Blog 6: Have I Found a New Pet?

What is up, everyone! Welcome back! I have been going through some school websites in my free time, you know, for nostalgia, and I decided to view my old high school's website and see any updates recently made. The school is a Grades 9-12 secondary school called Olympic Heights Community High School. Honestly, I don't remember what the website used to look like, but it looks good now! Browsing through, I found some interesting web page links, for example, a link to a web page providing the school calendar and detailing the block schedule for the entire year. Pretty helpful resource, if I may say so myself. Another web page link redirected me to a page encouraging students and parents to download the school district app. The app has many different helpful features, from providing parents and students with important times (class changes, lunch, start and end of day), to allowing parents and students to utilize the app as a way to ensure safety in the community. Which, fascinated me that they added this feature, because another web page link directed me to a page informing students that they must wear their ID Badges on campus. I assume this action by the school is a direct reaction to the horrible event that occurred at Stoneman Douglas High School a little over a year ago, being the fact that the schools are relatively close to each other. I will leave the link to the website below, as well as a screenshot.

Speaking of screenshotting, I used VoiceThread recently to complete an assignment and I think that is the magic tool to use in my future class. The website allowed to use screenshots I took while editing three random clips together on Premiere by Adobe. In retrospect, I wish I had been a bit less monotone on it, but I will keep that in mind for when I implement them. I think that I will use this tool for incoming students to the class each year so they can become more familiar with the software before I formally teach them. I will also have some VoiceThreads for some tips or skills I couldn't potentially cover in class. I just have to make sure I am more charismatic, and my screenshots and descriptions need to be more informational. Check out my last blog to hear about my experience!

Another experience I had that allowed me to see some of the cool technological items teachers could use in their classrooms to enhance the student's learning, growth, and development, was my tour to the FSU Tech Sandbox. Oh my gosh, talk about Disney for this generation's intelligentsia! The 3D Printer is always a pleasure to see, and the VR though the Oculus is an awesome experience (the scary game made me rethink some things, not going to lie). I also thought the "3D" pens were pretty cool, but I know they have more potential. I think the pens are still at a very early stage, however their function still boggles me. Now, let's get to the bread an butter of the Sandbox: the robots. Oh wow, the robots they had were cutest, most awesome things I have ever seen! They are little robots named Dot, Dash, and Cue, and their function is to teach kids at a young age basic coding skills, and the robots learn along with the student! Now, I know what you are thinking... well actually I think you have two thoughts: 1)"These things should become the new class pets!", or 2)"Umm... this is the plot to iRobot...", yes, you are right! But, they are so cute, and they will actually help the student understand computational thinking as well as create a relationship with an item they get to raise themselves. Now, don't worry, I have some pictures of the robots for you, I'll insert them, but do yourself a favor: try to contain yourself...

But, that's it for this week! Till next time!

-The Tank

Olympic Heights Community High School Home Page

ILP "Design" - Premiere Pro by Adobe

For my tool for my class, I decided to use Premiere Pro by Adobe as an editing software for videos that the students could create themselves. The explanation is basic and to the point, and the content is random royalty free for the sake of figuring out how to tell your own story with other people's free work. Below are the links to the voice thread and the final video:

Voice Thread to Premiere Pro Basic tutorial

Practice Video for Students

Blog 5: Is This My Last Blog?

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Blog by the Tank! I believe we're at the midpoint of the semester, which can be a positive or a negative statement depending on who you ask. In this midpoint week, some interesting topics have surfaced, one of them being this amazing, and newly discovered (by me, at least) online resource, Diigo. When used as an extension on Google Chrome, Diigo works magically when you desire to bookmark a web site you find worth returning to. Diigo will allow you to save an abundance of bookmarks, provide tags for them (so that other people can discover them while searching for them), and even let's you store them in a place where a specific group of people you want to share the bookmark with can utilize it without having to search it themselves! I there a better way to maximize social bookmarking? I don't know, but for now, this is best thing out there and I am not complaining. The only problem I have with Diigo, if any, is not really with Diigo, but with myself. Although a great resource, I don't know if I will be able to combat laziness one day when I am looking at a random source I'd like to return to on a different circumstance. But, I will try my hardest!

I can tell you what I will bookmark in Diigo next, though, and that's Blogger. Going back to that midpoint of the semester, that means I have been blogging for half of a semester... and it has been awesome. I have to say, blogging is fun in many ways, one being that these are my words and my opinions that I get to share with all of you. I can be myself, while also being respectful, and what I am providing for myself is an outlet to speak on things I probably wouldn't think about it in my personal time. From the first blog, I realized that the way to make the blogging experience in the class as enjoyable as possible is to make it as if I actually had a huge audience. That way, it feels like I am doing it for a reason, not a grade. And, honestly, it has made the experience much easier. Now... If I had to choose between doing blog assignments and not... that's a different story entirely, which maybe suited for a different blogpost. But, I will continue to post blogs, that's for sure.

I guess from that statement, one can guess that blogging may not be my favorite Web 2.0 tool, which is true. And, someone who has been reading my blogs could probably determine that, if I had to pick a favorite Web 2.0 tool, it would be somehow associated with media. Well, that's also correct. After looking at some Web 2.0 tools, I have decided that my favorite is definitely Vimeo. Over my years in college, I've fondly used Vimeo to submit video assignments and view online class lectures. I believe Vimeo to be a great tool to use in my future class because it may be used as a platform for students to submit their video projects once or twice a week (free subscription allows only one video submission a week). I don't see why I would do online lectures since the class should be very hands-on and I probably should supervise high schoolers with a camera. However, I could utilize Vimeo to make short "How To" videos on certain skills they may learn that week. I haven't thought much about that, yet, however, I believe that my students will learn three key things when using Vimeo: 1) Uploads are public to everyone, therefore be careful what you post, 2) deadline managing, and 3) how to create a brand/channel representing yourself/the group.

