Ideas and Thoughts from an EdTech

I started teaching my second online class at the University of Regina.(in large part due to the recommendation from Alec Couros)  Last summer I taught my first, totally online save for an optional face to face meeting. This class was scheduled to be a face to face class, students thought it was going to be face to face and found out tonight, that was changed. (a strike late last year of administrative workers and others likely meant course offerings were not updated and thus the confusion). I didn’t know, they didn’t know but think I managed to convince them it would be a good thing and after some dry runs of the technology, establishment of their shiny new blogs, we’re ready to take off and learn.

I’m so looking forward to this. I love this stuff, I’m passionate about it and  I live it everyday. I’m excited to be able to watch and learn, share and teach with largely a group of first year pre-service education students. Here’s are the main themes of this course:

• Learning is social and connected
• Learning is personal and self-directed
• Learning is shared and transparent
• Learning is rich in content and diversity

So much of the work I do in my day job is similar in all but one key way…TIME. Even the best case scenarios allow teachers 4 or 5 days a year for professional learning of this nature. How can they possibly begin to do the kind of learning and thinking that my students will do? We will meet every week for a few hours, they will spend hours on their own and with each other learning. We will be in constant communication. The teachers that I work with must try and carve out time after work to begin to reflect and embrace the idea of a changing classroom. Ever see the video of building a plane while it’s flying? Perfect analogy for today’s teachers. My students get to build it on the ground where it’s supposed to be.

This is not so much me reflecting on how hard it is for teachers to have the opportunity to learn but more on how excited I am to be able to spend some quality time helping these young people consider how they’ll be able to create spaces that are fun, engaging, personal, relevant and authentic. Those aren’t buzz words for me either, I really try to foster that in all the work I do. It’s not easy all the time but it’s what I believe is important. What makes it hardest is not being able to spend the time to really get it. That’s what it’s like for most teachers and I have to find ways to live with that. I can’t expect big things from a teacher who is already maxed out from a day filled with all kinds of distractions, duties and stresses that at times deplete their energy down to almost nothing.  So I make adjustments, try to support them in small ways, give them bite sized chunks of ideas and because most are smart and want to be better, they do pretty well. But most will say to me over and over, “I just wish I had more time”.  This phrase is echoed throughout the walls of most schools on the planet.

But for the next four months, I get to work with people who have the time; not the expertise, not the experience but the time. It’s gonna be good.

Update: Another surprise to me was that many of my students are Arts Education students so if you know of some great teachers of arts education (music,dance,drama and visual art) showcasing their work via blogs, wikis, podcasts, whatever, leave the link here….it would be greatly appreciated.

Technorati Tags: uregina, aleccouros

I haven’t done many hardware or software reviews but am quite excited about the potential of products like this. Those who read this, know of my passion for video and my quest to make this more seamless and part of classrooms. This is the language of our youth but that’s for another post.

Part of the issue of introducing video has been time, hardware, software and skill level. We’ve seen the use of digital cameras increase as well as the video options of the still cameras. They’ve provided very good quality in many cases. With the “straight to the web” concept, this works quite well and the need for more devices like this increases.

I picked up a Sony Net-Sharing Camcorder for $200. My thinking is this will help classrooms use video more. I’ve seen an increase in usage with webcams direct upload to youtube and flixn, but webcams aren’t usually portable. Quality is always an issue, here’s my first real crack at this camera:

It’s very easy to use. I did import mine into Pinnacle to add some text and a few trims but the cool part is there is built in software in the camera that allows direct upload to youtube. As soon as the computer recognized the camera via USB, it shows it as a storage devices ala memory card and inside that is a folder with the PMB Portable software which  you open to upload your movie. You can  choose from a few pre-determined sharing sites or add your own. You simply authenticate to the site and upload your movie.

The big down side other is the ability to edit. It does come with a simple piece of software you can use to trim but that’s it. If you want to use your current video editor, it must be able to accept .mp4 files which Windows Movie Maker does not and I don’t think imovie does either. David Jakes suggested using Zamzar to convert the video which is a simple work around but again, adds a step and part of the reason for choosing these cameras is to make things simple.

I’ll continue to play and explore but am hopeful this and other similar products will be gateway tools to sharing and creating video.

Technorati Tags: sonynetsharingcam, pinnacle, davidjakes, zamzar, flixn,

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I posted about printing my blog as a book but wanted to expand some ideas.

As I show people the printed version, most seemed quite impressed; mostly with the quality of the print, the quantity of my work and the concept of being able to publish to a traditional, familiar format.  It’s fairly novel (but it’s no novel) and could perhaps help those who aren’t engaged in digital learning to see the depth of work that is done via blogging. These people expressed that sentiment well.

