News Update!

The Ides of February

Tomorrow is February 15th, which is the deadline for presentation proposals for the Association of Educational Communication and Technology's conference in Anaheim this October. I've presented at this conference for years, and am looking forward to it. Have turned in two proposals. One is on "Learning through Podcasting: Student-Created Podcasts." The other, with my colleague Mark Millard, is "Web 2.0 for Educators: We (and Our Students) are the Web." Hopefully, both will be accepted! Hopefully, you can attend AECT (right next door to Disneyland--Bring the Fam!) and hear what we have to say.

February 15th is also the opening day for presentations to the International Student Media Festival, also in Anaheim in October. As I've mentioned previously, I will be helping out again with the festival. I will be teaching a new class for the ISMF, about podcasting. We will also have a new category, for student-created podcasts. So if your students have or will be creating their own podcasts (or other media type), consider submitting it!

The next episode of "Teach with Tech" is in the planning stages, and I'm eagerly looking forward to the recording session. It will be about technology and special education, something that I haven't dealt with yet in the series. I look forward to finding out more about the state of the art in the area.

Chris

Podcasting Presentation Download, Secure Email Service, KidCasting!

ICE Podcasting Presentation
As promised, here is my Powerpoint file for the "Integrating Podcasting into Your Teaching" presentation from the Indiana Computer Educators' conference. Feel free to download and view it. Again, if you'd like a similar presentation (or something completely different) at your school, just contact me at cessex(at symbol)indiana.edu.

Secure Email for Your Students
I've talked with my online students, K-12 teachers from all over the US, in my Education W505 course, about Internet communication options, and one problem that they consistently comment upon is the difficulty of designing email-based projects, primarily based on the security concerns. Obviously, establishing student email accounts could result in all sorts of problems. But they could also result in some wonderful learning opportunities. How about connecting your students with another class, say in the Middle East? How about sharing email with astronauts, or experts in other areas? Or doing peer review of assignments via email?

Well, at ICE, I talked with some representatives of Gaggle, a service which promises secure email, blogs, chat rooms and student lockers. They have a pornography scanner, which according to their brochure, can distinguish between a photograph of Paris Hilton in a bikini and two eight-year-old boys on the beach. So, the immediate question in your mind is, how much? Well, they offer a free, advertising-supported service for poor schools, and a $3-4 per student service for others.

A caveat--other than talking with the friendly people at the booth, I don't have any experience with this service. But I would think that it would be worth checking out for many teachers.

KidCast--Podcasting in the Classroom
The people at FTC Publishing provided me with a free copy of this book to give away at my ICE presentation, and the reaction was very enthusiastic. I've read through the book, and it is very informative.

The new episode is still being edited, but should be online Tuesday!

Chris

Welcome, Indiana Computer Educators!

This past Friday, I attended the Indiana Computer Educators' conference in downtown Indy. It was my first time at the conference and I was impressed. Things seemed very well organized. I hadn't been to the Convention Center since the Star Wars Celebrations II and III, and so it was strange walking down the halls and not seeing Jedi Knights and StormTroopers anywhere. I still kept expecting to turn a corner and bump into Darth Vader, but it never happened.

There was a nice, large exhibitor's area, with representatives from many companies and lots of goodies to pick up. I won't need a new pen for the rest of the year, for sure. My presentation on podcasting was during the first session of the day, and in one of the Wabash Rooms, which is the biggest, I believe. Had a good turnout, maybe 80% of the seats were full. A lively, interested audience of K-12 teachers. Most had listened to podcasts, maybe a third had created them, but only a couple had used them in their teaching. I provided guidance in all three of these areas. It was a shame we only had 45 minutes, because I would have been happy to keep going on and giving more examples of cool uses of podcasting in the K-12 arena.

As promised, the Powerpoint from the session will be posted here on the blog. But not tonight! I'm still in Indy and using a friend's computer now. But on Monday, when I get back to the office, I'll post it.

If you're in Indiana, and you think your school might want a similar presentation, let me know and maybe we can work something out.

During the presentation, I mentioned the International Student Media Festival. I encourage you to have your students submit work! This year will be the first for the new podcasting category. Check it out at http://www.ismf.net. There isn't any podcast-specific info there yet, though. Doesn't mean you can't start a project though.

Episode 17 Notes! and Office 2008 and ICE Conference

Episode 17 is online!

During the episode, as promised, Mark Millard and myself discussed the recent MacWorld conference, focusing on iPhone and AppleTV, which were announced at the keynote.
How could these new technologies be used by classroom teachers and higher ed faculty?

