Jim Temple Library Manager for Trafford College and Chrissie Turkington from the RSC NW discuss the Shibboleth system of authentication for online resources.

Jim and Chrissie explain how Shibboleth provides the opportunity for a single sign on to resources such as Britannica online.  They explain some of the issues such as what is the UK Access Management Federation and dispel some of the myths including how much does it really cost.

Here is the link to the podcast

http://www.garageband.com/mp3/shibboleth.mp3?|pe1|WdjZPXLrvP2rYVS_Y29lAA

Follow the following link for a full list of our podcasts and details of how to subscribe;

http://www.gcast.com/user/JISC_RSC_NW/podcast/main

Mick Merrick, Assessor and Internal Verifier at Mid-Cheshire College talks about their use of ePortfolios for assessment.

Mick discusses the advantages of using an eportfolios, how they have been used at Mid-Cheshire College, as well as advice on choosing an eportfolio system.

Click here to download the podcast interview

This podcast was originally posted Feb 28, 2008 at http://www.gcast.com/u/JISC_RSC_NW/main

Click more to get a full transctipt of this interview

00:00 KH: Hello and welcome to the JISC Regional Support Centre for the North West Best Practice Podcast. I’m here today talking to Mick Merrick, assessor and internal verifier at Mid-Cheshire College. Hi Mick, as I say, we’re here today talking about e-portfolios. So, first of all would you like to tell me what you think an e-portfolio is.

00:28 Mick Merrick: Yes. An e-portfolio is the standards for the course to whatever people are doing, which is actually an electronic form. This can either be stand alone or on a website. The stand alone would be particularly on the assessor’s own laptop whereas the web based one gives more ownership to the candidate. They can access it to their own website and put their own evidence on. It is available to people like IVs and EVs who can also access it remotely, so cutting down on EB visits and time for the EB travelling and of course the big thing is that e-portfolio can become condensed on to, well not condensed, download it on to a CD, which is just the size of a CD where the old paper portfolios where a file six inches thick or whatever carry a lot of weight, similarly technical with awarding bodies, coupled with students finding somewhere to keep them from getting lost etc. So, the e-portfolio is a handy way, a convenient way of compiling a portfolio.

01:55 KH: Okay. So, how have you used e-portfolios at the College?

01:59 MM: We set them up for each individual student on to that e-portfolio we call the course, the standards that the student is studying and a website would be set up for that student particularly. So, he or she could access that website and enter their own information on, their own evidence which would then be edited by the assessor. Therefore, cutting down on assessor visits and there is an interaction between the, a day to day interaction between the candidate and the assessor. Whereas previously with a paper portfolio, it was a case that the assessor might see the candidate once a month, so it’s a continual process with the student.

02:53 KH: Okay. You’ve already mentioned some of the advantages already the fact that it cuts down and can be downloaded. Is there any other advantage you can see in using e-portfolios over perhaps a paper portfolio.

03:06 KH: Yes, I think because students, now I deal especially with modern apprenticeships for the younger people and they are, obviously we’ve seen the growth of mobile phones, so they can interact between with a computer and electronic systems and find it more interesting. They enjoy the playing if you like attitude as against writing reams and reams of paper out to put into a portfolio that they struggle to find a use for. So, there is interest as well, keeping the student interested.

03:46 KH: And of course, as you mentioned before there is the ownership because they take ownership. Do you have any advice for anyone either using or looking to use an e-portfolio or perhaps choosing an e-portfolio for their college?

03:59 MM: Think carefully because when you get the system, there are a lot of systems out there. Get the system that you find suits your particular courses best. You know it’s very difficult if you’ve got say a builder who is working on a roof a take up your system if this necessitates him having a laptop. He’s not going to want to be on top of a roof with a laptop so make it a system that is just, works best with your courses. I don’t think that there is one that does everybody, its look for the one that fits your courses you are doing and certainly there is a lot of training. Make sure that your assessors understand what they are trying to get out of the student and explain correctly to the student, how he or she uses the system.

04:56 KH: Okay. Finally, the last question that we’ve got here is, do you have any ideas on how you think e-portfolios might be used in the future?

