Celtx is a great program that takes the approach of being an all-in-one pre-production house.  The program has elements of story design, storyboarding , editing, and is designed to help plan the pre-production for videos.  This is a great program for students and teachers who are planning a video production or project and also is a nice alternative to programs like Final Draft.

Cite Bite is a simple to use webtool that allows you to paste in a chunk on text and the URL (web address) that it comes from and it will create a link to that selection of text on the webpage that is highlighted.  A very easy to use and effective researching tool.

Lightning Bug is a story writing reference site for young adults. Whether they need help finding an idea, developing the idea, or finishing the story, Lightning Bug has a host of great references for all of them. There are even suggestions on where to get work published. A nice site that is rich with information, but still looks fun and inviting for the young adult crowd.

"Everyone has been inspired by a great teacher. Exceptional teachers open our eyes to the world and provide us with the knowledge necessary to succeed. Unfortunately, those efforts often go unrecognized. My Teacher, My Hero is a way to highlight and bring to public attention the important role that teachers play in our society."  This new site seems like a great way for students or teachers to point out the educators that have made a difference in their lives. Seems like a nice way to recognize those that inspire us.

Story Something generates personalized stories for a student that makes them the hero by putting them at the center of the narrative. A teacher or parent selects a theme (dragons, pets, superheroes) to see a list of stories that fit their child's interests. Stories can be browsed by topic or age. The hero takes on the child's name, and a story is generated which can be viewed on the Web or emailed to the teacher, student, or parent. While still in Beta, this looks like it will be a great classroom tool.

Storybird is a wonderful new web tool that allows you and your students to create great looking digital storybooks that can be worked on in groups and shared with the world. It is a very easy to use site with a ton of great images that you can use in creating your story. You can choose a theme to search the images they offer or select a style that you like best. Storybirds can be shared and even viewed on devices such as the iPhone. A Great site for all ages, but especially for those in the younger grades.

Tikatok is a nice way for students to become published authors.  This site lets students create a story, upload pictures or illustrations, and then purchase a hard or soft covered printed copy of their book.  It is great as a class project or even for a teacher to create books that relate specifically to their own classroom.  The site is very user friendly and easy to get around.  A nice tool to make reading, writing, and art even more fun!

Liszen (Library and Information Science Search Engine) is a web search tool that looks through over 750 different library blogs. This is a great tool for library/media specialists, as well as classroom teachers who need or want information about books and literature to use in the classroom. A simple to use search that provides very specific and to-the-point results.

Plagium is a web-based plagiarism tracking tool. Teachers (and students) can paste their text document onto the site and track if there was any direct copying from outside sources. This is a valuable tool in today's classroom. Teaching students about copyright and using their own voice is something that is difficult to do in this new and ever expanding digital world, but it is something that we need to do. This site is free and does a nice job, for a more robust tool you can look at Turnitin.com, a paid service.

Turn It In is a service that helps check for plagerism in the classroom. It also can be used as a way to deter such behavior and help students understand how to cite their sources. Students are assigned accounts that they log into and upload their documents to. These documents are then cross-checked with all the information on the Internet and results are sent to the teacher, the student, or both. The results show if material is too close or is an exact copy from other information out there by highlighting it and giving a link to the "original" material. It is a great tool to use, especially with the amount of information that is available over the Internet for students to "borrow" from.

We Papers is a site aimed at college students to find academic papers, collaborate and create study groups, and then share their knowledge with others. While it might be intended for an older crowd, this site is a great place for High School students to meet up virtually and accomplish those same goals and start learning about the digital collaborations that they will be sure to experience for the rest of their academic careers. We Papers is an easy to use and effective tool.

Open Zine is a great website that lets you create an online magazine, collaborate with students or fellow teachers, and then distribute your work on the web.  It is an easy to use site that has a lot of customization options and really lets you craft your magazine to look and feel like whatever you envision.  A great place to work on class magazines together or even create a teacher magazine with the people from your field.

Citation Machine is a great research tool for teachers and students that helps create citations easily.  MLA or APA formats are both supported.  This is a nice tool to help students learn how to cite their sources, something that is becoming more and more of an issue these days with the abundance of content available on the web.

CiteULike is a free service to help students and teachers to store, organize and share the scholarly papers you are reading. When they see a paper on the web that interests them, they can click one button and have it added to their personal library. CiteULike automatically extracts the citation details, so there's no need to type them in. It all works from within your web browser so there's no need to install any software. Because the "library" is stored on the server, it can be accessed from any computer with an Internet connection. Great learning tool.

Kerpoof is a site that provides free multimedia software that can be used directly from any browser, on any computer with Internet access and an up-to-date Flash player. While Kerpoof offers paid, premium services directed to at-home, entertaining use of the site, all basic content directed to in-school use is entirely free. The site can be used to create original artwork, animated movies, and stories, among other things. The work can then be shared with the Kerpoof community, but only after it passes an inspection of the content to make sure that it is all appropriate.

My StoryMaker is a site that lets you easily create an animated storybook by using drag and drop animation tools and story-helpers.  This is such a great site, especially for young students learning how to write stories.  It is fun to use, easy to understand, and produces a great product.  You can save the story online, share it with others, and print it.

Xtra Normal is a very cool new site that allows you to create a script, pick some characters, setting, music, etc. and turn it into an animated movie that you can share with friends via email or even upload to YouTube.  It is a really great little site that can be fun and also educational.  Imagine a student making a Shakespeare scene with these characters or staging a famous scene in history.  A greal tool!

Publish Your Own Newspaper is a site that makes creating quick and easy magazine or newspaper publications easy and fun.  It is all web-based and it is free, so while it is not as robust as Publisher or Print Shop, it doesn't have any software to install and it does a nice job at making publishing easy for students of all ages.  Simple and effective, a nice place to start playing with publishing - great for a weekly or monthly classroom bulletin produced for the students.

MyBytes is a fantastic site that allows you and your students to express ideas creatively, show them to the world, and protect them. "When you create something, you have the right to receive credit for your idea, and have a say in how others use it."  The site helps explain how this works for musicians, filmmakers, video game programmers and other creative people.  Included is also a great the music mixing tool that is easy and fun, and while it is not as robust as GarageBand, it is useful and lots of fun.