4T2012

Making ebooks – quick and easy

Posted by on May 19, 2012 in Uncategorized

** UDPATE** New handout on creating ebooks with Calibre

In my 4T Virtual conference session today, there was a lot of interest in how to make ebooks with open content, so I’m writing this short post with more details. (We’ll also be doing this at ISTE 2012 this year, so stay tuned for more resources and handouts on this.)

Here are steps for one, very easy way to do this:

  1. Create your ebook content in Word (or LibreOffice…or even in Google Docs, exporting to a Word doc afterward), including images, etc.
    Make sure your images are your own or open licensed for sharing, and cite your sources!
  2. Export the document to HTML (filtered) by doing Save As… with a Save As Type of “Web Page, Filtered.”
  3. Download and install Calibre, a free, open source ebook tool.
  4. Open Calibre, click Add Books, and add your HTML document.calibre
  5. Your book will then appear in the list in the main part of the screen. Highlight it and click Edit metadata to add a title, author, cover, etc.
  6. You can continue going through the wizard, or close it and select Convert books to select your format.
    EPUB and MOBI (Kindle) are two of the most popular formats.
  7. Your final ebooks will be in a folder called Calibre Library in your documents folder. You can also click Path: Click to open to navigate directly to that folder.

In the interest of getting this post up quickly, this is brief. If you have questions or need clarifications, post here or drop me an email. Hope this is useful.

And thanks again Liz Kolb and her team for putting together this great online learning opportunity!

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A hands-on online workshop?!?? Really?

Posted by on May 10, 2012 in Uncategorized

On Sat. May 19 at 1:oo pm Eastern, I’m going to be doing a free online workshop on “Remixing Open Educational Resources for Your Classroom” (webinar link here) as a part of the Virtual 4T Conference. CEUs are available for this session.

You can register (free) here.

remix-4TV

This 2-hour workshop will be almost entirely hands-on (and online?!?!). I’m trying a new format. It will look something like this:

  • 15 minute intro – What is remixing? What is OER?
  • 1-1/2 hour – Using open content (a list of resources supplied), participants will remix for topics/lessons of their choice.
    • Everyone chooses a lesson or topic that they’d like to address. They will also pick a final remix format (web page, PowerPoint, ebook, movie, etc.).
    • Participants can work individually or in small groups.
    • There will be a shared wikispace where people can collaborate or post their work if they like (or they can use their own space).
    • I’ll be available for support throughout the two hours (and by email afterward).

The idea of doing an online workshop that is primarily hands-on with “on call” support available is new for me. I’m excited about it.

I’m hoping some great remixed, shareable content comes out of this! Hope you can join us.

And stay tuned for a debrief afterward on how this format worked.

** UPDATE **

This workshop went great! Here is an archive recording of it.

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