(As a side note, these Steve Jobs keynotes are often emotional experiences for those watching. Check out "Why Apple Makes Me Cry" at:
http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,72473-0.html?tw=rss.index)

We also discussed various software packages that I picked up in the two exhibition halls:

• Toon Boom, Mac/Windows/Linux animation and storyboard software
• Toast 8 Titanium, Mac disc-burning software
• Slick Transitions & Effects, Mac special effect plugins for iMovie
• Civilization IV, a Mac/Windows history/politics simulation game
• Sims 2, a Mac/Windows people simulation game
• SubEthaEdit, a Mac text editor with synchronous collaboration features
• Profcast, a Mac program that allows you to convert your Powerpoint and Keynote presentations into screencasts/videocasts.

Sadly, we ran out of time to talk about a couple of products. First was Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac. Big news about it seems to be that it is compatible with the new version recently released for Windows, which has a new document format. Like the iLife programs, the new version of Word focuses on the use of templates to create documents. There is a new interface item called the "Elements Gallery" which has templates available for various parts of the page, like headers and footers. It also has a new kind of view, called "Publishing Layout" which helps with desktop publishing projects (sounds kind of like Apple's Pages). Here are some links with news about Office 2008:
http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2382
http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/17/macworld-2007-show-floor-showoff-microsoft-office-2008-for-mac/
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2007/jan07/01-09Macworld.mspx

Indiana Computer Educators Conference

I'll be presenting on the topic of Integrating Podcasts into the K-12 Curriculum at the Indiana Computer Educators conference in Indy. I'd love to see some "Teach with Tech" listeners there. Find out more at: http://www.iceindiana.org/conference.aspx

Keep on listening!
Chris

Episode 16: "What is Web 2.0?" Show Notes

Well, the episode is out there! Go get it! Great for listening to while shopping, or driving to Grandma's!

Articles for this Episode:

Time Magazine Person of the Year 2006:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1569514,00.html

Web 2.0: A New Wave of Innovation for Teaching and Learning?
http://www.educause.edu/apps/er/erm06/erm0621.asp?bhcp=1

What is Web 2.0?
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html

Featured Websites:

Second Life: http://www.secondlife.com
Student-Centered Learning Management System: http://www.elgg.org
Easy sharing of large documents: http://www.yousendit.com and http://www.rapidshare.de
Slashtmp (IU only): http://kb.iu.edu/data/angt.html (instructions)
Google Docs & Spreadsheets: http://docs.google.com/
Google Labs: http://labs.google.com/ (including all the other Google tools we mentioned)
Innovative use of widgets: http://www.protopage.com/
Breeze/Contact competitor: http://www.vyew.com/
Blog Search Engine: http://blogsearch.google.com/
Teaching via the iPod: http://www.mogopop.com

Teachers' TV!

This posting is a continuation of the previous one about using online video...

teacher's tv
http://www.teachers.tv/

This is quite an exciting find! Teachers' TV has over a thousand online video programs (or programmes as these Brits would have it) on K-12 teacher professional development topics.

The first one I watched was:
Internet Research and Podcasting
http://www.teachers.tv/video/3207
This episode covers webquests and podcasting as used in secondary classrooms. Plus a number of excellent tech tips--for example, an elementary teacher says she has her students turn off their monitors when they are supposed to be paying attention to her in the computer lab.

The streaming was pretty darn slow, even with my broadband connection from the university, so I'd suggest downloading these very professionally produced Windows Media and Qucktime files (it seems you have to register to download the files, though you can view them without registering; registration is free). They also sell DVDs of some shows.

This episode was, of course, about teaching with technology. However, the majority of these videos are not about teaching with technology, but instead range all over the K-12 age range and content areas.

Other examples:
Body Image for Beginners
http://www.teachers.tv/video/4888
Much of this one is teachers talking about the subject, but it also features fascinating but kinda saddening clips from interviews from fifth-grade students who are already quite aware that they are "too fat" or "too freckled."

KS1 Literacy: Laying the Foundations 2
http://www.teachers.tv/video/220
in this video, an experienced teacher describes and shows a Vygotsky-based approach to early language and literacy learning. The fact that you can actually see what she is talking about in action in the classroom really makes this video useful.

The site is well-constructed. You can bookmark the various videos you are interested in (important when there are so many), and it keeps track of recently viewed videos so you can easily find them.

But that's not all.... (Like they say in the late-night infomercials.) When you visit this site, you also get

InClass tv
http://www.teachers.tv/inclasstv

This, a subsite of teachers.tv, hosts a collection of videos for showing to students, again ranging all over the K-12 curriculum. Of course, some kids may have problems at time understanding the English accents.

