New Jersey

You’ve already seen Planet Earth,  now you can see Disneynature’s spectacular follow-up   presentation, Earth, in an over-sized digital format in the JD Williams Science Theater at the Liberty Science Center. The film follows animal families — elephants, polar bears and humpback whales — as they move in search of food, raise their young and encounter other creatures from orcas to lions. Narrated by James Earl Jones, the film offers a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of nature, and the need to preserve its wonders.

Call 201.253.1302 to reserve your tickets now.
Watch the trailer for earth.

I just can’t say it enough, so I’ll say it again now- EVERYONE learns through stories. That’s why digital storytelling is such a powerful learning/teaching tool! With that in mind, I found out today about an exciting new way that digital storytelling is being used in education.

I received a message this morning from a classroom 2.0 colleague:

I was wondering if you, your educator contacts or students would be interested in participating in a nationwide Vocab Video Contest @ MIT university. We’d really like to get more students involved from NJ! You can view contest details at BrainyFlix.com. Thanks!

So I checked out the contest details & it looks like a really fun and DO-ABLE digital storytelling project.  Here are the basic contest rules:

• Make a video about any SAT/ACT vocabulary word of your choosing from this list. On that list, they show you how many videos have been submitted for each word. You are encouraged to choose one without any videos submissions.

• 1 video for 1 word, but you can make as many videos as you want.

• Anyone can enter the competition! Just remember that part of the prize money has to go to a U.S. high school or middle school of your choosing.

• All voting will happen at BrainyFlix.com, so make sure your video includes the following text: “Vote for this video at www.BrainyFlix.com/xxxxx”. And substitute the “xxxxx” with your vocab word.

• Important contest dates:
  • Video submission opens: 1/1/2009
  • Video submission ends: 3/16/2009
  • Voting opens: 3/23/2009
  • Voting ends: 4/5/2009
  • Winners announced: 4/13/2009

The Word List is rich and organized alphabetically ( I had a hard time remembering what some of the words mean :))  Here’s an example video that the contest coordinators, a group of MIT alumni, created:

 

If SAT vocabulary prep is part of your curriculum, I strongly encourage you to give thsi contest a shot eith your students.  Let’s do our part to get NJ well-represented!  Good Luck & remember to share your videos with us

Sorry about the title of this post, but I’ve always been a sucker for a good pun

I decided to forgo sending out my usual Holiday Card this year, and instead, created a “Year in Review” music video of my son, Connor (6).  I used an AWESOME web 2.0 tool called Animoto.

Animoto is an online digital storytelling tool that’s been taking the world by storm.  Basically, you give them your photos & they give you a music video.  Anyone can register for a standard, FREE account, which gives you the ability to make an unlimited amount of videos, each up to 30 seconds long.  But, as an educator, you can sign up for an all-access account, which allows you unlimited video length for you and all of your students!  Take just minutes to create a video. Bring your lessons to life. Post/embed videos elsewhere or download them for in-class presentations!  The possibilities are endless…

As usual, your fellow DEN educators are at the forefront of using this Web 2.0 Digital Storytelling tool for educational purposes.  In fact, DEN educators are the REASON Animoto for Education even exists!  I’m not kidding, Really!

I could go on and on with examples of how Animoto can help you help your students gain valuable 21st Century Skills, but since a picture tells a thousand words, a video must tell at least ten thousand, right?

Animoto is such an easy tool to use, I’m not even going to bother walking you through the steps. I promise, you will have more fun learning how to use it on your own (it is SOOOO easy!). For more information on how to get Animoto for Education accounts for you and your students, Click Here. Enjoy,  and don’t forget to share you projects with the rest of us Happy Storytelling and Happy New Year to You & Your Loved Ones!

Picnik is a free, online tool that makes photo-editing fun and easy.  Picnik began its life with one purpose: To bring photo editing awesomeness to everyone!

Picnik is the default editor on Flickr and also integrates seamlessly with a variety of websites including Facebook, MySpace, Picasa Web Albums, Photobucket, Webshots, Lexmark and Box.net. In December, 2007, Picnik won the Macworld Editors’ Choice Award in the Web category.

Picnik is very user friendly, quick & clean, and you don’t even need to register to use the free, basic editing tools.  They do offer a premium version of their editing tool that will give you more advanced features for around $25 a year and they are adding new features at a rate of about one/month.

To get started, you just have to click the “Get started” button, then you’re off to the races!

1. Go to Picnik.com & click “Get started”

2. Click on the Library Tab

3. Choose where you want to upload your photo from- the possibilities are virtually endless!  I am choosing Picasa for this demo.  Picnik will now access my Picasa account so I can view all of my Picasa pictures and before you can say “Picnik Rules!”, I’m able to edit any of the pictures I have stored on my Picasa account.  Here’s my Holiday card from last year:

and here’s a picture I made after my son’s 1st swim meet this past summer:

 

After you create you edited picture you can save it to your computer AND to the photo site of your choice.  So now, I have the original swimming picture AND the edited version on my Picasa account.  Disclaimer:  My son, Connor, didn’t want me to use the swimming picture because he said there’s no way he could ever be as good at swimming as Michael Phelps is..I twisted his arm to let me use it anyway

I cannot express how easy Picnik is to use.  If you try it once, I promise you’ll be hooked AND you’ll find one-thousand and one ways to use it with your students.

Together We Have Earth-Saving Powers is a contest that Liberty Science Center and ParentGuide have created to make every child an eco superhero! Children ages 12 and under can submit drawings, paintings or photographs showing their “Earth-Saving Powers” such as recycling, taking mass transit and reminding friends and family to use canvas shopping bags. First prize is a class field trip to Liberty Science Center for up to 40 people. Second prize is a Super-Powers party at the Center. Every child receives a prize for entering – a free visit to Liberty Science Center! Entries must be received by December 19, 2008.

Find out about more details and entry rules

Kevin Jarrett turned me on to this video that David Warlick recently used at the NJElite Conference in Wildwood, NJ. You might recognize some of the speakers, including Daniel Pink, a former EdTechConnect webinar guest speaker.

Basic message: We need to stop “teaching” our students with tools of the past. We EXPECT the latest and best technologies to be used to manufacture the products in our lives (our cars, clothes, etc.), so why don’t we demand they be used in education as well?  What old habits are we willing to let go of?  What are we willing to change so that our students (and we) can truly learn?

Do you have a favorite education video? After watching this one, leave a comment with a link to a video you think people should see. I’ll compile them in a future post.

Recently, I took a look back at my notes from Dan Pink’s A Whole New Mind & instantly honed in on his thoughts about Storytelling: “The Conceptual Age can remind us what has always been true but rarely been acted upon- we must listen to each other’s stories and that we are each the authors of our own lives.”

With so much attention being given lately to the Digital Story (and rightfully so), I thought it fitting to pay homage to the Father, or Mother if you prefer of the Digital Story- The written Short Story.

One Story is a non-profit literary magazine that features one great short story mailed to subscribers every three weeks. Their mission is to save the short story by publishing in a friendly format that allows readers to experience each story as a stand-alone work of art and a simple form of entertainment. As an interesting twist, they only publish a writer ONE TIME. This prevents them from relying on a stable of writers and helps them find new and exciting voices. Between September and June, all writers can submit their work.

I just ordered an 18 issue subscription for my mother-in-law for her birthday (I hope she likes it!) - I’m looking forward to reading her back issues.