One of the neat things about Full Sail University’s Filmmaking Principles in Education course is that it completely took me out of my element in creating stories. I like history, which is a series of stories, but making stories up on my own is toughie.
So, for a group project we had to create a Machinima. We created our own version of “The Ugly Duckling”, with lessons to be learned and everything. Check it out! (and remember, its only our first one!)
I love this application!
Finding websites that have public domain images to use in your Glogs can be a time-consuming task. Searching for hours on Google or other search engines for websites that have images that are public domain and royalty free can be daunting. I have found that a quicker way to find public domain images is through searching Pinterest.
Searching “public domain” in the search window on Pinterest allows you to quickly find images that have been categorized or tagged as such. While this will lead you to images that have been listed as public domain, doing so doesn’t assure that the images are definitely public domain. You need to click on the image and be redirected to the original website to double-check that the image is actually a public domain image (as well as to be able to save the image to your computer.)
Searching public domain images on Pinterest…
View original post 365 more words
Wow! I cannot believe it has been a month since I was able to sign in on here. At the end of last school year I left thinking, “Im totally going to be productive this summer. Im going to revamp my courses and start next year with a bang!” Well, thats not going to happen with the few weeks that I have left. Great thought though. Maybe next summer? haha…
Anyways, the course at Full Sail has been amazing and I have been spending 40% of my time on that, 40% on my stationery design, 10% on Cheerleading, 8% on house projects, and well, 2% on the next school year 🙂 Technically, thats 100% productive, right?
Currently I am in the Filmmaking Principles in Education course. I love it! I will definitely have to think of way to incorporate this into my curriculum next year. Here is a video I had made for my Digital Story project. It is nine minutes, and kind of on a solemn note, so be prepared!
Also, keep in mind that it is my first digital story, and the camera that we were sent to use is not of the greatest quality. I had to actually use a personal camera for a lot of it. Ill take criticisms with a grain of salt, though.
Enjoy!
If you found my post on Schoology interesting, my classmates at Full Sail did their own reviews of great Web 2.0 sources that teachers can implement in the classroom.
Livebinders is a website that allows you (and students!) to create digital binders. This is a great way to keep assignments organized and lift a load out of those book bags.
Check out the implementation and review of LiveBinders here!
ComicLife2 is an application that will allows students to create graphic novels. In my 12th grade class, we look at the Maus series and I think it would be neat to create our own graphic novels on World War II once we finish looking at that. The implementation of this was well done and provided great insight!
Check out the implementation and review of ComicLife2 here!
-Quote from the “Creating Innovators” book trailer (below)
Recently, an article in Forbes magazine titled “Creating Innovators: Why America’s Education System is Obsolete“, caught my attention enough to share its importance to you. Tony Wagner, Harvard Innovation Education Fellow, rather accurately argues that education systems in America should be concentrating on developing students’ innovation skills, and pumping them up with motivation to succeed rather than filling students with knowledge- a commodity in today’s system. Wagner states:
“Today knowledge is ubiquitous, constantly changing, growing exponentially… Today knowledge is free. It’s like air, it’s like water. It’s become a commodity… There’s no competitive advantage today in knowing more than the person next to you. The world doesn’t care what you know. What the world cares about is what you can do with what you know (Swallow, 2012).”
Wagner’s book is now available as a hard copy or eBook. Check out this preview:
The book itself has a unique format, as it includes over 60 QR codes for online videos explaining each story.
After two years of research, Wagner identified core competencies every student must achieve before high school graduation:
– Critical thinking and problem solving (the ability to ask the right questions)
– Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
– Agility and adaptability
– Initiative and entrepreneurialism
– Accessing and analyzing information
– Effective written and oral communication
– Curiosity and imagination
(Swallow, Creating Innovators, 2012)
He also outlines five ways describing how America’s educational system prevents students from becoming innovators.
A week earlier, Erica Swallows, the author of the article in Forbes made a connection to Wagner’s thesis.
Check out her article, Can Innovative Thinking be Learned?
An Emerging Technology Connection:
“Learning to be an innovator is about learning to cross disciplinary boundaries and exploring problems and their solutions from multiple perspectives” – Wagner, 2012
Through our course at Full Sail, educators and businessmen (and women!) alike have implemented modern – emerging – technologies to provide innovative ways to deliver content to a specific audience, keeping in mind that viewers will be learning differently. Just by viewing their home page and talking to their professors, a viewer can be mesmerized by the talent impacting millions. Like Thomas Edison realized inventing the lightbulb, innovation is learned through trial and error- experience! Not what the government wants, what the state wants, or even what a Superintendent wants through established curriculums. And common assessments? What exactly is common about each learner, in or out of the classroom? Oh, right, my apologies. We are just now beginning (I think?) to realize the value of No Child Left Behind.
