Please see this letter in request of your support for the PATINS-Project to continue providing Assistive Tech and UDL support in the State of Indiana.  We would greatly appreciate your voice of suport.
Download Letter Here: PATINS AT letter of support 11-10-09

3D SL Wiki PATINS Staff

Think the idea of multiple parties in multiple locations collaborating on a single piece of writing in a traditional Wiki is cool?  Try to wrap your head around the possibilities that exist with a 3 Dimensional Wiki where each node or page of the wiki can contain text, links, notes, objects, etc!   Here’s a screen shot of the PATINS Staff participating in a 3D wiki experience on our Second Life Island regarding a Project Based Learning Book Study.   More to come on the possibilities here!  Don’t forget today at 2pm in my office on our Second Life PATINS Island will be the Accessible Technologies Round Table Discussion!  Here’s the slurl:

Mac Accessibility: Today, I’m doing a session for a district on some of the built-in accessibility features of Mac OS X and thought I’d might as well share a couple things here!

• Great Video Demonstration: Accessibility in Action
• Take your accessibility preferences with you: “Once you’ve customized your own Mac, you can take all your VoiceOver settings with you on the road. To do so, connect a USB flash drive to your Mac and choose Create Portable Preferences from the File menu in VoiceOver Utility.”

Quick Thoughts:

• Today’s students are expected to have about 7 careers, NOT 7 jobs in their lifetime.  How should this impact what we teach them and how we are teaching them?
  
• When you think about ACCESS to your curriculum; physical and sensory access is usually pretty concrete, but we must also think in terms of cognitive access.  What, specifically, are you doing with your teaching to account for cognitive access to the general education curriculum for ALL of your students?
  

TEXT TO BRAILLE: www.translatum.gr/converter/braille.htm

First, I’ve also spent quite a bit of time with the folks at Don Johnston discussing and working with Read:OutLoud 6.  I wanted to be sure to remind everyone that you have access to download this new version 6 of Read:OutLoud at no charge to you AND to put it on ALL of your school computers AS WELL as send it home wiht your students for their home computers!  Read more on this opportunity you have to move your educational space toward a more Universally Designed instructional environment:   www.icam.k12.in.us/ DRMs download ROL6 here: www.icam.k12.in.us/downloads.php

CRU’s:

…AND You can get 3 CRU’s just for learning how to use Read:OutLoud!   Here: www.donjohnston.com/state/indiana/indiana_readoutloud/index.html

UDL Blog: Some of you may know of Karen Janowski already.   If you don’t, you should!   One of the many great things Karen has is a real nice blog on UDL (Teaching Every Student)  http://teachingeverystudent.blogspot.com

Wikipedia Simple English Image

Wikipedia Tip: Many of you know my feelings on Wikipedia and if you don’t I’ll be happy to share.  In general, I am strongly in support of allowing the use of wikipedia and teaching students to cross reference and to truly evaluate their resources.  SO, I thought I’d share this little tip.  When performing a wikipedia search, there is a link along the left side of the screen that reads, “Simple English,” within the available languages.  Remember that access to the curriculum is certainly about physical and sensory access, but it’s also just as much about cognitive access.  Play with using this Simple English setting to get the same content presented in simpler terminology.

UDL Concept Map: Check here for a nice pdf of a UDL, AT, RTI, DI concept map from Brian Wojcik: http://59303.wikispaces.com/file/view/UDL+RTI+AT+Relationship.pdf See what you think.  I’d love to have discusison with Indiana folks on how these terms/concepts relate to one another.

Magify! I think I’ve blogged this one before, but certainly worth sharing again.  A MAGNIFIED search tool: http://big.com/home.php

Simplified Web Pages: Allows you to simplify and remove some distracting content on web pages.  There are also add-ins for firefox, apps for the iphone and bookmarklets.  http://tidyread.com/

OK… I have LOTS more to share and I promise I will… I have to make the journey back to Indiana RIGHT NOW, before Jim leaves me in Chicago, but I will try to post another entry perhaps tonight after Trick Or Treating! 

