Week 5/EDLD 5363 Course Reflections

When I saw that this course was called Multimedia and Video Technology, I was excited.  I love to create video and looked forward to the “multimedia” aspect and what I would learn.  This course offered me the opportunity to learn about podcasting, digital storytelling and video editing software.  I also learned about camera shots, the importance of a storyboard and tools to collaborate with other classmates.  The actual outcomes actually exceeded what I had expected. I found most of the assigned readings applicable and informative.  I especially enjoyed the Week 5 assigned video, Pixar University's Randy Nelson on Learning and Working in the Collaborative Age.  I plan to show this to our principals and hope to share it during a professional development to encourage conversation regarding encouraging this aspect of learning. 

                                                                                      

I found the information I learned very relevant to what I do. There was one area that I would have liked to be incorporated. Because I am in charge of my student video announcement broadcast, I had hoped that there would be more information related to this form of video technology. Now, I am working on having 6^th grade students create PSA’s.  I am encouraging them to find something they feel strongly about and write me a letter about it and why they feel strongly about this topic.  I will then group them (if applicable) and have the create a storyboard for a one minute PSA.  When I introduced this idea to the students, they seemed to really like the concept. I have also had students create a podcast on a picture they created and record their narrative.  Here is the link to the teachers wiki.  I am also planning on teaching a video technique course.  I am going to go over camera angles and creative ways to shot a video.  As you can tell, I am applying much of what I have learned in this course! I was able to achieve all the outcomes of the course. 

I believe I was able to complete all the course assignments and the outcomes without much difficulty. The only issue I had was to attend the web conferences during the appointed time.  I have two daughters and am very busy with two schools, so I wasn’t home many times during the times they were offered.  I did get to attend one on a Saturday morning though and found it helpful. I have a Lamar Facebook page that I am a member of, and found other members helpful with questions and information. I also had difficulty with the Week 2 assignment of comparing video editing software.  The assignment wasn’t difficult in itself, I simply had a hard time deciphering the requirements. 

In this course, I enjoyed the Discussion Board much more than in previous courses.  I think we are getting to know each other and that reflects in our board comments.  I love to hear what position the other students have in their district, some of the activities they are doing with students, and their thinking on some of the articles that we have read.  Again, I am going to bring up the  video by Randy Nelson.  I was truly inspired by what he had to say.  I feel I am one of those that  would have been able to go to the moon. J  I have failed many times in my endeavors and know that I have learned from those failures.  I also prefer to think outside the box and appreciate when people notice that about me.  I might not have the right idea, or the concept that THEY were looking for, but I know that I want to think of something that no one else had thought of...even if it is wrong (in their eyes.) I hope to use this degree to find a position that encourages my innovative thinking and allows me to make mistakes as I think outside the box. 

Resources 

Desktop-Video-Guide. (n.d.) Guidelines for shooting quality video. Retrieved on April 22, 2009, from http://www.desktop-video-guide.com/shoot-video.html

 Nelson, R. (2008). Learning and working in the collaborative age: A new model for the workplace. Edutopia. Retrieved April 23, 2009, from http://www.edutopia. org/randy-nelson-school-to-career-video

Week 5/EDLD 5363 PSA Post Production Assignment

 

Team PSA Debriefing

Team PSA Post Production Doc.

• Our process included creating a Google Doc (see link above) and creating tables within the Google Doc. We each selected an area to work on, and divided the tasks.  We posted the completed PSA to You Tube (see video below.)

• I loved the idea for our PSA, I suppose the only way it could be improved would be to have more time to edit it, apply transitions and make it look a little more professional.  But, I still think it is excellent.

• All aspects of our video were created by us, the interviews and the beginning and end. 

•  Our team worked very well together.  I feel we evenly dispersed the PSA responsibilities and respected each others opinions.

Week 5/EDLD 5363 PSA

The More I Know is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Week 2/EDLD 5363 Web Conference Reflection

I was not able to attend this week's web conference, but I did watch it at a later time. In all honestly, I much prefer to wait for the link and read through the "Chat" section (even then it is hard to scroll through the conversations that are not relevant.) I have noticed though that many of the other students were as confused as I was about the assignment so the web conference is important in that aspect. Thank you Dr. Abernathy for your patience and the time you invest in these web conferences. You try to keep a focus while answering the same questions over and over.

