- 101 Free Learning Tools
- OpenCourseWare and Open Educational Resources
- Free EduGames
- Printer-Friendly Version
Let's explore the idea that there is at least one excellent free learning tool (or site) for every learning problem, need or issue!
I want a FREE:
- Easy-to-use and secure Internet browser? Firefox
- e-Mail system? Gmail
- Social bookmarking tool? del.icio.us
- Social bookmarking tool with collaborative learning features (groups, forums, etc.)? Diigo
- Tool to translate text or a webpage? Google Language Tools
- RSS reader? Omea Reader
- Online RSS reader? Google Reader
- Online Calendar? Google Calendar
- Tool to aggregate all my resources, mail, RSS feeds, etc, in one place? iGoogle or Pageflakes
- Platform to incorporate all my favorite tools within one environment? Elgg
- Learning Management System (LMS)? Easy, Moodle
- Hosted LMS? Here are SEVEN!
- Tool to assist me in evaluating and selecting a LMS? EduTools
- Learning Activity Management System? LAMS
- Collaboration tool? Connect with Ning
- Social Networking tool? Tricky one! Facebook
- 3D online virtual world where I can socialize, connect and learn? Second Life
- Content Management System (CMS)? Joomla
- Tool to create my own website? Webnode
- Virtual Classroom? DimDim
- Hosted Virtual Classroom? WiZiQ
- Tool to broadcast myself to the world? USTREAM
- Tool to make calls from my computer? Skype
- Videoconferencing chat service? Vawkr
- Content authoring tool? How about two? eXe & CourseLab
- Alternative to Microsoft Office? OpenOffice
- Online suite of office tools? Google Docs or Zoho
- Tool that accurately converts my PowerPoint to Flash (including animations)? iSpring Free
- Web authoring tool alternative to FrontPage and Dreamweaver? NvU or KompoZer
- Personal online notebook? Google Notebook
- Blogging tool? WordPress! Why aren't you using WordPress? Good Question!
- Blogging tool for educators? Edublogs
- Directory of edubloggers from around the world? International Edubloggers Directory
- Microblogging tool? Twitter
- Wiki tool? PBwiki
- Encyclopedia, which I can add to or edit? Wikipedia
- Community dedicated to collaborative development of free content? WikiEducator
- Audio recording tool? Audacity
- Tool to record and host my audio recordings online? Odeo Studio
- Tool to transform media into collaborative spaces with video, voice and text commenting? VoiceThread
- Tool for storytelling? Here are 50!
- Screencasting (recording) tool? Wink
- Hosted screencasting tool? Jing
- Mindmapping tool? FreeMind
- Tool that lets me brainstorm and create mindmaps online? Bubbl.us
- Easy-to-learn 3D authoring software tool? Google SketchUp
- Alternative to 3D Studio Max? Blender
- Photo/image editing tool? GIMP or Picasa
- Online photo/image editing tool? Splashup
- Tool to create cool personalized images? Custom Sign Generator Widgets
- Image Resizer? Dosize
- Watermarking tool? uMark
- Screen Color Picker? ColorSchemer
- Tool to highlight text in a webpage? The Awesome Highlighter
- Tool to create flowcharts, diagrams, technical drawings? Gliffy
- Tool to create comics and cartoons? ToonDoo
- Tool to create animations? GoAnimate
- Tool to make screenshots from different browsers with one click? Browsershots
- Tool to create PDFs from any Windows program? PDFCreator
- Online file conversion tool (e.g. Word >PDF>PowerPoint)? Zamzar
- Tool to share my slides? Too easy man! SlideShare
- Tool to share my videos? Come on! YouTube
- Online science research sharing portal? SciVee
- Online community to share and discuss instructional teacher videos? TeacherTube
- Online community to share, discuss and learn about the uses of educational technology? EdTechTalk
- Online community to test my big ideas? Big Think
- Tool to download videos from any video sharing site (YouTube, Metacafe, etc.)? ClipNabber
- Self-publishing tool (books, papers, articles, etc)? Scribd
- Tool to share my pictures? Are you joking! Flickr
- Space to upload and share my files? eSnips
- File hosting solution that allows me to share files up to 250MB each? FileCrunch
- Online quiz tool? ClassMarker
- Tool to create interactive quizzes and puzzles? Hot Potatoes
- Tool to create web and print-based crossword puzzles? EclipseCrossword
- Inquiry-oriented lesson tool? WebQuest
- Online polling tool with a bit of fizzle? Polldaddy
- Online survey tool? Click here to choose!
