UW TRIO News » Collaboration & Social Networking

Edmodo – Safe and Secure – Social Media and/or Learning Management System

Sharon Primm-Dayot — Mon, 14 May 2012 19:09:39 +0000

Edmodo provides a FREE, safe and easy way for your students to connect, collaborate, and access information. Unlike facebook, Edmodo uses a secure interface to provide a safe social media environment for students and staff. It also provides a lot of resources and support. Check out the Edmodo Blog for Best Practices and other important tips and print out the User Guide below.

http://help.edmodo.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/UserGuide_Sep11.pdf

http://www.edmodo.com/

http://blog.edmodo.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmodo

Skype for Education – Build Needed Skills

Sharon Primm-Dayot — Mon, 14 May 2012 19:06:04 +0000

A FREE global community where students, experts, and educators can collaborate on projects as well as find a library of new ideas.

Skype for Education

TRIO students must learn 21st Century technology and collaboration skills. With Skype for Education they can connect globally to different cultures, languages, and ideas. They can attend a virtual field trip, or talk with scientists…the possibilities are endless.

At this time there are 1873 Projects listed and each one is asking for outside participation – why not list your own project to collaborate with other TRIO students and experts? Check out the Collections page to view amazing projects from around the globe! And get TRIO students involved.

http://education.skype.com/

http://blogs.skype.com/en/education/

http://blogs.skype.com/en/whitepaper/skype-in-the-classroom.pdf

http://education.skype.com/collections

WordPress and Social Media

Putri Hiendarto — Wed, 02 May 2012 20:57:05 +0000

WordPress is a free content management system that can be used to create and manage websites or blogs. This very blog runs on WordPress! You can start a WordPress site either by creating an account and have it hosted at WordPress.com, or by downloading the software through WordPress.org and installing it on your own server.

There is no need to learn web programming languages like HTML or graphic programs like Adobe Photoshop to create a WordPress site because WordPress comes with a great visual editor and has a library of themes to choose from that you can install. Getting a WordPress website or blog up and running is simpler and easier than you may think!

WordPress can also be connected to Twitter and Facebook, so every time you publish a new post, the information will propagate across your social media. Since more and more programs and educational insitution are using social media as a way to distribute information, I have shared with you on how to do this below.

Depending on which type of WordPress you are using, the instruction is a bit different.

If you have a WordPress.com site, the ability to connect your WordPress site to Facebook/Twitter is already built-in, so all you need to do is to set it up. For a tutorial, please visit WordPress.com Support Documentation on publicizing posts to social media.

If you run into issues when trying to connect your WordPress.com blog to your Facebook Page, an alternative would be to install RSS Graffiti to your Facebook Page and set it to grab posts through your blog’s RSS feed URL.

If you are using a self-hosted WordPress, you will need to install a social media plugin such as WP to Twitter in combination with RSS Graffiti mentioned above.

Google Voice for Calls and Texts

Dave Wolczyk — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 19:18:03 +0000

Google Voice is a free service that lets you control and manage your calls from the Web or your mobile device. You can get a new phone number or use an existing number to consolidate calls made to multiple numbers and control who can call and when. You can place people into different groups (think staff and students) and handle their calls in different ways. You can also create a program-wide number that can be transferred to whatever staff members you chose without divulging their personal numbers. It makes it easy to record calls and to transfer them from one phone to another.

Google Voice also has powerful features for managing your voice mail and text messages. It allows you to access and manage your voice mail from the web and share voice mails by email. You can compose text messages on your computer and have your text messages sent to your email. It also makes it easy to host conference calls simply by having callers dial your Google Voice number. Of course there is a mobile app for iPhones, Androids, and Blackberries. Best of all, it’s FREE.

To learn more, watch the videos at:
http://www.youtube.com/googlevoice
To see some of the features available go to:
http://www.google.com/googlevoice/about.html
Suggested topics below. To find out how to ___________ go to :
http://support.google.com/voice/?hl=en

Recording calls

Sending Text Messages

Setting which phones will ring

Text message to email

Call Screening

Conference calling on the fly

Recording calls

Checking messages

Contacts, Groups, Greetings

Create Free Web and Text Polls

Dave Wolczyk — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 19:24:04 +0000

Increasingly our staff and students now communicate by text messages or via the Web on their smartphones. Poll Everywhere provides a quick and easy way to gather data from anyone with a cell or smart phone or computer. It lets you ask a question and collect responses via the web, text messaging, or even Twitter. You use it the same way you might use “clickers” or responders with an audience. The polls can be shared by downloading and placing poll slides into your PowerPoint presentation, displaying them from a web page with your projector, or even emailing or embedding them into your web site.

With Poll Everywhere you can create free polls for up to 40 people in just a couple of minutes. Premium plans are available with additional features and for polling more users.

