2009 July Archive at geogalot

Monthly Archive for July, 2009

IB Geography [New Syllabus] re…

Published

on July 20, 2009

. Comments

IB Geography [New Syllabus] resource: Earthquakes – An Overview http://bit.ly/4s4MZB – and I was meant to be taking it easy!

Excellent – the July Google Ea…

Published

admin

on July 19, 2009

in Twitter

. Comments

Excellent – the July Google Earth imagery update covers where I going to be living as of next month. Details of update http://bit.ly/wmURz

Less geeking – more other stuff…

Published

Richard Allaway

on July 17, 2009

in Campus des Nations, Richard Allaway and geographyalltheway.com

. Comments

It’s time for a summer break – so I will be taking four or five weeks off from working on geogaphyalltheway.com. With the aim of having a rest, spending time with the new addition to my family and to moving to Geneva.

I will still be checking email, moderating comments and tweeting – the wonders of an iPhone

Using YouTube Clips in the Classroom

Published

Richard Allaway

on July 16, 2009

in ICT in Geography Education, Training and Consultation and geographyalltheway.com

. Comments

As I mentioned in an earlier post I have added three buttons under each YouTube clip that is embedded into geographyalltheway.com.

The buttons link to:

YouTube in the Classroom Tutorial – explains how you can download a clip using keepvid.com.

Tooble – YouTube > iTunes – links to a cross-platform programme – tooble – that helps you download YouTube clips and add them to iTunes for easy organisation and watching on a iPod etc

Report a Missing Video – YouTube videos do get taken down so links become broken – please use this link to report these broken links so I can mend them.

You can see an example in the starter of this resource on Development Indicators.

Response to the User Questionnaire

Published

Richard Allaway

on July 14, 2009

in ICT in Geography Education and geographyalltheway.com

. Comments

During the second half of June 2009 I asked users of geographyalltheway.com to give feedback on various elements of the site. I have now processed all the responses – numbering nearly 200. The feedback was detailed and fantastic. As a result I have decided to make several (minor – but hopefully helpful) changes to the site. I going to outline the following developments to geographyalltheway.com:

Navigation of the Site

I will add some topic based menus and menu pages to compliment the existing Key Stage based menus – especially for the Key Stage 3 resources. I will also be adding more ‘next’ and ‘home’ buttons to help people navigate individual units of resources. I have started this already with the resources I am developing for the new IB Geography Syllabus: Hazards and Disasters.

Worksheets

I will be adding more worksheets that don’t require the use of a computer as I start teaching in September – so more resources will be available in .pdf format that can be printed and then photocopied. I will also be changing the ‘branding’ on the worksheets – the logo that is seen in the background of some worksheets will be removed as I redevelop and a more discreet logo will be placed in the document’s header.

PowerPoints and Presentations

I will continue to host presentations on Slideshare.net rather than offering PowerPoint files to be downloaded – as a way of saving my bandwidth and therefore the costs of running geographyalltheway.com. If you are desperate for a presentation in PowerPoint format so that you can adapt it – just get in touch.

YouTube Clips

I will continue to embed YouTube clips – I am not currently seeking a hosting alternative. Lots of people have issues using these due to blocks put in place by schools etc. I will add a tutorial on ‘alternative’ ways to access these files beneath each embedded YouTube clip. I will also add a button so people can flag when a YouTube clip is ‘missing’ so that I can find another hosted copy and mend the link.

Information on new resources

The place to find out about new resources is this blog (with it’s RSS feed) or via Twitter. This blog has a Twitter feed at @geogalot and I tweet at @richardallaway

Feedback

I have added a comments box onto the bottom of every page of geographyalltheway.com using the DISQUS system. Please use these boxes to give feedback on resources and report broken links, missing YouTube clips, spelling mistakes etc. All comments are moderated so there may be a short delay before comments appear.

Site Search

I will review how useful this is and try and make any necessary improvements.

I hope that the above are seen as developments. They will take a while to implement so keep an eye out for them. If you have any suggestions for improvements – don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Rehosted and Ready for Development

Published

Richard Allaway

on July 13, 2009

in ICT in Geography Education, Key Stage 3 Geography and MYP Humanities

. Comments

Cloud Hosting and Cloud Computing by Rackspace

I have completed one of my big ICT jobs for the summer – geographyalltheway.com and some of my other sites/projects have been rehosted on rackspace cloud.

I think I have ironed out most of the bugs – but if you spot any – please let me know via the comment box that you will find onthe bottom of all pages of geographyalltheway.com.

In terms of development, next academic year I will be a Teacher of Humanities and IB Geography so expect some more humanities focused units and some materials for the new IB Geography syllabus.