- Tool to create Flash games (templates)? ClassTools.net
- Investment Simulation Game? Virtual Trader
- Interactive 3D business simulator? INNOV8
- Game to understand cancer better? Re-Mission
- Game to understand the scientific method and 21st Century Skills? River City
- Game to understand variable manipulations for urban management? SimCity
- Game to understand social studies better? Quest Atlantis
- Game to understand world hunger and efforts to alleviate it? WFP Foodforce
- Game to learn more vocabulary and help hungry people? Seriously! FreeRice
- Range of interactive tools to help me understand maths concepts? Shodor Interactivate
- Tool to create my own search engine tailored to my needs? Google Custom Search Engine
- Human-powered search engine? Mahalo
- Metasearch engine with visual display interfaces? What! Here is KartOO!
- Search engine that groups the results by topic via automated clustering technology? Vivisimo
- Science-specific search engine? Scirus
- All-in-one research search tool? Schoolr
- Tool to help me collect, manage, and cite my research sources? Zotero
- Tool that generates detailed statistics about the visitors to my website? Google Analytics
- Tool to search, discover, rank and compare different sites around the world? Alexa
- Tool to search the full text of books? Google Book Search
- Tool to search for scholarly literature? Google Scholar
- Tool to search for patents? Google Patent Search
- Tool that sends me email updates of the latest relevant Google results (e.g. e-Learning)? Google Alerts
- Energy saving search engine? Blackle
- Online visual dictionary and thesaurus? Visuwords
- World digital library? World Digital Library
- Tool to build and distribute my own digital library? Greenstone
- Site to find and search across all OpenCourseWare (OCW) courses? OpenCourseWare Consortium
- Repository and learning network of Open Educational Resources (OER)? OER Commons
- Site to get the latest updates on OER and OCW? OER Blogs
- Portal to non-formal OER and training resources? Open Training Platform
- Encyclopedia of video tutorials to help me learn any software? Edumax or Wikivid
- e-Book to learn more about e-learning 2.0? Learning 2.0 eBook
- Site to learn more about rapid e-learning? The Rapid e-Learning Blog
- Site to learn more about Online Course Development? Hitchhiker’s Guide to Course Development
- Crash course in learning theory? Click here!
- Database of Learning Theories? Click here & here!
- Tool to help me understand and use learning styles effectively? Learning Styles Online.com
- Repository of creative and critical thinking tools? Mycoted to the rescue!
- Route to learn more about the 21st century skills? Route 21
- Repository of how everything works? HowStuffWorks
- Repository of lectures from the world's top scientists? Videolectures.NET
- Directory of academic open access repositories? OpenDOAR
- Site covering today's top social, political, and tech issues? FORA.tv
- Site to improve my learning skills? Study Guides & Strategies
- Gaming tool to help me learn ICT? ReviseICT.co.uk
- Tool to improve my typing skills? Peter's Online Typing Course
- Tool to improve my reading skills? ZAP Reader
- Interactive courseware to improve my workplace skills? ALISON
- Multimedia site that enhance our understanding of war and its history? Maps-of-War
- 3D human anatomy visualization tool? Visible Body
- Tool to learn languages? Mango
- Tool to explore the World? Google Earth
- Tool to explore the Universe? WorldWide Telescope
- Tool to visualize human development? Gapminder
- Tool to answer all my questions? Answer.com
- Site with talks by the world's greatest thinkers and doers? TED is a good starting point!
- Article to reveal the secrets of the super-learners? Click here!
- Link to the most innovative web 2.0 (and 3.0) lab in the world? Google Labs
- Tool to stumble upon and discover great websites, videos, photos, etc. ? StumbleUpon
- Daily newsletter that keeps me updated with the latest news on online learning? Stephen's OLDaily
- Site dedicated to tracking the changes occurring in education today? Open Education
- Site to update me on the latest free instructional resources for Higher Education? EduResources Weblog & Educational Technology
- Site to discover delicious free tools, resources, and sites? ZaidLearn's Del.icio.us Discoveries
- Site to make you shut up? About time! Here we go:
25 (must-have free) Tools: Professional Development Programme (Jane Knight)
In short, for every learning problem (or issue) we have today, there is probably
a free tool or site out there that enables us to solve it. If not, I am pretty sure some genius out there is constructing it right now. If no one is doing it, perhaps we can do it.
a free tool or site out there that enables us to solve it. If not, I am pretty sure some genius out there is constructing it right now. If no one is doing it, perhaps we can do it.Another challenge is to integrate all our learning tools efficiently and effectively into our learning spaces. On the positive note, more and more tools are creating integration modules to widely used systems like Moodle and Facebook, so it might not be so difficult after all. Also, with OpenID we can increasingly login to all our favorite websites without much hassle. Single-login to all our learning tools! Now that is something we all can appreciate! Remember one password! Tough one!
