Fuze meeting is an online web tool that lets you host meetings (and of course lessons, need be) so what, you say, well the interesting part about it, is that you can host them via your mobile device, thus being BlackBerry or iPhone wow!!! Having said that it is early days yet (a few teething problems) but this could be a big break through for the future.

I tested it out on both devices, the iPhone was straight forward and you just download the app via the app store whereas the Blackberry, you have to add you mobile number in the appropriate box for it to arrive via mail, I didn’t received a mail, so I wrote to fuze meeting’s customer care, and they sent me the link for downloading via mail. I was able to enter the meeting room with my iPhone on wifi whereas the BlackBerrry didn’t want to know. I was not on wifi at the time, perhaps I should have tried that option out.

Anyway I will be interested to find anyone else using this tool, perhaps let me know and we can try it out together, it would be too premature to actually give a lesson on the platform, but it could be an alternative in the future.

Here is what Fuze meeting say ..

1. Manage remote teams

You’ve got a talented team. But one of them is in Boston, two are in Minnesota, and yet another is in Silicon Valley. Get ‘em all on the same page with a daily 20 minute online sync up. You’ll get more done and have fun doing it.

2. Join meetings on different continents

Flying from the U.S. to Bulgaria to meet with your offshore development team? Don’t do it! Stay up a little later one night and save $2,500 by meeting online.

3. Stay at home in your slippers

Web meetings let you meet your boss or employees wearing your favorite bunny slippers — or nothing at all. When was the last time you went to a face-to-face meeting buck naked? Yet another online meeting benefit!

4. Conduct sales presentations

Make sales presentations, demonstrate applications, and even review contracts online. Web meetings aren’t just for nerds anymore.

5. Demonstrate products and software

Remember Show & Tell in kindergarten? Nothing beats being able to “show” while you “tell”. Get your point across and dazzle your audience with a couple of clicks.

6. Train customers, partners, and employees

Train your customers, partners, and employees anywhere in the World. Or around the corner.

7. Hold a meeting…on a train

Got an iPhone or Blackberry? Join a Fuze Meeting from the train because your daughter insisted on an early morning game of scrabble.

8. Hold a meeting…with a dude from Spain

If you read #7 but never take a commuter train, then find a reason to meet with Pablo in Spain.

9. Conduct a meeting going 600 miles per hour

If you’re a Virgin America customer, join a board meeting five miles in the air while going 600 miles an hour. Why? We say, “why not!”

10. Share your next big idea

You are a superstar at your job. You have great ideas. Don’t just share them with your immediate colleagues. Go big. Go wide. Go online and reach the remote corners of the world.

Fuze Meeting for BlackBerry and iPhone is available free and offers a range of features, including:

• Instant web conferences – host audio conferences with full dashboard controls, and attend online meetings – all from a single, intuitive interface
• Live desktop sharing – see files and presentations in perfect sync with the meeting presenter
• HD-quality content – view crisp, detail-rich video and imagery
• Integrated IM – log in to multiple IM platforms simultaneously through one application – Yahoo!®, AIM®, MSN®, Google™ Talk and others

Source www.fuzemeeting.com

Instead of making a list of ‘Twitter Teachers’ here we have a mosaic of all the people I follow on Twitter, not only teachers as you can see but other people I have learnt from, become friends with or had some kind of contact or conversation. My list will stay that way although sometimes I am known to ’spring clean’ yep I unfollow people who do not converse/and or have nothing interesting to say to me, nothing personal of course everyone has there own idea of how or how not to Twitter and this is mine. While I am at it, if you can see yourself in the mosaic I would like to say thank you from me to you! Aniya

P:S Having said that after the success of  teachers need feeding I would be more than willing to feed any other teacher’s blogs for those who are following me on Twitter. Just leave a comment below with your blog’s URL feed and you will be added.

