HARDWARE
AUDIO
Kidz Gear Headphones for Kids are adult-featured stereo headphones designed for children, featuring independent volume controls and an ergonomic design with child-size padded earcups. $19.99.
Kidz Gear; (925) 803-7506; www.gearforkidz.com
DESKTOP
Apple introduces the new 2-inch thick iMac G5, which features 17- or 20-inch active matrix LCD displays, PowerPC G5 processors, built-in stereo speakers and microphones, and more. Starts at $1,299.
Apple, 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA 95014; (800) 692-7753; www.apple.com
HANDHELD
The Tungsten T5 handheld from palmOne offers 256MB of flash memory and can double as a portable flash memory drive. It also features a 320x480 pixel color screen, Bluetooth wireless technology, and a new File Transfer application. $399.
palmOne, Inc., 400 N. McCarthy Blvd., Milpitas, CA 95035; (408) 503-7000; www.palmone.com
HANDHELD ACCESSORY
The Synosphere Blue Dock enables the use of their handhelds as a desktop alternative and is compatible with standard computer keyboards, monitors, mice, and network equipment.
Synosphere, Inc.; (512) 610-2900; www.synosphere.com
PRINTERS
The Dell Laser Printer 3000cn is a network-ready color laser printer
featuring high-quality color printing, and print speeds up to 25 pages per minute for black text, and 5 pages per minute for color printing. $449.
Dell, Inc.; 1 Dell Way, Round Rock, TX 78682; (800) 926-9587; www.dell.com
The Epson Stylus CX6600 scanner/printer/copier features one-touch photo restoration, a memory card slot for PC-free printing and scanning, print speeds up to 22ppm, and more. $179 (after $20 rebate).
Epson America, 3840 Kilroy Airport Way, Long Beach, CA 90806; (800) 463-7766; www.epson.com
Lexmark P915 and P6250 photo printers feature a 2.5-inch LCD display with built-in video instructions, print preview, and countdown timer; on-board camera card readers; and six-color output with resolution up to 4800x1200 dpi. P915: $149; P6250: $249.
Lexmark International, 740 New Circle Rd. NW, Lexington, KY 40550; (800) 539-6275; www.lexmark.com
Brother's new label printers, the Brother QL-500 and the Brother QL-550, can print address, shipping, visitor badge, file folder, and CD/DVD labels from a PC at up 50 labels per minute. QL-500: $100; QL-550: $130.
Brother International, 100 Somerset Corporate Blvd., Bridgewater, NJ 08807; (908) 704-1700; www.brother-usa.com
PEN TABLET
Intuos3 professional pen tablets from Wacom Technology come in three sizes with active areas of 4"x5", 6"x8", and 9"x12", and includes Adobe Photoshop Elements 2, Corel Painter Essentials 2, and nik Color Efex Pro 2IE. Supports Macintosh and Windows platforms. Starts at $199.99.
Wacom Technology Corporation, 1311 SE Cardinal Court, Vancouver, WA 98683; (800) 922-9348; www.wacom.com
SOFTWARE
ASSESSMENT
Released for the 2004-2005 school year, PASeries Reading and PASeries Mathematics from Pearson Education's Progress Assessment Series uses scientific scales to evaluate student progress in reading and math for grades 3-8.
Pearson Education, 1 Lake St., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458; (800) 627-0365; www.pearsoned.com
AUTHORING
With Macromedia Captivate, users can record screen actions and add annotations and voiceovers to create multimedia software tutorials.
Captivate simulations and demonstrations can be incorporated with Macromedia Breeze for online presentations. $299 for RoboDemo upgrades, $499 for new users. Volume discounts available.
Macromedia, Inc., 600 Townsend St., San Francisco, CA 94103; (415) 252-2000; www.macromedia.com
CALENDAR TOOL
Designed for the K-12 environment, SchoolFusion from Centrifuge Solutions allows teachers and administrators to manage events, assignments, announcements, test dates, and more on one calendar page. The system integrates into the school Web site and uses a customized security system to protect the students' information.
