cwilliams11

portal for educators, librarians, & media specialists

Archive for December, 2008

Twine

A spool of string.

Image via Wikipedia

Twine could ape Donny & Marie, with “I’m a little bit Diigo and I’m a little bit Zemanta.”

Push and pull content based upon your interests through automated magic behind the scenes and selected contacts within view.

Easy to use from the start: http://www.twine.com/user/cwilliams11

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Wordle for Schools

Via twitter friend Angela Maiers, the Unquiet Librarian (2008/12/12) posted a slideshare and several useful links in “Resources for Using Wordle“.

Sproutbuilder @ Schools

Sproutbuilder’s blog reports that “Farmington Public Schools Creates Web Presence” by embedding sprouts into the school’s webpages. (

Link to the Farmington training wiki: http://techfarm.wikispaces.com/Sprout

Link to Farmington’s Faculty Webpages: http://www.farmington.k12.mi.us/woo/facultywebpage.html

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TimeSearch

TimeSearch “Search the Web through Timelines” (and surprise yourself with what you find.)

Thanks to Zemanta for citing this new startup as a popular article. From TimeSearch’s results, you can move to related Google or History World items. You can also browse single search timelines, picture search or go to places in history.

History World is “an ever expanding history resource to Make history Make sense.”

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Zemanta

Galileo semantic areas sewcom method

I just added Zemanta a firefox-add on (download it here); a semantic application that adds suggestions, “fuels content”, for photos, links, tags and other helpful items as I post. A fantastic feature is that each item’s copyright license is displayed, or a directive to “check for yourself” is noted, if a license statement is not located by the search function.

I’ll go back to a few prior posts to test it out, meanwhile you can take the Zemanta tour.

Right away I’ve seen that photos should be added at the start of a post since the style of this blog has narrow columns. Otherwise, individual words get stuck floating along side the image.

Thanks for the correction!…

One idea for adding images in-between text is to include it where you want it, then while writing click on a small image of an image in top-right corner of inserted image. A new dialog will open up where you can select alignment type “none”. This should prevent it from messing up your design.

__Jure Cahalev (comments: 12/15/2008)

Now I can’t wait to try scribefire and Insights, a WordPress plugin!

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Google Book Search adds Magazines

This morning’s announcement from the Official Google Blog:
Search and Find Magazines on Google Book Search

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Use Google Earth for Evacuation Plans

An excellent idea via the Hot Chalk blog: Use Google Earth for Evacuation Plans

  • Create a Google Map with two escape routes from you classroom and meeting spots
  • Create a Google Map to mark the location of first aid kits, defibrillators, and other other emergency supplies
  • Use Google Docs to create a spreadsheet with a list of items needed in an emergency kit
  • Use Google Search to look for emergency supplies online
  • Create a Google Site for your classroom, specifically for the emergency plan. Students can collaborate and use it to check in if an emergency happens when they are off campus
  • Use Google Earth and turn on the weather layer to track local weather to see how it will affect your neighborhood. The weather in Google Earth is updated every 10 minutes

Synchcronicity is grand! I’ll be passing this along to add to a plaxo contact’s International Librarian site. Based in India, his reaction to Mumbai terrorist attacks is to consider what library professionals can do to assist with on-demand information in times of emergency.