W4 Reading

O.K.  Here is a true confession... I was not able to get to 4 readings this week.  It has been a busy week; I have been wrapping up my season coaching field hockey, I have gone in for minor doctor's appointments which turns out are leading to surgery, I have worked full time,  I have taken care of a 3 year old who had a head injury on Wednesday ( he is fine now, just one big shinner), I have been a wife, mother, daughter and friend to all and most importantly I have taken some needed time for myself.

I know that this is a non weighted activity, but I have enjoyed my previous weeks and am anticipating this reading being very conducive to lower stress levels next month.  I just wanted to "blog" about what is going on with me and share the personal side of this journey.

I am thoroughly enjoying Full Sail University!  The EMDT program has truly been amazing and I am learning more than I ever dreamed possible.  It is so wonderful to be able to be learning tools and putting them into practice immediately.  I feel like what I am learning is so authentic and relevant that it is  very motivating.  I am bragging about the program to anyone who will listen and I am looking forward to an enriching year!  Thank you all, my co-learners, my co-workers, and my co-habitants!!  I would not be able to do this without you!

Week 4 Final Video Project Based Assessments R the Way 2 Go!!!

http://www.viddler.com/explore/tjonesme39/videos/8/

This is my final video regarding Project Based Assessments and how beneficial they are!!  So many teachers try to make the test "hard" when what we all need to focus on is validity.  Is what the students are showing for work, valid to their learning?  Have they gained life long knowledge that they can and want to expand upon?  These are the measures by which teachers should be assessing the assessments.

PE6 iMovie Finale

Grand Finale

WoW!!  So here I am, completed the training in Lynda.com and been playing around with what I have learned.  There really is so much that I find myself keeping the Lynda tutorial up while I play around with changes on this video.  The first new thing I did was that I shot video on two different days of my sons soccer camp, I combined those two events into one event.  I learned how to organize my video more effectively by combining events or separating them.  Next, I stabilized my video, since this was shot with a hand held camera, I learned how to run the pictures through a stabilization analysis, this takes a bit of time, but I believe the results are well worth it.  The next exciting thing I did that I just learned about was putting a picture in a picture, I superimposed so that there are two videos playing in the same clip.  I hope you enjoy my newly edited clip as much as I enjoyed playing around and taking the time to master this new skill.  It was great to take the time to really learn this program, rather than just scratching the surface.  It was also a great experience using Lynda.com.  I thought that I would have to go to the Apple store to get this training and it turns out I didn't have to leave my home and I was able to do it on my time, which is often "off" hours.  So, between Lynda.com and iMovie, I have gained invaluable knowledge that I look forward to putting to good use in the future!  Here is the link of my video in You Tube:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L78wzQTzuS0

PE5 iMovie

Climbing Through The Fear

I continued with the tutorial on Lynda.com and discovered how to upload movies to YouTube.  This is something that I have wanted to do, but was afraid of the whole idea of "exposure."  This month my class at Full Sail University has been "Emergent Technologies in A Collaborative Culture." I entered this month feeling hesitant about blogging, having a website, tagging and basically putting myself out here into this World Wide Web.  I had fear of the unknown....  I now am ending the month with a new confidence and an excitement about sharing information with the world and collecting information as well.  The opportunities for expanding my horizons exponentially is empowering and exciting.  I have just uploaded my first months bio up on You Tube!!  This is a major break through and I feel like I am really becoming a part of the 21st century and all of it's technological tools.  iMovie has been a wonderful tool that has truly given me a new skill to use to collaborate with the world and show what I know!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ay7w3_OFChM

I am still learning and I am unsure of how to properly give credit where credit is due.  In this video, I have some background music by Chris Daughtry.  I bought the song in iTunes and give credit in the closing clip, but would love any and all direction or advice on how to best go about using popular songs in your movies.  Look forward to hearing from you.

PE4 iMovie Continued

http://lynda.com

I have been discovering iMovie with Lynda.com.  This site has been amazing with what has been offered and the clear, concise instructions that are given.  I have gone through an entire program tutorial, specifically, the iMovie '09 Essential Training by Damian Allen.  I wanted to share with you all a bit from this training to show just how helpful and easy to use Lynda.com is.  As you will see, I have many windows open while the tutorial is going and I am able to use iMovie while watching the tutorial, thus making it more hands on learning for me.



http://www.lynda.com/home/Display Course.aspx

W3 Reading

PE3 iMovie

This third Personal Experience was something I have not spent time doing in the past.  I took more time and went over transitions in between, tweaked the music, and added some informative tags.  I placed transitions in appropriate places and hope I didn’t use too many , which the tutorial says is a rookie error.  I am very pleased with how this came out and really look forward to cleaning up my other still photos.  My goal for week 4 is to smooth transitions and editing with video clips.  I look forward to seeing the results.  

