Since this time last year, when I recommended the purchase of portable video cameras, drawing tablets, USB headsets, media readers, the iPod Touch and flash drives to support teaching and learning, the market has exploded with tons of neat gadgets and gizmos! This year’s items support collaboration, creation and content acquisition.

Electronic books

In the third quarter of 2010, Amazon reported that for every 100 hardcover books purchased, 143 digital books were sold. Electronic books are certainly gaining acceptance as a viable option, and teachers and students should have the chance to experience this exciting new media! Amazon recently introduced the Kindle 3, which comes in 2 versions—a WiFi only version for $139 and a WiFi/3G version for $189. Neither requires a monthly access charge. Sony, Samsung and others have their own devices. Having a few e-readers in the classroom, loaded with books (up to 3500!), will provide students with the ability to have access to unlimited titles and content loaded up by the teacher. More importantly, many current e-readers, including the Kindle, can read aloud some commercial titles to help support the student who benefits from that option. Start slowly and consider buying one to share with your students! (Learn more about e-readers including where to find free e-books.)

Online storage sites

Although not technically a gadget, online file storage and sharing can be a huge asset for collaborative work for both professional and teacher-student activities. Online storage sites offer the user a certain amount of storage space on a server; the best ones include the ability to either share things publically or keep them private, and to allow the user to create their own file structure for organization. Dropbox (dropbox.com) is my favorite of all these apps. The no-cost version has most of the functionality of the paid version and allows each user 2GB of online storage space. If you convince friends to sign-up, you are rewarded with extra online space up to 8GB. You can create folders, easily upload and download items, share with specific users or the world and use a corresponding desktop app that allows easy access to the Dropbox. Dropbox works on all desktop platforms and many mobile devices, too. Teachers can add a link to a Dropbox for students to download files of any type, which makes provision of assets to support a project easy to implement!

Ultra-portable document camera

A document camera is a device, mounted on a stand, that hooks to a computer via the USB port and allows items to be viewed on the computer or via an attached video projector. With the proliferation of smaller digital devices in the classroom, like the iPod touch, iPad or graphing calculators, there is often a need to project the screen in order to demo applications or processes to students. One device that projects these smaller screens, and costs under $70, is the IPEVO Point2View USB Camera (ipevo.com). This ultra-portable document camera is perfect for projection of electronic device screens and includes macro and snapshot modes. It would work well for any small item or document and works both on Windows and Mac operating systems. The Point2View can even be used as a webcam!

Powered USB Hub

With the proliferation of USB devices in the classroom—like drawing tablets, USB scanners, digital cameras, MP3 players or external hard drives— that either need to communicate with or charge through a computer, there never seems to be enough USB ports to go around. Many devices need the small bit of power that a USB port supplies and will not work with USB hubs that are not powered. I recommend the Belkin series of powered USB hubs (belkin.com). They are stackable if you need multiple hubs and include a cable management feature to help keep you organized. They come in both 4- and 7-port models ($30 and $50), and 2 of the USB ports are located on the top, which allows easy access for flash drives.

Photo scanner

Students often need to scan in photos as part of a project. There is a great little device by ion (ionaudio.com) called Pics 2 SD ($149.95) which can scan 3x5, 4x6, and 5x7 inch photos, slides and negatives using a 5.1 MP scanner with up to 3600 DPI. The scanned item goes right to an SD card so the Pics 2 SD can be used away from a computer. Images are moved to the computer from the SD card when scanning is complete. Students could even take the device home with them to scan those “family heirlooms” that can’t be brought to school, or to participate in a community service project by digitizing the local library’s or historical society’s photos, slides or negatives. My family has scanned over 500 slides with this product, and the process is simple and the results are exceptional!

External USB hard drive

As teachers and students create multimedia projects that are in high-definition or are of a large resolution for projecting on a big screen or monitor, the file size of these projects quickly outgrow the standard 4- or 8-gigabyte flash drives used for transport. Every classroom should have a USB external hard drive available to make moving of these huge files possible. Western Digital (wdc.com) makes small external drives for both Mac and PC in their Passport Essential series that are available in capacities from 350 GB to 640 GB of data and range in price from $99.99 to $149.99.

Wish List

If you are asked to contribute to a technology wish list for your school, or are looking for a device that can support any grant that includes the embedding of technology into the curriculum, look no further than the Epson (epson.com) Brightlink 450i Interactive projector! This short-throw, 2500 lumen LCD projector is mounted on the same wall as your whiteboard and creates a 59” to 96” image. It has audio and video inputs and outputs of all types, built-in speakers and audio amplification system, and, best of all, it turns any surface into an interactive whiteboard! Epson is offering special pricing through its Brighter Futures program from various academic resellers. The cost of this multi-functional device is $1799 with the wall mounting hardware included and, for additional monies, you can get RM Easiteach software bundled with the Epson Brightlink 450i.

NEA members can find great discounts on a wide assortment of today’s hottest gadgets through NEA Click & Save.

Images courtesy of Barnes & Noble, Dropbox, IPEVO, Belkin, ION Audio, Western Digital, and EPSON.