Blog - EdWare Learning

Eyjafjallajokull Volcano in Iceland

2010-04-15T10:25:00.002+01:00

With the news this morning regarding the disruption of European flights due to the ash cloud from the Eyjafjallajokull Volcano in Iceland I decided to post some very interesting cloud maps, photos, and video regarding this.

Great to show the class using an interactive whiteboard or data projector, really bring the news into perspective and incorporates geography too.

Cloud Map
http://metoffice.com/aviation/vaac/data/VAG_1271309704.png

Articles:
New York Times Article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/16/world/europe/16ash.html

BBC News Article & Video:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8621407.stm

Irish Time Article:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2010/0415/breaking2.html

NASA Photo
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=43252

Amazing Video from the BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8578576.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8586442.stm

Great Photos
http://www.millhouse.nl/eyjafjallajokull2010.html

I hope you find these links as interesting as I do.

INTO Annual Congress 2010

2010-03-23T18:23:00.003Z

We are exhibiting at the INTO Annual Congress 2010 which is being held at the Salthill Hotel in Galway City, from April 5-7.

Once we have our stand number confirmed I will post details here including some photos of the exhibition hall, check back soon. I look forward to seeing you there.

Visit the INTO website to learn more about the conference. The agenda of the conference:

CESI 2010 Conference

2010-01-30T20:59:00.006Z

We will be exhibiting at the CESI Conference 2010, which is titled "Creative Technology in Challenging Times" and it will be great to meet everyone who attends, so don't forget to pop into the expo to try our software.

The CESI expo will be held on Saturday, 6th Feb at Portlaoise College which is located on Mountrath Road, Portlaoise, Co. Laois. Hope to see you there.

IPPN 2010 Conference

2010-01-30T20:47:00.000Z

Many thanks to all who visited us at the EdWare stand (25B) at the IPPN, it was great to meet our existing customers and our new customers. It was great to showcase our geography software: Know Your Ireland, Know Your Europe, Know Your USA and Know Your World over the three days of the conference.

A special thanks to Lennox Labs for providing us with an interactive whiteboard and projector for the conference.

The conference was held on January 28-30, at the Citywest Hotel & Conference Centre, Dublin, Ireland.

INTO Congress 2010

2010-01-26T15:00:00.004Z

Great news, we will be exhibiting at the INTO Congress this April 5-7 in the Salthill Hotel, Galway. We look forward to seeing you there, we will update our stand information as we receive it from the INTO.

Visit the INTO website to learn more about the conference. The agenda of the conference:

UPDATE: April 08, 2010
Excellent conference, it was great to meet everyone who stopped by the stand. I have uploaded some photos from the exhibition hall.

Know Your Europe 2.1

2009-11-14T15:16:00.003Z

Update of Know Your Europe, version 2.1 is now available. This is a free update to all current users of version 2.0. There are a few minor and major improvements and features:

More photos, over 100 photos from across Europe.
Improved functionality with interactive whiteboards.
Multi-layered country maps, great for using with interactive whiteboards.
Updated content with more information on each feature.
Country maps are now larger and can be expanded to full screen and include further country information.
View country maps from the Capitals study area, so you can see where the capital is in each country.
Each country flag can now be enlarged to full screen.
Minor bug fixes including support for dual screen displays.
Improved support for Windows Vista and Windows 7, works great with the new Windows 7.

The trial version is now available to download from our website, with audio provided by Sarah Lane from California. The Irish edition includes audio in English and As Gaeilge by Nicola Crean from Co Cork.

Co-founder of Apple talks Tech in education

2009-11-10T14:08:00.006Z

"In schools," says Steve Wozniak, the inventor of the Apple II, "the life span of a desk is 25 years, a textbook is 10 years, and a computer is three years, tops. Which of these devices costs the most to buy and operate? Why, the PC, of course. Which has residual value when its useful life is over? Not the PC--it costs money to dispose of. At least books can be burned for heat. Until technology slows down enough for computing platforms to last long enough to be economically viable, they won't be truly intrinsic to education."

Quote from Steve Wozniak when asked recently about the end of Moore's Law (the idea that the number of transistors on a chip doubles every two years). Published by Technology Review Jan/Feb 2009.

