WIDGET:

widget is anything that can be embedded within a page of HTML, i.e. a web page. A widget adds some content to that page that is not static. Generally widgets are originated by third parties, though they can be home made. Embeddable chunks of code have existed since the early development of the World Wide Web. Web developers have long sought and used third party code chunks in their pages. Early web widgets provided functions such as link counters and advertising banners. Widgets may be looked upon as downloadable applications which look and act like traditional apps but are implemented using web technologies including JavaScript, HTML and CSS. Widgets use and depend on web APIs exposed either by the browser or by a widget engine such as Widsets, Akami, WebWag or Plusmo.

DEFINITION OF SLIDECAST:

A slidecast is a term that is used to describe an audio podcast that is combined with a slideshow or diaporama presentation. It is similar to a video podcast in that it combines dynamically-generated imagery with audio synchronization, but it is different in that it uses presentation software, such as PowerPoint, to create the imagery and the sequence of display separately from the time of the audio podcast’s original recording.

Slidecasting may be useful for the display of relevant photographs or text, and are an alternative to camera video recordings.

An alternative definition of the slidecast is the online distribution and syndication of video recordings of live slideshow presentations and accompanying narrations.

Definition WebCast:

• web+broadcast=webcast
• A webcast is a media file distributed over the Internet using streaming media technology. A webcast may either be distributed live or on demand. Essentially, webcasting is “broadcasting” over the Internet.
• The generally accepted use of the term webcast is the “transmission of linear audio or video content over the Internet”.
• A webcast uses streaming media technology to take a single content source and distribute it to many simultaneous listeners/viewers.

Definition of Podcast:

• iPod + broadcast = Podcast

• audio file stored on the internet and downloadable by subscription

Benefits of Podcasts:

• anytime, anyplace

• automatically downloadable

• burnable to CD

• control over speed

• internet not required once downloaded

• portable

Activities for L2 Podcasts:

• drawing / diagramming

• gap-fill

• multiple-choice

• notetaking

• summarizing

• true / false

Requirements for Podcasts:

• internet-access

• audio card on computer

• podcatcher

• speakers or headset

What is RSS?

RSS FEED

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication”. It is a way to easily distribute a list of headlines, update notices, and sometimes content to a wide number of people. It is used by computer programs that organize those headlines and notices for easy reading.

Most people are interested in many websites whose content changes on an unpredictable schedule. Examples of such websites are news sites, community and religious organization information pages, product information pages, medical websites, and weblogs. Repeatedly checking each website to see if there is any new content can be very tedious.

Email notification of changes was an early solution to this problem. Unfortunately, when you receive email notifications from multiple websites they are usually disorganized and can get overwhelming, and are often mistaken for spam.

RSS is a better way to be notified of new and changed content. Notifications of changes to multiple websites are handled easily, and the results are presented to you well organized and distinct from email.

RSS works by having the website author maintain a list of notifications on their website in a standard way. This list of notifications is called an “RSS Feed“. People who are interested in finding out the latest headlines or changes can check this list. Special computer programs called “RSS aggregators” have been developed that automatically access the RSS feeds of websites you care about on your behalf and organize the results for you. (RSS feeds and aggregators are also sometimes called “RSS Channels” and “RSS Readers“.)

Producing an RSS feed is very simple and hundreds of thousands of websites now provide this feature, including major news organizations like the New York Times, the BBC, and Reuters, as well as many weblogs.

So you’re doing a presentation and you think that it’d be useful to make the content available afterwards. Well you can put the slides online. Job done. But does that give attendees at the presentation enough? What about people who come upon it in the future?

Well we’ve got technology available now that allows us to record more. (In fact we’ve had that capability for a long time; pre-digital and pre-web, it was just harder to do for most people.) But now it’s easy to do. Surely having your dialogue will make the content of that presentation a whole lot more useful, immediately and into the future. Therefore when you get up to speak record it with some kind of digital recorder; be that an mp3 player with a mic, a phone, an ipod, whatever gives a decent quality recording. Now you can tie the two together. The easiest way is at Slideshare. There you can host your slides and add your mp3 file (with position markers) to re-marry the slides with the audio commentary.

But we can go further. Set up a video camcorder somewhere nearby or have a colleague in the audience with one. By the end you’ve got a video record of the presentation. Now you can put that up on a video hosting site, YouTube being the best known, but there are others which might suit your needs better. That’s okay as it goes, but what about the slides. We’ll there are free online facilities that enable you to put the video and slides together, a good example being VCASMO.

Your video plays alongside your slides, which is rather useful for a demonstration.

Of course, there are other presentation alternatives, some of which I’ve previously written about here. And another one I need to do some work on being Prezi.

Olá pessoal!

Finalmente fiz um slidecast :p
Não tá perfeito porque eu estava treinando para uma palestra, mas ta ae:

The concept of a webinar, or web conference, is not foreign for most academics and practitioners these days.  In the early childhood realm it seems like the frequency and range of these online presentations is constantly increasing.  But considering travel and professional development budgets have been in free-fall it is not too hard to figure out why.  Webinars offer presenters the chance to reach audiences that they might not be able to reach and eliminate the need for travel.

The two biggest names in web conferencing are webex and gotomeeting.  These services can essentially mimic certain elements of traditional presentations and meetings including the ability to share documents and powerpoint slides while allowing the attendees to see the presenter and ask questions.  Their downfall is the price.

In comparison to the total overall cost of travel and meeting spaces for the presenter and attendees a service like webex doesn’t seem so bad.  In reality, this expense starts to add up quickly, especially if you present often.   Luckily, with a little “outside the box” thinking this cost can be brought down considerably.

The Not-so-live Presentation

Have you ever attended a webinar only to hear a speaker, or speakers, talk for an hour then not allow any significant time for questions?  These are the times that webinars make very little sense.  What is the point of using an interactive format when there is no planned interaction?  You are basically paying expensive webinar fees to provide a presentation to a limited audience (only those invited to attend) during a limited time period (scheduled time window).

The first consideration you should make is whether or not live interaction is imperative.  There are a range of sites that will host recorded presentations free of charge.  Most often you are also given the opportunity to allow viewer comments, essentially changing the format of interaction, while opening up to a wider audience.  Here are a couple of examples.

Slidecast

A slidecast is basically a power point presentation with audio.  All you need is a power point presentation and an mp3 voice recording.  Slideshare allows you to synchronize the two and then will host the resulting presentation slidecast for free.  (Slideshare is also a good place to post your traditional powerpoint presentations for sharing with colleagues since ppts often easily clog email inboxes).

Video

Another option is to simply record your presentation using a video camera then post it online.  Then you can send the link to potential viewers or embed the video on your website.  There are a number of free online video hosting options, the most popular of which being youtube.  Keep in mind that free sites do have some limitations, youtube for example caps out at 10 minutes and 2 gigs.  One similar site, vimeo, allows uploaded videos of any length but has a more restrictive size limitation of 500 mb.  An example of this model can be seen at TED.com.

The Cheaper Live Presentation

Ok, there are definitely times when live interaction is important but that doesn’t have to mean breaking the bank.  Here are a couple of options

Free Webcast Services

Believe it or not there are free webinar services out there but as always there is usually some kind of catch.  Most often a service is offered for free but only up to a certain number of users.  DimDim, an open-source web conference service offers free web conferencing for up to 20 users.  This service is fully functional and allows you to record the meeting.  All you need is a webcam and a microphone and you’re ready to go.

Streaming

Video streaming is like live broadcasting and presents the perfect opportunity to provide a live presentation for a much less expensive price tag.  Ustream.tv allows you to broadcast for free and even record your presentation.  Unlike a traditional webcast a streaming broadcast is not as focused on interaction but does allow some back and forth through the use of live chat.

These are only a few of the ways the internet is increasing the capacity for inexpensive presentations.  There are many more services today than there was 5 years ago and as time moves forward I am sure this trend will continue.

What’s a wiki anyway? Watch this introductory video to find out, and read the overview provided by NWP, Digital Toolbox: Wikis.

Why use a wiki?

This is the question. The answer depends entirely on your needs. Wikis can be public or private collaborative spaces between administrators, teachers, parents, students, or some combination thereof. They can also serve as websites with only certain areas open for collaborative editing. Our own wiki fits into this last category, where members are allowed to edit the Summer Institute pages, but not other restricted areas of the site.

One Idea for Classroom Use

Despite being a great place for authentic, real-world research, Project Citizen could also serve as a great way to venture into collaborative research projects through the use of wikis. My good friend, Terra Mahre, has completed this project with her seventh-graders for several years with outstanding results. Group wikis, linked to a teacher moderated classroom wiki, could work to manage this kind of collaborative research project.

Wiki platforms to consider for education

• Wetpaint: Easy to navigate, organize and manage, Wetpaint offers ad-free wikispace to qualifying educators. With the option to keep your wiki private, this is a good platform for classrooms with students 13 and up (Wetpaint restricts users under 13 because of COPPA). The editing history on Wetpaint sites is a little less searchable than other platforms, but for more advanced users, this platform offers more baubles, whistles, and knobs, as well as organizational drop down menus that can prevent clutter on the navigation toolbar.
• PBworks: Previously called PBwiki (as in, as easy as peanut butter and jelly) PBworks is the new and revised version of their free, teacher moderated wikispace. I prefer this platform for first time users, because of it’s clearly recorded history and simple design.
• Wikispaces: Like almost all wiki platforms, this one provides free classroom spaces, and a simple, easy-to navigate workspace. Personally, this is my least favorite of the three that I’ve listed here. I find that there are too many editing tools available, when a few simple ones would do. I know there are plenty of educators that would disagree, so explore each and decide for yourself.

A few places to find examples of classroom wikis

• EduWikis: A great overview of educational wikis, along with classroom examples.
• Teach2.0-What about Wikis: An evolving list of resources, including classroom examples (scroll to the bottom) and a SWOT analysis.
• Wetpaint Wikis in the Classroom: Browse the list of classroom wikis to get ideas for your own.

A Sample of Ancillary Programs:

What follows is a sampling of programs I’ve found useful in both my personal and professional life. While the county in which I currently work is still, shall we say, in the process of reviewing several of these resources for classroom use, many schools are already using them with their students and leading the way for the rest of us. You can either browse the recommended tools below, or search the Top 100 Tools for Learning 2009.

VoiceThread

Used along or in combination with a blog or wiki, VoiceThread allows users to post images, video, and comments (text or voice) to what are essentially interactive slideshow presentations. Although VoiceThread is relatively new, educators around the world (including our own Jennifer Dail) have snapped up some space for their own students. In addition to Jen’s expertise, there are some good online resources to consider when considering VoiceThread for your classroom. If you have sound on your computer, you can watch the VoiceThread introduction.  There are lots of great tutorials on the site that will lead you through the basic in’s and out’s of the software. Voicethread4Education is a good place to start if looking for classroom examples.

SlideShare

Within my own county, SlideShare is blocked (at least as of Jan. 2009), but for the rest of you (and for those who don’t mind doing a little online work from home) SlideShare is the best new way to share slideshow presentations. You can embed slideshows right into your wiki, webpage, or blog without overwhelming your puny email inbox. And, with the option of adding narration and creating a SlideCast, your presentations can become multi-modal.

Gabcast

Record your voice from anywhere using a phone. Simple to set up, easy to manage, I’ve used this with my own classes to allows students to record narration for final drafts, piece together audio for digital projects, and record my own spur of the moment thoughts driving home. For classroom use, consider setting up separate channels, trying it out yourself, and then printing and passing out directions for a test run. Eventually, you may find that students can manage their own channels, or sign up themselves. You can also set up automatic posting to your blog, which could feed into your wiki for audio updates from the teacher. This biggest downside to this service is the inability to moderate comments as they come in. I haven’t found this to be a problem for my own classes, since I manage the channels myself, but be cautious in asking students (especially younger, less mature students) on how to manage their own channels if they sign up themselves.

Flickr

Flickr is an online photo sharing community that often works well in combination with wikis or blogs. On most platforms, you can embed flickr feeds, either from individuals or collaborative photo sharing groups. Many images are also geotagged, which could be a good way for inquiry driven research projects. I often use this site to search for images licensed by the Creative Commons to use in presentations and digital projects.

Wordle.net

Aside from just being pretty cool, Wordle can be used to preview a text, guide students in revision, and create cover art for final drafts. Simply copy and paste any brief passage (or heck, paste the whole student paper into it if you want) and see what emerges. Words that appear more often in the passage will be larger, while less frequent words are smaller. This can help students to see emerging themes in their work, identify areas for word variation, or provide a springboard to discussion where students predict what the text will be about.

Glogster.edu

Build interactive, digital multi-media posters that you can embed and share through your website, blog, or wiki. This is a great way to have students create interactive book reports, collect and share research, and present creative writing in a new way. While my own county has blocked this resource, many classrooms are making good use of this free, online tool. For more information, browse Glogster.edu or do an internet search for Glogster + education.

