Tired of singing a cappella at Family Home Evening? The new LDS Sing-Along apps for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch are a great way to sing along to and learn the music and teachings of the Church:

• LDS Hymns Sing-Along ($4.99)
• LDS Children’s Sing-Along ($4.99)

I got this app from the developer to test it out and my kids love it.  Even my wife loves it because the little bouncy ball that follows along with the words at the bottom help our 5 year old as she is learning to read.  Highly recommend.

Here’s a quick look at how much fun you and your family can be having:

Today Google announced an awesome new feature for families.  The Google Family Safety Center.  It really is a great resource for parents trying to keep their families safe in the sea of immorality that is on the internet now a days.  They have the following sections right now.

• Google Safety Tools
• Advice from Child Safety Organizations (Partners)
• Learn how to report others that are sharing inappropriate materials
• Videos from Google Parents about how they manage their children’s safety.

As I mentioned yesterday, the church has opened up the new.lds.org site for everyone.  It really is a great site!

This morning I got a chance to play around with the new site and used the scripture study feature for the first time.  It took me a little while to find my way around and I thought it would be helpful for some folks to have a little intro.  So I made a video up.

Overall I am pleased with the scriptures.  I sent them a bit of feedback.  I’ll post it here.  Feel free to add your thoughts.  Perhaps you have found ways around the problems I was having.

Feedback:

• The biggest problem I have is the method for marking.  It is sometimes hinky to get the highlighting working.  You are supposed to just hover over the verse to make the highlighter open up.  But it doesn’t always work.  I think there should be a “Highlighting Mode” that you can activate when you are highlighting verses that allows you to click and select a part of a verse and then the menu pops up afterward to choose the color, add a note, AND add a tag (tag is not currently one of the options).  T
• Right now after you highlight anything it pops open a menu where you can edit the highlight, add a note, and add tags.  I think that should not automatically pop open even time.  It distracts from the scriptures.  Or at least make an global option for each user where folks can decide if they want it to have that pop open each time.
• I woud love to be able to highlight multiple verses at once (passages)
• When tagging, I would like a way to browse current Tags
• Multiple Versions of the scriptures.  Sometimes you want to just read the BOM and highlight all the places where it mentions a topic.  It would be great to have multiple copies of the scriptures for different times, and purposes.  Maybe you could use tags or folders for this as well if you could set a default tag or folder for when you were marking.  Or filter and show the markings based on the tag as you read (ie. Only show Tags: BOM Christ Reading 2010).

What are your thoughts?

Remember about a year ago when I posted about this great browser for kids called Glubble?  Well, it is still out there and great, but I think I just found something better.

Zoodles website link

Zoodles is a Glubble like product.  It lets you create a family profile and add each kid, but it is focused on education.  What’s more, it has this amazing reporting back-end that allows partents to look at what the kids are learning based on areas like reading, math, science, etc.

I was looking around for a game tonight on my phone to entertain (and educate) my 5 year old preschooler and just ran across this on my android phone.  It is a free download to install.

I was very pleased when she opened it and it had a ton of the Starfall games (another great website for young preschool learners) right on my phone.  She had a blast.

Unfortunately it costs about $5/month to track what the kids are doing, but it lets the kids keep playing even if you don’t have an account to see what they are doing.

Of course I went ahead and set up profiles for all the rest of my kids and they had appropriate stuff for them as well.

I’m so losing my phone for the next couple of weeks to the kids… and I’m okay with that.

I often will find an awesome YouTube video that I want to share in a class I am teaching…. but how do I get it downloaded? Unless you are one of the lucky few, you don’t have an internet connection at church. I hope this post will give you some ideas of things that have worked for me.

NOTE: YouTube has said that they are working toward putting download options on all Video’s, but for now they are only on certain popular ones. So hopefully one day, this won’t be important.

Downloading YouTube Videos:

The easiest way to download a YouTube video is the following:

• Go to this website: http://keepvid.com/
• Enter the URL in the top part: ie. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eM3mlgLAlMs
• Click the Download button to the right. Look to the bottom and click the download button under High Quality. Wahla!