05:04 MM: Yes, I think that they can be used very much on, as I said earlier, I’m involved with modern apprenticeships, frameworks which involve the three elements, or might do, of key skills, a technical certificate for the underpinning knowledge and the NVQ which is the work based evidence gathering and it is quite easy to cross reference the various factors and criteria in each of those three elements. And that’s the big advantage I find that the candidates have not needed to do the same amount of work for key skills for instance which in my particular discipline which is motor vehicles they very tiring and not interesting. Whereas a lot of it can be cross referenced very easily through e-portfolio and that’s the big advantage I find.

06:02 KH: Well, thank you for speaking to us today. Thanks a lot.

This podcast was edited with audacity with music by Luksa which is used under the creative comments license.

What is it?

Glogster is a website where someone can create online posters which contain text, images and multimedia content.  It has features specific for education including the ability for a teacher to quickly create a set number of student accounts

What can I create?

Where can I find out more?

The main website is http://www.glogster.com/

There is a detailed user guide available here;
http://www.scribd.com/doc/14015153/Glogster-Instructions

What are the alternatives?

Nota is similar to Glogster but is more geared towards collaboration and does not have as many fun features such as a background wall and posters;
http://notaland.com/

What can I use it for?

• Get students to create poster presentations
• Teachers creating fun posters for students to access and learn from

Please add your own suggestions using the comments box

Fiona Mulholland is the Learning and Technologies Co-ordinator at Carlisle College.  In this podcast she discusses the college’s use of ePortfolios for assessment.

Fiona discusses the advantages for learners and for assessors in the move away from paper based portfolios.  She also goes through some of the devices which have been used to create and transfer digital evidence including digital notepads, netbooks, budget video cameras and learners’ personal mobile phones.

Click here to listen to the podcast

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Transcript of podcast interview with Fiona Mulholland about ePortfolios at Carlisle College

KH:         Okay so I’m here at Carlisle College on a fairly sunny Thursday morning and it’s the calm before the storm because its a week before the students come back.   Is it a week?

FM:        Yes, well about a week and a half.

KH:         And I’m here with Fiona Mulholland so Fiona would you like to introduce yourself?

FM:        Yes,  I am the learning resources and  technologies coordinator at Carlisle College and one of my roles has been to introduce the ePortfolio into Carlisle college and also the eassesment tools. I’ve had to purchase the eassesment tools to use with the ePortfolios. Does that make sense?

KH:         Yes  it does,. So what eportfolio systems have you gone with?

FM:        We decided to go with paperfree. There were 2 or 3 different ePortfolios that we looked at and lots of people came into the college giving demonstrations.   I had a group of staff looking at the demos and between us we decided we liked the Paperfree ePortfolio.   One of the reasons we liked this one was the support we felt we would get, and got. I know I can call or email Richard or John any time day or night and they’ll respond within the hour and that to me is worth it.  So  we started off with 7 candidates in may 2008 and by September 2008 we hoped to have 100 candidates for  the 2008/9 academic year and we actually had 190.  This academic year the whole of the hair and beauty dept have decided they will use the eportfolio and I think we’ll have at least 300 candidates just from that curriculum area,  but we’ve also got students from motor vehicle, wood occupations, business admin , plumbing , electricals, site supervision and all the train to gain students are using the eportfolio.

KH:         So what’s the point of an eportfolio, what were they using before and what are the advantages?

FM:        Before the ePortfolio everything was paper based and we were very reliant on the students to bring the portfolio to every lesson which they often did forget to do, also with eportfolio a students can find evidence and upload the evidence and it enables the assessor to assess at any time of day.  They don’t have to wait until they see the student if the evidence is uploaded it can be assessed immediately and we’ve found that with level 1 beauty students last year they finished their course 8 weeks ahead of schedule because they used this eportfolio. The level 1 beauty lectures had never seen anything like it; they actually finished 8 weeks ahead of schedule.

KH:         It was interesting to you earlier about the different technologies you had used with the ePortfolios.

