TOP 10 TOOLS 2008
Jennifer Madrell

I live in the United States in Hoboken, NJ ... just across the Hudson River from Manhattan. I am currently enrolled in the Old Dominion University Instructional Design and Technology Doctoral program.

Blog: DesignedToInspire.com   Portfolio Site: JenniferMaddrell.com

Jennifer's Top 10 Tools as at 11 January 2008

1. Drupal: My online life is centered around a Drupal installation. It is my blogging platform, as well as the content management system which houses my important online artifacts.
    
2. Del.icio.us: While there are many fine online social bookmarking sites available, del.icio.us is still my favorite because of the extensive network. At EdTechTalk.com, we use del.icio.us to aggregate educational technology links bookmarked within our community of educators - see del.icio.us/edtechtalk where we have over 3,100 bookmarked web sites. The links that are shared each week within the network form the content for our live EdTechWeekly web cast.
    
3. Flickr: I upload or link to Flickr photos several times a week. Beyond using Flickr to house traditional photos, I also use it to store presentation slides saved as .jpeg files. Flickr makes interfacing with other slideshow applications, such as VoiceThread, a snap.
    
4. Firefox: Firefox is more than a great browser. It is also my online desktop loaded with invaluable add-ons, such as ScribeFire for blogging and Zotero for research citations.
    
5. Skype: Skype does more than just facilitate voice and video conversations. It also is my primary "chat" client.
    
6. Twitter: While I have a love / hate relationship with Twitter, it has become an important means of staying current with the latest news and resources in education and technology. I now follow Twitter closer than blogs.
    
7. Google Docs: I can't image going back to the days of e-mailing draft documents within a group. Google Docs is the application I use when I need to collaborate on any writing project with a group.
    
8. Audacity: Audacity is still the best application I have found for simple recording and editing of audio. It just works.
    
9. Ustream: At EdTechTalk, we have been using Ustream.tv to stream live web cast for several months now. The possibilities of both live and on-demand audio and video presentations are tremendous.
    
10. Yugma: Yugma is an excellent screen sharing application. At EdTechTalk, we have used Yugma many times to facilitate live interactive web casts. Combined with Skype, it provides a great free online presentation option.