Brent Warner 0:00
What should you buy as a gift for the nerdy educator in your family? We’ve got the 2024, gift guide for techie teachers. This is the higher edtech podcast season six, episode nine. You

Tim Van Norman 0:20
Brent, welcome to today’s higher ed tech Podcast. I’m Tim Van Norman, the Instructional Technologist at Irvine Valley College and Adjunct Professor of Business at Cypress College.

Brent Warner 0:32
And I’m Brent Warner, Professor of ESL here at Irvine Valley College, we both enjoy integrating technology into the classroom, which is what this show is all about.

Tim Van Norman 0:43
Welcome. We’re glad you’re here with us. So after Thanksgiving, end of the semester,

Brent Warner 0:49
Yeah, we always struggle a little bit with this episode, because it’s like, when’s the best time to release it? And it would be nice, I guess, if people could have gotten their Black Friday deals or whatever. But, you know, people are always forgetting things. And so if you just need a little inspiration, every year, we do a little gift guide on some things that might be interesting or useful to a, you know, the type of person who would listen to a show like this. And I think, Tim, you’ve got some ideas. I’ve got some ideas. So are we ready to jump right in?

Tim Van Norman 1:23
Absolutely. Let’s do this all right. So let’s start off a couple of gifts, some stuff that I’m working on right now. I because I’m a teacher, I’m actually doing interviews with some people, so I’m looking, and I’m hoping to get if, if it’s not gifted to me, I intend to go purchase a 8k video camera.

Brent Warner 1:51
Oh, okay, that’s a lot of case.

Tim Van Norman 1:54
I was surprised for $170 Amazon’s got one, and I’ve got one I want a second one. It it does a beautiful job. And it just, it does a really nice job. But for for recording, if you’re gonna do anything, video, you know, $170 isn’t bad,

Brent Warner 2:18
Yeah, for sure. So, you know, we talked in a recent episode like, Hey, are you looking at things like flipping your class or making, you know, pre recorded videos or anything like that? And so, you know, like, there’s a part of me, Tim, you know, like this whole, like, the resolution wars that just keeps coming. And it’s like, okay, well, finally, you know, 2k is enough. Finally, 4k is enough. Finally, okay, 8k is enough. And it’ll it just keeps on going, right? Because, I guess it can, but it is at this point it’s past the capacity of the human eye, right, right?

Tim Van Norman 2:49
Well, I also look at the frames per second, and this particular one has got 60 frames per second, which really does make a big difference.

Brent Warner 3:02
Okay, so awesome. I am looking at doing some flipping next semester, so maybe I’ll peek into that as well. So I’m gonna start with mine. So this is, I don’t I can’t remember if I talked about this in the past, but it’s the Ember mug. It is a very expensive mug. It’s like $125 for this mug. But what it basically does is it inside of it, it has heat coils, and so it stays charged all the time. And you can get a little, what do you call it? Like a tray, right? Like a little saucer that has tiny little prongs on it so it stays heated, even when you’re like, leave the coffee out for 30 minutes or 45 minutes, or whatever, it keeps perfect temperature. And I have to say, this seems like the silliest thing, right? Like, What a ridiculous waste of money. It is the best thing if you’re a coffee lover. It is amazing to always have the perfect consistent temperature, whether or not you sit and forget to drink for 3540 minutes, an hour or whatever, it’s just there and ready. Shocked. I’ve had one of these for years now, but I’ve continually just like, Dang, this thing is awesome to have so so even if it sounds a little much to you. If you have a coffee nerd friend or family member or something, I would highly recommend looking into the Ember mug. It’s been popular for a number of years, but that’s my first recommendation here.

Tim Van Norman 4:32
Nice, that sound does sound good. And even for those of us who don’t drink coffee, maybe we drink tea or hot chocolate or something like that, is the season for warm drinks at least.

Brent Warner 4:42
Yeah, definitely worth it, and perfect for the winter too. So it’s a good double combo. All right, what else you got? Tim?

Tim Van Norman 4:51
All right, so my second item is an Audio Technica shotgun mic with the boom stand together. It’s about $200 so this is a mic that goes over and out of the shot. My mic that I use, like for podcasting is, is good. It’s also an audio technica. I like that. But this one keeps out of the shot. And so both for doing the recording that I was talking about earlier and for even, like podcasts or something like that. It’s a really, really directional, really nice mic