FM:        We use allot of the small video cameras, there’s allot on the market, we tend to use the cheaper ones because their droppable and if you’re going to take them into a construction site,  you want to know the students aren’t going to break them and worry about them,  so we use allot of video evidence . we use small scanners because it’s quite a big transition from truly paper based to truly eportfolio so we still scan allot of the paperwork but we’ve bought some smashing portable scanners  which assessors can take with them onto the workplace.  we’ve bought net books with internet access,  so that while the assessors are in the work place they can access the ePortfolio with the student,  attach the scanner and upload onto the eportfolio.

We use digital voice recorders and these have been really good with foreign students who tend to be able to speak the language very well but when it comes to writing it down they tend to struggle a little bit and they’ve found it quicker just to record using a voice recorder.  So we’ve got lots of professional discussions, we’ve bought head cams, they’re a bit of fun but ideal for motor vehicle  so when the students got his head under the bonnet of a car we can actually see what he’s doing and that can be uploaded to an eportfolio.   All of these devices have got audio attached to them so, not only do take video file but we can speak at the same time and we’ve found that really important.  We’ve bought digipads, which can be taken into the workplace.  We can fill-in a form and upload it directly to the pc, we’ve bought a z pen which is the next best thing to a digipads I think. I think we’ll buy some more Z-Pens, you can write something down and upload that text directly to the eportfolio.  So what its doing, it’s actually speeding things up and actually reducing the paper work.

KH:         Have you found that assessor have been okay to accept the evidence in this range of formats?

FM         Yes, they love it.  It’s change and change isn’t easy and at first it was difficult but they’ve grown to like it and I think they’ve come to realise that a 15 second piece of video footage, can take 15 seconds to shoot, and they get so much evidence from that,  whereas before the students would spend hours writing all sorts of things out and assessors would spend hours writing things up on observation logs, where as they find the video footage is so much easier.

KM:        One thing you have mentioned to me in the past is bluetooth dongles, what are they and how have they been used.

FM:        We have small video cameras, which we suggest to the students that they use however, nearly all of our students have mobile phones  and they love using the mobile phones, but our problem when a student comes in with evidence on a mobile phone, is getting the evidence from the mobile phone onto their eportfolio, because they never come in with the leads.  What we’ve done is installed Bluetooth on some of the computers in our learning resource centre.  We’ve also bought Bluetooth dongles which we’ve given to various members of staff for use in their staff room or classrooms, so if students have gained evidence on their mobile phone we can Bluetooth it to a PC and upload it immediately.

KH:         Of course they have their phones with them pretty much all the time they can always get their phone out and video or take photos.

Is there any equipment that you’ve trialled that hasn’t been as successful as others or has it all worked well?

FM:        It’s all worked pretty well.  I think we bought too many digipads.  The digipads are great but I think we’ve bought too many.  They haven’t been used as well as I’d thought they’d be used and that’s about the only piece of kit that hasn’t been used.

KH:         So have you got any ideas on how this project is going to develop in the future?

FM:        No, it’s a case of watch this space, at the moment we use the eportfolio with nearly all our NVQ courses, full or part time.  I understand we should be able to use eportfolio with Btec courses so we are going to trial that.  This year we’re looking at key skills and we’ve put  key skills onto eportfolio; communication  and ICT,  even though they’re going to change to functional skills next year.  We thought we’d try the key skills out because it’s such an easy way to gain evidence.   We’ve found that our students don’t tend to bring their portfolios into key skills lessons so it’s really difficult to get the evidence from the workplace but with the eportfolio they can do this.  We are trying key skills this year with a view of moving onto functional skills next year

KH:         It sounds like exciting times so thanks for speaking to us today Fiona

Net Generation, Google Generation and Digital Native are all terms which conjure up the image of a tech savvy youth whose integration with digital technology has made them a virtually different species than the older digital immigrant, who can barely read an email without printing it off first.   These terms have become popular and formed the basis for several assumptions about the behavior and attitudes of young learners, however there are also those that reject the idea of a digital native as they can see that these assumptions are misleading.

” I don’t see a Google Generation or Digital Natives in the learners I work with. Some are using Facebook and other tools, many are not. Those that are, not all are using these tools for learning.”  (James Clay)

I have my own understanding on the Net Generation and what this means for education, which is based on Chris Andersons Long Tail theory.  First of all I would like to point out that I am using the term generation quite loosely as I don’t think it refers to age.  I am talking about the latest wave of learners, no matter what their age.  We have all ‘grown up’ with Google, although not necessarily in our childhood.  At what age do you stop ‘growing up’?