PATINS-Project Staff in Second Life Image

Here’s your chance to see what the PATINS Project is doing in Second Life.
We are hosting an open house on our Second Life Island and you are invited to join us to see what it is all about.
When:    Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Time:     9:00 a.m. – 2:30 p.m. and then again 6:00 – 8:00 p.m. EST
Where:  Go to: http://slurl.com/secondlife/PATINS%20Project%20Island/114/98/26

Various PATINS staff will be available during these hours and activities will include island tours, formal address and discussion of potential future events and training/meeting topics.  You must already have your avatar created prior to this event in order to participate. Attached, you will find how to “GET STARTED” on Second Life or visit the PATINS Website http://patinsproject.com/videos.html for 5 video tutorials that walk you through getting your avatar created.  You can always contact us ahead of time for additional help.

Give it a try… and give us feedback on how you like it, and what you would like to see us provide you on our island.

1. Do you have an Avatar created? See here: www.patinsproject.com/htm/TrainingVideos/SecondLife/SecondLifeIntro1/Second%20Life%20Introduction%20Tutorial%201.html
2. Do you have the software downloaded and installed? See here: http://secondlife.com/support/downloads/?lang=en-US
3. Have you checked to make sure you can access Second Life and that your computer meets the minimum system requirements? See here: http://secondlife.com/support/system-requirements
4. Do you have the address or slurl for the PATINS Island? Here: http://slurl.com/secondlife/PATINS%20Project%20Island/114/102/26
5. Need The One Page Getting Started Hand Out? Second Life Getting Started Informational Sheet

Free Online Sketch Pad: I’ve recently been playing around with the potential use of a pen/tablet type of device in place of a traditional mouse.  During this experimentation I’ve been fascinated by the ability of many of these devices to respond to pressure (pressure sensitive) and have been looking for a free way of utilizing this technology.  Check out this Free Online Sketch Pad. www.onlinesketchpad.com

RFB&D Books! The ICAM is pleased to announce a recent agreement made with Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic to provide audio digital format to certified students with a print disability textbooks and trade books (novels). The Agreement allows at no cost to the school district to place request for materials and download materials through your ICAM registered Digital Rights Manager. To learn more on training and how to access RFB&D See the Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic tab on the Tools & Downloads page.

• Announcement Letter: www.icam.k12.in.us/RFBDannouncementfall09.pdf
  More Info Under the RFB&D Tab here: www.icam.k12.in.us/downloads.php

Read:OutLoud Image Logo

Read: OutLoud: NEW VERSION FREE!!!!   FOR ALL YOUR COMPUTERS!!!!  Version 6 has many GREAT improvements!

More info and perform download here: www.icam.k12.in.us/downloads.php

Caption YouTube Videos: Just sign in with your Google Account and quickly caption YouTube Videos to make them accessible.  Easy and Free: http://captiontube.appspot.com/

]]> http://nepatins.edublogs.org/2009/10/16/10162009patins-sl-open-house-tuesday-new-readoutloud-version-6-free-for-all-your-computers-rfbd-book-opportunity-free-online-sketch-pad-caption-you-tube-videos/feed/ 1 http://nepatins.edublogs.org/2009/10/09/1092009-crus-available-now-for-rol-second-life-getting-started-quick-tips-and-updating-patins-open-house-other-great-locations-k-12-podcasting-resources/ http://nepatins.edublogs.org/2009/10/09/1092009-crus-available-now-for-rol-second-life-getting-started-quick-tips-and-updating-patins-open-house-other-great-locations-k-12-podcasting-resources/#comments Fri, 09 Oct 2009 15:32:24 +0000 danielgmcnulty http://nepatins.edublogs.org/?p=403 Are You Ready?

The PATINS Second Life Open House is only 11 days away!