Interactive Whiteboards

2009-11-09T16:50:00.005Z

Over the past few weeks I have been trying our software on a selection of Interactive Whiteboards. This week I will post a few videos I took using Know Your USA, Know Your Europe and Know Your Ireland on a Promethean Interactive Whiteboard.

View our YouTube Channel for the latest videos of our software in action, more coming soon and HD video will recorded over the coming weeks too.

http://www.youtube.com/user/EdWareLearning

EdWare Learning / Seomra Ranga Competition

2009-11-02T15:45:00.003Z

EdWare Learning has teamed up with Seomra Ranga (www.seomraranga.com) to bring you a competition on their website for the month of November. We are sponsoring prizes for the competition and providing a number of copies of Know Your Ireland and Know Your Europe to the winners. To be in with a chance of winning one of these prizes, all you have to do is upload a resource to the Seomra Ranga website during the month of November. Simply attach the resource, in any format (.doc, .pdf, .xls, .pub, .jpg etc) to an e-mail and send it to info@seomraranga.com, visit the Seomra Ranga website and blog for further details.

Good luck...

IPPN Conference 2010

2009-10-20T12:10:00.006+01:00

Come visit the EdWare stand at the IPPN (Irish Primary Principals' Network) Conference from January 28-30, 2010 at the Citywest Hotel & Conference Centre, Dublin, Ireland. We will be at stand number 25, drop by and try our award winning geography software for schools.

NASA | A Tour of the Cryosphere 2009

2009-10-19T16:14:00.001+01:00

Fantastic NASA video showing the frozen parts of our planet.

Irish Schools & ICT

2009-10-09T20:27:00.002+01:00

A very interesting article appeared on SiliconRepublic.com today regarding Interactive Whiteboards. According to the article parents pay 90% of the cost of Interactive Whiteboards in Irish schools;

"Efforts of parents rather than the Government are responsible for 90pc of the interactive whiteboards deployed in Irish schools."

This does not surprise me, although this is not limited to just Ireland either. Newsweek about 12 months ago reported the great length teachers in the United States were going to get Interactive Whiteboards in their classrooms.

Other interesting developments is a piece reported on by the Irish Independent (from enn.ie) that money currently not spent on school buildings may be diverted to ICT;

"The Irish Independent reports that millions of euro earmarked for school building this year is to be diverted to pay for long-overdue computers in schools. Education Minister Batt O'Keeffe has been sitting on a high-powered report on ICT in schools, prepared by leading industrialists, outlining the need for urgent investment in technology in schools. The report's recommendations, which include a laptop in every classroom to be phased in from this year, have been awaiting a cash injection. However, the threat to the school building fund has caused anger among the 1,200 schools currently seeking approval to go ahead with major building projects."

LEAP 2009 / 10

2009-10-07T14:57:00.002+01:00

EdWare joined the LEAP programme in June 2009, hosted at the EAC in Limerick. LEAP is a one year enterprise development platform that will enable EdWare to grow and take the business to the next level.

We have now moved into the EAC, and our new address is: EdWare, Enterprise Acceleration Centre, Moylish Park, Limerick, IRELAND

What is LEAP?
LEAP 2009 is a year long milestone driven enterprise and management development programme hosted by the Enterprise Acceleration Centre @ Limerick Institute of Technology that assists men and women entrepreneurs to establish their businesses.

Know Your USA 1.6

2009-09-09T13:28:00.002+01:00

Update of Know Your USA, version 1.6 is now available. This is a free to all current users. There are a few minor and major improvements and features:

Printable state fact files, you can now print state information including a high quality map of each state, great for class projects.
View state maps from the Capitals study area, so you can see where the capital is in the state.
Further web links, you can easily disable web links to Wikipedia, but you can now use Encarta, Lonely Planet links too, offering greater access to online content.
Updated content and more information on each feature.
State maps are now larger and can be expanded to full screen and include further state information.
School Editions also have a new Interactive White Board state map feature, allowing you to flick through layers of detail on each state map, and provides drawing tools too.
Each state flag can now be enlarged to full screen.
New map of New York City, and updated Washington DC map.
Even more photos added, we have close to a hundred photos now included with Know Your USA.
Minor bug fixes including support for dual screen displays.
Improved Windows Vista and Windows 7 support, works great with Windows 7.

