Sharing the Addiction

OK - it is now 2:30am in the morning and I am still sitting here like an idiot (school holidays at least) and I have become quite excited about a tool that I have just been messing about with called Brickabox to the point that I feel I need to blog about it.

Basically, it allows you create your very own YouTube or other resource site by helping you to build a similar interface and then start populating it with content (there are six ready made templates such as video sites or map sites) or you can completely design your own using their building blocks. I thought it could be handy to have my very own collection of videos that I think are good for education. At the moment, I have been embedding these into a wiki page but I think the interface much better when I create a brickabox to store them in. I signed up for a Brickabox account and then selected the option to make a ‘Video Collection Site’ which I then called  http://edvid.bricabox.com

From there I just used the ‘Add Video’ button to start putting in the content. I simply needed to give the video a name and then use the embed code from the site it was stored in to add it to my own site. I have only put in two so far but can say that the process couldn’t be simpler. There is also an Admin area (like the back end of a blog) where you can change the theme of the template (I chose the blue colour) as well as other aspects of the site. I REALLY like this tool and think it would be great in a school where you could bank great resources without anyone having to go to the sites where they were originally hosted.

Tags: brickabox

Today I put the finishing touches on my resource page on Flickr for teachers on my wiki.  I have included a number of ways that you can use Flickr in an educational context as well as links to tutorials and other tools that can work with Flickr. I am going to put a very brief summary here of some of the types of examples so it would pay to check out the wiki page to see an in-depth coverage of this topic.

Flickr to Share what is happening in the classroom

This is the most basic use for Flickr. Upload pictures of activities, displays or examples of work for others to view and to share ideas.

Use the Note Feature in Flickr for Interactivity

Flickr has the ability to add notes to parts of your image that will open in a pop-up window when you mouse over the area where you have placed the note. This can be used to ‘embed’ writing and information into your images. The only disadvantage is that the pop-up note feature only functions within Flickr itself and you can’t embed the images into a wiki or blog and maintain the notes. It is easy enough to have a link to the Flickr page however. The example to the left shows using this to create an online and interactive mihi (information about your background and heritage for non-New Zealanders). It can also be used for labeling, instructional writing or having information about each child within a group picture. It would be great if you could leave a comment on this blog post with other ways you might use this.

Using Flickr for Digital Storytelling

There are groups on Flickr where people submit photos that tell stories in 5 photographic frames. A New Zealand teacher with the Flickr username Hey Milly has created a group specifically for children to post their photo stories to and the example below was on this Flickr group.

 Using Flickr to Learn About Other Places

There is a map tool on Flickr that allows you to save images from your Flickr photostream into locations on a world map. This is not only handy for when you travel but can be great if you want to find images from other parts of the world if you are learning about them in class. You can ask to see the results on the map from everyone’s images and can then use pictures from these places.

Using Flickr as a Storage Site that Works with Other Tools

Flickr released to the public what is called its API. Other online tool developers where then able to use this to allow you to build connections between your account with them and your Flickr account. This saves you uploading the same pictures into all the different tools. An example of this is Big Huge Labs where you can make your Flickr photos into all kinds of things such as the motivational poster on the right.

Searching Flickr

Many people who upload their photos to Flickr make them public and apply a Creative Commons license to them meaning that you are legally able to use them as long as you cite your source. There are tools to search for these type of pictures in Flickr with search engines such as CompFight, Flickr Storm and FlickRiver.  You can also use the advanced search options within Flickr to do a Creative Commons search. See the wiki page for more detailed information on Flickr searches.

There are tutorials and more examples within each category on the wiki page. Enjoy using Flickr!

Tags: flickr, photos

Here I am comfortably housed in my new home at Edublogs and I thought that my first post here would be to explain the reasons for my move.

• No ‘Next Blog’ - This has always been an issue in Blogger. If anyone clicks on Next Blog at the top of your blog, they could end up somewhere less than desirable within a couple of clicks. Edublogs is designed for education and there is no danger or possibility of this happening and no ‘Next Blog!’
• Attractive templates -  Edublogs is built on WordPress technology and has a large number of templates (over 50) to choose from for your blog. It also allows you to make certain modifications to themes such as changing the image header. It was great to be given the exact dimensions of this header as well so I didn’t have to guess the desired size the way I did in Blogger.
• Great technical support - I have already posted a couple of questions to the forum and have had lightning fast replies. There is also a great blog that shows you how to do almost anything that you would need.
• Ability to embed all types of code - this was the one that stopped me from making this change earlier. Edublogs did not let you embed certain types of code such as iFrame used by a lot of web 2.0 tools due to security worries. They have recently changed this policy and I can now embed almost anything that I want to. I need to be able to do this on a blog that writes about Web 2.0 technologies.
• Designed for teachers - this is a blog tool specifically designed for teachers and the tools and the help are specifically molded to this purpose.
• Ease of moving - I was able to migrate all of my blog posts from Blogger with a few clicks. It was a very simple process to bring my content with me.