I was also surprised by this part of the assignment. I understood that we were to attend one conference (even though more are encouraged) during the five week session. I think I can say, and have others in this class in agreement, that we need the assignments to be relevant and not have any surprises. Many (all) of us work full time in a school district in one way or another and have to ration our time. When the assignment is modified, it not only adds more time, but in the case this week, much more time invested in being confused and trying to decipher what is being requested. This week I learned how to post a podcast to Teacher Tube.

Week 2/EDLD 5363 Comparison of Video Editing Software

My peer partner and I explored Movie Maker, iMovie, Pinnacle and Camtasia.  I am quite familiar with both Movie Maker and Pinnacle.  I have also worked with iMovie in the past.  I chose Camtasia to also look at because, even though it only records your desktop, it has wonderful editing capabilities. 

Here are the file extensions for each of the options above.

Movie Maker	iMovie	Pinnacle	Camtasia
Initially you have the options of: Save to my computer Save to CD Send in an e-mail Sent to the Web Send to DV Camera Then you have many other options: SWF/FLV/M4V/AVI/WMV	There are 4 options for exporting your project: To Podcast To Camera To QuickTime To iDVD M4V mov movie file	There are numerous export options, arranged into four types: Disc, File, Tape and Web, each with a corresponding icon located at the left portion of the screen. The Disc option allows users to export their movies and burned straight on a disc such as AVCHD, Blu Ray, HD DVD, DVD, SVCD and VCD. File is for saving the movie into file types such as AVI, Flash, MPEG 1, 2 and 4, RealVideo, Sony PSP, iPod and 3GP.	Web CD Blog iPod all SWF/FLV/M4V/AVI/WMV movie file
Windows Media Player file extension options	.asf, .asx, .avi, .wav, .wax, .wma, .wmv

I decided that I will use Movie Maker.  I have used Movie Maker in the past and found it to be fairly easy to maneuver around. Windows Movie Maker allows you to do things such as transitions, special effects, credits and titles, add audio to the movie, and more. You can also use Windows Movie maker for editing audio files.  Overall, Windows Movie maker is a good free software for editing and creating movies and videos, for publishing to DVD, YouTube, or wherever you choose. The following software is required to play back a movie:

• Microsoft Windows 98 or later or Windows NT® 4.0 or later
• Software that can play Windows Media Video (WMV) files, such as Microsoft Windows Media Player 7.0 or later

From my experience with Movie Maker, it is easy to input video, pictures and audio.  There are several problems though with Movie Maker.  I have experienced it “freezing” quite often.  The replay of the video also drags to make it difficult to know where to edit.  I also wish that I had the ability to edit the video audio as you can do in Pinnacle and iMovie.  I did learn that Movie Maker can save to a version that is compatible with many video sites such as YouTube and Teacher Tube. 

I have learned about other video editing software through this assignment.  I especially like Camtasia and I think I will have my students and teachers explore options to use Camtasia in an educational setting.  I have bookmarked many sites during my research of video editing software to refer to when I am working on a project

I viewed a YouTube how-to called “Movie Maker Video Editing Tutorial.”  I have been using Movie Maker for quite a few years, and I learned a couple of tricks from the video.

Week 2/EDLD 5363 Movie Maker Infomercial Podcast

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Script (based on an Infomercial format)

Tired of all those lost videos? Tired of taking time to edit  in those difficult to understand video editing programs, only to throw your hands up in frustration?                                                                                                                  Well my friend, those days are over. Windows Movie Maker is taking the video editing world by storm!  This is the day that your video editing troubles are over!  Movie Maker combines the benefit of many editing options with the ease of a user-friendly format.  Yes, Movie Maker is your answer!

Listen to all these unbelievable facts about Movie Maker.

First, it’s free.  You heard right – it’s free! It is so easy to use; you’ll have all your videos saved to a WMV format in less time than it takes to do a load of laundry!

Let me tell you how easy it is.  Download the free movie maker software from Microsoft.com.  Import video, pictures and music.  Arrange it as a one-of-a-kind video with all your personal touches.  Then, “viola” – your project is ready to convert to a movie!  You can save it to your computer, send to grandma, or save it to post to your family blog, YouTube or Facebook.

How easy is that?

With millions downloading movie maker, you can’t go wrong.  Again, here’s how to get your OWN version of Movie Maker.  Go to Microsoft.com and order yours today!