The home page highlights videos on math (or maths), PE and social studies.

All in all, a tremendous source of videos for K-12 teachers!

Chris

Episode 15: Analysis of Video Documents, My New Snowball

My "Rig"

In case you were wondering what my recording setup looks like, here it is. I've got a MacBook Pro and a Blue Snowball microphone. The Snowball is a new purchase; before that I was just using the microphone built into the laptop. This is the first episode recorded with the new microphone. For this episode, I used iChat, Apple's instant messaging tool to connect with my interview subject, and Garageband to record the session. When I clicked on the record button in GB, it announced that it saw that I had an audioconferencing session going, and asked if I wanted to record it. Then it put myself and my subject on individual tracks, allowing for adjustments to either side without affecting the other, and panning one person to the left, the other to the right for a stereo effect. The Blue microphone looks cool, don't you think? It requires the download of a firmware update in order to record podcasts, as it comes set up to record things at a louder volume, like musical instruments, but once you've installed the firmware update, it seems to work fine. The audio quality of iChat doesn't seem to be quite as good as Skype, which I have used in the past in conjunction with Audio Hijack to record the session--GB doesn't recognize that you are in a Skype session the way it does with iChat. But hopefully, the sound quality is good enough.

Episode 15: Video Analysis Software

Episode 15 has been recorded and may even be online before the day (Friday) is over. This episode features an interview, the first interview I have done with a software developer. This developer is also an educational researcher, which provides him with unique insights into the creation of his software package--he's a user as well as a developer. His name is Jon Tapp, from the Kennedy Center at Vanderbilt University, and he's the man behind ProcoderDV.

It seems like every semester, my office gets more and more requests to help faculty as they work with digital video. Sometimes the faculty member just wants to record a lecture, or capture an existing clip for use in a PowerPoint, but often the faculty member is involved in a research project that incorporates video documents of child behavior, classroom interactions or counseling sessions. Sometimes they have hours and hours of this sort of raw video data to process. Usually this involves identifying types of behavior and then noting when and for how long the behavior takes place. Doing this sort of analysis manually can be quite time-consuming and the resulting data hard to work with. But a tool like Procoder DV makes this type of qualitative data analysis much easier. Which is why I decided to interview Jon Tapp for Episode 15. I thought that many "Teach with Tech" listeners would be interested in hearing about this type of software. Let me know what you think. And if there are other pieces of education-related software that I should focus on, let me know.

Well, back to editing Episode 15. Thanks for reading this!

Chris

Back from AECT! & Podcasting Screencast

Had a great time at the Association for Educational Communication conference in Dallas, Texas. Met a lot of charming, inteliigent people and saw some old friends. As I suspected, I barely got out of the conference hotel, so I don't have a great sense of what Dallas has to offer, though I did enjoy the Mexican food at RJs on the West End.

At AECT, I presented on the topic of "Podcasting: A New Medium for Distance Learning." It was a packed room and numerous people asked me for a copy of my slides. Better than that, I've created an enhanced podcast or screencast for you, for free download. Just click on the title above. You will probably find that it opens in iTunes, but Quicktime Player should work fine, too. (Actually, I just tried this out, on Windows---for some reason, the slides are almost unreadable in Quicktime, so you will want to use iTunes after all.) I may make this a part of a "Teach with Tech" (Enhanced Podcast) series, along with my HTML tutorial, and make it subscribable. But I don't want to confuse things and upload it along with the regular "Teach with Tech." By the way, I used Profcast to make the screencast and it couldn't have been easier.

Also, while at AECT, I participated in a Skypecast, which is a live broadcast over Skype, in a show called "EdTechTalk Brainstorm." It was a lot of fun, partly because of my co-guest (is that a word?) Jennifer Maddrell, who is an IU grad student in Instructional Systems Technology. We will both be appearing on EdTech Weekly this coming Sunday at 7pm Bloomington time. They should also have an mp3 archive of this past Sunday's session up soon, so check it out. Not that my contributions were all that meaningful, but....

Do you know about the International Student Media Festival? Sponsored by AECT, it is a wonderful opportunity for K-12 students to show off their work, in areas such as still photography, stills with audio, websites, and digital video productions. I assisted as one of the judges this year, and also attended some of the events, such as Marco Torres' inspiring keynote, and the viewing of K-6 projects. I also interviewed some parents and kids, who were very excited about the ISMF. More about this in a future podcast.

More to come....

Chris