There are a few drawbacks to using Edublogs that I feel I should point out as well if you are considering the move:

• You are unable to edit the html of the templates which means that you are unable to put code from Google Analytics or other monitoring services into your template. UPDATE: Thanks to people who left comments and pointed out that you can use a built-in plugin to add Google Analytics. I still would like to be able to use other tools from sites such as MyBlogLog which do need access to the code so I’ll look forward to the addition of this feature to Edublogs.
• Edublogs is seldom listed as a blogger platform when trying to set up links between your blog and other web 2.0 services. I am still trying to set up a link to my Google Docs account - I’ll let you know how that goes (and how to do it if I manage it )

Otherwise, I am very happy with my new home. The back end of the blog looks a little different to Blogger but doesn’t take too long to get the hang of. Instead of the ‘Layout’ tab in Blogger, you go to ‘Presentation’ in Edublogs. Posts are handled in two different tabs called ‘Write’ and ‘Manage’ rather than being under the one ‘Posts’ in Blogger. Basically, there are no major issues and I’d recommend the change.

Tags: edublogs

This is my first attempt to use UStream along with a free application for adding effects to your videos called CamTwist. In the video, I talk about two other applications Spanning Sync (to sync between iCal and Google Calender) and GooSync (to sync between mobile and Google Calendar).

What do you think of this attempt? Am I really an angel??

Tags: Calendars, ustream, video effects

I realised the other day that I put the wrong Firefox Add-on in my earlier post on how to get YouTube videos. I should have been Download Helper and not Video Downloader.

I used to use Video Downloader but it stopped working - sorry about the confusion. I will edit my earlier post to fix the error there as well.

I know that most people already know about Big Huge Labs but I thought I’d remind people about it again. I had fun this morning making a motivational poster out of one of my photos from Vietnam. I really must get to using this with kids!

I love the internet - it is such a leveler! Getting in touch with people who work with different tools has now become very easy and effective.

I have posted a number of times in the past about a favourite photo editing tool of mine called FotoFlexor. It has to be one of the easiest way to manipulate photos and work in layers and it’s FREE online. However, recently I have been concerned about the advertising at the top of the site for ‘Girls Gone Wild’ where woman were topless with only their hands for cover. I decided to try and get in touch with someone from the site about this issue and the email exchange below shows the results:

Hi there,

I wanted to bring your attention to the banner advertising on your site (particularly the Girls Gone Wild ads) that means that we can’t use Fotoflexor for education. I have a number of teachers ask me in my role as an ICT advisor what site will allow them to edit photos and work in layers and FotoFlexor is the obvious choice but the advertising of topless women holding their breasts means that we can’t use it in education.

I’d really appreciate it if you could drop me a line just to let me know if that type of advertising will stay on the site so that I know to advise teachers that they won’t be able to use the application.

I am a HUGE fan of Fotoflexor and voted for it in the web awards and was very excited about using it with students. I do understand that you have to make money as well.

Hi Suzie,

Thanks for your interest in FotoFlexer. I completely understand your concerns and I’m 100% sure we can find a solution. Let me talk it over with some people internally and see what filtering we can do with the ads (to be honest, I didn’t know we had ads like that!). I’ll be in touch with a solution for you shortly.

Hi Suzie,

I tracked down the issue with GGW wild ads, they were running on an Australian regional campaign, which is why I had never seen them. We have instituted exclusions for all “sin” ads in the future (sex, alcohol, cigarettes, anything not appropriate for all ages). We serve a young audience generally and these should never be served on FotoFlexer at all, at any time. The ad company that sells our ad inventory has said that the exclusions should be in place with very little delay and so the issue should be resolved.

I really appreciate you brining this to my attention!

-Neil Warren
FotoFlexer.com

And so a great result! Now I can feel free to recommend FotoFlexor without any further problems. It just shows that it is definitely worth sending a quick email to the people behind the tools if there is something that you think could be improved.