Haugen’s Tech Tips Blog

I think I mentioned VoiceThread before - the marvelous web site that lets you present a slide show and record comments, captions & doodles. The other innovation of VoiceThread is you can invite others to comment as well, creating a visually guided dialog about… well, anything.

One of my favorites:

See also Kenya Escape, the incredibly powerful story of one family’s experience in Kenya, during the election upsets of December 2007.

Flocabulary “…uses the educational power of hip-hop music to foster literacy and promote academic success in the classroom and beyond.” In other words, get your kids to study by delivering content to a hip hop beat. You can listen to tracks online or purchase books and CD’s.

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  Mango Languages - HomeMango beta is an online language learning system freely available to everyone. Learn at your own pace with a suite of features that make language learning more engaging and fun.

  (tags: multilingual free cooltools tutorials language/foreignlang)

TRUCE (Teachers Resisting Unhealthy Children’s Entertainment) has released its 2008 Toy Action Guide, just in time for the holidays.

In their own words,

This guide is intended to help adults promote children’s creative and constructive play by making informed choices about toys, and by working with others at home, school, and in the community to promote positive play and toys.

The guide includes indispensable  tips for  how to shop for toys, what to look out for in terms of toys that promote violence or stereotyping, and ideas for toy alternatives, including their wonderful “shoebox gift” ideas.  The guide may be freely downloaded and shared.  While on the site, be sure to check out their other resources.

Starting today (Nov 12-26, 2007), for $400, you can give - and get - one of the most unique laptop computers on the planet.

One learning child. One connected child. One laptop at a time.
The mission of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) is to empower the children of developing countries to learn by providing one connected laptop to every school-age child. In order to accomplish our goal, we need people who believe in what we’re doing and want to help make education for the world’s children a priority, not a privilege. Between November 12 and November 26, OLPC is offering a Give One Get One program in the United States and Canada. During this time, you can donate the revolutionary XO laptop to a child in a developing nation, and also receive one for the child in your life in recognition of your contribution.