Brent Warner 5:27
That is nice. Yeah, I love Audio Technica, so you and I both are on the same mic for our regular one, but also that shotgun mic too. So going back to that conversation of recording videos is like, these mics that you and I, Tim use are in our face, right? So if we’re trying to record ourselves, then it’s like, okay, you’re going to have a microphone covering half of your face, but those boom mics, so if you’re doing things like flipped recordings or whatever, and you just want to have your face and you talking and kind of being natural, I think a boom mics a nice choice, absolutely cool. Alright, so my next one is doodly. So doodly is a, it’s a, it’s a app. I guess it’s an application for your computer that you download, and then basically you can make those hand doodle animations. And very easily, you kind of drag and drop the things you want in there. A hand comes in and doodles, like fake doodles it, right? And then it shows up as like a white screen, or a whiteboard video, or a chalkboard video, or whatever. And so you can kind of have these cartoony pictures, and then as you’re narrating, you can do all these things. So for classes, for teachers. This is really great, right? Because you could build a video that doesn’t necessarily have to have your face in it, but you could, you could explain a concept using the pictures. It’s kind of engaging. We’ve seen all these videos many times before online, but when you go on the website for dudely, it is expensive. It’s like a lot of money every month, but if you search for it on Google, then every single one will take you to a page where you says you’re not paying a monthly or yearly subscription. You get a flat rate for $67 and so it’s the same tool. They just have these dumb marketing things, right, where they’re pushing one thing or another. And so so it is great. Doodly $67 just go search for it on Google, or I’ll put the link that takes you to the cheaper one time payment instead of an expensive subscription payment for the exact same tool. So you can go get it and it’s, it’s very cool,

Tim Van Norman 7:39
Nice. Yeah, I’ve seen those, and I’ve wanted to take a look at them. But every time I look at the price, I’m like, nope, yeah, worth it.

Brent Warner 7:47
It’s a, it’s one of those things where it’s like, you know how, like, all these algorithms work, right? And they’re like, Hey, you’re gonna get this price for whatever, and you get this price for, you know, like, they, they adjust all these prices and whatever sells, sells, right? So I don’t know exactly how this one works, but I have for years seen this option for the the one time payment $67 so they’re not very secretive about it. I guess it’s just that they’re punishing the the dumb people who not dumb. But you know what I mean, like

Tim Van Norman 8:15
The people actually pay attention to the website instead of searching,

Brent Warner 8:19
Yeah yeah, right? Yeah, so Doodly

Tim Van Norman 8:23
Nice. So, a repeat from last year master class subscription. I used mine quite a bit this past year. Yeah, I just like it. I enjoyed it. I learned a lot of different things and stuff. And it’s $120 right now for two devices, and you can download it, download the video onto a device. So that was one thing that the one that I got last year didn’t have, and I loved it. I mean, traveling, just sit there and watch a video while I’m while I’m traveling. A lot of times it would work in the airplane if you’re flying, or at least the airport, you know, and stuff like that. So it just is really nice way of catching up on different topics that are of interest. So $120 right now for a year subscription.

Brent Warner 9:16
That’s great. Yeah, I did that together with you last year, right? And I didn’t, I just got busy with things, and so I but I watched a few of them, and they were really good. And, you know, it was really interesting to see these experts really talking about their field and how to do things. So, yeah, great. Okay, my next one is the anchor power bank. So I think Tim, everybody should have a battery that they can take with them to charge their phones or their devices when they go to a conference or when they go to, you know, wherever you end up, right? And these things, I was like, shocked this. One is like 20 something dollars. I think the prices went up a couple bucks, you know, like up, ups and downs, little prices, but, but this, I have the same one that I bought several years ago, or roughly the same one, and it was like, I remember it being 60 or $70 and now this thing is like 20 bucks for for a good quality battery charger. And so I am a big fan, you know, it’s, it’s just incredible. I mean, you know, obviously it’s just a dumb thing. It’s a battery charger, right? But, like, it makes a big difference. And all that running around people do, like, where’s the charger? Where’s the wall port? Can I get in the right spot, right? And just being able to, like, stick a quick charger, run off, come back, and they charge very fast too. That’s the nice thing is that they, they have the high speed chargers built into these things. And so it only takes, you know, 30 minutes to an hour to get back to a full charge, and, you know, not very much time at all to get it really functional again. So get yourself a power bank, go out and buy that. Anybody would be happy with one of these, I think, unless they already have several. But it’s just a hey, you can have it somewhere. You can have it in your office, you can have it in your bag, you can have it in your car, whatever. I think it’s a smart investment.

Tim Van Norman 11:21
Oh, absolutely. I love those, especially, as I mentioned travel before. You never know, just to be able to reach in and pull one out and not have to worry about plugging into finding the right seat to plug into, absolutely

Brent Warner 11:35
Yeah, asking a bunch of strangers. “Hey, can I…” that’s dangerous, so be very – Oh, yeah, by the way, don’t go ask a stranger to plug into their devices, right, or whatever else it is. (laughter) So, yeah, very cool. All right, what else you got?