Early next month Know Your Europe 2.1 will be available, follow us on twitter at @edwarelearning for the latest updates and educational news.

Satellite Data - Plankton Bloom

2009-08-04T23:23:00.001+01:00

This NASA visualization shows a decade’s worth of data from a sea-tracking satellite. Blues show warm water, greens and reds show cooler, nutrient-rich areas.

EdWare News - Coming in Fall 2009

2009-07-21T17:39:00.006+01:00

We have some interesting announcements over the coming months, just in time for the back to school rush.

New international pricing from October, we are pricing our school site licenses based on school size (number of pupils). We are also introduce an optional maintenance license fee for schools, a great way to reduce upgrade costs.
Update to Know Your USA, version 1.6 will bring lots of new features and improvements, including new printable state maps.
Know Your Europe update to version 2.1, minor improvements with extra content and more photos, and some improvements for Interactive Whiteboards.

Regarding conferences and trade-shows over the next 12 months, we plan on attending BETT (London, UK - Jan 2010), CESI (Dublin, Ireland - Feb 2010), ISTE (Denver, USA - June 2010).

National Geographic Bee 2009

2009-05-25T14:48:00.001+01:00

Texan seventh grader Eric Yang wins the 2009 National Geographic Bee on Sunday in Washington D.C., congratulations Eric, watch the winning question.

The winning tie breaker question was "Timis County shares its name with a tributary of the Danube and is located in the western part of which European country?" The correct answer is Romania. Arjun answered Hungary, and Eric answered correctly.

Find out more about the National Geographic Bee at their website http://www.nationalgeographic.com/geobee/

Also try our geography software, a great way to improve your geography skills, Know Your Europe, USA and World.

European Elections

2009-05-22T19:50:00.006+01:00

Between 4-7 June of 2009 (Friday, 5 June in Ireland), registered voters in the EU's 27 Member States will use their votes to elect 736 members of the European Parliament or MEPs.

Our software Know Your Europe is great for learning all about Europe and the European Union, try it out today, excellent for both home and the classroom.

Learn all about the European Parliament and it works at www.europarl.ie/abouteu.html

Newstalk Quiz on the EU:
Chris Donoghue of Newstalk quizzed Irish candidates from the South on the upcoming European elections, below is their findings. The list of ten questions came from a mix of children’s quizzes on the European Parliaments website.

Quiz Questions:

What year did Ireland join the EU?
How many stars are on the EU flag?
How many countries joined the EU on May the 1st, 2004 when Ireland held the Presidency?
What date is Europe Day?
Which two countries were admitted to the EU in 2007?
What is the capital of Bulgaria?
How many countries use the Euro as their currency?
Who is the minister for state with responsibility for European affairs?
Which country currently holds the EU presidency?
How many EU commissioners are there at the moment?

Answers: 1) 1973; 2) 12; 3) 10; 4) 9th May; 5) Romania & Bulgaria; 6) Sofia; 7) 16; 8) Dick Roche; 9) Czech Republic; 10) 27

Top of the class were outgoing MEPs Brian Crowley (FF) and Kathy Sinnott (Ind) with 9 out of 10. At the other end were Ned O’Keeffe (FF) and Toireasa Ferris (SF) with 3 and 4 out of 10 respectively. Sean Kelly (FG) scored 1 out of the 3 questions he answered before withdrawing and saying the quiz was an unfair way of judging MEP candidates. Alan Kelly (Lab) and Colm Burke (FG) scored 6 out of 10. Listen to the full quiz below.

Newstalk - Are Our MEPs Smarter Than 10 Year Olds? - May 2009

If only they played Know Your Europe, any MEPs want a copy of Know Your Europe let me know, more than happy to pass it on.

EdWare Software Reviews - Anseo.net

2009-05-13T18:22:00.003+01:00

Know Your Europe, Know Your USA and Know Your World were reviewed this week at anseo.net today, and it's another great review from anseo.net. Our software was again awarded their "Top of the Class" award and I am very pleased with the feedback, thanks again Simon.

"Know Your Ireland is in my opinion the definitive solution for any teacher teaching Geography classes. There is nothing else out there that looks better, works better or teaches better. There are a number of other solutions out there but I think this is the very best.

