I was at a slam session at the high school and the teacher who presented it showed everyone Magisto. The school here has purchased a licence for all staff but I used a free version that allows a limited number of pictures. You can choose your theme and pictures and the video is created in a few minutes. Very easy to use with good results. Definitely worth showing teachers and students who don't want to use a proper video editing programme.
Monday 27 June 2016
Tuesday 21 June 2016
SAMR with Dr Ruben Puentedura
Apple recently brought Dr Ruben Puentedura to NZ to work with educators around his model for technological integration into teaching and learning - SAMR. I was fortunate to attend this professional learning day. Yes, it was an opportunity for Apple to showcase their products; namely their software for ipad and their new Classroom app which has many of the same features as Hapara Teacher Dashboard. However, it was wonderful to listen to Dr Ruben in the morning and do an activity with him in the afternoon. Other members of the Kootuitui and Manaiakalani community attended along with Maria and me. Notes from the day
Sparkshop
I went to a Sparkshop recently which was a day of some great google learning organised by the Google experts of Auckland. The day began with a slam session of the potential workshops that would be held. All potential presenters had added a slide to a slideshow and were given two mins to give their pitch. There was a google form that everyone used to rate whether they'd like to attend each potential session. After this, the organisers took 15 mins to sort through the voting results and then presented a board of the sessions that had received the most interest, separated into sessions and locations. We were able to pick three sessions and then all joined together at the end to share a slam of one min each for new ideas. I was keen to show everyone my new Google Space. I attended sessions on sites, forms and extensions/add-ons. It was a really worthwhile day.
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| The Sparkshop Participants |
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| The Workshops Most Highly Sought |
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| My Spaces |
Using a Greenscreen
It is possible to put yourself or others on top of an image or a video if you take the pictures of the people in front of a greenscreen. You remove the background by dragging the photo into software - I used Background Burner with the help of Dave Winter. This programme gives you versions of the edit to choose from and you can even remove more of the background yourself. Then you insert the final image (minus the background) into the slide. I added callouts to complete the task.
Saturday 18 June 2016
My Double Creation Project
This project has within it 2 creation stories. The major creation was how I developed ways to showcase the beautiful shells that can be found on NZ beaches. The secondary creation was the use of wevideo to document the shell creation story. I also uploaded my video to my Youtube channel so that I would have the finished creation if my free Wevideo access was taken away sometime in the future.
Thursday 16 June 2016
Two ways to put a blog into a google site
I have recently discovered two ways to put a blog into a google site: adding a click through link on the navigation and embedding it.
1. The first is quite simple. You just go into the site and click on 'edit site layout' then go to 'add url', copy the url there and give the button the title. From the home page, the button will be on the navigation bar and when clicked on will open the blog in its own window. I also added a Google+ community the same way.
2. The second is more complicated and allows you to read and comment on the blog from within the site. Create a new page, give it the title you want and place it where you want it to be in the navigation bar. Go to the page and click on 'insert', then go to 'add a gadget' then click on 'public'. Type 'embed blogger' into the search, find it and 'select'. Copy in the URL, change the width to 100% and the height to 900, click on 'add a scroll bar' and preview. If it's how you like it, save and then save page.
1. The first is quite simple. You just go into the site and click on 'edit site layout' then go to 'add url', copy the url there and give the button the title. From the home page, the button will be on the navigation bar and when clicked on will open the blog in its own window. I also added a Google+ community the same way.
2. The second is more complicated and allows you to read and comment on the blog from within the site. Create a new page, give it the title you want and place it where you want it to be in the navigation bar. Go to the page and click on 'insert', then go to 'add a gadget' then click on 'public'. Type 'embed blogger' into the search, find it and 'select'. Copy in the URL, change the width to 100% and the height to 900, click on 'add a scroll bar' and preview. If it's how you like it, save and then save page.
Putting Screencastify and screenshots into a blog
Screenshots are best taken and put onto the desktop. With a mac this is cmd+shift+4 to take the shot. Then insert the image by clicking on the image icon and going to upload files. Choose the desktop and select the screenshot. Wait for it to upload and then 'add selected' into the blog. Here is a screenshot of our Google+ site.
For screencastify, first of all record the screen cast, then download it to your desktop and select the file in downloads, chose it and upload into the blog. It may take some time to upload so just be patient.
Wednesday 15 June 2016
Manaiakalani Visitors' Day 15th June
The day began with individual student presentations from many of the Manaiakalani schools: these children each did a speech about a particular aspect of their learning, eg an inquiry topic and its process, supported by video, slideshows, and explanation.
After this, the Chef Executive of the Trust, Jenny Oxley, made a presentation. This began with the visit of the Hawaiian waka in 2015, which was a hugely important day for the cluster as the visitors spent time in Pt England school sharing the learning with students and teachers.