More options: Teach Web 2.0

The list of options continues to expand, almost daily. When you get to a place where you’re reader to explore some of the hundreds of other options being used in classrooms out there, check out TechWeb2.0. Better yet, join their wiki and add your own expertise to the  collaborative space!

חפשנו יחד עם דניאל פתרון להעלאת מצגת מלוות בקול. הגעתי אז למסקנה שתוכנות לכידת מסך שיש בהם אופציה להקלטת קול – זה הכי נוח. יש כמה כאלה וכתבתי עליהם: Jing, screencast-o-matic. מסתבר, אבל, שאפשר להוסיף קול ישר למצגת ב  Slideshare.

הם קוראים לזה slidecast – שילוב של slideshare and podcast.

להלן מצגת מלוות בקול עם הסבר הכנסה ועריכה של קובץ mp3.

On Wednesday, April 29, Mrs. Nayman’s 1st period 11th American Literature/Composition students shared poems inspired by personal photographs @ The Unquiet Library!  You can enjoy the slidecast below to see their photos and hear each student read his/her poem.  Simply click the green button, and the slides will automatically play and advance themselves.

It took me awhile to get the hang of syncing the mp3 audio to each slide, but after some trial and error, I think I have it.  I hope to improve my syncing skills as I work on the next two poetry podcasts/slidecasts for 2nd and 7th periods.

I am also making class books of each set of poems for the poetry reading—one set for the library, and one set for Mrs. Nayman’s classroom; many thanks to Mrs. Joy Mabry of the Cherokee County School District Teacher Center for her help with this endeavor!    The photos from the day are also housed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/8166472@N03/sets/72157617481444372/ .  We also have the student poems hanging from our poetry clothesline.

For help on creating the Slidecasts, try these resources:

and

Buffy Hamilton, Media Specialist
Creekview High School

http://theunquietlibrary.wordpress.com

On Wednesday, April 29, Mrs. Nayman’s 2nd  period 11th American Literature/Composition students shared poems inspired by personal photographs @ The Unquiet Library!  You can enjoy the slidecast below to see their photos and hear each student read his/her poem.  Simply click the green button, and the slides will automatically play and advance themselves.

On Wednesday, April 29, Mrs. Nayman’s 7th period 11th American Literature/Composition students shared poems inspired by personal photographs @ The Unquiet Library!  You can enjoy the slidecast below to see their photos and hear each student read his/her poem.  Simply click the green button, and the slides will automatically play and advance themselves.

On Wednesday, April 29, Mrs. Nayman’s 1st period 11th American Literature/Composition students shared poems inspired by personal photographs @ The Unquiet Library!  You can enjoy the slidecast below to see their photos and hear each student read his/her poem.  Simply click the green button, and the slides will automatically play and advance themselves.

It took me awhile to get the hang of syncing the mp3 audio to each slide, but after some trial and error, I think I have it.  I hope to improve my syncing skills as I work on the next two poetry podcasts/slidecasts for 2nd and 7th periods.

I am also making class books of each set of poems for the poetry reading—one set for the library, and one set for Mrs. Nayman’s classroom; many thanks to Mrs. Joy Mabry of the Cherokee County School District Teacher Center for her help with this endeavor!    The photos from the day are also housed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/8166472@N03/sets/72157617481444372/ .  We also have the student poems hanging from our poetry clothesline.

For help on creating the Slidecasts, try these resources:

and

On Wednesday, April 29, Mrs. Nayman’s 1st period 11th American Literature/Composition students shared poems inspired by personal photographs @ The Unquiet Library!  You can enjoy the slidecast below to see their photos and hear each student read his/her poem.  Simply click the green button, and the slides will automatically play and advance themselves.

For many educators, the use of multi-media is a regular function in the classroom.

I went to an excellent workshop hosted by Carolyn Guertin from the eCreative Lab @ UTA about Moving Teaching Online: Screencasting.  This is one of many in their digital workshop series they offer.  It was  a great (free) workshop for faculty & staff to gain more knowledge about slide & screen casting to best support educational practices.