Centrifuge Solutions, 655 Broadway, Ste. 855, Denver, CO 80203; (800) 906-0911; www.schoolfusion.com
DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT
Laserfiche 7 is a single solution for managing high-volume paper, electronic, and e-mail content. New features include local data extraction, security features, and improved archiving controls. Laserfiche 7 runs on MS-SQL, Oracle, and Microsoft platforms.
Laserfiche, 3545 Long Beach Blvd., Long Beach, CA 90807; (562) 988-1688; www.laserfiche.com
HISTORY
World History: Ancient and Medieval Eras, a new subscription Web site from ABC-CLIO, offers chronologically organized lessons and reference sources with a worldwide perspective, interactive timelines, current events-related features, and more. $599 per year. A free 30-day trial is available at www.abc-clio.com.
ABC-CLIO, 130 Cremona Dr., Santa Barbara, CA 93117; (800) 386-6868; www.abc-clio.com
Teaching for Thinking announces two new software titles. The Middle Ages: The Building of Nations and The Renaissance: Winds of Change are both told from the point of view of key historical figures of the period and illustrated with period artworks. Interactive timelines, additional study materials, and a Teacher's Guide are also included. $39.99.
Teaching for Thinking, Inc., 3016 Waterloo St., Vancouver, British Columbia, V6R 3J6; (800) 602-6606; www.teachingforthinking.com
MATHEMATICS
Key Curriculum Press introduces TinkerPlots, data analysis software for grades 4-8. Students can use it to organize data sets into graphs and create reports integrating text and graphs.
Key Curriculum Press, 1150 65th St., Emeryville, CA 94608; (800) 995-6284; www.keypress.com
MULTIMEDIA
Premiere Elements from Adobe features professional-level video editing and effects, simple footage transfer from DV camcorders to the video timeline, and integrated DVD burning for the Windows platform. Adobe's Photoshop Elements 3.0, available for both Macintosh and Windows platforms, offers advanced photo editing tools, music and special effect transitions for slide shows, and more. Premier Elements: $99.99; Photoshop Elements 3.0: $89.99 (Mac), $99.99 (Win).
Adobe Systems, 345 Park Ave., San Jose, CA 95110; (800) 492-3623; www.adobe.com
Pinnacle Studio Plus offers a second video track for true A/B style editing, picture-in-picture effects, and chroma keys effects. It also includes Dolby Digital Stereo Creator, enhanced slide show capabilities, and dual-layer DVD support. Pinnacle Studio Media Suite is a package of media tools that includes Studio Plus, audio and photo editing, CD and DVD backup, a digital media organizer, and a 5' by 6' green sheet backdrop.
Pinnacle Systems, Inc., P.O. Box 9305, Pittsburgh, PA 15225; (800) 569-7697; www.pinnaclesystems.com
Ulead's CD & DVD PictureShow 3 Deluxe includes templates and Ulead Photo Explorer for organizing, enhancing, and transforming photos into DVD and CD slide shows. Also from Ulead is PhotoImpact 10, which now features quick access to tasks such as scanning, downloading photos, and making photo corrections; new creative design tools, including new Lasso and Touch Up tools; and more. PictureShow 3: $49.99; PhotoImpact 10: $89.99.
Ulead Systems, 20000 Mariner Ave., Ste. 200, Torrance, CA 90503; (800) 858-5323; www.ulead.com
OFFER
webEdition Software announced a program in which the Standard Version of their Web site content management system will be available free to schools throughout North America. More detail can be found at www.webeditioncms.com/education/home_page_offer.
webEdition Software Ltd., 349 Terry Fox Dr., Kanata, Ontario K2K 2V6, Canada; (888) 615-1113; www.webeditioncms.com
OMISSION
In our October 2004 cover feature, "The New Literacy," we neglected to include co-author Sara Armstrong's Web site (sgaconsulting.org) and the resource DigiTales: The Art of Digital Storytelling (www.digitales.us).