Below is an example of the a free poll that was created in just a few seconds. The first 40 people can vote via the Web or by texting or Tweeting their answer as shown below. You can also view the PowerPoint slides and instructions for this poll.

When people vote via the web, this is what they see:

The image to the right shows the results for this poll and how people responded. If you are teaching a small class where each student has free access to texting, a smart phone, or a computer, then the free version of Poll Everywhere might be all you need!

Create Short URLs and QR Codes

Dave Wolczyk — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:43:22 +0000

The Google URL Shortener takes long web addresses and generates a shorter version that is easier share via email, twitter or on the Web. It also generates a QR (Quick Response Code) for your web page that can be read by most smart phones and reports statistics on visitors to your site.

To use it, just go to http://goo.gl, enter the full URL and click on the Shorten URL button. The short URL will be created instantly. Note that all these short web addresses are publicly accessible. You (or anyone else) can also view the traffic to the shortened URL by adding “.info” to the end of the address.

Below is an example of a short URL (goo.gl/rLft1) generated this way for the home page of this blog (http://depts.washington.edu/triolive/wordpress/ttt/) .

A QR (Quick Response) code image is also generated along with the shortened URL. If you have a smartphone, try downloading a QR Reader and scanning the image to the right with your phone to go directly to the web page.

There are other services that produce shortened URLs, but goo.gl adds your new URLs to your Google account. Just be sure you’re logged in first. Another advantage of goo.gl is that also includes the world’s easiest web stats. Just add a”.info” to the end of the shortened URL to produce stats and graphs like the ones below. Note that this only includes visitors that reach your page via the shortened URL and not those who type out the whole address.

Changing Hotmail and GMail to require HTTPS

Lynn Churchill — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 17:39:07 +0000

With the growth of utilities like FireSheep, people can view login information on unencrypted network connections. Stealing login information opens the door to identity theft and using compromised accounts for SPAM and Denial of Service (DOS) attacks

We have recommended that if you use Hotmail or GMail or any other mail service that you set it to use a secure HTTPS connection that will encrypt your communications with that site. It has come to my attention that some people are having difficulty finding out where you go in Hotmail and GMail to set this setting. This post will hopefully clarify what you need to do to get there.

Hotmail:

After logging into Hotmail, you will see a headline near the top of the page that says: “Hotmail highlights“. In the small print under that is a link called “Options“. This will take you to a page called “Windows Live Options” and you will find on the left of that page a selection under “Show options for” that says “Hotmail“. Click on the “Hotmail” link. This will take you to a page called “Hotmail Options“. Look for the section entitled “Managing your account” and click on the link called “Account details (password, aliases, time zone“. You will be redirected to a page called “Account overview“. At the bottom of that page click on the link called “Connect with HTTPS” that will redirect you to a page of the same name. On this last page, look for a radio button towards the bottom in front of a statement that says “Use HTTPS automatically“. Kind of a long journey but that’s it.

GMail:

If you want to do this for a GMail account, it’s a lot shorter journey to get to where you need to be. Starting from your GMail account, click on the arrow next to your account name on the top right side of your web browse and select the “Account settings” option. This will take you to a general “Google accounts” page. Find the link called “Settings” next to the GMail icon on the right hand side of the page. Clicking on that link will result in you being taken to a page called “GMail – Settings” with lots of options. One of the options is called “Browser connection“. Make sure the radio button in front of “Always use https” is the option that is selected. Finally at the bottom of that page, make sure you click on the “Save Changes” button.

That’s it, hope this was helpful.

Google Promotes New File Synchronization for Google Docs

Lynn Churchill — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 16:36:10 +0000

As many of you know there are a lot of online file synchronization solutions out there that help you keep files and data updated and backed up. Some of the ones that have been discussed in various presentations include:

Dropbox – http://www.dropbox.com
Microsoft Mesh – http://explore.live.com/windows-live-mesh
Box.net – http://www.box.com/
iCloud – https://www.apple.com/icloud/what-is.html

Google used to use Box.net for synchronization but has just now released their new relationship with Insync.

Like other cloud based file synchronization and file backup solutions, Insync has different plans depending on the number of users and how much space you might want or need. This includes:

Cheapskate -1GB syncing limit for unlimited computers – Cost: Free
Pro -16TB syncing limit for single user and unlimited computers – Cost: $25/year (introductory offer)
Business -16TB syncing limit for unlimited computers with centralized billing and user administration for 5 users minimum – Cost: $3/user/month (introductory offer)

So, if you have a Google account and files in Google Docs, you can now collaborate and share those files with others with greater ease using this new Google service.

Important Update (12/12/11): Just got word from Insync that they are reworking their pricing. Now if you have a Google account, Insync is now free with no limits on storage.