1. Do you have an Avatar created? See here: www.patinsproject.com/htm/TrainingVideos/SecondLife/SecondLifeIntro1/Second%20Life%20Introduction%20Tutorial%201.html
2. Do you have the software downloaded and installed? See here: http://secondlife.com/support/downloads/?lang=en-US
3. Have you checked to make sure you can access Second Life and that your computer meets the minimum system requirements? See here: http://secondlife.com/support/system-requirements
4. Do you have the address or slurl for the PATINS Island? Here: http://slurl.com/secondlife/PATINS%20Project%20Island/114/102/26
5. Need The One Page Getting Started Hand Out? Second Life Getting Started Informational Sheet

Regarding System Requirements: The two most common issues with some computers not being able to access Second Life are High Speed Internet Connection and a new enough Video Card and Drivers.  The high speed internet connection speaks for itself, but you can check here for info on updating your computers video card drivers to the latest, which just might solve your problem:

Update Your Video Card:

• ATI Video Card Drivers: http://support.amd.com/us/gpudownload/Pages/index.aspx
• NVIDIA Video Card Drivers: http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

Info on Letting Second Life Through! Here’s some techy info which may be necessary for accessing Second Life from your teacher computer at school:

• Hardware firewalls need to allow access on certain network ports. Second Life needs to connect to ports:443/TCP, 12035/UDP, 12036/UDP, 12043/TCP, and 13000-13050/UDP.
• You should configure your firewall to allow outbound traffic on those ports, and related inbound traffic.
• You’ll need to consult your firewall’s documentation, or the manufacturer’s website, for instructions on how to make these changes to your firewall.
• As of Version 1.13.2, released Jan. 10th, 2007, you need to enable UDP/TCP in order to access Second Life.Second Life Subnets used for connections:
  • 63.210.156.0/22
  • 64.154.220.0/22
  • 8.2.32.0/22
  • 8.4.128.0/22
  • 8.10.144.0/21
  • 216.82.0.0/18

Contact Us
With Questions.  We’re Happy To Help!

CRU’s for ROL:

You may or may not be aware that you can get CRU’s just for learning how to use  Read:OutLoud software that Indiana has made available to every computer in your district AND take-home rights for students.

• CRU’s available here: www.donjohnston.com/state/indiana/indiana_readoutloud/index.html
• More info on ROL here:  www.icam.k12.in.us/downloads.php

NPR in Second Life: As I’m sure you’re eagerly awaiting the Open House for our very own PATINS Project Island in Second Life on Oct. 20, you might want to spend some time over at the NPR Island, especially on Fridays when they have their “Science Friday” presentations!   Here is a great set of resources on the blog: www.storyofmysecondlife.com/?p=397 and here is the Island Location in SL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Science%20Friday/205/250/23

Two Other Virtual Spaces: I’ve blogged about lots of different virtual spaces, in addition to Second Life, including the 150 or so that are specifically intended for school aged children.  Well, here are two more that are new to me.  I’ve not explored either of them yet, but wanted to throw them out there and if you decide to check into one or both, I’d love for people to report their thoughts back here to the blog as comments.

• Blue Mars: www.bluemarsonline.com
• Metaplace: http://metaplace.com

Jokaydia Island and Resources:  “…a community of educators and artists exploring Second Life. Lots of great, creative resources here.

• The Wiki: http://jokaydia.com/2009/10/02/trademarks-and-the-sleducation-wiki/
• The SL Location: http://slurl.com/secondlife/jokaydia/128/128/25

1 Quick Teleporting Tip: Ever teleport away and want to go back?   See here:
https://blogs.secondlife.com/community/community/tnt/blog/2009/10/01/quicktip-ever-accidentally-teleport-away-and-want-to-go-back

K-12 Podcasting: …had a few questions this week about podcasting at the K-12 level.  Here’s just a real quick and NOT comprehensive list, but a good place to get started if you are new to the concept of podcasting:

• http://www.edtechmag.com/k12/issues/april-may-2007/podcasting-at-school.html
• http://www.edtechmag.com/k12/issues/april-may-2007/podcasting-at-school.html
• http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~nshelley/
• http://www.infotoday.com/cilmag/apr06/Eash.shtml
• http://www.det.wa.edu.au/education/cmis/eval/curriculum/ict/podcasts/
• http://kathyschrock.net/podcasting/podcasting.pdf
• http://www.intelligenic.com/blog/
• http://fcit.usf.edu/podcasts/

I do have a free hands-on podcasting workshop scheduled for Feb. 9.  We can also come out to you to do a training and/or we can have a training online in our new Second Life Island for free, saving travel costs for everyone!  Let us know how we can help!

