For starters I lost my iPad. Yep, left it in a cab (I think) after an friend’s wedding festivities in Bermuda. I’m never gonna see it again. And with DE’s new app for their video library, I’ve become obsessed with finding a replacement. So in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’m feeling moved to share a bountiful [...]
We’ve all said terrible things about TV. Bruce Springsteen even wrote a song about his 57 channels with nothing on. But despite the subscription fees, the inevitable price hikes, occasional loss of service, and some mind numbing content, the real problem with TV is, well…, you need a TV. Until last week. If you want [...]
Sorry for having avoided blogging for a time. We’ve been slowly updating our blog engine and I didn’t want to tempt fate until all the pieces were working properly. I’m going to hope enough of them are in place to share this contest with you. Once again, I know it’s short notice, but even if [...]
It’s probably too late for you to formally join this project but you might find a lot of inspiration in it for your classes. The One Day on Earth project is a great way to raise your students’ global awareness. They even have a page of resources specifically tailored for education. What could students learns [...]
The 10 finalists for the coveted Discovery Education/3M America’s Top Young Scientist title have been named. They will gather this fall to see who will wear the crown and how the many prizes will be distributed. In the mean time you can see how creative they all were in their video applications. The focus this [...]
Most of you are just about ready to start school (if you haven’t already). And, as the days are obviously getting shorter, I bet all of you are reflecting (mourning?) as much on another quickly passed summer as you are planning for this school year. Though I’m “retired,” I’m no different. On Monday I’m off [...]
ISTE 2010.1 I always start the national conference telling myself I’ll do a blog a day on what and who I’ve seen. It’s already the closing day and I’m just getting around to it but this might be hard to top (if I ever coalesce my thinking on all that I’ve seen and heard on [...]
In this time of global connectedness and emphasis on not just digital citizenship, but responsible, global citizenship in general, Challenge Based Learning would seem to go hand in hand with challenge based living. And I can’t think of a better tool to express and share solutions to those challenges than digital storytelling. I believe it [...]
Here are a few things your students could get involved in to keep the energy up through the end of the school year. 11 days left for Jr. Hi students to enter the Discovery/3M Young Scientist Challenge. Our past winners have some solid advice for putting together an entry video (or any video for that [...]
I am not a photographer nor do I play one on TV (or DV). I do know how to tell people how to compose video shots for effective visual storytelling. But if it weren’t for my two younger sisters and some neighbors, I’d hardly have any pictures of my own kids when they were growing [...]
I got to kick off Discovery Education’s 4 week series of webinars for the NetGenEd Project yesterday. Hall Davidson and I will be taking turns every Wednesday in April talking about various aspects of student video making. My webinar on writing and good preparation through storyboarding is already archived on their site. I know it [...]
Sounds like the “Odd Couple,” doesn’t it? Well, I’m writing about Jay because he featured some student films done with Flip cameras the other night and one was done by a girl who graduated from a local high school here in the northwest burbs of Chicago. The students had to film and turn out a [...]
I almost missed mentioning this year’s Shortie Awards. The deadline for videos is April 9th. There are three age groups for 7 to 18 old year students and one K-12 teacher category. “The Shortie Awards focuses on nurturing imagination and choice making in students” according to their website and is a rich source of inspiration [...]
It’s been two weeks since I presented at our late winter Illinois edtech conference and I promised to post some updated tips on creating simple special effects with your students for their videos. Since I’m still trying to organize and condense my thoughts, I thought I’d offer up this very creative effect from elementary art [...]
“Editing is sometime called a story’s final re-write,” so says good buddy and fellow Wilkes instructor, Frank Guttler. He has some insightful thoughts and examples on what creative editing can do on his blog. “Mary Poppins” as a horror flick? Check out his most recent post over at “lights, camera, learn!“
I just found out that the annual AFI/Discovery Channel SilverDocs Documentary Festival is accepting 13-19 year olds’ work. The entry has to be in by April 1st, under 10 minutes and posted on YouTube. TeenDocs will show the top three entries at the festival this June at the AFI SilverDocs Theatre (right down the street [...]
Just where did all those words at the beginning of “Star Wars” movies go? Do they spend eternity scrolling through space? What if they eventually hit earth? Local area student and movie fan, Bill Parker, has his own answer to that and it has caught the eye of more than 500,000 YouTube viewers (HD + [...]
No, not the Julius Caesar kind. Nor that old Chicago rock band. I’m talking about how much time your students have to make a short video illustrating the meaning of one of the words on the ACT/SAT vocabulary list for the latest round of BrainyFlix fun. The best video will win $600 for their middle [...]
This is the 201st anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s birth and you’re probably celebrating it by anticipating Valentine’s Day with your students. Monday will be the official Presidents’ Day celebration with the usual day off or institute or something along those lines. “When I was a kid” in the middle of the last century, when there [...]
We probably all associate a favorite quote to people we listen to and read. For better or worse. “Well intentioned paperwork” is my favorite from Jason Ohler. He uses it to describe most of our “traditional” assignments and assessments. I bring this up because I am beginning to teach my 9th section of Digital Storytelling [...]
Nothing very sinister here. That’s just the deadline in the latest round of BrainyFlix vocabulary videos contest. Winners split the $600 Grand Prize with their school and anybody (up to the first 900) who submits 3 videos gets an iTunes gift card. This is a great way to visualize vocabulary in any language as [...]
What’s Your Issue Foundation‘s mission “is to provide a unique national platform for young adults to propose creative solutions to some of our nation’s most important challenges and for that voice to be heard, honored, and acted upon by leaders in government, the media, the private sector, and the nonprofit world.” They’ve just opened the [...]
The Great Minds Foundation is starting the year with its newest challenge to create a 2-5 minute video on something that “you’d like your peers to be more aware of (such as anti-smoking, anti-drugs, anti-violence, or random acts of kindness, etc.)” This is open to high school and college students. You have until June 1st, [...]
I have always felt that one of the recurring gifts of teaching was hearing from or about former students who were successful (I even taught and coached with a few). I got a bit of that feeling Sunday morning when I was thumbing through the USA Weekend insert in our Sunday paper and Spotted the [...]
In spite of suspicions of “coercion,” the latest winner in the BrainyFlix series of vocabulary competitions has been announced. Kind of reminds me of a B movie I saw once about a high school sub who is really ex-Green Beret or something and comes in to clean up discipline in the school. Keep checking in [...]
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