These are a few of my favorite tools:

• WordSift - quickly generate a word cloud from a text, find related words and images to help with pre-reading comprehension

• Etherpad clones - no login or account necessary to get people working collaboratively on a document, great for starting a group project, peer editing, and identifying who is participating and how.

• Google Forms - pre- and post- assessments, questionnaires, generates a spreadsheet and allows for easy graphing and interpreting results

• Unit Package Editor - this tool is under development, but I want to preview it with you.

• Other web tools I've bookmarked but haven't played with (Diigo generated report)

Other Programming Software

• Scratch - more snap and click programming, good for animations

• "Scratch is a programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art -- and share your creations on the web."

• Alice - originally designed to get girls interested in programming, Java based

• "Alice is an innovative 3D programming environment that makes it easy to create an animation for telling a story, playing an interactive game, or a video to share on the web."

• Storytelling Alice is designed for middle school

• Alice 2.0 and higher are intended for high school and beyond

• Net Logo

• "NetLogo is a multi-agent programmable modeling environment. It is used by tens of thousands of students, teachers and researchers worldwide. It also powers HubNet participatory simulations."
• "NetLogo is particularly well suited for modeling complex systems developing over time. Modelers can give instructions to hundreds or thousands of "agents" all operating independently. This makes it possible to explore the connection between the micro-level behavior of individuals and the macro-level patterns that emerge from the interaction of many individuals."
• Lots of tutorials, sample projects and resources.

   

• StarLogo - The original non-3D version

• "a programmable modeling environment designed to help you model and explore the workings of decentralized systems, such as bird flocks, traffic jams, and market economies."

Tips

• Don't be afraid of web tools
• If you find one tool you like, but wish it were better, there's probably another "version" out there - Wordle was improved by  Tagul  
• Pick one thing at a time to learn
• Develop a use for the tool that's relevant to your classroom and teaching style
• Have more than one web browser. Many sites don't work on one, but may work better or completely in another.
• Internet Explorer (Windows only)
• Firefox
• Chrome
• Safari (Mac only)