Promethean Try B4 U Buy! Dave Tutton at Promethean Inc. has offered the opportunity to evaluate Activclassroom and accompanying products for a period of 90 days as a try before you buy sort of opportunity.  As many of you know, I’m a big believer in the instructional power of interactive whiteboards.  This may be an offer you want to look into. Full offer details available and a download of the form to take advantage of this offer here: http://www.patinsproject.com/ExperienceActivClassroom  TC’s Final 1 19 2009 97 version.docAny questions should be directed to tutton@empower-learning.com

Priory Woods: Check out these cool switch/touch screen videos from Priory Woods! www.priorywoods.middlesbrough.sch.uk/resources/videos.htm

Online Teaching in Florida: Check into this article from eSchool News on teaching and learning in virtual environments.   A quote, “As virtual schooling continues to surge in popularity, there is a growing need for new K-12 teachers who understand how to teach in an online environment successfully. ” www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/?i=57314

While we’re on the topic of online learning and professional development; I realized this week that there are people out there who simply are not aware of the educational potential of these tools.  Most of you know that I’ve been blogging about the potential of professional development in immersive 3D environments like Second Life, Jumpstart World, Pixie Hollow, etc., for most of this school year.  We’re getting closer, I feel, to doing some professional development in an online immersive  environment every week and I find it exciting in many ways.  We’ve got a lot to learn, thats for sure.  I realized this week however, that perhaps I haven’t shared with you all some of my reasoning behind supporting tools like Second Life for teachers to learn and develop their professional skills in.  I am, by far, not the first to think of implementing these tools for educational purposes.  I thought it would be worthwhile to use the rest of this week’s post to share some resources, data and general information on the topic.  I hope it is beneficial and informative.

Just a select few other respected educational organizations and campuses utilizing Second Life include:

• Florida Diagnostic & Learning Resources System: http://www.paec.org/fdlrsweb/
• More than 300 universities including: Duke, Harvard, Purdue, Indiana University, Bowling Green, Ohio, Ball State, etc.
• Center for Advanced Technology at Oregon University
• PBS Teachers: http://innovateclassrooms.blogspot.com/2008/11/are-you-pbs-teacher.html
• Austin Educators Coop
• Marlboro College Graduate Center
• Lighthouse Learning Island: A Second Life professional learning community created by four K-12 school districts in southeastern Massachusetts.
• Another helpful article in “THE Journal” http://www.thejournal.com/articles/23777
• The Appalachian Ohio K-12 Second Life Learning Community
• IBM, NASA and International Spaceflight
• Ann Myers Medical Center:  A training/teaching hospital in second life for real life doctors and nurses.
• A slideshare from the University of Cali Berkeley on Academic Library 2.0:
  http://www.slideshare.net/HVX.Mica/second-life-education-in-a-virtual-world-slidecast
• Specific information on educational usage from the Second Life folks themselves can be found here:  http://sleducation.wikispaces.com/educationaluses
• The top 20, according to Second Life folks, educational locations in Second Life here exist here: http://simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Top_20_Educational_Locations_in_Second_Life
• Discovery Educator Network: http://blog.discoveryeducation.com/secondlife/
• A strong listing of Second Life URLs for K-12 education continues here: http://kathyschrock.net/k12secondlife/

I realized this week that some people new to the blog who maybe hadn’t read my early postings on immersive environments might not have this foundation which would help in understanding my interest in the concept for teacher learning and professional development.  The main point I want to make is that we are not the first, nor the only educational orgazation to recognize the potential in these immersive technologies like Second Life.  There are true pioneers of this concept listed above and it would be well worth your time to check them out before forming an opinion for or against this idea of immersive 3D virtual world teaching and learning.

Tech Expo: Don’t forget to register for the 2009 PATINS Tech Expo here: www.patinsproject.com/training.html

ROL: …and to download your district’s FREE UNLIMITED license of Don Johnston’s Read:OutLoud software here: www.icam.k12.in.us/DJ/DJLogin.aspx

Indiana’s Universal Design for Learning (UDL) teams gathered in Indianapolis this Monday.  One team has already blogged about their experience there:  http://esmspatins.edublogs.org/2009/02/24/udl-collaboration-day/

Photos from the UDL Collaboration Day next week!