The wealth of media resources available online is overwhelming.  If your objective is to enhance instruction and learning, here are a few tools I use, and a couple new ones I have just begun to play with:

• Screen Capture tools
  • SnagIt – screen grab tool for Window users; purchase required (test out the 30-day trial version)
  • Grab – a tool included in Mac computers to get screen shots/images
  • Jing – great for screen capture for image or video for any platform, able to do voice-overs & it’s FREE!
• Slide Casting
  • SlideShare – online community forum to share slides (& audio) with students and others; able to match audio recording with slide content easily [I use this website the most.]
  • MyPlick
  • Sliderocket
• Slides
  • MS PowerPoint
  • Impress by OpenOffice
  • Google Docs or Zoho – great free online tools, but will often have to convert presentations to PPT format for slide casting
  • Keynote – need to convert to PPT format to use on slideshare
• Audio
  • Audacity – get a solid microphone with headset & start recording and editing tracks for your presentation
  • PodcastPeople – record your audio & get a link to an mp3; downside: there is no post-production editing feature
  • GarageBand – Mac users can get this free application to record & edit audio tracks
• Screen Casting
  • Camtasia Studio – record, edit & share on screen activity; costs $
  • Camstudio – FREE streaming video software for screen capture
  • Captivate by Adobe – for those who are serious about their online learning and visual screen capture; purchase required (pricey even with education discounts, but worth it if used often)
  • Windows Media Maker – able to create videos for the screen cast; not part of the new Vista package (down grade OS)
  • Snapz Pro X - high quality imaging; able to use video, images and save the in a smaller format; time lapse editing,  audio voice-over and great editing options
  • iShowU – records audio & video; tagline = “when words aren’t enough”
• Video Content Storage Online
  • YouTube EDU – YouTube videos posted for learning; great for archiving teaching material for your students
  • CaptionTube – new feature from YouTube that allows for adding captions via a sophisticated video caption editor – this means that the  text transcription sits beside the video
  • Recommendation:  use institutional web portal or closed site if you are using any copyrighted material or content

Have fun!

Several weeks ago, I challenged other would-be innovators to try something new. Take an existing PowerPoint presentation and mix it up with a podcast (for those of you who are already intimidated, a podcast is only an mp3 file). I asked folks to send in their links so that we could share.

Unfortunately, I’m still waiting to receive my first link.

Meanwhile, I went ahead and did one myself. It’s not perfect, but it’s getting a lot of views and has already helped me to meet new people in my niche. I’d go so far as to call it a success. And I learned a lot (!) doing it.

Feedback is welcome, but please be gentle – it’s my first try too.

Here are my tips – things I learned from this first effort:

• If you don’t have some awesome software (Adobe CS4 comes to mind), you still have what you need. I used my Skype headset with microphone and Audacity (free). You can find out more about recording a podcast here.
• I recorded in my office (which is our safe room) without anything to dampen background noises, etc. The sound quality isn’t perfect, but it’s usable.
• I did the whole thing in two halves and married them together with Audacity. You can do a lot with that program – I took out a bit of my umming and hmming and uhhing, but could have made the whole thing a lot smoother with a little more time.
• I didn’t rehearse ahead of time, but it’s good to review your slides so that you can move quickly between slides.
• Remember to speak slowly – I forgot.
• This is really fun. I had a great time doing it and look forward to doing more of them.

After you record the audio, you put it online where SlideShare can access it (yes, you can do this fee without a web site too). Then you play the audio and move the little bars to decide when SlideShare advances the slides. Voila! Webinar.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy – now who’s going to join me?

Today I came across two very interesting pieces which provide options for assessment when requiring students to participate using blogs and wikis. Assessment when using some of these technologies in education seems to be a continuing bugbear.

The first is a very interesting slidecast by Konrad Glogowski from the University of Toronto. Konrad explains one route to introducing the process of blogging into the classroom and how to develop that process with students. Here he uses a plant growing metaphor, which requires the students to consider what they want from their blog right from the onset. Formative feedback is given to the students partially based on the students’ initial considerations. The overall process applied is one of student enquiry, with them engaged on a topic of research of interest to them (hence ‘engaged’ is the operative word). Konrad nicely weaves in concepts from the work of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi throughout his presentation.

If you are even considering introducing blogging into your curriculum I would suggest spending 36 minutes to view this slidecast:

with a corresponding blog post.

Paralleling this but for introducing the use of wikis into teaching is this blog post. This article gives some of the academic theory for using this collaborative process. Significantly how to apply assessment to a collaborative wiki based process is considered. And interestingly there is an explanation of how a tool developed by the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) called WikiDashboard was used to ‘measure’ contributions to wikis by individuals.