Tim Van Norman 11:50
So my next one is a book, okay? And actually, I, when I get books, I actually like to get a paperback book, mostly because I find electronically, I can’t search it as much as I’d like to. And so to be able to just flip the pages and go through and stuff I just paper feels good. I know techie, but

Brent Warner 12:18
no, I’m 100% on board with you there, yeah, although I do still buy I buy ebooks sometimes, yeah, it’s like, you have to mix right, like, but a good paper book, there’s a magic to it there. It just is. Okay, yeah,

Tim Van Norman 12:32
absolutely. So how to build large language models, llms, from data preparation to deployment and beyond. Whoa, yeah, getting into looking at more AI stuff, really enjoying a lot of stuff that I’m seeing and learning about AI and looking at what that future is. And so that one happens to be 20 bucks at Amazon, okay, and it looks really interesting. Nice,

Brent Warner 13:01
nice. Now that you’re saying, I didn’t even think about putting books on there, which is just a sad statement from a teacher, but, but I might add a couple here in the last minutes as we go So, but I’ll hold off on my book suggestions until a little bit later. So my my last physical item is this car. What do you call them? A cell phone mount for your car that goes into your vent. I bought this one, very cheap, from this company called Lam call I guess. I don’t know. I’m sure there’s plenty of these different things. But the nice thing is, it’s kind of beefy. So if you have a a case on your phone, it holds it all with the case and everything. And it’s, it’s very like, it’s very nice to the touch, I don’t know, like for, for being this cheap, like it holds, it squeezes in well. So it’s one of those ones where the side arms come out and then, you know, they kind of, you squeeze them together on the phone. And so it’s not totally locked in, but it’s very I haven’t had any issues with it driving around. But then the quality of it is very sturdy. And what it does, it has these metal hooks that go into the vent and then pull back on the vent so it stays in place very well, too. And so I, you know, again, same type of thing, just cheap, right? It’s just 10 bucks. And for a very good, sturdy phone mount, I was really happy. Like, these are the kinds of things where, like, in my head, I’m like, oh, a decent one is going to be at least 25 bucks or something. I was like, no, actually, this one was cheap, and really works, and I’ve been happy with it. And you can, you know, I mean, it’s just a fun mount, so you can tighten up the little pieces or whatever. But again, this will be, as all of them will be in the show notes. And so if you’re just looking for something that. That just works and doesn’t cost too much. This is the one I recommend,

Tim Van Norman 15:03
nice, nice. So my last one that I have here is another book and LLM engineers handbook, master the art of engineering, large language models from concept to production. Wow. Okay, are you a really light reading I’m

Brent Warner 15:25
sitting here thinking, like, Tim, like, these are, like, hardcore, like, your Christmas vacation is gone with these books, right? Are you planning on building some llms over the break? Is that? Is that what’s happening here,

Tim Van Norman 15:38
not over the break? Basically, I want to, I want to look at what is needed and figure out what I don’t know. Because I know I don’t know a lot, but I don’t know what I don’t know. So, so yeah, I mean, it’s definitely at least of interest, even if I’m not going to do any of it, having the conversation and being able to intelligently talk about large language models and building them is an important aspect of my job, of all of my jobs,

Brent Warner 16:09
yeah, for sure. Okay, well, when you finish those, I want to peek at them if you don’t, if you don’t mind, I’m assuming. I’m assuming these are gift recommendations, but really they’re things that you want, or that you’re already ordering for yourself, so or at least you’re requesting. So

Tim Van Norman 16:25
they were in my wish list, and my daughter told me not to open a package that came in. So, okay, I don’t know. Maybe I’m getting one. That’s

Brent Warner 16:34
a a clue. So maybe we’re going to come back in your after the break, and you’re going to have like a mega brain going on on all this stuff, so very cool, or be completely wiped out. Alright? So I have, I guess I’ll bundle these two together, Tim, since we’re kind of wrapping up and getting towards the end here, this is a shorter episode, but I have a couple subscription possibilities for teachers. And so number one is brisk. You and I have talked about brisk quite a lot, and I think you already got brisk for yourself, right? Like you’re paying for the annual subscription. Is that? Right?