Indiana Moms: I came across this blog this morning from “real Indiana moms of a child with a disability,” and was completely impressed!  Check this out and get yourself subscribed to their blog for sure: http://4thosewhofollow.blogspot.com/

There are still many Indiana schol districts that haven’t taken advantage of this incredible opportunity to install Read:OutLoud text-to-speech on ALL district and ALL student home computers, AT NO COST!  PATINS-Project and the State of Indiana has already purchased this unlimited license for all Indiana K-12 districts with a Digital Rights Manager (DRM).  All the DRM in your district needs to do is go to this website to download the software: http://www.icam.k12.in.us/DJ/DJLogin.aspx

The September 15th letter announcing this unique opportunity for Indiana schools can be downloaded here: http://www.icam.k12.in.us/LEADRMannouncment.pdf

Remember this software can (and should) be used with all students, not just those who qualify for NIMAS File Sets.  Contact me with questions you might have about this opportunity.

TRLD: Two weeks ago I gave a few short intros to several tools I learned at TRLD and promised to go into more detail on them.  So, here’s one of my new favorites!

Bubbl: The first tool worth spending some time with is called, “Bubbl.”  Bubbl is a website: http://bubbl.us/, so it can be accessed on any computer with internet capabilities AND it’s FREE.  Think of Bubbl as a concept mapping or brainstorming application.  Each bubble can be moved, linked or re-linked to other bubbles, named, re-colored.  You don’t even need to sign up for the free account to start using it.  You simply click Start Brainstorming as in the image to the left.  If you want to save your creation, then you do need to create a free account.  This tool, to me, seems like a great resource for the classroom (any classroom) the case conference, parent-teacher conferences, alternate method of response and/or pre-writing preparation for students to use at home, etc.  A sample Bubbl looks like this:

ATIA…and some more from ATIA 2009: The idea of Assimilation vs. Accommodation was something interesting in one of my sessions that I wanted to share.  We all know that far too often, when we try to incorporate or implement technology into the classroom, that it ends up getting dusty over in the corner of the room.  There are likely many reasons this happens, but this concept of Assimilation vs. Accommodation is one that really stuck with me.  Most of the time I think we try to Assimilate technology into what we are already doing in the classroom.  Think of this as doing old things in new ways.  When we do this, we can often end up saving time, being more efficient, etc, but not really changing the core achievement of students.  Accommodation, on the other hand refers to really taking a look at doing things in completely new ways, possibly with new technologies.  Are we truly teaching our students to be literate when we consider non-linear or hypertext reading, interactive text and multi-media reading and navigation?

Mac Screen-Capture: I received a question about screen-capture software for the Mac yesterday and did a little researching that I thought was worth sharing.  On the PC, I certainly have my favorite tools of Camtasia (paid) and CamStudio(free).  But, on the Mac I hadn’t yet found anything I’d consider a favorite.  Here’s a quick list of products on the Free Mac Blog that I thought was certainly worth sharing here: www.freemacblog.com/mac-options-for-capturing-a-video-of-your-screen/.  Playing around with them myself, I have to say that I like iShowU HD the best.  It is not a free one, but relatively inexpensive at around $29.  It includes YouTube upload and capture from video cameras as well.  iShowU (w/out the HD) is around $20.   There is also an iShowU HD PRO for $59 which adds a few features you may or may not need such as watermarking and audio mixing.

JING:  Of course, there is my old friend JING for both the PC and the Mac that will also do screen capture as both still images and video.  However, the free version of JING only records screen video as an swf file.  This is fine, unless you need to convert to another format or do editing on.  The paid version of JING costs $14.95/year and offers many additional features including the recording of video in formats other than swf.