Next, the cluster was explained via key labels and themes, eg decile 1a, geographical location, 2500 children, 13 schools, kura kaupapa, Catholic, and a special school and the paramount importance of equity. Links to the cluster include twitter.com/clusternz and manaiakalani.org. Followed by the members of the team, the trust (to provide more resources than the schools had access to), and the many commercial and philanthropic partners.
The 3 main elements of the programme were then explained as:
1. Acceleration: children talking about their learning and using technology as a tool.
2. Whanau engagement: parents invest by paying for their children's device. The Trust makes this affordable via micro-financing.
3. Research: investigation of the effect of the programme on student achievement.
There are 5 Outreach clusters of about 40 schools throughout NZ, of which Kootuitui ki Papakura is one, being supported by the Manaiakalani vision, structure and pedagogy. There is also another group of schools that has taken onboard different versions of the programme.
Next came the goals of the programme followed by the background from the beginnings and the shift in student achievement. The opportunities for teachers were discussed in relation to the digital teacher academy, the innovative teacher programme, the professional learning groups, the toolkit sessions, the GEG groups, the annual GAFE Summit, the Google ClassOnair, the annual hui, f2f opportunities and the relationship with Auckland University. The Trust is thinking about establishing a housing trust which could benefit teachers as well as whanau.
Participants were told about the cybersmart curriculum, the use of Blogger as the platform for sharing learning, and shown the circular model which combines LCS and the principles- visibility, ubiquity, connectivity and empowerment. There was quite a lot of discussion around the principle of visibility for both teachers and students. Once a student goes digital, parents can be disadvantaged if they don't have access because the opportunity to view bookwork may have disappeared.
Dave Winter, Outreach Delivery Manager said, "Privatisation restricts the opportunity to improve. Visibility and Kawa of Care sessions also reestablish the relationship between parents and schools, as schools may have been unpleasant experiences for them in their childhood."
GAFE, Google sites, Google+ Communities and Hapara were discussed and how they operate together. Also, how the work may be referenced to SAMR and technology is implemented into teaching and learning. Everything in Manaiakalani has Creative Commons so can be copied and repurposed.
Next, it was time for school visits. I meet Fiona Grant, the Lead Facilitator, at Kura Kaupapa Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa o Puau. The children were working on their digital footprint and public/private. The resources are in their class folder and there was plenty of discussion.
Everyone met back together again for the afternoon session. We listened to 3 teachers about their digital 1:1 teaching-learning environment.
The first was a year 4 teacher from Pt England School, Room 11, where she'd been for 15 years through the journey. She was in her 6th year 1:1 with both ipads and chromebooks. The approach was to chose a student and follow their learning through the class site. The 'Teacher Notes' were on the site accessible to the teachers and management, not to the students. The student had watched the videos, done a writing task, resolved comments by the teacher, loaded the learning to his blog and by 9.30pm his parents had commented on his blog post. The average child posted about 1-2 times a week. The teacher put folders on her site which contain photos and pictures she has taken through the day.
The second teacher was a junior teacher in Room 19 at Pt England who used ipads with Explain Everything in her class. She started by working through the tools and then followed up with rewindable reading activities which took the whole lesson eliminating the need for a reading rotation. All activities had audio instruction so that the children didn't have to continuously come up to the teacher. Writing was still done in a book with a pencil, but
augmented with an ipad and stylus.
Lastly, we met a teacher from the high school who is a
participant in the Google ClassOn Air. She talked about applications with the SAMR model and that the ClassOn Air lessons are potentially to be used with training teachers while at training college. Discussions are continuing with Auckland University Teacher Education Department.
This was a very enjoyable and interesting day. It confirmed the journey that Kootuitui ki Papakura are on. I could understand the presentations, the class facilitation and the teacher presentations due to my learning over the last 6 months. Even though our cluster is much younger than Manaiakalani in its digital enablement journey, it is still a work in progress that we are all collectively on. Thanks Jenny, Dave, Fiona, student and teacher presenters.
After this, the Chef Executive of the Trust, Jenny Oxley, made a presentation. This began with the visit of the Hawaiian waka in 2015, which was a hugely important day for the cluster as the visitors spent time in Pt England school sharing the learning with students and teachers.
Next, the cluster was explained via key labels and themes, eg decile 1a, geographical location, 2500 children, 13 schools, kura kaupapa, Catholic, and a special school and the paramount importance of equity. Links to the cluster include twitter.com/clusternz and manaiakalani.org. Followed by the members of the team, the trust (to provide more resources than the schools had access to), and the many commercial and philanthropic partners.