Instead of thinking about a generic Net Generation as a generic individual, I see this as a generation of individuals and within this generation there are a wide range of different preferences, interests and characteristics.   What the internet has done, has allowed differences to flourish in other parts of their lives.  So thanks to Amazon, people can chose to read from a wider collection of books, thanks to iTunes and spotify people can choose from a wider collection of music.  This doesn’t necessarily mean the most popular titles will change, it just means a number of smaller niches will flourish.  In these markets people no longer expect the one size fits all approach of making do with what they can buy at their local shops.

Within education there will be an increasing number of niches as individuals find increasingly diverse ways to learn whether its learning teamwork via world of warcraft or Learning to play the guitar with youtube or learning a language via twitter. This does not mean that the most popular way of learning has changed from classroom participation; it just means that other niches are flourishing.

What does this mean for practitioners?
As many people have said before, the one size fits all approach no longer works in education, maybe it never did.  Practitioners could take advantage of this by providing education in a range of formats, but what they can’t do is decide how the learners will learn, as the individuals within this net generation will find their own niches with or without the help of practitioners.

Kevin Hickey and Lisa Valentine from the JISC RSC NW talking with Julie Worthington and Jane Walker from Wigan and Leigh College to discuss the use of inclusive technology used at the college, including the screen reading software ClaroRead. The discussion moves on to why it is important for publications and handouts to be made available in an accessible electronic format. Making sure that these issues are considered at an early stage of producing or preparing content can lead to greater independence for learners who have difficulty reading content and ensure those students are not put at a disadvantage.

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Transcript of  Interview

KH:         OK.  So I’m here today on a fairly miserable Wednesday morning here in Wigan and Leigh – I’m here with Julie Worthington and Jane Walker from Wigan and Leigh College and Lisa’s here as well so first of all would you all like to introduce yourselves

JWth:    Hi, I’m Julie Worthington, I’m the enabling technology tutor at Wigan and Leigh College for inclusive learning

JWkr:     I’m Jane Walker and I’m the inclusive learning officer enabling technology mentor also at Wigan and Leigh College

LV:          I’m Lisa Valentine and I’m Kevin’s colleague and eLearning Adviser for Inclusion as part of the Regional Support Centre of the Northwest

KH:         OK, we’ve been here today, we’ve been having a chat about various bits of technology that they’ve been using here and one of the things that was mentioned is Claroread – so what is it?

JWth:    Claroread is a piece of software that actually enables students with reading difficulties and spelling difficulties to access text to produce assignments to have any text read back to them.  A really good piece of software.  I think initial problems being towards students who have dyslexia but was brilliant for anybody with any kind of reading and spelling difficulty.  I really like it.

KH:         How is it being used here at the college?

JWth:    At the moment what we’ve done is we have it in our enabling technology resource room and that’s on every computer within that room and then as a student as identified to inclusive learning and it’s deemed that the software may be useful to them – we do an assessment and then decide yeah that may be some use – we then found out where the student accesses a computer throughout the college and have that piece of software put onto the computers within the computer rooms or the classrooms where they’re working.  We’re hoping to get it networked across college – we’ve got 5 campuses so hoping to get it across college on all of those campuses as soon as we possibly can but it’s a case of it being installed.  Little bit at a time so it would take us sometime but hopefully that’s where we want to end up.

JWkr:     And also it’s on laptops

JWth:    It’s on our laptops as well.  We have a bank of about 60 laptops that we’re issued out to students and it’s on each of those as well.  If the student needs it sometimes they may just need say some mindmapping software or dragon voice recognition software in which case that would just go on.  I think more or less we’re just trying to get it on everything really then if the student either stumbles across it say on a network they could access it cos I feel it’s so intuitive that they can kind of get a little bit out of it without any training.  If the students identified them and come to inclusive learning, I’ll do a training session with them that’s usually about two hours – we’ll go through various setups for it and stuff like that.  That’s more individualised but as I say if you just stumbled across it and opened the software, I think it’s so easy to use anybody can get something out of it.