I’m also wondering if producing your blog into a book might be good for those who don’t get the amount of learning, communicating, etc. that we get from working in these ways. For example, it would be great for administraotr’s, etc. that I work with to see this volume of print as a way of justifying the time that I spend learning on my blog. Online it is hard to see the volume that is produced, in a book, the learning is more “weighty” and easier to show. Clarence Fisher

Wow Dean, just recently a friend (Diane Cordell) was lamenting that her district would not accept her blog as time spent in professional development. I wonder if they would have denied it had she produced a book like this. WOW! Cathy Nelson

But as I peruse it’s contents, it’s strikingly obvious how it lacks power. Without the comments, hyperlinks, and multimedia, it’s just my thoughts and work. It clearly doesn’t capture my true learning. Blogging isn’t just about me. It’s about my learning, my network and resources. It’s about me being able to express ideas in a variety of ways, engage in conversations, and take me to all sorts of new places and spaces. Even without those aspects, how many people would read this if I published it a  book? How about zero. Instead, I’ve had over 100,000 eyeballs look at my stuff. I realize eyeballs aren’t everything but still, how many people have published their dissertation and had that type of response? This print version cost me about $50 and misses so much. I could blog for free and include all that multimedia as well.

So here’s where it hits me even more clearly. If you are a teacher and have the ability to choose how your students will demonstrate their learning, why would you choose analog text over blogging? How can it compete? Is there even one reason that analog text is better than digital? I can’t think of one advantage other than access and while in some cases that may be important, for most schools and situations, it’s not.  When you watch Michael Wesch’s first video, it’s clear how digital text changes everything. You haven’t seen it yet? That’s easy, I’ll just embed here: (By the way, if you’re reading the text version of this blog, you won’t be able to see this or click on the links or read the comments)

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I don’t know if 2008 is to be the year of video and I won’t attempt to make any predictions but I do think we need to consider what video is. It’s a term to describe a wide variety of genres and formats that only have in common a file extension at best. I know that some think that digital video is a fancy name for Film making. I do see a difference and think that there may be some value in distinguished these differences. Scanning youtube I noticed some common styles/genres. While these are basically how I distinguish between the genre, others may have a different way to categorize.

• Talking head video  We’re seeing more of this with the advent of vlogs, Ustream, Skype, etc. I don’t have a problem with it. Depending on the circumstance, length, it can add to a message. Dave Cormier’s efforts to do a daily video for 2008 is an example of value added blogging. Webcams now provide a high quality image so this makes the experience better. There are many bad examples on sites like Ustream where people turn on their cameras and just ramble.

• Screencasts Tools like Jing and Camtasia make this pretty simple. We’re even seeing some innovations beyond the basic tutorial approach. Here’s one about photoshop that offers a unique approach and some humor as well.

• Caught on tape   Cellphones and Net Sharing type cameras have helped people go directly to video after capturing live events. Certainly many of the best viral videos are simply a case of being at the right place at the right time. This will likely be the most popular genre. Even scripted video might fit into this category if it’s shot in one take and uploaded with no editing. The bride hair cut video is a classic example, although it appears to be a spontaneous event. The low quality resolution of these devices, in particular cellphones can be distracting but in many ways adds to its “viralness”. With no editing, it speaks more about the event than the work of the videographer. Yet now most phones come with video editing software on the phone itself so we may see this format evolve even further.

• The Slide Show  Probably the most popular format. Gather a collection of photos, add some music and there you have it. Often a very nice way to capture a moment in time. This however, is generally over used and is often best suited to use for a target audience like family or perhaps a classroom. If however, you include narration, from a well designed script, this is the best way to begin introducing students to video. It requires less equipment and horsepower so almost any computer can produce a nice product.

• The Text Presentation  This is basically the typical powerpoint presentation converted to video. Karl Fisch’s original Did You Know might be the best example.  This is usually a good fit for those who grew up in a text bias world. They tend to relate well to this approach. I think this is hard to do well without some real understanding that text can be a visual medium.  A simple uploaded of a bullet ladened presentation doesn’t cut it. If the creator understands that text must be designed with visual considerations, it can be a powerful medium.

• The Mash Up  This takes advantage of existing footage where the creator remixes content to tell a new story. I blogged about this recently.  With sites like GorillaSpot, this may be the best place to start with students.

• The Edited Movie  This is what I’d consider the purest of video. This is the planned, scripted, edited use of moving images. Definitely the most time consuming and there is really no way around it; quality takes time. Most classrooms aren’t willing to devote the time necessary to produce this type of work. Instead, students who produce this, are doing it on their own and learning from the work of others. While this is good, teachers can play a role in moving students to better quality if they begin to engage in learning about what constitutes good work.

So what’s important here is that we choose the method that’s more appropriate for the message. I’ve used all of these methods from time to time but I am bias towards anything that requires a script or at least some editing. I rarely post a picture to flickr without at least an “autofix”, rename and tag.  It just seems to me that we need to be thinking about the quality of work that we share. This blog post does have at least one key idea and certainly offers a perspective worth considering when it comes to writing. One of the other key considerations is length of video. Just like we struggle with the length of posting text online, the same considerations must be used for video. We’ve definitely moved to shorter forms of communication in both writing, speaking and viewing. Like it or not, it’s a fact. So helping students create meaningful pieces, either written or visual is challenging. Educators often value quantity, the web values conciseness. As more and more of our content is going straight online, this is a key issue. We haven’t been all that critical or concerned about video because we haven’t done it enough to either understand what’s good or not or perhaps we’re just so thrilled that we can post anything that quality isn’t a big consideration. Maybe being able to distinguish using these categories can help structure and design more effective learning experiences.

Image: 3692018.05 by torres21
http://flickr.com/photos/torres21/2164930932/

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