1. Acceleration: children talking about their learning and using technology as a tool.
2. Whanau engagement: parents invest by paying for their children's device. The Trust makes this affordable via micro-financing.
3. Research: investigation of the effect of the programme on student achievement.
There are 5 Outreach clusters of about 40 schools throughout NZ, of which Kootuitui ki Papakura is one, being supported by the Manaiakalani vision, structure and pedagogy. There is also another group of schools that has taken onboard different versions of the programme.
Next came the goals of the programme followed by the background from the beginnings and the shift in student achievement. The opportunities for teachers were discussed in relation to the digital teacher academy, the innovative teacher programme, the professional learning groups, the toolkit sessions, the GEG groups, the annual GAFE Summit, the Google ClassOnair, the annual hui, f2f opportunities and the relationship with Auckland University. The Trust is thinking about establishing a housing trust which could benefit teachers as well as whanau.
Participants were told about the cybersmart curriculum, the use of Blogger as the platform for sharing learning, and shown the circular model which combines LCS and the principles- visibility, ubiquity, connectivity and empowerment. There was quite a lot of discussion around the principle of visibility for both teachers and students. Once a student goes digital, parents can be disadvantaged if they don't have access because the opportunity to view bookwork may have disappeared.
Dave Winter, Outreach Delivery Manager said, "Privatisation restricts the opportunity to improve. Visibility and Kawa of Care sessions also reestablish the relationship between parents and schools, as schools may have been unpleasant experiences for them in their childhood."
GAFE, Google sites, Google+ Communities and Hapara were discussed and how they operate together. Also, how the work may be referenced to SAMR and technology is implemented into teaching and learning. Everything in Manaiakalani has Creative Commons so can be copied and repurposed.
Next, it was time for school visits. I meet Fiona Grant, the Lead Facilitator, at Kura Kaupapa Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa o Puau. The children were working on their digital footprint and public/private. The resources are in their class folder and there was plenty of discussion.Everyone met back together again for the afternoon session. We listened to 3 teachers about their digital 1:1 teaching-learning environment.
The first was a year 4 teacher from Pt England School, Room 11, where she'd been for 15 years through the journey. She was in her 6th year 1:1 with both ipads and chromebooks. The approach was to chose a student and follow their learning through the class site. The 'Teacher Notes' were on the site accessible to the teachers and management, not to the students. The student had watched the videos, done a writing task, resolved comments by the teacher, loaded the learning to his blog and by 9.30pm his parents had commented on his blog post. The average child posted about 1-2 times a week. The teacher put folders on her site which contain photos and pictures she has taken through the day.
The second teacher was a junior teacher in Room 19 at Pt England who used ipads with Explain Everything in her class. She started by working through the tools and then followed up with rewindable reading activities which took the whole lesson eliminating the need for a reading rotation. All activities had audio instruction so that the children didn't have to continuously come up to the teacher. Writing was still done in a book with a pencil, but
augmented with an ipad and stylus.
Lastly, we met a teacher from the high school who is a
participant in the Google ClassOn Air. She talked about applications with the SAMR model and that the ClassOn Air lessons are potentially to be used with training teachers while at training college. Discussions are continuing with Auckland University Teacher Education Department.
This was a very enjoyable and interesting day. It confirmed the journey that Kootuitui ki Papakura are on. I could understand the presentations, the class facilitation and the teacher presentations due to my learning over the last 6 months. Even though our cluster is much younger than Manaiakalani in its digital enablement journey, it is still a work in progress that we are all collectively on. Thanks Jenny, Dave, Fiona, student and teacher presenters.
Wednesday 1 June 2016
Embedding a Slideshow into my Blog
This was quite straightforward. I made the slideshow from an event I attended a couple of weeks ago. Then, I accessed a 3 minute tutorial made by one of the Core Ed facilitators and followed his instructions to accomplish this task by using the file button and 'publish to web'. I know I am going to use this a lot with students in the future.
Publishing a Video from Drive on my Blog
This was a bit tricky. Firstly, I had taken this video when I attended an Apple educators session in Auckland last week. It is Dr Ruben Puentedura reviewing the SAMR model as applied by a group of educators to a unit on Matariki. I used my tablet to do the recording and found that although the sound is fine, the picture, especially of the screen, is not very good at all. Maybe to just record people, it would have been ok, but to record screens I would need a higher quality recording tool.
So, I have the video. Next, I followed a tutorial that has been shared by a Core Ed facilitator. Everything worked according to his instructions except that when I reviewed my blog with the video it stretched across my page outside the width of the blog section. The tutorial did not tell me how to fix this, so I googled my question and found another short tutorial which showed me how to go into the advanced section of the template and enter code to make the video narrower. I copied this code and updated and voila, my video is the correct size!
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