PE2 iMovie

In my next lessons I am again learning more in depth about  how to manage my images in my library.  I learned about the star buttons that mark favorites or reject clips and how to change the date on my clips, this hasn’t been an issue yet, but I can see as the years pass, it will be helpful to have the correct dates to keep track of videos.  I also found out about  changing the standard clip length in format and a keyboard shortcut of “e” which adds highlighted clips to the end of the project.  I also found out about dragging clips in between a couple of existing ones.  Finally, I learned how to put still photos into a slideshow with some music to make an interesting slide show of stills.  Here's what happened when I tried it!  I look forward to keeping pictures organized!

PE1 iMovie

Even though I have been using iMovie, I have not been thrilled with my results and felt like there was so much I was missing.  I want to become smoother with transitions, cropping and finishing.  I have begun viewing the Lynda.com training, iMovie ‘09 Essential Training.  So far, I have learned about the benefits of selecting specific clips while I am importing pictures from my camera and then archiving all, but not putting them all in the original movie make up.  I am learning about skimming and how to get different screens, also there is an on/off button for skimming, I never knew what that button did!  I look forward to more discoveries with iMovie.  The following is my first movie attempt with iMovie, I tried to add some things in.  Looking at it now I can see I have already come a long way and I look forward to seeing my future videos as I learn more and practice with iMovie.  This is good for a laugh, though.

Things I hope to improve:

*Transitions

*Sound

*Camera Angles

*Editing clips, not cutting them off

*Picture framing in the shot

Please feel free to add a comment, or critique... I look forward to getting better!

BP_12 OMM_DoInk

This is My One Minute Movie on a great Web 2.0 tool... DoInk... It is a fun online flipbook that students and teachers can be creative and share characters and props as they become animated.  Hope you enjoy. Watch out, this site is addicting!

BP_11 Comment to Monica Heaney

Monica has found a great comic strip site.  Come put your ideas into the "funny pages"

Come see what Monica's Message is.....

http://manceheaney.blogspot.com/2010/10/p5-web-20-tool.html

Retrieved from Maine Sunday Telegram

BP_10 Comment to Cherie Hellenbrand

Question:  The newest tool from Cherie Hellenbrand.  

Answer:  What is Online Jeopardy??   Come see what other questions we can answer together.








(Picture: Sample image from jpeg.images)
      
http://chellenbrand.blogspot.com/2010/10/bp9jeopardy-web-20.html 

BP_9 DoInk

This week my Web 2.0 tool was DoInk.   http://www.doink.com/ This is a  fun, interactive site that caught my attention right away with it’s super logo(see attached, cute pink octopus)…..(picture from doink.com)

This was only the beginning!  

The site was easy to navigate, free to sign up for, and kind of addicting once you started animating your pictures… and I am NOT an avid artist, as any of my students will tell you!

This is an evolving site, currently there is no direct link to sound with your animations or importing photos to add but according to a review by Kyle Psaty in BostInnovation(bostinnovation.com/2010/05/11/doink…/).  Aaron White, the CTO, is looking at ways to add both of these features. 

So, to begin you have a blank slate with  a brush, pen or fill in option.  You choose your tool and then your color.  After you have drawn and colored  an image, you can copy it to the next frame, adding to it or changing it.  The basic principle is a digital flip book,  you make small changes in each frame and when put together the end result is motionJ  You are then able to publish your creation to Facebook, Twitter or get the embed code to move your creation around and really put it out there. 

I paid $5.  and got 400 coins which I can use to buy other creations to use, to upgrade color/shape options or to download my image as a Mp4 which I then put into iMovie.  See my One Minute Movie.  

My students figured it out in about ½ the time I did, which is no surprise and only fueled their interest in the site,  “here let me show you how to do it, Mrs. Jones” was a common theme of the dayJ  I watched the excellent tutorials and was pleased they were clear and easy to follow.  I will be adding this tool to my classroom Moodle and can’t wait to see what my artists create.  Tune in for future animations! 