Source Twitter Mosaic

The Art of Conversation in Brief

1.  Don’t talk too long without pausing for a reaction. More than a minute is usually too long. Forty seconds is ideal.

2.  Never contradict or flatly disagree with the other person. It’s an implied insult.

3.  Don’t be too forceful or emphatic in stating your opinions until you learn the other person’s attitude.

4.  Give the other person intellectual freedom and cooperation, and claim them for yourself.

I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.— Socrates (BC 469-BC 399) Greek philosopher of Athens

This time last year my blogging adventure began. My first post was the above quote. I spent most of my summer working, teaching online and blogging, in no time blogging had become quite addictive. On the 24th June I joined Twitter, what a weird thing that was, I didn’t know quite what to make of it nor what to do with it so I left it until January of this year to really get to know what it actually was and how to use it.

Conclusion: Both my blog and Twitter have made an enormous impact on my life, they have both helped me grow professionally with little or no effort and this has in turn given me the knowledge to help and share with others useful resources.

A special thanks to all those people I have encountered along the way, whether through blogging or Twitter. Aniya

I am dedicating this to my youngest son Sammy who is 18 and suffers from autism. It might help both children and adults to understand what autism really is and how it effects the autistic person (in this case a child). Narrated innocently by a child with easy colourful images to follow via this YouTube video, it really appealed to me so I hope it does for you too.

Source www.aisforautism.net YouTube

While some of you might think I’ve gone a little mad others will appreciate this compilation of 70’s TV shows and adverts typical in the UK. I happened to be reminiscing with a friend of mine on Skype  and then got carried away with this, it certainly brings back memories, anyone else remember?

Source YouTube

Are you a teacher embarking into the online world? If you are this might be for you. E-Teacher’s Academy is a new website founded by Kirsten Winkler. The difference with this one is that the teachers are the students. So what will E-Teacher’s Academy offer their teacher/students?

What is the E-Teachers Academy?

Empowering Teachers for Education 2.0

The E-Teachers Academy will offer a 360° program to their students including:

- Using Language Teaching Platforms 
- Virtual Classroom Training 
- Creating Lesson Material for Online Lessons 
- Methodology 
- Video Editing 
- Graphic Editing 
- Podcasting 
- Marketing 
- Creating Revenue Streams 
- Content Monetization 
- Product Development 
- Social Media 
- …

There will be monthly webinars by Founders, CEOs and Managers of the industry leaders giving the students a deeper inside of their platforms and products and how to use them.

The goal is to give the students a complete tool box and overview over the whole language market so that after one year they can decide which way to go. Found an own business, teach on platforms, develop a product, get certified, etc.

The other important question is how much will it cost?

What will it cost?

There will be a one time fee for one year. All the webinars, screencasts, videos, exercises and other content and material will be included in this fee.

The fee will be 49 Euro during the month of June 2009, from July 2009 onwards 99 Euro.

It’s great to see initiatives like this from teachers wanting to help other teachers, and I’m sure there is a lot to learn for us all. The fee of 49€ and then 99€  is I believe affordable for teachers looking for insight on what will be our future.

Source www.eteachersacademy.com www.kirstenwinkler.com

Online instruction is new to many teachers, and for good reason. In just a few years, it has grown from an academic experiment to a recognized alternative to traditional classroom learning.

Teaching online is different from teaching in the classroom as it requires a different type of facilitation.  In a nutshell I will take you through some of the basic traits I have noticed since teaching online.

One of the difficulties for students these days is they do not have the opportunity to use their newly acquired English skills with a native speaker and additionally have no need to speak it, unless their job foresees this. They probably don’t have enough time to attend a  regular English class or travel to an English speaking country. So the online learning is a great alternative.

Teachers need to be flexible and human in their dealings of students. You are likely to come across many different cultures, religions and personality traits. So it is important that you are able to communicate with a variety of different people. Communication skills are very important in online teaching, and this can open the doors to the modern type of teacher, the so called traditional teachers may find it not to their liking.

The use of webcams are not compulsory in classes, and some teachers prefer not to use them as they can be distracting and not always important, whereas listening plays an important role to these types of lessons. So not only does the teacher have to be a teacher, but also a great communicator and know how to get a student talking, and what makes the student tick so to speak, not always easy during the first few lessons, but as soon as a student feels at ease and forgets the barrier of monitor, microphone and headphones, the setting is ideal and the virtual classroom seems nothing more than a traditional classroom, but set in your own home.