PATINS TECH EXPO 2009

April 16, 2009
9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Junior Achievement Building
of Central IN, Inc.
7435 North Keystone Ave.
Indianapolis, IN  46240
No Cost to attend!   Door Prizes
To Register:
http://patinsproject.com/training.html

TRLD Conference 2009:

Lots of good stuff at the conference!  My session went really well this evening and was well attended.  A recurring theme at the conference and general buzz amongst people seemed to be that of professional development and how it seems that so many teachers are ready for it to be, at least in part, an online experience.  This is interesting to me and goes right along with my recent blogging about Second Life and other immersive environments as I believe this sort of 3D virtual world is where we are headed with a lot of professional development.

Some quick tips and things to try:

Zoho: Zoho is sort of like Google Apps on steroids.  Try this out as a great way to collaborate on documents!   It’s FREE.  www.zoho.com

Twidla: Twidla is a FREE interactive whiteboard that multiple people can use and colloaborate on at once.  It’s fairly basic, but it works really well and it’s free!  www.twidla.com

TagCrowd: A free, simple way to take a body of text and focus down to the most frequently used words in that text.  Very Powerful Tool in my opinion!  www.tagcrowd.com

UDL Editions: http://udleditions.cast.org/

Book Builder: http://bookbuilder.cast.org

CAST Curriculum Self-Check: http://udlselfcheck.cast.org/

CAST UDL Lesson Builder: http://lessonbuilder.cast.org

PATINS Project Tech Expo

April 16, 2009

Junior Achievement Building of Central IN, Inc.

7435 North Keystone Ave.

Indianapolis, IN  46240

• No cost to you.
• Varied Presentations nd Vendor Booths.
• Door Prizes and Giveaways!

• Register for the Tech Expo By Clicking HERE

NIMAS Digital Rights Managers Update:

• There are currently a little over 600 DRMs registered statewide.
• New DRMs can now be registered through the ICAM right on their website.
• There will be DRM Webinar Trainings from the ICAM almost every week, on Tuesdays.

Pixies Online: It’s been a few weeks since I’ve talked about immersive environments such as Second Life and I wanted to mention a couple of things.  First, we now have a PATINS-Project SL Group in Second Life.  If you create an avatar (which is free) in Second Life, do a search for PATINS and join our group!

These last few weeks, my daughters have been completely immersed in Disney’s Pixie Hollow, which is a free, online virtual world.  Unlike Second Life it is highly controlled and I feel, quite safe.  My daughters each have created multiple fairies (avatars), know how to fly them around, how to chat with other fairies, how to collect ingredients such as leaves and spider webs and how to decorate their fairy homes!   My daughters are 5 and 7 years old.  I’ve given them relatively little instruction or help once I helped them set up their accounts.  This is just incredible to me and it really goes to show that this sort of 3D virtual or immersive world is what our students are growing up with.  They understand it, it’s not “wierd” to them like I hear from many teachers and they are quickly able to learn with it, from it and contribute to their worlds.  I think we have an obligation to pay some close attention to what’s coming!

Congratulations Frontier Elementary School! Last Friday morning I visited Brookston, Indiana.  Frontier Elementary is the school I taught at and helped to plant the Universal Design for Learning seed prior to working with the PATINS-Project.   Having successfully completed the 3-year UDL Pilot Project with PATINS, the dedicated Frontier Elementary staff enlisted the help of the community of Brookston in order to continue funding technology (mainly SMART-Boards) to continue making the instructional environment of FES more universally accessible to students.  Friday morning, FES hosted a special ceremony to express their gratitude to all the donors and to the staff who put in a lot of extra work to make possible the purchase of 13 additional SMART-Boards at around $42,000!!!  It was an honor to return to Frontier on Friday and to be a part of the ceremony.  I’m certainly proud to be able to say I taught at FES and proud to be able to recommend FES to other schools looking for a model of how to scale up the UDL efforts in their buildings.  The dedication, hard work and teamwork of FES teachers and administration demonstrates that even in the current economic situation, funds do exist!  Check out the News Channel 18 (WLFI) coverage: www.wlfi.com/dpp/news/local_wlfi_smartboards_01092008

Welcome New UDL Teams! Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, the 8 new schools selected this past October to particpate in the PATINS UDL Pilot Program met in Indianapolis for two intense days of training with Dave Edyburn and the PATINS staff.  Check out photos from the training here: www.patinsproject.com/PhotoGalleries/UDLTeamTrain2009

NIMAS Sample Contract Language: As many districts begin planning for textbooks and are talking with publishers, it’s important to remember to include language in your textbook contracts regarding the deposit of the NIMAS File Sets into the NIMAC.  PATINS and the ICAM have some sample contract language you can use here: www.icam.k12.in.us/generalinfo.php

MOBCASTING CONTINUED: So, hopefully last week you were able to set up your mobcast.  If you missed it, check out the easy step-by-step instructions.