That's all for this week, guys! Here's a link to Vimeo I inserted  for better reference.

'Till next time, everyone!

-The Tank

Blog 4: Am I Too Old For Twitter?

Welcome, welcome, welcome. I hope everyone's midterms either went fantastic or will go be fantastic. So far, I can't complain. This week, there some interesting topics in the air, one them being the use of Twitter. When I first joined Twitter, I didn't understand how it worked. I preferred Instagram, I didn't have to read much. And then Snapchat came and you only could read a sentence, it was great! Well, after three years of not using Twitter, I gave it another chance and loved it as a "comic relief" part of my day. In the last year, it has changed much from a way to get a laugh in the day to a bit more political and related to local businesses. This change came after I started working at my current job when I began meeting different, more professional people than I'm used to interacting with. And, this experience has made me realize that Twitter can be used to further your career through networking and self-marketing. Upon this realization, I am very grateful to have the tools necessary to be able to use Twitter for career growth.

The problem is that some people may not necessarily have the same resources that others have. Therefore, it may be more difficult to accomplish things like networking successfully. And, it makes me think about if I was a teacher with a classroom of kids... How do I fight the digital divide? Digital divide causes a disadvantage to less fortunate students who do not have grand access to digital aspects of a class. I believe the wealth to be probably the most common reason as to why a student would be on the disadvantaged side of the digital divide, ultimately depriving them of some technologies that may be considered common to have today. This divide may affect the students with lesser access to certain technologies to be less adept to use them, which could be harmful later as new technologies are created and upgraded exponentially. So, how would I fight digital divide in my classroom? Well, I believe I've mentioned before that I would like to be a TV Production teacher if given the chance. However, this class needs a huge amount of technology involved. Well, the digital divide would be broken through the fact that the school would need to provide the equipment necessary for students to do the minimal work required to be successful in the class. That means a few computers, a few cameras, and editing software. I believe that if the school cannot provide this, it shouldn't have a TV Production class. The class would serve as the hub for all projects. Students may complete certain aspects of the projects at home or outside school, and with their own equipment, however they have the time and resources to get all of it done during class.

To be fair, equipment for my classroom could be expensive depending on the quality of the equipment and the budget of the school. And I know this, but I still believe that a school should be ready to provide those things for the educator if a TV Production class is desired in the curriculum. That being said, I am willing to provide the software for editing the videos. The main software that will be used will be Premier Pro from Adobe, specifically for video editing. Students will be able to learn basic and some advanced aspects of the software, allowing them to construct videos for a mass audience (students and staff). Students will also learn to use and apply Spotify. Spotify is the music app that they... no I'm kidding. After Effects is the software, however Spotify will be on as much as possible because I need music for most of my day. Anyway, After Effects is also an Adobe software that used for applying effects to Premiere projects, or even to make random effect that could serve as stock footage, slideshows, etc. The cool thing is that students will mainly learn skills pertaining to the editing aspect of telling a story, and then they will add their awesome Hollywood-ish effects to their stories! All of it is hands-on, which I believe is the best way to learn.

Until the very next time, everybody!

-Tank

Blog 3: Did I Mess Up My Newsletter?

Welcome back, everyone! Interesting things to talk about this week. ELA technology standards seems to be the topic of discussion among other things. I decided to use similar criteria as the presentation done in class and browsed through the 11th-12th Grade standards. In my search, I stumbled upon LAFS.1112.SL.2.5, which involves the use of digital media and related media to complete presentations. I believe I can excel at teaching this due to the fact that I have been editing and creating projects ever since I can remember. My strength in this standard comes from my frustrated experience with softwares that can complete these assignments, as well as the ability to find ways to make the project look relatable to its aspects. I, definitely, would not want to start of by teaching LAFS.1112.SL.1.2, because it pertains to finding different diverse forms of media in order to solve questions. The standard also includes the reviewing of the accuracy and credibility of the media, which I don't even know if I am great at on my own.

Now that I have established my comfort standard to be LAFS.1112.SL.2.5, I decided to research a good resource to help me implement it. Well, CPALMS was insanely helpful throughout that search and provided me with a Unit Lesson Plan called Seeking Social Justice through Satire: Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal".  This lesson plan is fantastic! It provides students the experience of analyzing satirical media, and then taking their research and implementing it into their own project (a mock newscast). My idea may not take the satirical route, however, I believe that related assignments to the project would be given out mainly to analyze the work of media that will be used as the prime example of what they are mocking. Once they understand how to create something similar, they will be provided tools in class to create it themselves. 

Speaking of creating things for class, does anybody else feel like their newsletter didn't get a "pass"? I am nervous. Not super nervous, but a little bit. I do think I learned some new skills, though. For example, when adding the banner to the top of the newsletter, I had absolutely no idea how to add the warthog head without the background. To be honest, I am still a little hazy on how to do it, but it's possible without Photoshop, I promise! And, I'll insert it so you guys can see what I am talking about. I have to say, I like my organization on my newsletter and I think I chose a decent color palette. I, definitely, did not like how the borders of my articles came out. The bottom of my "Math" article border is non-existent for some reason, so for my next newsletter, I will have to properly learn how to avoid that type of formatting. And, the good thing is, now I can send newsletters to my employees on what is going on with trucks! I am probably not going to do it, but its nice to know you can!

Till next time!

-The Tank