxBe saying that I use their service. Evidently this is something users agree to by default when they sign up for the

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Podcast317: Comparing Drop.io and Gabcast for Cell Phone Digital Recording

In this podcast from the road, I compare the available features, limitations, and relative benefits of using the web service drop.io compared to Gabcast for cell phone (or regular land line phone) digital recording. Gcast is another available option for phone-in recording, and I discuss it a bit as well. Both Gabcast and Gcast became

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