I'm Off To NSBA T+L!

So tomorrow I fly to Denver to attend the annual NSBA T+L conference. I'm looking forward to it as I haven't been to Denver before; last year's event was in Seattle. I have some great meetings lined up to learn about new products from a variety of vendors including Follett Software, Pearson, eChalk, BoardDocs and a bunch more. Plus I'm sure I will meet new ones as I peruse the exhibit hall. Perhaps I'll see you there!

FREE STUFF ALERT: 2-For-1 Flip Ultra Cameras For Educators

Last year's Readers' Choice Top 100 Products issue generated a good deal of feedback from our readers, and among the many products nominated was the Flip from Pure Digital. These small handheld video cameras have been a hit with educators, because these are simple to use, point and shoot digital video cameras that only cost about $130-$150 each. So classroom use is easy and straightforward, and if a student drops one in a creek, it's an annoyance but doesn't bankrupt the school. Unlike, say, those classic $3000 VHS camcorders.

Well Pure Digital has found huge success with their products, having recently been acquired by Cisco for a cool $590 million (wish I had thought of this idea). In an effort to continue pushing into education, the company has just partnered with nonprofit Digital Wish to offer 2-for-1 pricing on the Flip Ultra exclusively to educators. That's TWO cameras for $150. Or buy-one-get-one, if you prefer. All you have to do is go to the Digital Wish site and register your classroom, and twice the mini-video camera goodness is yours. Nice.

FREE STUFF ALERT: Big Offer From eInstruction

It's a Friday before a three- (or four- some places) day Columbus Day weekend, and there's no better way to celebrate colonialism annihilation of native peoples than with... FREE stuff from generous ed. tech companies! I'm kidding. Just about the colonialism part, though. Seriously, here's a big opportunity.

eInstruction, makers of all sorts of classroom hardware including the InterWrite Mobi slate, just announced the launch of their third annual Classroom Makeover Contest. This is a contest with HUGE prizes. The company "invites entrants to submit short, creative music videos demonstrating how they would use advanced technology to enhance their learning experience in the classroom."

Grand prize winners in each grade category (K-5, 6-8, 9-12) will receive not only a classroom technology package worth a whopping $30,000 but also $1,000 in cash and a school party for winning. The package includes stuff like the Mobi, InterWrite DualBoards, Dell netbooks, software from Study Island, Inspiration, Texas Instruments and lots more of all kinds of stuff, plus a day long professional development training seminar to introduce teachers to all the new loot. Wow.

eInstruction boasts that last year, "nearly 300" entries were received from around the world, but that really isn't that many in the grand scheme of things! Your chances are good. Give it a shot! 

SMART Releases Student Response..... Software?

You might be familiar with the student response system market, these are the little remotes that students can hold to "vote" or answer multiple choice questions so a teacher and the class can see results instantly. Players in this realm include Turning Technologies, iRespond, and eInstruction, who also integrate their CPS clickers into their InterWrite Mobi portable slate, a pretty unique combination.

But, this post is about everyone's favorite Canadian interactive whiteboard designers, SMART Technologies, as you probably guessed from the title. In a different approach to the student response segment, this week SMART released their new Response CE software, which provides the functions of a clicker, but students answer questions from their computers. Teachers can then see results instantly to assess where the class is on comprehending the topic at hand. Makes sense if you have a 1:1 computing program and you'd rather not have 30 remote controls floating around every classroom to complicate things. Of course, SMART is offering this as just one part of their pretty large stable of products, hoping to be a one stop shop for district customers. It's a good move (notice I didn't say "smart") because there are plenty of competitors out there looking to grab some of SMART's considerable market share in interactive whiteboards, so this product provides yet another weapon in their arsenal. The whiteboard battle continues...