I would echo these sentiments in all three other products. Another worthy “Top of the Class” award." anseo.net - 12 May, 2009.

To read the full review visit the anseo.net website: http://anseo.net/blog2/?p=1033

What is anseo.net?
"Anseo.net has grown from humble beginnings as a basic blog to a fully-featured magazine-style web site. The basic premise of Anseo.net is opinion. The authors, all practicing primary school teachers, write about things in education that they are passionate about."

Mexico Map

2009-04-29T17:11:00.005+01:00

Mexico is being featured in the news the past week regarding the H1N1 influenza A outbreak. I created a map of Mexico that will help greatly the teaching of geography, the printable Mexico PDF is available to download and print, and is ideal for copying.

Mexico_Map_EdWare_PDF.pdf (0.3 MB)

Learn more about Mexico and H1N1 influenza A at Wikipedia.

Know Your Ireland - anseo.net

2009-03-31T12:26:00.004+01:00

Know Your Ireland was reviewed at anseo.net today, and it's a really great review. Know Your Ireland received their "Top of the Class" award and I am very pleased with the feedback, thanks guys.

"Know Your Ireland is in my opinion the definitive solution for any teacher teaching Geography classes. There is nothing else out there that looks better, works better or teaches better. There are a number of other solutions out there but I think this is the very best." anseo.net - 31 March, 2009.

To read the full review visit the anseo.net website: http://anseo.net/blog2/?p=1029

What is anseo.net?
"Anseo.net has grown from humble beginnings as a basic blog to a fully-featured magazine-style web site. The basic premise of Anseo.net is opinion. The authors, all practicing primary school teachers, write about things in education that they are passionate about."

INTO Congress 2009

2009-03-26T11:29:00.008Z

The INTO Congress 2009 is taking place this Easter; April 13-15 in the Mount Errigal Hotel, Letterkenny. EdWare will be there, so make sure you come visit us in the exhibitors area and try out our latest software, and to say hello. I look forward to meeting everyone.

Find out more about and plan your trip to Letterkenny visit the official INTO Congress 2009 website - www.intocongress09.com and the Letterkenny visitors website - www.letterkenny.ie

View Larger Map

INTO Congress:

The 141st Annual Congress of the INTO will take place from Monday 13 to Wednesday 15 April 2009 in Letterkenny, Co Donegal.

INTO President Declan Kelleher will preside at Congress and both Minister Batt O’Keefe TD, Minister for Education and Science in the Republic of Ireland and Minister Caitriona Ruane MLA, Minister for Education in Northern Ireland, have been invited to the Congress.

Over 800 INTO members representing branches throughout the 32 counties will gather to discuss a wide ranging agenda but with a particular focus on the current economic and educational challenges facing teachers throughout the island.

Ireland Worksheet - St. Patrick's Day

2009-03-12T15:00:00.003Z

St. Patrick's Day is celebrated on the 17 March and we have prepared a PDF worksheet with some great maps of Ireland and a flag you can colour. The worksheet is great for learning about Ireland's major cities and counties and perfect for printing to use in the classroom. Download the Ireland PDF Document (1.13MB).

Interactive Whiteboard Series

2009-02-27T01:49:00.006Z

Today we have released the first in our Interactive Whiteboard Series, Introduction to Money. This series will feature mini games that are designed to work great with an Interactive Whiteboard or any digital projector, and are extremely easy to use. The series will only be available as an online download.

The first title Introduction to Money is designed to aid the teaching of maths and money for students aged 4-8. The software features an easy to use drag and drop coin function and with fifty random money questions. Available for only €19.95, this covers the license for use with the teachers computer and interactive whiteboard. You can download the trial edition and try it today, please sign-up to our newsletter to hear the latest EdWare news. Download (5.40MB / Zip File)

International editions coming soon for the US Dollar $ and British Pound £.

New Interactive Whiteboard Games

2009-02-25T14:22:00.002Z

We are currently working on one or two quick learning tools designed for Interactive Whiteboards, they will be posted on our website over the coming weeks and will be great for using with a digital projector. The first title will be a quick drag and drop money game, this will be followed by a few titles in March and April.

Our Interactive Whiteboard Series will only be available as an Internet download, each title will include a 7 day trial so you can test it out before you purchase. All feedback welcome.