Tim Van Norman 17:13
I’m not paying for the annual I’ve only done the free one so far. So far, I’m liking it. And, yeah, okay, would really like to get the, the paid one, the full

Brent Warner 17:23
version, yeah. So it’s 100 bucks, I think, right around there. And, you know, again, you do the math on how much time it helps you save, right? And so I think you get a free week if you haven’t ever used it before, with the, with the paid ver, you know, all the upgraded versions, or you get 10 days, or something like that, so you could go see but if you’re going to say, hey, this thing can save me, let’s, let’s keep it modest, right? And say you’re just doing that feedback on one assignment a month, right? That’s going to take you an hour, normally, to go through all of your assignments, and you’re going to get through that in 45 seconds. Maybe that’s a little bit generous, but let’s, let’s just imagine that we’re saving an hour once a month. So if you get that for 10 months of classes, let’s say nine months of classes. I don’t know how the math works exactly, but if you get that for nine months of classes, nine hours of work. So you’re saying, Hey, does 100 bucks saved me nine hours of time. If you’re getting paid more than 10 bucks an hour, then probably it’s a good investment, right? And so that’s kind of how I’m looking at it. It’s just like the the nerdy, hard, hard math of it, like, how much, how much is the turnaround on it? And I think I’m going to save a lot more time on it than that. So brisk is probably a good investment. And then the other one, Tim, which has just gotten so expensive, but I’m I this is one that I will not buy for myself, but I’m like, whoo, if, if, if I got this, it’d be cool. Is quizzes? So quizzes is we talked about this actually, many years ago, so Kahoot and quizzes and all of these things, quizzing platforms, but quizzes has really just blasted off with a full on AI integrations, video work so you can do upload your YouTube video into it make interactive videos like play posit and EdPuzzle and those kinds of things are now features inside of here you can go click a button now on quizzes on any web page you’re on, and it will turn it into a quiz inside of your platform. So it’s just going to go through and scan that Wikipedia page and turn it into its own quiz, or its own activities and all sorts of things. So pretty cool stuff, and teachers are loving it. So I’m talking to teachers at these conferences, and everyone’s just saying, I want to talk more. I want to see this quizzes thing. I want to see what’s going on. And so it’s not cheap, though it’s. $216 per person for an individual license, which is like, whoo, that jumped, and that jumped a price range, right? So quizzes used to be, I mean, I remember, I think, like 96 bucks or something like that. And so it’s just kind of blasted off for pricing. And I do have a qualm, I will say, charging individual teachers to get into the access to it at that rate is not really. It feels kind of gross to me, and that that is the price range that we’re talking about for not, you know, it’s just like, that’s, that’s the expectation for you to get it for yourself alone, right? And so anyways, but that said, like, if I got it as a gift, I would be super stoked. And so if you’re thinking, hey, I’m gonna get someone a gift that they would like and that’s the one, then I’d be like, Yeah, very cool. Yeah, until it comes around.

Tim Van Norman 20:52
Along those lines, I didn’t put this as a gift for me, because I did just buy it myself. I got screen pal, oh, there’s their top version. I believe it was like 36 bucks a year. Yeah, so. But one of the things that includes is, when you upload, you can record your video, you can upload a video, you can put quizzes directly in your videos, in screenpal. Oh, that’s nice, nice and stuff like that. So some of the things that I’m seeing in some of the other environments is included. And I’ve always liked screen pal. We’ve talked about Screencast O Matic, which became screen pal in the past as well. But I found it worth it for me to just buy it, even though I get it for free, it was worth it to buy it for my class and for the other stuff that I’m doing. So think about something like that too. You might find, if you’re interested in doing quizzes, but don’t have $216 maybe a video quiz like that, system like that will will get you what you’re looking for

Brent Warner 22:00
that’s incredible. That’s actually very reasonable. 30 zero, reasonable. Yeah, for

Tim Van Norman 22:04
a year. Yeah,

Brent Warner 22:07
awesome. So I think that’s kind of it. We’re keeping it light and short and trying to make it as easy and accessible as get your orders in today. We’re not making any money on these, I don’t think. But, you know, like, again, you know, keep in mind, if you’re listening, that the you know, the the season comes upon you very quickly and all of a sudden you’re scrambling for gifts at the last minute, maybe some of these can help you out and save you the worry later down the line. Absolutely.

Tim Van Norman 22:39
Thank you for listening today. For more information about this show, please visit our website, at the higher ed tech podcast.com

Brent Warner 22:46
as always, we do want your feedback, so please go to the higher ed tech podcast.com and let us know your thoughts for everyone

Tim Van Norman 22:53
at IVC that’s listening. If you need help with technology questions, please contact IVC technical support. If you have questions about technology in your classroom, please stop by a 322, or contact me. Tim Van Norman tvannorman@ivc.edu

Brent Warner 23:07
and if you want to reach out to me about the show, you can find me on LinkedIn at @BrentGWarner.

Tim Van Norman 23:14
I’m Tim Van Norman

Brent Warner 23:17
And I’m Brent Warner, and we hope this episode has helped you on the road from possibility to actuality, Take care everybody.