Multimedia Sharing Blog Post March 14, 2010


Reflections on the process of learning about the tool (3 points)
This week’s tools were very cool! I loved Animoto and really hope I am approved for an Educator’s account so I can make videos longer than 30 seconds. All of this week’s tools were very useful and easy to use. I am already using VideoThread and find it incredibly useful in my teaching at RDC for the daily podcasts I already do. Animoto is definitely going to be my Web 2.0 replacement for PhotoStory if I can get an Educator’s account. As far a mash-ups, the RIP Remix Manifesto is something everyone should see. I don’t personally remix music, but I’d like to learn how! I do mix music into my videocasts and my podcasts. I use Audacity for the mixing, I used to use MixPad when I had a PC. I don’t like GarageBand or iMovie. I think both of them are way to hard to use. They used to be way easier, but Apple has made them way too complicated to use now.




Discussion of the tool in terms of your personal learning (e.g. me as a learner, me as a parent, me as part of a social group) (3 points)
Me as a learner! Well my learning curve wasn’t steep again this week, but I have to reiterate that Animoto was a very nice surprise. Animoto is dead easy to use and the product you get is of superior quality. VoiceThread is great. I don’t really use the threading part or any of the other features right now, but the ability to upload and then embed is awesome. I found some of the placement of the buttons to be a pain to find and I had a hard time remembering where to click to do certain things. Maybe it’s just me?


Me as a parent! Both of these tools are tools I can see my kids using. Podcasting again isn’t something either of my kids do, but both have made PhotoStories before and I could easily see them using Animoto! I also see Animoto as a fairly safe place to go. Some Web 2.0 tools have lots of sketchy things posted that I don’t like.


Me as part of a social group! Well, this one is more difficult as I don’t really use these types of tools outside of my professional capacities. However, I have posted Animoto and PhotoStories to my Facebook page before. Both have worked seamlessly and were no hassle to integrate. Because of this, Animoto and VoiceThread are tools that I will continue to use.


Discussion of the tool in terms of your professional learning (e.g. me as a teacher, me as a school leader, me as a teacher-librarian, me as a member of professional learning communities/networks). This takes into account technology integration, use in schools, pros and cons, etc. (3 points)
Well, there was a steep learning curve for either of these tools, but both certainly had me thinking about the possibilities. As soon as I used Animoto, I could see a myriad of possibilities for myself. I could see using Animoto for the creation of videos for my EDIT class and for my personal life like I already do with PhotoStory. But I really like the ability to embed the video code into any website or blog I want. You can’t do this with PhotoStory. As far as my students go, I could see uses for the creation of digital stories and yearbooks in their classes at RDC or when they get into the K-12 system. For my colleagues, I see many of the same uses as I do for myself and my students. I could see my colleagues using Animoto in their own classes, specifically for use in the development of the portfolios we ask students to create.


I have to also add a confession. I use podcasts and now VoiceThread in an effort to increase my students’ chances of success. I attended a lecture once where the guest speaker showed research that students test scores and grades increased by 15% with the use of videocasts or vlogs and podcasts. So, why wouldn’t I use this easy to use tool (VoiceThread) if I could give my students a bit of an advantage. I use Viddler for some of the screencasting I do.


Here is an example of a screencast I did.





I can’t really see any cons for VoiceThread and Animoto other than cost. VoiceThread is reasonable at $60 a year, but Animoto is ridiculous at $250 a year. The pros are that they are both free at the basic levels. These as with any Web 2.0 tools that are free, are a fantastic thing to explore based on cost alone for schools and teachers. A couple other pros with these and other Web 2.0 tools is that there isn’t any software to install on school computers and there aren’t any storage issues either. Everything is done on the respective servers of the tool. The last pro I see is that they are so easy to use. We all know that any tool that requires lots of time to learn and/or is hard to figure out isn’t going to get used by a teacher. The folks out in the classrooms don’t have time for complicated pieces of software. That’s why Animoto, VoiceThread and most of the other tools we’ve discussed are great for any classroom.




Evidence of Research and Further Reading (3 points)
I found this week’s textbook readings less than helpful and insightful for the topic. However, I really did like and find helpful the following resources.


The VoiceThread Ning (http://voicethread.ning.com/).


Here is a great look at how VoiceThread is being used as a digital story book! (http://voicethread.com/?#q.b347728.i1843125)





Here is a great article I read and have included in my personal library on Web 2.0 tools from Educause that explains the importance and significance of VoiceThread. This is worth the read.

http://www.educause.edu/ELI/7ThingsYouShouldKnowAboutVoice/173329

and the pdf version…

http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7050.pdf

Excerpt from the Educause pdf. [Educause. (2010). 7 things you should know about
VoiceThread. Retrieved from http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7050.pdf]





Demonstration of new knowledge (3 points)
Animoto



VoiceThread (Please don’t listen to more than about 30 seconds of this!)

I’d like to end with a quote from Josh Cantone’s blog entitled Read, Write, Web. Josh blogs about Animoto and the title of his blog is “Animoto: Video Kills the Slideshow?”. Not only does he have any interesting message, he has stated the template for every Web 2.0 tool. Here are a ten examples.

1. VoiceThread: Podcasts kills the in person lecture.

2. Flickr, Picasa and PhotoBucket kill the photo album.

3. Google Docs and Zoho kill Microsoft Office!

4. Bubbl and DabbleBoard kill Inspiration.

5. Facebook and Twitter kill Canada Post (well kind of!)

6. Mixbook kills the photo album and yearbook.

7. Viddler, Blip, YouTube and Vimeo kill T.V.

8. Blogs kill newspapers and magazines.

9. Wikis and especially Wikipedia kills the paper-based encyclopedia.

10. Last FM kills radio.

Respectfully,

Brad