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

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.

In many schools, YouTube is blocked by filters due to concerns with inappropriate content being on the site that kids could access. However, there are a lot of fabulous video resources that could be used in an educational context that are also being blocked. Still, if you have access to YouTube at home, there are ways to download the videos to your laptop to be played in class. This also solves problems with slow streaming speed (videos stopping and starting as they load).

Step One - Downloading
Downloading the video using a Firefox Extension
If you have Firefox (or Flock) as your web browser, there is a very handy Add-on that you can install for free into Firefox that will allow you to download videos from YouTube and other similar sites. It is called Download Helper. When it is installed and you are on a page with a specific video, you will see a group of coloured balls rotating next to the URL address. Click on the down arrow next to the balls and you will see the flv file for that video that you can then click on to download.

Downloading the Video Using Online Services
This site asks you to paste in the web address of your video and then it will download it. It also offers a free FLV player to download to view videos.

Zamzar is another site for getting videos but it has the added advantage of letting you choose what format you would like the video. It converts the video and then sends you an email with a link to download it.

Downloading the video using Mac software Tube TV
If you have a Mac, you have another option if you download a free application called TubeTV. You open up the application and then use the search within the program to locate a video that you want. Then you can click on the black download arrow. This program also has additional features such as automatically converting the video to other formats from flv which makes it easy to play back.

Step Two - Playing Back Movie
If you don’t use TubeTV to convert the file, you will have an flv file which won’t play in either Quicktime or Windows Media Player. I will quickly cover options for fixing this for both Mac and PC users.

Perian Plugin for Quicktime on a Mac
First, go to the Perian website and download this plugin and follow installation instructions. Perian will now be added to the bottom section of your System Preferences window. Open your downloaded video in Quicktime and the flv file will now play. VLC player can also be downloaded for Macs but Perian means that you can still stay within Quicktime rather than have to use a different player.

VLC Player on a PC
This is freeware software that you can download and install. If you open up your downloaded video file in VLC, it will play without any problems. If you still want to play your video within a popular player such as Windows Media Player, there are other applications and plugins that you can install. Check out this website to get instructions.

Well, I’ve been rather quiet recently as the Year Group meetings take quite a long time to put together. Stil, I have been finding some very interesting bits and pieces as I prepare for them and I have also been making some handouts for workshops that others might be interested in.

OK - here is a list of things that may or may not be useful to you.

List of links for different year groups.
http://zerototwo.wikispaces.com/Great+links+for+Juniors
http://threetofour.wikispaces.com/Yr+3and4+Links
http://fivetosix.wikispaces.com/Yr+5and6+Links (still being worked on)
http://seventoeight.wikispaces.com/Yr+7and8+Links

When you on each year group space, you will notice in the left hand navigation menu that there are also pages for great use of ICT under different currciulum headings. I have started to add to these but this will be an ongoing project.

Here are the links to some of my latest software wiki resources

• A huge bank of sites to find film resources and short films that you could use in the classroom.
• A restructuring of my large wikis page into smaller pages with two new downloadable tutorials added to the Wikispaces page.
• Two new downloadable tutorials on my Powerpoint page about adding audio and about customising backgrounds of slides.
• Much prettier and easier to use index pages such as this one for online tools.

I have also found a really great resource on the Google Educators page with this unit on using Google Docs for revision of writing. There are a number of downloadable worksheets to support the unit. There are a number of other resources on the Google Educators page so it is worth checking out.

TeacherTube Crashing Issues

I have been experiencing problems with TeacherTube and I know that a number of other people have been as well. I was looking through their blog when I saw a comment posted by Paul Harrington asking about the issue and the response from the TeacherTube staff was that there have been some reported problems on Macs and to update Flash Player in order to fix it.

Having been lulled into a false sense of complacency due to my computer normally telling me when I need a software update, I kind of assumed I had the latest version. However, when I checked my version it was 9,0,28,0 but the latest version available is 9,0,47,0. That means that I have missed almost 20 updates!! TeacherTube now seems to be working fine and I wonder how many other sites I’ve cursed will run better now.

Click here to go to the Flash Player download page.

Yesterday, I had great sessions with Petone Central staff. In the morning, myself and two staff members worked with their media team. I gave the children and the two teachers a snippet of video to play with and some still images. What was really interesting about this I told the kids to just try and figure out how to use the software without me ‘teaching’ it first. I busied myself with trying to sort out the video camera problem (unsuccessfully!) and so I didn’t have a chance to intefer and take over. They picked it up so quickly and were ‘fearless’ when trying things out. I couldn’t help but notice that this is quite different to working with adults who generally prefer to rely on being taken through things step by step (at least until their confidence grows). I am determined to try and get staff more comfortable with ‘having a play’.

I have started a new wiki (yes - yet another one with tips for different software packages and downloadable notes I have made for each piece of software. The site can be accessed from here.
I was meant to run a workshop on Kidpix in the afternoon but ended up looking at some of my favourite new discoveries instead when the networked version of Kidpix on the computers at the school failed to open correctly - ahh the joys of technology. One of the things I talked about is an online application where you can easily make online diagrams. The site is Gliffy and you register for free to use it. It is such an easy to use format - again I think it could be really useful. This is a rather lighthearted practice diagram I made when I was testing it out: