The Digital Frog Blog

We are often asked what grade level our software is designed for. When we answer Grades K-12, we suspect it sounds like a sales pitch. Although we originally intended the field trips to be used in middle schools, our designers became so engrossed that they kept adding more and more screens suitable for more and more age levels and now the field trips truly appeal to learners of all ages.

We visited Montreal this weekend and could not tear our three year old grandchildren away from my laptop. They were totally absorbed in the Rainforest Dependency Web Game and learned a surprising amount by “reading” silhouettes. And yet this same game is challenging even for adults.

As for the text, it is written clearly and succinctly and supported by context-sensitive definitions and integrated text-to-speech to help early readers, ESL learners and auditory learners.

No comments »

Being dubbed the “frog lady” by all and sundry results in friends and family alerting me to all things froggy.

So I regularly receive emails about froggy topics such as the 70-million-year-old fossil of a giant frog unearthed in Madagascar, the killer disease chytridiomycosis (a fungal disease that has been blamed for the extinction of one-third of the 120 frog species lost since 1980) and even an article about an Iranian woman giving birth to a frog (and the date was not April 1!).

Yesterday, I received several emails about the recent discovery of a lungless frog in Indonesia. One thing that bothered me about some of the articles was the implication that it is unusual for frogs to breathe through the skin as it’s know that frogs breathe in three different ways: though their mouths, lungs and skin. So I consulted the respiratory system module in the Anatomy and Physiology section of The Digital Frog 2.5. This is a small part of what it has to say:

Frogs have three different methods of respiration, or gas exchange:

• cutaneous respiration takes place across the skin,
• buccopharyngeal respiration occurs in the mouth,
• pulmonary respiration uses the nares, mouth, and lung

On land, most oxygen absorption occurs in the lungs. In water, most gas exchange takes place across the skin, but even the most aquatic frogs must come up to the surface to breathe. Most carbon dioxide is released across the skin. While hibernating, frogs do not use their lungs and depend on cutaneous respiration.

It seems frogs are much more versatile than us humans. But then, of course, we are not amphibians.

If you have any quirky frog stories to share, add a comment for your chance to win free software.

1 Comment »

We recently returned from the National Science Teachers’ Conference in Boston, exhausted but at the same time exhilarated. Our booth was busy the whole time and teachers were excited about our software. One lady rushed up to our booth insisting “I cannot live without Digital Frog”. We love quotes like this, even it is a little extreme, and probed further. This teacher has been using The Digital Frog 2 for many years to prepare her class for the wet lab. We have asked her to write about her experiences in our new forum which we will be launching soon for teachers and homeschoolers to share their experiences.

Another teacher purchased a Building Site License for ScienceMatrix: Cell Structure and Function last year and told us that her students scored higher marks on this subject than any other class she has ever taught.

A special ed teacher was extremely excited about our Digital Field Trip series to help his mixed grade class of 7 to 12 year olds.

Of course, our goal in attending these conferences is to showcase our products to teachers who have never seen them before, but we get energized by stories from teachers who are using the products. One experienced biology teacher approached our booth with some reluctance having been asked to check out dissection alternatives by his colleagues. We showed him The Digital Frog 2.5 and he then admitted that he had been completely biased against all dissection alternatives, but was now planning on recommending a district-wide purchase!

I was asked at the last minute to present The Digital Frog 2.5 at a presentation hosted by Animalearn (who loan out dissection alternatives free of charge, including The Digital Frog 2, their most popular loan item). Although The Digital Frog 2.5 has been rated the best dissection alternative many times, we do not consider it a dissection alternative program. It’s an anatomy and physiology learning tool, supported by an interactive frog dissection. After all, the ultimate goal of dissecting in schools is to help students understand their own bodies, not to teach them how to wield a scalpel.

No comments »

If you teach science this conference is a must. We have been exhibiting at the National Science Teachers Association national conference for many, many years and we always learn something new—from the teachers who visit our booth to other exhibitors and, when we have time, from session presenters.

Our favorite presenter of all time is Nancy Harrison (and not just because she recommends The Digital Frog 2.5). Nancy is a practicing pathologist who loves animals and firmly believes that cutting up dead animals in high school is of little pedagogical value and countless animals die unnecessarily.