If you want to experience my learning adventure as I discover, perhaps you should subscribe to my Del.icio.us Learning Adventure! Otherwise, you could always wait a week or two for the updates in this blog. Have fun 'Socratic Tooling' to solve your learning problems and issues :)
Posts
18 comments:
What about OpenCourseWare!?!?!?!?
:)
(He says self-servingly)
Dear John,
Thanks for your great feedback!
If you look closely, you can see question 72 (might change later) which says: I want a free Repository and learning network of Open Educational Resources (OER)? OER Commons (http://www.oercommons.org/)
Which enable you to have access to most of the OpenCourseWare indirectly :)
But since you made a very important point, I have actually added another question specifically mentioning OpenCourseWare, which links you to OpenCourseWare Consortium (http://www.ocwconsortium.org/).
Thanks for the great question :)
Warm Regards,
Zaid
Alexa.com is a subsidiary of Amazon.com. It is a website which provides information on traffic levels for websites. The Alexa rank is measured according to the amount of users who’ve visited a website with the Alexa toolbar installed. Alexa toolbar is an application developed by Alexa Internet. Its primary use is to measure website statistics. This toolbar collects as well as gives some valuable information. Once you install it, the Alexa toolbar monitors all your surfing and collects information about what domains you visit. They use this data to rank web sites. The traffic rank they assign to websites is based on 3 months of aggregated historical traffic data from millions of other users and is a combined measure of page views and users. Webmasters, advertisers and ad networks use your blog’s Alexa rank as a gauge to determine the worth of a link on your website. If you depend on link or site selling as a form of monetization you’ll definitely want to increase your Alexa rank, because it’ll increase your bargaining power when it comes to ad pricing.
Great list! Find many more Web 2.0 apps on www.web20searchengine.com.
Zaid,
Thank you. Well done. We will include most of the tools you listed to the LeMill's tools section.
LeMill is a user managed "repository" of free and open learning content, learning methods and learning tools and we hope that you or other people will write descriptions of the tools in there and translate them to other languages.
- Teemu
Under #23 Web authoring tool alternative to FrontPage and Dreamweaver? NvU
I have long used Nvu, great software, yet they have not upgraded for ages, please do try Kompozer
Dear Teemu,
Thanks for your great feedback :)
I have added KompoZer (with NvU) to the list. Anyway, KompoZer is Nvu's unofficial bug-fix release, so I suppose they have a lot in common :)
All the best!
Zaid
Hi Zaid
This comment is really for you but came in on my post :-)
http://pdonaghy.edublogs.org/2008/04/12/free-tools-for-all-your-needs/#comments
Patricia
PS: Thanks for adding IE Directory!!
Dear Patricia,
Thanks for notifying me.
Yes, I can live with that comment :)
It is good to see that people are benefiting and enjoying the learning tool/resource list.
Warm Regards,
Zaid
As for the free software everyone should have, I think you guys are forgetting iSpring Free. I use it for a while now and I am very positive about it.
Dear Norma,
Thanks for the suggestion :)
I have also added it to the list (Currently, item 28).
The only real disaster (from my brief experiment!) with the free version is the compression output. The Flash version weighs ironically more than the actual PowerPoint (Did a test!).
Since they have a commercial upgrade, I suppose they have left out some of the important and useful juice. Otherwise, how are they going to sell the product!
If you want to compare the free and commercial versions more, go here: http://www.ispringsolutions.com/go_pro.html
Anyway, until I find a better alternative, I will include it :)
Thanks again :)
Zaid
Thanks a lot
This a a really great post! Thanks!
A very good list. I personally also advocate the use of free and legal software especially for countries of the Third World where acquisition of hardware is already difficult not to mention the software licensing. I am typing and posting from a laptop installed with Ubuntu.
http://educononline.com
Dear Amran,
Thanks for your feedback and thanks for sharing your site or blog (http://educononline.com). I am enjoying it, and have added it to my EduBloggers list: http://delicious.com/zaidlearn/Edublogs
I wish you the best of success with your work and new blog (since July). Hopefully, one day we can hook up for a learning discussion :)
Warm Regards,
Zaid
I like this blog because it reminds me of myself. Thanks for posting!
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