The teacher needs to have some basic computer skills as she/he will need to be able to use a virtual classroom and its tools, upload courses and lessons. Having said that it is not necessary being a computer geek and designing your own lessons as there are plenty of ways of adapting offline courses or using web based printables or handouts.  The important thing is that the lessons are as student-centred and as interactive as possible. If you do need some initial advice and practice of how and what to do, during this month only you can join up for half price to E-Teacher’s Academy.

Technology can play an important part in an online teacher’s success, once the lessons  become frequent. I would recommend to anyone who is about to embark in online teaching in having a smartphone. Depending on the model, you can keep all your contacts in one place, have e-mail instantly and keep in contact with your students online with the various instant messagging clients. I personally find this fundemental for organizing my day,  especially if you have this kind of  ‘mobile online office’ it makes your life a lot simpler. I have tried several smartphones but the one I am most attached to is the BlackBerry simply because it has all the features I need, and push e-mail which is a must for any professional whatever line of business.

For invaluable links posted by teachers and educators www.teachertuesday.info

If you teach or are learning online please share your experiences. Aniya

Image flickr

No not Athos, Porthos, and Aramis but Aniya, Kay and Kirsten making us The #teachertuesday team, you may have noticed the initials AKK on the teachertuesday Twitter page, so now you know what they stand for. From an idea of mine after the success of #followfriday I thought that it would be nice to congregate other teachers, educators and anyone else in the education sector, I mentioned this to both Kay and Kirsten who thought it was a great idea, they backed me up and Kay invented the blue owl logo and designed our website which collects all tweets from teachers, educators etc., allowing anyone to look up info regarding education and find it all in one place, we have had some great feedback from teachers and the idea is steadily growing. And so @teachertuesday was born a month ago now.

The idea of writing this post is to introduce my colleagues, Kay, the shy one, well he’s not really, but he’s that smart guy who gets on with his work and doesn’t like to be in the limelight, he’s a fantastic web designer and both Kirsten’s and my sites have his personal touch in them, I won’t say anymore about him in case he’s blushing ;-). Kirsten on the other hand gets all the limelight lol, she possesses a lot of talent, from her teaching 3 languages to coaching too. Her newest venture is what looks to be a great investment for new and not so new online teachers E-Teacher’s Academy. The gates will open next week and you can also follow updates on Twitter, so don’t miss out! During the first month only subscription will be offered at a reduced price.

“All for one, and one for all!”

Source www.kirstenwinkler.com www.twitter.com Image www.costumetemplates.com

Source YouTube

Yesterday evening whilst I was posting feeds via viigo on my BlackBerry I came across this interesting post..

If you’ve ever read a RIM or RIM partner press release, you will notice that RIM legal as well as RIM marketing insist that the word “BlackBerry” is always written as “BlackBerry® smartphones” or “BlackBerry® smartphone device.” The reason for this, is that RIM branding wants to separate itself from the rest of the mobile phone market. Although I’m not a big fan of the registered trademark logo, or writing the stock symbol, there are still some branding issues I think are important.

Here are my top 3 tips when using the BlackBerry brand:

1. It’s a mobile computer not a fruit.

Many journalists, make the mistake of writing the plural form of BlackBerry as “BlackBerries.” The plural form of BlackBerry is ‘BlackBerry devices’ or ‘BlackBerry smartphones.’

2. There are 2 capital letters.

Again, the BlackBerry is not a fruit which only takes a capital at the beginning of a sentence. BlackBerry is a brand name with 2 capital letters.

3. A BlackBerry device is not a mobile phone.

A RAZR is a mobile phone. Anything made by Sony Ericsson is a mobile phone. A BlackBerry is not a mobile phone. The BlackBerry stands alone as a powerful device for enterprise and prosumers. If a group of devices are to be mentioned in a sentence, BlackBerry must stand alone. For example, “please submit your pagers, mobile phones, BlackBerry devices and laptops.”

BLACKBERRYCOOL

This is very much a case in itself and I would like the views of GrammarGirl on this one seeing as my first post was based on what she had said, this BlackBerry thing is becoming quite a riddle but very interesting.

Another interesting fact is the use of  CamelCase (also spelled “camel case”) or medial capitals is the practice of writing compound words or phrases in which the elements are joined without spaces and are capitalized within the compound.  The name comes from the uppercase “bumps” in the middle of the compound word, suggestive of the humps of a camel. Camel case is a standard identifier naming convention for several programming languages, and has become fashionable in marketing for names of products and companies. However, camel case is rarely used in formal written English, and most style guides recommend against its use.

