Tuesday, September 19, 2006

UMAJIN -

Last Thursday I attended a session where Russell Brebner demonstrated the new updates to the Umajin software. If you haven't had a look at this NZ made application, you just wont know what you are missing. This creative publishing tool is so user friendly and loads of fun, ideal for primary aged children and a great introduction to such things as blue or green screening etc. It encourages exploration and creativity. For more details and to download a free 30 day trial click on: http://www.umajin.com/static/default.htm Good pricing makes this affordable and well suited to the school environment.

In our earlier discussions Gabi mentioned a concern regarding a compatibility problem with the video cards installed in the computers at Paengaroa. Thanks Gabi. This may not apply to your school computers and it would pay to check it out. There is a tool on the website which checks the compatibility of your computer with the software, during the 'trial' download.

I have invited Russell to join in this discussion so please add any questions you may have to this posting. That way we can all benefit from the dialogue.

It will also be worthwhile following it up if you are going to Ulearn. Umajin will be there. Have a play. It is great fun. So innovative!

Lorraine

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Team, I hope you don't mind an outsider posting on your blog… I am posting from the company that develops UMAJIN.

I met Lorraine for a second time at Tauranga last week. I was demonstrating the new version of UMAJIN and she encouraged me to participate on your blog.

UMAJIN software is really trying to push the boundaries of what you can do with your computer, particularly in terms of graphics, interactivity and 3D. However, in trying to do cool things we need a reasonably capable computer. Most machines that have been purchased or upgraded in the last 3 – 4 years work well. I have had good success installing it on almost all teacher laptops.

We have been working really hard over the last 3 months to extend the range of machines that UMAJIN will work on. Our new release will include Macintosh computers and some slower PC’s that we did not previously support.

We have offered an extended FREE trial of the software until the end of the year. This allows you to evaluate the software and confirm that it runs on your school hardware.

I would be delighted to answer any questions or provide any help – please contact me at support@umajin.com. We are a NZ company attempting to make a world beating educational product. I would be delighted to receive feedback and suggestions on how we can make UMAJIN better.

Come and meet us at ULearn!

Russell Brebner
UMAJIN

11:56 AM

Peregrine Panacek said...

Hi Lorainne -

Thanks so much for collaborating with our Third Grade class in Texas. Today was the last day of school and the students here who were able to participate in our Skype chat with your students talked again about how special it was to meet your students from half way around the globe.

The students were able to finally finish their Umajin projects which I will put into the mail in the next week. One project is a tour of their school in both English and Spanish (audio is included) and the other is some interesting facts about Texas and our community. Both projects were created using Umajin v1.5.

The principal at the school has offered to host another connection at the school in the fall after the time changes and we have a 19 hour time difference instead of a 17 hour time difference. This will allow us to both be at school when chatting if you would like to collaborate again next school year. School starts again in late August.

They have installed a fiber optic line to that campus now so that we can utilize either Skype or a Polycom Videoconferencing connection.

I hope we will be able to continue to bring children together and share the power of Umajin.

Best,
Whitney
Ingleside, Texas

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