As an educator, selecting innovative tools to use in the classroom is just as important as selecting content. Every year I tell students they leave my class not just making connections, but with skills they can use in their future.
Now for my history connection: Every year I begin my American History course with Metropolis, from the History Channel’s America, the Story of Us. One of the first tasks we do is define innovators and before and after viewing, discuss the importance of innovating in our history. Perhaps its time to turn it up a notch to move from talking, to acting on these ideas.
References
Swallow, E. (2012). Creating Innovators: Why America’s Education System is Obsolete.Forbes. Retrieved May 14, 2012, from http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericaswallow/2012/04/25/creating-innovators/
Swallow, E. (2012). Can Innovative Thinking be Learned? Forbes. Retrieved May 14, 2012, from http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericaswallow/2012/04/19/innovators-dna-hal-gregersen-interview/
Metropolis. (2012). The History Channel website. Retrieved 7:19, May 14, 2012, from http://www.history.com/shows/america-the-story-of-us/episodes/episode-guide.
Wagner, T. (2012). Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People who will Change the World. Creating Innovators. Retrieved May 14, 2012, from http://creatinginnovators.com/
Tikatok Update
After seeing a video on Tikatok’s website on how to embed finalized videos, I spend a good amount of time creating the “perfect” users manual to present you with on the Web 2.0 Application.
As stated on their website, to publish the book various teaching credentials needed to be verified.
It took about one week for the people from Tikatok to get back to me with the following email:
“Hi Jessica,
I apologize, I was just informed that the site is no longer offering the sharing option. Please let me know if I can help with anything else.
Thanks,
[Name Withheld]”
To me, this defeats the purpose of the eBook feature and I am rather disappointed. I still believe that as a teacher you can see kids work, but unfortunately cannot allow other people to view them without purchasing a download or hard copy.
You can view the pdf. of the manual in the previous post, or by ET Tikatok Book.
In my classroom I have a single filing cabinet with each drawer consisting of a course that I teach. Within each drawer, you can see my lesson plans filed neatly in color-coded folders, not just by learning levels but also by assessment type. As if that was not enough, the students have a folder in the classroom color coded to correspond with the course “color” found in my filing cabinet. And that is only the beginning…
Yes, Im crazy… but for some reason I hate being disorganized and even if it takes more work up front, I love making life easier. Now you may understand why I fell in love with
What is iGoogle?
Take the tour!
iGoogle is a Personal Learning Environment (PLE) similar to a digital binder. Below, you will see a snapshot of my home screen. I set this so as soon as I start a web browser, my personalized home space appears.
The home screen can be personalized with widgets. Since I like to log onto my computer before work in the morning, I thought having my calendar, some news, the weather, and even my horoscope would be a great way to know what my day will be like. There are numerous widgets that can be inserted here- it is all up to your personal preference.
The best part of iGoogle is the tabs that appear in the drop down menu, as shown above. The three sections I created are a home page (as pictured), a page for my courses at Full Sail University (pictured below), and a page for my work.
How can it be personalized?
The purpose of Google allowing you to design your own homepage is so that it meets your individual needs. Take at look at my course dedicated to my schooling at Full Sail:
On this page I was able to add quick links to my email account, the student portal, and even helpful resources. I have also embedded a Google Calendar with all the assignments due for my current course. Another benefit is that as I continue to find excellent websites, my iGoogle page can be modified at any time to add those links. Being online, your information will not be lost- as long as you remember your password!
Can I use this in the classroom?
Although I have not yet implemented this in my classroom, I already wrote a reminder in my plan book to spend the first or second day of next school year doing this. Students can add a tab for each course they are taking, and I could even share links or widgets with them to help keep them organized. Currently, I embed Google Calendar to create our course schedule on my teacher page. With iGoogle, they will be able to see the agenda with a simple log-in (this will be great when students are absent!).
This is my tab for Gettysburg Area High School.
Reference:
What is iGoogle? (n.d.). Google Inside Search. Retrieved May 4, 2012, from http://support.google.com/websearch/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=20324
Hello followers – and classmates from Full Sail!
I am excited to be starting a new direction in my life. I am in my fifth year of teaching and up to this point, I have focused my degree and continuing education on History. I am glad to get a refresher on what teaching in the 21st century entails.
For more information about me, please view my About Me page!
Happy Blogging…
Jessica
technorati.com
JesSmith Blogs 