W2 Reading

This week I read more articles, researching the topic of Moodle and how it is a beneficial tool for Middle School Classrooms.  I am hoping to find some articles that oppose my ideas because I find that sometimes the opposing view can help me to not be biased and get a full picture of Moodle.  I have yet to find that opposing research, that is my mission for week 3.
As I did a synopsis last week of the articles I read, I decided to mix it up and used MindMeister, and excellent web 2.0 mind mapping website that you can use to collaborate ideas with others.

BP_8OMM Quizlet.com

This is my One Minute Movie (OMM) on Quizlet.com  I was amazed by how much you can learn at this site.  I hope you check it out and tell me what you think.

BP_7Comment to Cherie Hellenbrand

Come find out how to make your own animations and make your movies come to life!  Follow me to Cherie Hellenbrand's blog and learn about Animate Me.

http://chellenbrand.blogspot.com/2010/10/bp5go-animate.html

BP_6 Comment to Jim Farmer

Follow me to KnowledgeFarm and find out how to build vocabulary skills while helping feed the world!

http://knowledgefarmer.blogspot.com/2010/10/bp4discovering-web-20-tools.html#comments

BP_5 Quizlet

Quizlet is an AWESOME web 2.0 tool that helps students of all kinds learn and study just about anything! It is an interactive flashcard site that has a large group of flashcards made up, but also allows you to make up your own.  Whether you are a teacher or a student, most of us have some experience with using flashcards as an excellent study tool, but have you tried it online?  If not, Quizlet is the site for you.

This interactive platform really draws you in with self-tests and games.  A graduate student, Andrew, at MIT who is actively working on making this site better and more user friendly all the time, started this site.  In a recent blog post (Sept. 9, 2010), gave the statistic, “if you add up the length of each quizlet visitor’s study sessions in a single day, you get 1008 days, or about 2.9 years.” (The Quizlet Blog, 9/9/10)   That is an amazing statistic and speaks to how engaging and interesting this site is.  I found myself looking at Spanish word flashcards and then taking the “tests” to see how much I learned, or what grade I could get.

 I ultimately found a set of wonderful cards, which I will be attaching to my class site Moodle, the Fertile Crescent.  The existing card set matches perfectly with the chapter the 6^th grade social studies class is learning and this tool will hopefully only enhance that learning.   I also plan on continuing this connection throughout the year and encourage the students to explore this site and test their knowledge on whatever might peak their interest.  I have to go now, get back on Quizlet; I may have found a way to study that inspires learningJhttp://quizlet.com/

Pictures: Screen shots of cards made by Tiffany Jones on quizlet.com

W1 Reading

The following 4 articles are just the beginning of what I am researching to support my Action Research Project:  Moodle Doodle.  I am looking into how using Moodle in the classroom can be an inspiring, motivational tool that increases productivity. 

1.Attitudes Toward eLearning Using Moodle: A Qualitative Approach

   By:  Yusniza Kamarulzaman, Azian Madun and Farinda Abdul Ghani University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

This study looked at what students’ attitude was towards eLearning, what factors influence students’ adoption of eLearning and what motivates students to continue to use Moodle in the learning process. 

This study provides a clear explanation of what Moodle is and how to use it. As well as the reasons that Moodle is highly motivating to students. 

The conclusion shows that Moodle is a useful tool for students at all levels.  It was found to be easy to use and user friendly to students.

2.Comparison between Two Learning Management Systems:  Moodle and Blackboard

By:  Momani, Alaa M.

This is a specific list of both Moodle and Blackboard and compares how the two compare.  They look at six factors; Pedagogical Factor, Learner Environment, Instructor Tools, Course and Curriculum Design, Administrator Tools, and Technical Specification. 

3.  Curriculum Integration:  The Use of Technology To Support Learning

     By:  Jackson, Allen, Gaudet, Laura, McDaniel, Larry, and Brammer, Dawn

This article discusses Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences takes into consideration the different learning styles, therefore, the use of technology is ideal to support the multiple learning styles.  By using technology, differentiation is much easier and allows students to use their strengths and different styles to learn and master the same concepts.

4.  Moodle Habitudes

     By: Angela Maiers

    This book opens with the definition of “habitudes” as the combination of habits and attitudes.  This seems to be a perfect combination to analyze and look at how Moodle can be used in the classroom. 

There are specific tools discussed such as: Questionnaire, Book, OUBlog, Lightbox Gallery Resource, Learning Diary, Exabis ePortfolio.  These are explained and then told how to install.  I will be referring back to this to add new options to my Moodle and compare them to existing classroom practices.  

These four articles have given me a great foundation from which to build my Moodle investigation.  I am looking forward to adding new tools to my Moodle and having students log in to begin their new journey.