LV:          Can I also say that I think it’s a really good idea to put it across campus because it’s actually a really good study aid for any learner with recognised difficulties or not, it’s a really useful piece of kit and it’s a great proof reading tool

JWth:    That’s it.  Yeah, yeah it’s brilliant.  And I mean for us a lot of our students  who prefer to access auditorally what we do is that we teach them to convert text to audio themselves or we’ll do it in here if the students’ got limited skills with IT and they find then that maybe they transfer the file or we will onto their mobile phone – off they’ll go home or to college listening to the piece of work that’s been converted so rather than take perhaps a big laptop around with them they’ve just then got a little Dictaphone, mobile phone whichever they use they’ll listen back that way.  So for revision purposes if they prefer to use audio, it’s been a great tool

JWth:    It’s a very good research tool as well.  So if they’ve been on the internet and they’ve been set a task and they’ve got to do some background reading and maybe they’re not that quick at reading and to have something that they can say “Oh I’ll have this bit read to me” that then makes it easier.  It gives them a break visually if they need it.  They’ve got a lot of options

KH:         Following on from something we’ve been talking about before we started the recording – a lot of this depends on having the content – whatever it is they wan t to read – having it electronically and earlier on we were talking about how important it is for learners to have that.

JWth:    I think from our point of view we’ve always struggled with accessing PDF files particularly.  The other documents Word and stuff, it’s been fine.  PDFs have definitely been a problem and of course you’ve now got tutors preparing handouts that sometimes insist on actually saving it rather than a doc document, they’ll save it as a pdf document.  So again although they’re doing it for reasons such as limited space on our network or on their own part of the network, for us it’s not actually been helpful so we’ve tried to encourage them to save back as doc documents but what we’ve found is we’re really pleased with the trial we’ve had of Claro 5 that that now seems to be reading pdf files really really reliably so from that point of view that will help us, but again we’re still trying to make sure that the students have as great access as possible as easy as possibly and I’m sure we’ll come across some PDF files that still wont be read despite the improvements in version 5 so we’re trying to always get through to tutors that it’s really really important to provide the students with documents that are obviously suitable to be read by this kind of software.  So Jane and I we concentrate on doing that quite a lot throughout the year.  Particularly Jane who tends to see the tutors more than I do

JWkr:     It just opens their eyes – there’s so many more possibilities of changing the format to make it more suitable for a student.  And we find the students that we come across they’ve got far ranging needs and complex sometimes and for a student to have a handout that’s in one format is very very limiting.  It’s getting tutors and students to realise that once you’ve got an electronic format the possibilities by comparison are endless.

KH:         What would you say to tutors out there who maybe would think that any learner who does have special needs in accessing this kind of content – if they give them a handout, they’ll know who to take it to and they’ll know that they can eventually get it converted – are there any tutors…

JWth:    It’s the speed of processing.  As soon as you give the student a handout, they are straight away at a disadvantage if they’re printing paper in any way they are at a disadvantage because everybody else is accessing that information immediately for a student then to have to go somewhere else or for an inclusive learning officer to take that handout and go somewhere else in order to adapt it, that is putting that student at a disadvantage where already they are disadvantaged so with an electronic version the student themselves can adapt it they can click on a button  – they can change the font size – they can change the colour – with Claro they can use ClaroView they can make the changes that they themselves need.  They can access the accessibility options and they are then independent but also they are accessing that information at the same time as everybody else in their class.

JWkr:     We’ve tried to setup provision which has been working very well with our Business Admin department whereby if the tutors just take their work – maybe it’s a handout that they’ve copied themselves or a journal or something  and they might want it converting to text so student can access it immediately within the classroom that service from Business Admin just means that all they have to do is go along their with their scanned document that they want converting to Word – it’s usually Word that’s the easiest thing – and then the Business Admin department just get the students that work in there who are providing that service and are always desperate to do that kind of work, get them to copy it up get that back to the tutor either by email or snail mail so they getting it back fairly quickly within a couple of days usually.  So if the tutor has pre-planned the week before, “this is what I’m going to be using next week for next week’s session” then it’s quite an easy task to get it converted to electronic format and as we said before, that makes access for that student instant which is what we’re all about really.

KH:         It’s great that you’ve got that service here as well – not everywhere has that.

