Blog Post #6: Multimedia Sharing Sites

Reflections on the Process of Learning About the Tool

I was first exposed to Voicethread at the Tech It Up! conference in Kamloops which was presented by SD 73 (Kamloops/Thompson) and TRU. Up until that day I had not heard of or used VoiceThread. Tracy Poezler, a recent graduate of U of A and Librarian at two schools in Kamloops, whom I mentioned in my last post on wikis, was the session speaker on VoiceThread. Tracy is a great presenter in the fact that she is very knowledgeable about Web 2.0 tools and library issues and the way in which she presents her information. She makes everything seem really easy because she breaks it down into "laymen" terms (for those of us just beginning our technological journey) and presents useful, relevant ways to implement Web 2.0 tools into our classroom or library program.

Tracy's presentation on VoiceThread was presented to us via her wiki that she has created dedicated to Web 2.0 tools and examples of how they can be used with students. Wonderful Web 2.0 Tools is an excellent resource for technology teachers and classroom teachers who want concrete ideas to incorporate some technology into their daily lessons. She started her presentation with some background information with regards to technology and its advances in the last five years. She is very passionate and excited about all these Web 2.0 tools that are really quite easy to use, and a lot of them for free, that all teachers can use in their classrooms. Her enthusiasm is quite contagious and I'll admit I left that session wanting to do a voicethread with both my daughter and son's class for Father's Day! She showed us several examples of how teachers have already been using voicethread in the classroom at the elementary and high school levels. Tracy worked with a primary class to create a voicethread for Father's day where she had each student draw a portrait of their father and then record (voice) what they loved about their dad's. What a wonderful, powerful way to show the students' love for their dad's and also to show the parents the quality, technological learning taking place at school.

As for Animoto, I had heard of it, but had never been to Animoto to create anything. I was pretty amazed exploring Joanne's trailfires on Animoto how professional the videos looked and how easy it seemed to create one. It was a lot of fun creating the "Daddy Cool" video for my husband using pictures of our kids, not to mention effortless. Then came the sharing, well . . . everyone in my family that I shared it with thought it was amazing. I got phone calls and emails instantly after sharing it, everyone in awe of my incredible technological abilities. I really didn't want to tell them how easy it was, but I did - gotta give credit where credit is due! They assumed I was responsible for the lay-out and transitions of the video, not realizing all I had to do was download some photos, add some music and other small details, and Animoto does the rest. Joyce Valenza had a good point on one of her blog posts regarding Animoto. She stated, "Some bloggers argue that Animoto doesn't inspire a lot of creativity or higher order thinking, partly because the program does so much of the creative work, the animation choices, the transitions. I argue, we have other tools for deeper thought and sophisticated movie making. Animoto is a magically-easy way to grab attention, produce professional-looking public relations products, archive an event, visually showcase our best, and create new visual contexts." As a student myself right now, it WAS refreshing to not use higher order thinking skills, and still create something fun and professional looking with relative ease. As my husband said though, even though it seems easy for you it's not easy for everybody. I just can't imagine someone signing up for Animoto and not being able to create a video - I guess that's not a reality though. I posted it to my Facebook profile and one of my friend's wondered when my husband was going to make a video of how great I am!

Reflecting on the process of learning about VoiceThread and Animoto, I have to say it seems to be the most fun I've had with Web 2.0 tools. I felt fairly confident throughout the process and if time had allowed, I would have created more! I get excited thinking about the projects I could do not only for family, but with students as well. The VoiceThread I created for this assignment was a great way to bring us all together, from different parts of B.C., and reflect on an emotional time in our lives. There is quite the emotional story behind why I chose that photo, too long to mention here, but that was the reason I chose it - an opportunity for us to share our thoughts on something really personal to us all. I think voicethread is an amazing resource and tool.

Discussion of the Tool in Terms of My Own Personal Learning

Creating the VoiceThread was definitely as easy as Tracy said it would be. Registering and downloading the photograph for the voicethread went quickly. It was also straightforward adding details and adding my picture for my comments. Recording my comment took a few trials as my microphone on our webcam was not working correctly. This problem, though, had nothing to do with VoiceThread itself - actually it offered a tutorial on how to look for and fix potential problems. After fiddling around with the Control Panel and then carrying out the most technical trouble-shooting strategy I know (re-booting my computer) the microphone began working again! I shared it with everyone in the photo, hoping they would take the time to record their own comments and so far everyone, except my kids and husband, have commented on the voicethread. I have sent it to my husband's school email address where he and our kids should be able to make their own comments. That was one question I had with voicethread - can someone make more than one comment on the picture? I could not figure out how to do that to allow my kids to make their own comments on my account. I initially posted the voicethread as a link, but then embedded it right in the blog. For some reason though, when I clicked on the play button, I did not get any sound. Therefore I ended up linking to VoiceThread again directly. So, although creating the VoiceThread was fairly straightforward, I was not without my usual technical difficulties trying to embed it.