Nancy’s love of animals led her to research all the computer-based alternatives on the market. Recognizing that teachers are pressed for time, she felt this would help them make the switch from cutting up dead animals to a computer-based alternative. Initially, Nancy showed the teachers several programs, but eventually honed her presentation to just two programs, which she deemed to be the “best of the best”.

Whenever we can, we attend Nancy’s presentation and listen as Nancy explains to a hushed audience how her high school science teacher influenced her life and her career. And, of course, we love it as she tells the audience why The Digital Frog is “the best of the best”. We are very fortunate that Nancy endorses our program (as did eSchool News readers) but we do NOT give her any financial support. In fact, Nancy will not even allow us to buy her a cup of coffee.

Nancy’s presentation at CSTA in Long Beach last year was full to overflowing. This year NSTA is in Boston and Nancy will be presenting “Virtual Dissection: The Best of the Best” on Friday Mar. 28 from 12:30 to 1:30 in the Amphitheater of the Seaport World Trade Center (so you might actually get a seat).

By the way, our booth number is 1337 and we will be holding a draw for an unlimited Building Site License for The Digital Frog 2.5 (list price $899). Stop by our booth, mention the “secret” password - The Year of The Frog - and triple your chances of winning.

No comments »

I may be known as the frog lady these days, but there was a time when I could not tell a frog call from a bird call. That all changed when I became involved in Digital Frog International. The biodiversity section of The Digital Frog 2.5 features frogs and toads of North and South America, together with sound recordings of their calls.

Way back in 1995, we gave the first version of The Digital Frog to our vet to review. She reported back that her two year old son spent hours and hours clicking on the frogs and listening to their calls.

A few years ago we donated software to the Toronto Zoo and I spent a day in their conservation area helping visitors navigate our software. The frog calls were extremely popular.

I have also used this section to help children identify the spring peepers, northern leopard frogs, green frogs, wood frogs and tree frogs that can be found on our country property. Last summer my grandchildren were fascinated as they watched a grey tree frog, quickly nicknamed “Norman”, change from grey to green as he emerged from his hiding place. From then on, whenever they heard a tree frog call, they all rushed out looking for Norman.

Of course, I still secretly believe that the herpetologist who provided the recordings we used in the program was playing a joke on us —the bullfrog sounds just like a cow!

To learn more about the frog calls and other information on the frogs and toads of North and South America available in The Digital Frog 2.5, read more about the program’s ecology section. Or preview it for yourself with a free demo of The Digital Frog 2.5.

No comments »

As we mentioned in the last entry, 2008 has been declared as the Year of the Frog. And while the year officially kicked off on January 1, with this being a leap year, many zoos and aquariums around the world are using today, February 29, as the day to really start their educational and awareness activities to promote amphibian conservation.

At Digital Frog International, we’ve been supporters of frogs since we started over a decade ago. Our first educational software program was our virtual frog dissection, anatomy and ecology program, The Digital Frog. Since its release, the program has changed and evolved, but the core has always remained the same: to provide a viable alternative to real dissections and to emphasize ecology—the study of living frogs–alongside their dissected counterparts. Even our Digital Field Trip series of programs highlight frogs and toads, among other organisms, to show their place in ecosystems from wetlands to rainforests, and even deserts.

Experts believe that after more than 360 million years on the planet, between one-third and half of the world’s 6000 species of amphibian could become extinct within our lifetimes. Over the years, with The Digital Frog being used in thousands of schools across North America, we have helped save literally tens of thousands of frogs (not to mention thousands of dollars to schools who save on purchasing frogs for dissection).

Be among the first 29 to buy and save 29%

With this being the Year of the Frog, we want to help make it even easier and more affordable to bring the benefits of The Digital Frog 2.5 to your classroom or home. Starting today, February 29, 2008, we’re giving a 29% discount to the first 29 orders for The Digital Frog 2.5. That’s a savings of $24.65 off a home version CD, or more than $260 off the price of a building site license.

Act fast, though. We can’t promise how long this offer will last. (You can order directly from us here.)

No comments »