LV:          I was just saying that that’s absolutely brilliant that there is that support for staff

JWkr:     Students is used to then working in a real environment where there are real deadlines.  We take stuff along and we say usually we’re sort of last minute – we try not to be  – but sometimes that the nature of what we do.  The student that is then taken that request knows that is a real job it’s not a paper exercise that some tutors come up with that’s going to assimilate the real world.  It’s the real world.  This is what we do.

JWth:    and because they’re able to split the work between several students eg just before we broke up for Summer we had a full text book converted in a day which was absolutely wonderful

LW:        Wow

JWth:    It can be done, but obviously you’ve got a lot of student there who are taking maybe a chapter each – a ten chapter book or something takes no time at all.  That’s really good It think that’s working so successfully and we hope to maintain that forever

LV:          Setting a dangerous precedence there

JWth:    They are lovely.  Just give them a plug

KH:         Have you got any advice from a tutors point of view if they are thinking – well – any advice from getting content available and if there going  to be using Claroview within  – would they need to know much about Claroread – sorry.

JWth:    What we try and do is when the student comes in for their training, by the time they’ve gone away we ensure that they’re pretty aux fait with what they need to do.  It always helps the earlier we know say for instance a text book that might be needed for the course, the earlier we know what that book is, the earlier opportunity we’ve got to order it in pdf and then obviously now we wont have the same trouble because Claro5 will read it OK but it just means that the process of actually accessing that new information is as smooth as possible.  So from my point of view things like the students being appropriate trained in the first place is one thing; having knowledge of what that student is likely to need as far in advance as possible is another thing; but I think also staff development needs to be encouraged as much as possible so that the curriculum areas staff – so the tutors – can they say “oh yeah, it’s not new to us this stuff, we’ve seen it we’ve had a go on it – we know what it does” and I think once you’ve been through the training that Jane and I both do with our tutors, I think it’s kind of a bit of an eye opener really cos they realise how simple it actually is to make a document such as scanned article or journal easier for that student to read and at the end of the day if the student’s engaged with the curriculum you’re gonna get the best out of them.  You’re not going to have a student that’s sat there creating all sorts of nonsense because you’re thinking that there bored or they don’t like this or their behaviours not being easy to manage today when actually if you’d planned the session and got in place the resources that that student needed and could access easily then that session would have probably gone a whole lot smoother so I think if we can get round to doing more and more staff development – as I say we do do some but you can always do that little bit more – I think that would be an important point for me

JWkr:     I think it also means when you are faced with a student when a tutor is aware has difficulties especially maybe even when they’re enrolling and you’re faced with a student – a student might disclose that they’ve got various difficulties.  If they’re aware of the type of technology that we’ve got – the software that’s available they’re then able to enrol students with far greater integrity because they know OK, the resources that I’ve got at the moment they’re not set up exactly as the student may need to access but yes they are in electronic format and we’ve got this department – inclusive learning – we’re aware of this software and we know then that this information that they’re going to have to use and convey to the student that they are then going to be able to access easily at the same time as all the other students on their course. They have a chance then to complete the course and to succeed.  No-body likes to be faced with a student where you think I might enrol them but I’m not sure that they’re going to be able to access what I’m going to teach.  To have that doubt in your mind at the beginning of the year must be an awful thing and quite a stressful thing so it’s all about, for us, trying to convey what’s available and yes, they might need to make a few adjustments their end but we will also we’re here to help accommodate that and facilitate that student.  As a team all together we can succeed.

JWth:    I think it’s important that Inclusive Learning are actually seen as somebody that isn’t the enemy for curriculum staff that actually we’re there to help them whenever we possibly can and I think sometimes – tutors they’ve got a lot on and you know you’re going to get someone in with some kind of learning difficulty or disability and it must be almost natural to think “well this is going to mean extra work” and usually at a time when they’re pulled out “oh yeah I’ve gotta get this thing prepared and it’s going to take me ages”.  I think they see Inclusive Learning more as a “well all you’ve gotta do is come seek advice see what we have got to offer”.  That’s gotta make it easier.  I think sometimes they are a little bit afraid of us sometimes in Inclusive Learning and also the other end of the scale of course is well we can take this student on because of course inclusive Learning will be able to sort whatever problem the student might throw up and they have to realise also that that isn’t the case.  I think the more close liaison we have with curriculum staff, the better for everybody

KH:         From what you were saying earlier it’s not just curriculum staff I know we were talking earlier about having other resources available in the college such as the college brochure

JW:         Yes. Yes Absolutely.