Once you do have your free account set up and at least one episode recorded, you can login to your gabcast account (www.gabcast.com) to listen to your recordings online, download them individually OR you might consider submitting your gabcast mobcast to iTunes as a podcast (if you don’t mind it being public) OR you can simply share your mobcast RSS feed with the people you’d like to have access to the audio.

Submitting to iTunes:

1. Login to you gabcast account
2. Click on the My Channels Tab:

3. Click on the Title of your Channel:

4. Click the “CLICK TO SUBSCRIBE” orange button:

5. Click the RSS icon as the very first option on the page:

6. Copy (ctrl+C) the url in the address bar of the browser that opens up.

7. Open iTunes and go to the iTunes Store.  Once there, click on “Podcasts” in the upper left area of the iTunes Store.  You should then see an icon right in the middle of the store that looks like this:

8. When you click that “Submit a Podcast” button, you have the opportunity to Paste (ctrl+V) the address of your mobcast’s RSS Feed (from step 6 above).  This submits your mobcast to the iTunes Podcast directory for review.  It might take 2-4 days for iTunes staff to approve your podcast (verify that it contains what you state that it contains) before it will be public.

…AND THAT’S ALL THERE IS TO IT!  

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I know most people are either on break or just getting back to work so, I thought I’d keep it somewhat brief and simple this week with something you should already be somewhat familiar with:

FREE Text-To-Speeech: Most, if not all, of you have at least heard by now that the recent agreement between the PATINS-Project and Don Johnston Incorporated has allowed for an unlimited, school-wide, including take-home rights, version of Don Johnston’s Read:OutLoud software, free for all Indiana school districts with a Digital Rights Manager.

I decided to address this opportunity this week for several reasons.  First, Read:OutLoud on every computer in a school building (and at home) is a huge step toward a Universally Designed Instructional Environment. Second, I’ve gotten some questions/concerns from districts in my region over the past couple of weeks about what this Read:OutLoud program actually is, what it can do and what benefit there might be to offering it to all students in a school building.

First, I’d like to point out the financial importance of this opportunity. Simply put, Read:OutLoud is a commercial product that has been around for quite some time (long before NIMAS).  Typical pricing for the product starts at $299 per license (for 1-4) computers.  This opportunity through PATINS, allows districts to have the software FREE.

Once a DRM downloads the Free Read:OutLoud (ROL) software from the ICAM website (www.icam.k12.in.us/downloads.php) He/she is free to install ROL on any PC, Mac or Linux computer in the district AND keep it installed, free of charge, forever!  Additionally, the DRM can burn CD’s with the ROL software on it and send them home with the students who need the program installed in their home environment in order to complete their homework.  This is an important consideration as we begin to understand that if a student needs alternative formats at school, he/she will very likely also need them at home to complete assignments.  AND, if that wasn’t enough incentive to get this free download, Don Johnston Incorporated has also agreed to provide Indiana with free upgrades to ROL during the first year.  Please don’t confuse this with your ability to keep ROL installed for as long as you’d like.  You just won’t receive free upgrades past the initial year.  However, the program will likely still be very effective for a large number of students for many years to come with or without upgrades!

So, Quickly, here are some  Questions I’ve received recently and the answers to them:

Q: Is this only free for a limited time?  A: NO, the ROL application is free and unlimited forever (for Indiana Schools with a DRM). Upgrades are free for the first year.

Q: Is ROL only for NIMAS Qualified Students?  A: NO, ROL has been around since long before NIMAS and ANY student in your building may access the software.  Keep the UDL concept in mind.