You can play the video it downloads with Quicktime, which if it doesn’t play on your computer, you can download for free here.

Downloading other Online Streaming Video’s

Sometime you run across video’s from other sites you want to download. There is a nice Firefox Extension you can install that will look for the media on each page and allow you to download it. It is called SoThink Web Video Downloader for Firefox.

For those that might not be familiar with Firefox, it is a web browser like Internet Explorer or Safari and can be downloaded for free here.

After it is installed, you will see a little icon in the top right next to the google bar. Browse to the video you want to download and then click on the icon. It will have a URL in there of the video download. Right click on that and select Download.

The download will be in .flv flash format. You can watch that using Quicktime or VLC Media Player.

Conclusion

This is just two of dozens of ways to get videos offline. You should keep in mind that this is an area that is constantly changing. Google may change the way Video’s are online tomorrow and it might stop working. Sometimes it just will download the sound, and no video. It isn’t an exact science, and unless there is a Download option right next to the Video, there will probably always be the possiblity of problems. That being said, it does work mostly!

Feel free to share other ideas and tools you have used in the comments. Once you have it local, you can then put it on a DVD if you have software for that, or just bring a laptop to class to show the video. Good luck and happy teaching!!

Let me start this post off with a little story. I started working in IT about 5 years ago. One of the downfalls of working with technology is that sometimes you think you can fix anything. Well… I knew I should be backing up my family pictures and made some paltry CD backups, but never really took it seriously. I told myself “I am a techie and can fix anything.”

Well… let me just tell you that there are some things I can’t fix. And hard drives DO FAIL!

Since my unfortunate hard drive failure and the resulting loss of pictures and data I have researched dozens of back-up options. I now have a complex techie solution I use for my pictures, videos and documents that involves a script and automated backups to my own personal off site server where it duplicated the data once more on a Raid network device. But that is obviously not for everyone.

That being said I have long looked for a good solution that I could recommend to others. I finally found it. It is the Mozy.com folks.  And as an added bonus, they are based out of Pleasant Grove UT and I think they have Mormon connections.  I personally love supporting my brothers and sisters and gospel in their business efforts.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have signed up for an affiliate program that gives me a little bit on money when people do sign up so if you are going to sign up, please consider going there from any of the links on my blog. I figure this can help pay for the domain name and space I use to maintain this blog.

Versions

• A FREE version with up to 2GB of data (enough to back up important documents!)
• A super cheap version for $4.95/mo with UNLIMITED DATA (pictures, videos, etc!)
• Even an Educational and Business Version with local institutional administration capabilities.

Check out this comparison page for more information.

They even have a Mac version! How awesome is that? I have it installed and running now and it is GREAT!

How it Works:

You install it once, leave it and you can sleep at night knowing you have a backup. The first time takes a while, but it uses slow network time. I could still surf and even watch streaming video while it did the initial backup.

Restoring Data – There are three easy ways to restore data with the Free version.

• Use the client version to restore it right on machine.
• Web version to restore
• DVD sent to your home ($)

Overall, I am VERY pleased with this and highly recommend it to everyone! Even if you only use it for the free version to back up the important documents… give it a try!

One of the things that the LDS community is really good at is preserving memories.  Our keen interest in our ancestors helps us realize that we would like to leave a record for our posterity.

I know my family and MANY of my friends have all started a blog and write our family history as it happens on those blogs.  I have taken those posts and created books from them for my family.  (Technology makes it easier and I will post about how I did that in a future post).  But what about the past?

I ran across another start up today called “Remembering That.“  In their own words:

Our goal is to collect and present your memories and stories. Think of it as a bit of an historical archive and window to our past.

This is simply a site where you can share some of the stories about the past that you remember.  Some have to do with families.  Some just have to do with funny memories of the past.

What do you use to record your memories of the past?

I just came across a great new startup, Famplosion,  that helps you find family friendly activities in your area, or an area you are visiting.  Right now they only have the following locations, but perhaps they will expand one day.