Source The English Teacher BLACKBERRYCOOL www.quickanddirtytips.com

What are the main differences in teaching in a traditional classroom to e-learning?

Image by Flickr/ne

The use of RSS (the most common translation is now “Really Simple Syndication”) is a family of Web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format. An RSS document (which is called a “feed”, “web feed” or “channel”) includes full or summarized text, plus meta such as publishing dates and authorship. Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favored websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place. RSS feeds can be read using software called an “RSS reader”, “feed reader”, or “aggregator”, which can be web-based, desktop-based, or mobile-device-based. A standardized XML file format allows the information to be published once and viewed by many different programs. The user subscribes to a feed by entering the feed’s URL, often referred to informally as a “URL” (uniform resource locator), although technically the two terms are not exactly synonymous, into the reader, or by clicking an RSS icon in a browser that initiates the subscription process. The RSS reader checks the user’s subscribed feeds regularly for new work, downloads any updates that it finds, and provides a user interface to monitor and read the feeds.RSS formats are specified using XML, a generic specification for the creation of data formats. Although RSS formats have evolved since March 1999, the RSS icon (”“) first gained widespread use between 2005 and 2006.

Source wikipedia Image bytelove

Last Tuesday marked the start of #teachertuesday on Twitter. What does this mean? The hash mark (#) before a word in a post allows you to tag that post for that word. However, in order to get tracked via a hash tag, you need to opt-in and follow.  Once you’re following hash tags, every time you make a post in Twitter and tag it with a hash mark like so: #teachertuesday it will then show up as a real-time post on www.hashtags.org. All teachers, bloggers, schools, companies  and anyone else interested in the education sector is invited to follow the blue owl at @teachertuesday. Every Tuesday you can use the #teachertuesday to make suggestions to your followers and the blue owl who they should follow. For example

#teachertuesday follow @TheEngTeacher she is a great teacher and @edufire it’s a great company

The blue owl will revise all tweets of #teachertuesday and then add interesting teachers, bloggers, schools and companies to www.teachertuesday.info which is therefore becoming an educational data bank, a great resource for all teachers etc.,

Here is what my colleague and dear friend Kirsten had to say:

The idea is to recommend interesting teachers, schools, organisations, applications or anything else about education to your friends and followers on Twitter, like on #followfriday.

See you on @teachertuesday

agreement 1

Be impeccable with your word - Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.

agreement 2

Don’t take anything personally - Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.

agreement 3

Don’t make assumptions - Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.

agreement 4

Always do your best - Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.

A dear friend sent me this book several years ago now when I was not in the best of shape. I think everyone should read it and try to understand how human beings work sometimes, it’s amazing what you can learn.

Source www.miguelruiz.com

“Teachers don’t know it all, and there’s always a lesson in life to learn.”

The ABC’s of Online Teaching

Source  www.it.nmu.edu/abc.htm Image courtesy of SideLong

Credit to  www.catepol.net Source www.youtube.com and www.facebook.com

These changes are described as features of connected speech.

Sounds link
Linking is a way of joining the pronunciation of two words so that they are easy to say and flow together smoothly. In English there are different ways that this happens.

Consonant to vowel linking - when the first word ends with a consonant sound and the second word begins with a vowel sound.

Vowel to vowel linking - when certain vowels come next to each other an extra sound is added to make the link smooth.

Linking ‘r’
In standard British English (RP) the letter ‘r’ after a vowel sound at the end of word is often not pronounced. However, when the following word begins with a vowel the /r/ sound is pronounced to make a smooth link.

Sounds disappear
When the sounds /t/ or /d/ occur between two consonant sounds, they will often disappear completely from the pronunciation.

Sounds join together
When a word ends in a consonant sound and the following word begins with the same consonant sound, we don’t pronounce two sounds - both sounds are pronounced together as one.

Sounds change
When a word ends in a consonant sound and the following word begins with a consonant sound, depending on the particular sounds, the last sound of the first word or both the last sound and the first sound of the next word can change.

Easter Vocabulary Words and Definitions