Animoto was also a very user-friendly program to work with. Once again downloading my photos to create the video was simple and I really liked the fact they had several images of their own on the site one can use to add to their video. Throwing in a couple of drawings and theme related photos from Animoto made it seem more like a "real" video. Also, their varied music selections, including current pieces, enhanced the feeling of video. Animoto makes it simple to share the creation as well. Not only did I post it to my blog, but I shared it with family and friends via email and Facebook. The only problem I did run into was embedding the video as a size that would fit into the posting part of my blog. I did select the smallest embed code, but still found the right side of the video could not be viewed. So I put my inquiry out to the wonderful people of our eclass and got two responses from Pam and Annabelle - thank you! They both gave me similar advice, which was to change the dimensions in the HTML embed code, to make it smaller. And what do you know - it worked!

In the end my personal learning of these two tools was facilitated through Tracy's session on VoiceThread, exploring several voicethread and animoto examples through the Trailfires and my own searching, and just having fun playing around with the tools. I made personal connections with both mediums I created, with family and friends. I was successful in making people emotional and in awe of me at the same time - can't beat that!

Discussion of the Tool in Terms of Teaching and Learning

Joyce Valenza writes about Animoto in her blog saying, "I like this tool for any projects for which we'd formerly create a collage--the gathering of multiple pieces to create new context. Imagine a collage showcasing student work or art, gathering historical images and relevant music or soundtrack to introduce a time period, paintings and sound to introduce an artist or artistic movement." The options really do seem endless in what a teacher or teacher-librarian could create with their students. Valenza mentions using student artwork and historical images to produce an Animoto video, and what also comes to my mind are the Bill Nye The Science Guy short music videos embedded within the actual show. The music videos feature students singing about and presenting the information they are learning about in that particular Bill Nye episode. It wouldn't have to be limited to just science - students could make a short music video incorporating their knowledge from any subject area. This would a great way to make all subjects seem pretty cool and engage students in their learning.

I have to share a few sites created by a friend (Trevor Knowlton) of ours that my husband and I went to school with in Summerland, B.C., situated in the Okanagan Valley. When I first walked into the Tech It Up! conference that I have already mentioned, I ran into this guy attending the conference as well. I told him I was going to the VoiceThread session put on by Tracy and wrote down a website for me to check out BookNote.ca. I didn't realize at the time, because he didn't tell me, that this was something he had been working on. When I eventually got the time to check out the site, I realized that there were a few multimedia sharing tools that would be excellent resources to have and to share with everyone in our course. The BookNote for Schools page is for use in the classroom that, "Allows students and teachers to create online discussions about the books they are reading and recommend them to others. Books can be discussed within a class, school, school district or more." VoiceThread is used to comment on the books and there are some recommended for middle and high school students. It is free and safe, where students can submit their comments using an online "identity name" and teachers have the option of screening the comments before they are posted online.

OgoNet Inc., the name of my friend's business, has also created a few other "Classroom 2.0" tools that are free and easy to access for teachers and students. Virtual Guest is a live video stream that "Invites the world into the classroom." There is an example of a video stream with a Grade 12 class where they get the opportunity to discuss the book Slumdog Millionaire with the author Vikas Swarup. It's pretty amazing to watch, even though just a small portion is included in the video description of Virtual Guest. There a few quotes from some of the people involved, including the Vice Principal, who said, "Everything I know about education just changed." As well, from one of the grade 12 students, "That was so cool. It was the coolest experience of high school for me," and the teacher said, "It was the most amazing teaching moment I've ever had." Very powerful stuff.

Live Teacher is another multimedia sharing site available through OgoNet Inc., which they refer to as, "Real teachers, real learning." It is a, "Live Online Education Channel for students to get school assistance from certified, professional British Columbia teachers." Every Monday evening there is a videocast from a Math and Science teacher covering different areas of the curriculum. You can join them on Twitter and they will send updates for shows coming up and what topics they will be covering. Watching the introduction video reminded me a little of Bill Nye the Science Guy, as the teacher's knowledge and and humor was evident. There were also two other classroom 2.0 tools available on the page: Stop A Bully Program and Live Grad. The Stop A Bully program allows students to post concerns anonymously online if they feel they are being bullied, then the concerns are directly forwarded to the counsellor and principal of the school. The Live Grad tool offers people the opportunity to watch high school graduations if they were unable to make it in person. I was able to watch the part of grad from Summerland Secondary School last June 2009, where they hand out the bursaries and scholarships to students. This part of particular interest to me, as my Dad and I established a bursary in my Mom's name when she passed away.

I can envision implementing VoiceThread and Animoto quite successfully with students, using the wonderful ideas suggested by Tracy Poelzer on her VoiceThread wiki page, and also through the suggestions on my friend's BookNote site. VoiceThread and Animoto are two multimedia sharing sites that are user-friendly, grab your attention, fun to use kind of programs that even reluctant-to-use-technology teachers could incorporate into their classroom. I will definitely be sharing these tools with the staff at the elementary and high schools here in Chase.