• Atlanta
• Chicago
• Los Angeles
• Nashville
• New York City
• San Francisco
• Seattle
• Tahoe City

Our local chamber of commerce also has a great website with local events that I use to find good and varied date nights with my sweet wife.

What do you use to keep up with local events?

I came across this great video this morning about a networked student.  It really get’s the old juices flowing when thinking about spiritual education as well. 

So how does this all apply in a spiritual setting? I’m glad you asked.   Here are a couple of points off the top of my head.

Distance Education
Notice that this “Student at 21st century high school” only spends 3 days a week in classroom, 2 days online.  This is a great model for increasing interaction.  Technology enables more interactions outside of the classroom.  Meaningful interactions that can build up students.  I think we should certainly encourage as much interaction as possible. 

That doesn’t mean we should spend less time in a physical classroom where that is possible, but rather that we can increase interaction with those that can’t make it to a physical classroom every day of the week.

Personal Learning Network

Students in the 21st century need to be taught how to build up a personal spiritual learning network.  A lot of the work that happens in Sunday School and Seminary/Institute classes are there to teach students how to study the scriptures.  Well, today there is  lot more information out there that they need to learn how to navigate as well.

Social Bookmarking Site

This student goes out and finds relevant sites about their topic and bookmarks them where others can find them.  In the church there is certainly a ton of information out there, just from the church alone… not to mention the millions of personally created sites.  Social bookmarking sites will help students navigate this sea of information in meaningful ways.  As students begin to find the best content (D&C 88:118) and pass that on it will also help put that information to the top of search engines. 

Blogs

Students have the opportunity to not only comment on blog about their “own informed point of view,” but as they create their own blog they think critically and have opportunities to expression opinions to a global audience.

iTunes / Mobile Devices

Students in the 21st audio and video podcasts that support his learning.  In the church that is certainly the case as well with BYU TV, CES video’s, General Conferences, CES Firesides, etc. all available!

Connection with experts – Skype

Students can connect with LDS people all over the world.  If they are having a lesson on missionary work I’m sure some of the folks at A More Good Foundation would be DELIGHTED to do a Skype video interview about using the internet to spread the gospel.   Then there is the added ability to connect with General Authorities, or others that may have a special story to tell that will help the students.  Oh, and think of the global impact as well.  Perhaps connecting with a seminary class in Germany and chatting with them on a regular basis to see how the church is different/same there.

Personal Student Projects

Perhaps my favorite part of this video is where they talk about a student’s work culminates into a project of their own.  Where a student share’s his knowledge with the world through video, voicethread, wiki, etc.  In the case of the church, a student is sharing their testimony with the world.  We all know that often a testimony is gained in the bearing of it.  This is certainly no less the case.

Teacher Role

Teachers teach how to build this network, offer guidance, serve as a modeler, help the students differenciate between good information and propaganda, and help the students organize information.  They teach them to set up network that will help the student navigate their future in the gospel. 

Other Ideas?

These are just a few quick ideas off the top of my head this lovely morning.  What did you get out of the video?  If you are a teacher, how can you apply some of this in your classroom?  It can be on Sunday in church or some other setting where you get to teach. 

Hey… we are all teachers to some extent in our homes… how can you apply this with your kids?!  Mine are just starting to use the internet.  I should show them how to bookmark and share things with others.  And how to search and find good content. It’s never too early!

You know, one of the things I really love about being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the focus they put on helping us teach our kids the gospel. You may, or may not have heard, but the church just released a new nursery manual that is AWESOME! It has 30 lessons geared toward the short attention spans of our children. I don’t know about you, but there are a lot of times that I don’t want to do FHE because it is just too hard to keep the kids attention. Well… I really think this manual will help.

There are a bunch of different formats too. You can see them here:

• Online Text
• Online PDF
• Or you can order it online for $5.50… I ordered two today.

Here is a video introduction:

You know… It really is amazing to me how the church has taken to social media to get the word out. They are using YouTube to host their video’s. Awesome!