TOP 10 TOOLS 2008
Ian Usher

I'm Ian Usher, the E-Learning Co-ordinator for Buckinghamshire County Council in the UK. I look after and lead the provision of online learning in the 240 local authority schools in the county of Buckinghamshire. Previously I've worked in Hertfordshire in a similar role, and before that at University College London and the University of Hertfordshire. I blog on our VLE implementation at moodlea.blogspot.com and am also an Adobe Education Leader

Ian's Top 10 Tools as at 8 July 2008

1. Moodle - we offer Moodle to all of our schools and I'm constantly amazed and surprised at what it can do.
2. Google Search - just because. Because Yahoo and Live Search don't yet cut it, and the ancillary tools based around the Google Search give it extra momentum and reach...
3. Twitter - to paraphrase Bill Thompson - like working in a cafe and being able to hear about what your peers, colleagues and those you respect are working on - and join in where appropriate - www.twitter.com/usher
4. Google Reader - allows me to pick which pulses I have my finger on.
5. Adobe Captivate - an essential tool which we use to bring real depth and accessibility to the job of supporting our schools in their use of Moodle through narrated demonstrations.
6. ZoomIt - as far as I'm concerned, possibly the best tool ever made by Microsoft - and free. Lightweight program which allows zooming and annotation of any window. Every time I use this in training or presentation sessions, there's a queue of teachers at the end asking What was the name of that tool...? or How did you do that zooming thing...? If only I could claim the credit.
7. Blogger - for personal and professional reflection, sharing stories, ideas, thoughts, and whatever takes my mind at the time.
8. del.icio.us - the old version is getting creaky (when's that beta arriving?) but it's still a great way of finding, noting, remembering and (through its RSS feeds) sharing resources
9. flickr - for CC-licenced content, creative and inspiring groups, plus a way of documenting and storing any significant images included in my blog.-  flickr.com/photos/ush
10. Irfanview - even with lots of Richer and Richer Internet Applications appearing to manipulate and capture images, Irfanview is still the simple image editor of choice. Runs from a USB stick - perfect where a decent image editing application isn't present (e.g. within MS Office...) and an internet connection is filtered.