Week 1/EDLD 5363

Creating a script, story board and putting all it in video format is a wonderful way for technology leaders to stay abreast of emerging technologies.  I have in the past, and will continue in the future, incorporate multimedia learning into my curriculum. “Researchers have found that multimedia helps people learn more easily because it appeals more readily to diverse learning preferences (Shank, n.d.).”  This week has taught me about digital storytelling and how developing a style and method are important aspects.  I enjoyed the collaboration with Ann, she suggested changing some of my pictures to photos that I had taken myself. She also was having difficulty with audio and we discussed how Audacity and MovieMaker are sometimes better options than PhotoStory.  When teaching it though, there are specific ways to make it a more concise way of expression. I believe I will offer the students an option concerning the format of their digital story.

EDLD 5388 Project Charter

EDLD 5368 Instructional Design/Week 5

The benefit of educators designing and implementing online courses includes giving students 24/7 access to their education. The more educators that are capable of designing cohesive, effective and engaging online lessons opens the door for more learning in a 21^st Century environment. As Mark Prensky states, “Today’s teachers have to learn to communicate in the language and style of their students. This doesn’t mean changing the meaning of what is important, or of good thinking skills. But it does mean going faster, less step-by step, more in parallel, with more random access, among other things” (Prensky 2001) .  As well as learning that is engaging, teachers will need to learn how to develop, monitor and ensure that the online course meets all the expectations and standards set by federal, state, and district. I plan to use my course initially with teachers on my campus.  Before I dive into presenting it to the whole staff, I will first ask a couple of teachers to look through the course and offer suggestions.  Since this is the first course that I have designed online, I hope to verify that I have covered all necessary areas for a thorough and comprehensive introduction into Project Based Learning. I am also planning on presenting the material that I have collected as a class in a professional development that my district is offering in June.  Even though the class will not be online, I am able to use the knowledge that I have acquired through preparing this online course to present a well-thought out and developed lesson.  Now that I am aware of the ease of online course development and have “crossed that bridge”, I hope to put information online.  I can see using it with a topic as basic as how to use the teacher wiki, to a more in-depth lesson as in the one I created for this class, raising awareness about Project Based Learning and Essential Questioning.  I hope to even open this up to model for the teachers how to create an online lesson.  I could also create lessons on our school’s Broadcast room and a “Behind the Scenes” of our “KBZZ, The Buzz” video production.  I hope to share what I have learned with my principal and vice principal and all us brainstorm potential topics for online staff development.

 I thought this is a good illustration of all the aspects of all that online learning encompasses.                           


                                                                          

I would like to know more about what our district offers students regarding online courses.  Even though I do have a daughter in high school, I am neither informed nor knowledgeable about online courses offered.  I also need to delve into the online course management systems to better understand how the grading aspect works.   I am excited about the material presented and learned in this course.  I see online learning as an integral part of education in the 21^st century and hope to become an active participant in developing and designing more online learning opportunities.  In the immediate future, I hope to bring an awareness of online learning to the staff at my school.  I can see optional training sessions for those teachers interested in using online learning to supplement their grade level/subject area curriculum.   

Resources

Picciano, A, & Seaman, J. (2007). K–12 online learning: a survey of u.s. school district administrators. Retrieved on May 5, 2010, from http://www.sloanconsortium.org/sites/default/files/K-12_Online_Learning_1.pdf

Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, Marc Prensky © 2001 From On the Horizon (MCB University Press, Vol. 9 No. 5, October 2001) Retrieved on 5/1/10 from: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/

My Personal Leadership Vision

Schools should teach… the whole child.
A good school is one that…has a support group of staff, teachers and administrators who ensure that ALL students are involved, learning and that all physical, emotional and intellectual aspects of the child are being addressed.
An effective classroom is one in which…respect and voice is given in all actions and decisions and the teacher and students work as a “family.”
A good principal is one who…empowers the staff and teachers, and engages the students.
An effective school faculty is one that… has a professional respect for all and learns from each other.
A quality instructional program includes…high standards, engaging lessons and prepares the student for a 21st Century global world.


Personal Vision of Leadership:
I believe that all students are valuable, therefore are
 treated with respect, have their academic, personal and emotional needs addressed, and are given every opportunity to learn in an environment that ensures success and prepares them to contribute and succeed in a 21st Century global society.