Media and Learning 2013

IrfanView is a fast, small, innovative freeware graphic viewer that can be also used for editing. It is intended as free only for private, non-commercial and/or educational use (schools, universities and libraries) and for use in charity or humanitarian organisations.
The software is currently supported and a list of recent changes can be seen on the website. A FAQ page quite rich of useful information is also provided on the website.
Some IrfanView features:
• Many supported file formats
• Multi language support
• Thumbnail/preview option
• Paint option - to draw lines, circles, arrows, straighten image etc.
• Toolbar skins option
• Slideshow (save slideshow as EXE/SCR or burn it to CD)
• Show EXIF/IPTC/Comment text in Slideshow/Fullscreen etc.
• Support for Adobe Photoshop Filters
• Fast directory view (moving through directory)
• Batch conversion (with advanced image processing)
• Multipage TIF editing
• File search
• Email option
• Multimedia player
• Print option
• Support for embedded color profiles in JPG/TIF
• Change color depth
• Scan (batch scan) support
• Cut/crop
• Add overlay text/image (watermark)
• IPTC editing
• Effects (Sharpen, Blur, Adobe 8BF, Filter Factory, Filters Unlimited, etc.)
• Screen Capturing
• Extract icons from EXE/DLL/ICLs
• Lossless JPG rotation
• Unicode support
• Hotkeys
• Command line options
• PlugIns

Language support can vary with the version. The current version supports the languages listed aside. English is anyway always supported.

On this website you can learn foreign languages in a fun way: listen to popular songs and fill in the blanks. Test your knowledge of vocabulary in a fun way with music.

In this section of the official website of the European Union it is possible to find the summaries of EU legislation on every subject. The linked page gives an overview of the legislation on IPR. The act the page refers to is the directive 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights.
The page is available in 15 languages.

Ptable is an interactive Web 2.0 periodic table. It provides dynamic layouts, property trend visualization, orbitals, thousands of isotopes, and 5 writeup sources. The application uses no Flash or images, giving all the scalability and accessibility of a normal web page (it can be viewed on any kind of computer and device).
The layout, unless differently specified by the user, automatically switch to fit the width of the screen. Using the check boxes at the top of the page allows to dynamically switch between various configurations (simple, with names, with electron configuration, and inline inner transition metals).
In addition to Wikipedia descriptions in all languages, write-ups, photos, videos, and even podcasts are offered in the first tab's dropdown. Write-up windows can even be torn off or docked to the edges to allow simultaneous use of the table while reading.
Data is acquired from primary sources and curated libraries. Layout and presentation were reviewed by the world's foremost periodic table academic, Eric Scerri. Translations and non-English element names, however, should be considered no more reliable than Wikipedia.
Search (into the box at the top right) can be performed by name, symbol, or atomic number. Advanced searches work, for example, on the atomic weight, number of orbitals, etc.
Most browsers, tablets, and phones can store the site and its data for use offline. Firefox prompts you with a notification bar at the top while Chrome and Safari directly save it.
Full descriptions in 40 languages from Wikipedia.

Tux Paint is a free drawing program for children (3 to 12) that combines an easy-to-use interface, fun sound effects, and an encouraging cartoon mascot who guides children as they use the program. It is used in schools around the world as a computer literacy drawing activity.
The program runs on multiple platforms. It’s simple interface presents a number of useful drawing tools and at the same time relieve the user of the need to think about the technical details.
Sound and visual helps are available: fun sound effects are played when tools are selected and used and a cartoon mascot appears at the bottom to give tips, hints and information.
Parts of Tux Paint have currently been translated into almost 100 languages.
Stamps, starters and brushes are stored using popular open formats (PNG, SVG, Ogg Vorbis, etc.) allowing parents and teachers to create their own content for use at home or in the classroom - even using completely free tools.
The 'Tux Paint Config.' program allows parents, teachers, and school technicians to alter Tux Paint's behaviour using a simple, easy-to-use graphical interface.

e-Bug is a free educational resource for classroom and home use that makes learning about micro-organisms, the spread, prevention and treatment of infection fun and accessible for all students.