Q: Should I wait to install ROL until my district has students needing NIMAS books?  A: NO, ROL is a powerful tool intended to help students with all sorts of reading and print needs.  In fact, offering a tool such as ROL as a choice to all students at all times is really what Universal Design for Learning is all about.

Q: What does ROL really do?  A: Read:OutLoud can provide text-to-speech from many formats including html, xml, Daisy, rtf, pdf, NIMAS and also includes text to speech web browsing to improve the accessibility of online research.  Other supports, include text highlighting, text notes, supported reading guides, speaking dictionary and bibliographer wizard!

Q: How does Indiana’s ROL Universal Access version differ from the Bookshare.org ROL version?  A: Please reference this chart from Don Johnston to view the differences:  www.donjohnston.com/resources/rol_cm_table.pdf.  Of course, the Universal Access Version is FREE for Indiana DRMs with regard to this chart.

Hopefully, this helps clear up some of the misconceptions I’ve been hearing about this wonderful opportunity from Indiana, PATINS and Don Johnston Incorporated.  Please contact the ICAM or your PATINS Site Coordinator with further questions.  We’re all very happy to help!

Additionally, you can reference the Read:OutLoud Announcement Letter that was sent out to Indiana Digital Right’s Managers (DRMs) from the ICAM on September 15, 2008, here: www.icam.k12.in.us/LEADRMannouncment.pdf

If you are a registered DRM and you’re ready to download your free Read:OutLoud, you can do that here:
www.icam.k12.in.us/DJ/DJLogin.aspx

One more resource for finding accessible books online:

• Lit2Go: http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/ (Thanks Jim)

And a free Head-Tracking resource to try if you have a student needing to use head-tracking to access his/her computer.  I know I’ve talked a lot about this free program in the past and have recommended it to many people in person, but it seems like I’ve been getting a lot of questions lately from LEA’s looking for just this sort of thing. eFMer Track! is a free download that simply uses just about any old webcam you can find and tracks your student’s head movement as an alternative to a standard mouse, scanning, trackballs, etc.  Check it out: www.efmer.eu/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12&Itemid=30

Parent Forms, CD Labels for Take-Home Rights and More: www.donjohnston.com/products/read_outloud/un_access.html

Read:Outloud Video: www.donjohnston.com/media/flash/product_demo/readoutloud/index.html

ALSO, on the PATINS Website, one of the new Video Tutorials is specifically on using Read:OutLoud to open/convert a NIMAS File Set.  View it here: www.patinsproject.com/videos.html

Remember that you can also contact the ICAM and your Regional PATINS Site Coordinator for more info on Read:Outloud and other text-to-speech and NIMAS related software as well.  Contact info here: www.patinsproject.com/contact.html

iPod Touch Apps: It seems like more people everyday are starting to use the iPod Touch or the iPhone.  I know of at least one UDL Pilot School planning to implement iPod touches in their classrooms.  The technology in these devices is exciting to me and the educational possibilities with this sort of technology is just beginning!   Looking in the iTunes App Store, I found several educational applications including, flash card apps, math apps, foreign language apps, study/review skills apps and more.   Some of these apps are free and others range from $2 up to $10 or slightly more.  If you haven’t done so already, go to the iTunes store from within iTunes, then click on Apps and browse the Education category a little bit:

Don’t miss the
PATINS State Conference-

Accessing the Curriculum, November 10th and 11th. The “Early Bird” price break on registration has been extended to October 17th. Details can be found here.

There have been a lot of great, free, regional PATINS workshops and trainings going on around the state that many of you have been taking advantage of.  Additional workshops/trainings can be scheduled as well: www.patinsproject.com/regional.html Please note that there has been a slight change in workshop registrations for the NE PATINS Site.  All registrations must now be completed online rather than by faxing a form or calling.  See here: www.patinsproject.com/ne.html This should simplify the process and help elliminate errors and confusion.  Contact the NE Site if you have problems or questions with the new registration procedure.

Next Week is Closing The Gap in Minnesota.  I’ll be out of the office, but will be returning email as possible. I’ll be gathering information all week and then presenting on Friday afternoon.  I can’t wait to share information on the blog!

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