KH:         having to make available in Braille format.

JWth:    And usually those jobs come in and need to be done straight away at the wrong time when you are also busy

KH:         People think about these kind of issues when they are creating content or when they’re putting things as early stage as possible then

JWkr:     That’s one of the biggest parts of our job really – it’s making people realise why we need things in this way and every opportunity we get we’re explaining

JWth:    and to see that it only all functions as a college as a whole if you start looking at “Well they’re curriculum staff and they’re Inclusive Learning” you don’t want that division, we’re all part of one big team and the more closely that team works together then obviously the more successful the students’ are going to be and get out of it at the end.   I think that’s really really important and we do try.

JWkr:     I mean a lot of it’s not that people are wanting to be difficult it’s just that they don’t know the implications of them creating something in say pdf or when marketing are creating their brochures they look absolutely fantastic and they try to make them as colourful as user friendly as possible, but then when you try to ready it with a piece of software all of a sudden it’s a nightmare.  It’s getting them to be aware of what students who have got difficulty the software that they need in order to access it and then all of a sudden it’s just well give us the information before you do all this fancy creative stuff and we can work with it.  Then everybody’s happy.  Easy.

KH:         So there we go, it’s easy.

JWth:    If only

KH:         Well on that point, thanks for speaking to us today, it’s been great coming along and having a chat to you today

JWth:    You’re welcome

What is is?

Wordle is a site where you can create a word cloud from any text.  That means it creates an image of all the words in the text, with repeated words appearing larger than others.

What can I create?

Wordcloud created by Wordle based on a news article

The Digital Britain report presented as a word cloud created by wordle

barack obama's inauguration speech as a wordcloud by wordle

Where can I find out more?

Wordle  is available via http://www.wordle.net/

What are the alternatives?

http://tagcrowd.com/

Tag Crowd is similar to wordle but it does not provide options such as different font styles and colours

'Summer of 69' as a word cloud created by Tag Crowd

What can I use it for?

Use it with students to identify key words in speeches and publications

Add different definitions of the same word to find common themes.

Add an exemplar essay to see what the key themes are

Create a text based logo

Create a wordcloud based on a Wikipedia article and get students to guess what it’s about.

Please add your own suggestions in the comments sections

What is it?

Bitstips is a website where you can create cartoon strips by dragging and dropping components such as characters, props and background scenes, into a series of blank panels.

What can I create?

Bitstrips cartoon

Where can I find out more?

Bitstrips is available via http://www.bitstrips.com/

Further help is available from http://help.bitstrips.com/wiki/Main_Page

What are the alternatives?

There are a number of websites which allow you to create cartoon strips including;

http://www.toondoo.com/

Cartoon created by Toondoo

http://www.makebeliefscomix.com

Cartoon from makebeliefscomix.com

http://pixton.com

Cartoon from Pixon.com

What can I use it for?

-          An image on a VLE to introduce a new topic

-          Create a scene for students to discuss (eg, bullying, depression)

-          Create a cartoon summary of a book or historical event

Please add your own suggestions using the comments box

Sarah Nelmes, the Information Learning Technologies Director for Training for Travel, talks about why they chose to use digital notepads, their experiences of using them, and how they plan to use them in the future.

Sarah explains how the use of digital notepads to record information from assessor visit reports, have increased turnaround time. She goes on to explain who they chose digital notepads over similar technology, how they have used templates for working with forms and how they would like to develop their use of these notepads for eportfolio evidence.

Click here to download the podcast

Click here for a complete list of podcast interviews as well as detail on how to subscribe to future episodes.

Click here for a video explanation of digital notepads

Alan Carr talking to Kevin Hickey about Podcasting within Mid-Cheshire College

A podcast of Alan Carr talking to Kevin Hickey about Podcasting within Mid-Cheshire College is available at http://RSC-Northwestpodcast.notlong.com