The website is divided in three sections for Junior Students, Senior Students and for Teachers, where lesson plans, student worksheets, activities and presentations are available. All activities and plans have been designed to complement the National Curriculum. The student pages complement the teacher resources by providing online games, revision pages and more to continue the learning experience at home.

Scratch is a programming language that makes it easy to create animations, interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art. The outcomes can be stored and shared on the web within the Scratch system.
It is not only an ideal tool for the creation of simple and attractive interactive and/or animated learning objects, but it also serves as a learning instrument for young people. By using Scratch learners learn not only to create and share Scratch outcomes but more importantly they learn mathematical, logical and computational ideas, while also learning to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively.
Scratch is at first sight a bit difficult to learn, but there is a (short and simple) manual that helps everyone getting started within minutes. It is not a full blown animation tool but it is a lot of fun and very rewarding to work with.
Scratch is developed by the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab, with financial support from the National Science Foundation, Microsoft, Intel Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, Google, Iomega and MIT Media Lab research consortia.

Nanoyou is a source of materials and resources on the topic of Nanoscience, the study of phenomena and manipulation of materials at the nanoscale, where properties differ significantly from those at a larger scale. The nanoscale ranges from 100 nanometres down to the atomic level, where a nanometre is a millionth part of a
millimetre. This European Commission supported project provides a variety of videos and other multimedia like power-point presentations, posters, picture galleries and art projects related to nanoscience and NT that can be
used in education.

amara (formerly known as Universal Subtitles) is a community platform that allows for easily captionning and translating of the videos one produces, by seeking assistance from the viewers. Subtitling not only increases the geographical appleal of the vides by adding language versions, but also has the additional advantage of making videos accessible for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. The subtitling (translation and subtitle text addition) is done by volunteering viewers, like a wiki: easy, free and fast with no software to install. As of today August 15 2011) over 117000 videos have already been subtitled with Universal Subtitles.

Amara gives individuals, communities, and larger organizations the power to overcome accessibility and language barriers for online video. The tools are free and open source and make the work of subtitling and translating video simpler, more appealing, and, most of all, more collaborative.

The benefits of captioning and subtitling are immense:
- Captions make videos accessible for viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing
- Translations make it possible for all of us to watch video in languages that we don't speak
- Video creators get: better SEO, more views, access to a far bigger (potentially multilingual and global) audience, accessibility for deaf and hard of hearing viewers, and more

Amara is composed of three main parts:
- A subtitle creation and viewing tool (aka the widget)
- A collaborative subtitling website
- An open protocol for subtitle search/delivery

Mindsetter is a learning game on change management, created in 2009 by Christian Harpelund and currently used at the Danish School of Education (Denmark). It is meant to teach employees, consultants and managers how to recognize and work with resistance to change in their organisation or project. The game, available in Danish or English, is based on a model provided by Rick Maurer, called 3 levels of resistance, and aims to make this model come alive to the participants.
At the start of the game, the participants are provided with a challenge, e.g. to change the current values of an organisation. They have to go through 4 phases: initial recognition of the need to change, planning, implementing and integrating. In the game, the participants (or players) manage a department with 10 employees who are opposing the change and, dependent on what the players decide to do, these employees will leave the project by resisting the change in different manners.

The goal of the game is to navigate the project (illustrated as a boat in the game) through all 4 project phases while keeping the employees on board, as well as trying to pick those up who leave the project. The game can be played as a board-game with up to 40 participants, or it can be played as a simulation, either as a group or in solitary. The game-interface provides an interchangeable case, which can be played in both ways. The purpose of the game is to make the theory come alive to the participants; rather than remembering that decision A leads to employees leaving the project while exhibiting resistance condition B, the participants are allowed to experiment with different kinds of change management behaviour while experimenting with and experiencing their consequences. While the board-game explains the theory to the participants, the simulator helps speed up the participants' experiments, thereby allowing them to emphasise the experimental element of the learning process.

The game is currently being used with top- and middle managers, at university programmes teaching adult education, human resource management, change management and game-didactic design. It is first used for teaching the particular theory (Rick Maurer's 3 levels of resistance) and is used afterwards to design and test change scenarios for particular change projects.

A more detailed English description of the project is also available in the Showcase on the MEDEA Awards website: http://www.medea-awards.com/showcase/mindsetter