It's a Wonderful Life

EffectiveUI offers 360-degree video apps

EffectiveUI offers 360-degree video apps

This review of EffectiveUI got me re-thinking about the future of CALL. Virtual reality worlds (MUVEs), such as SecondLife, has so much potential, but they have had so much potential for many, many years in one form or another. They have never broken through into truly useful tools for your average classroom teacher to utilize.

One problem is still that development is so difficult. I know that many might argue that developing in SL is relatively easy and they anyone can learn, but that is exactly the problem. People need to be able to do, not learn. I consider myself rather tech capable in many areas, but all of my attempts at development in SL have been complete failures.

There are many great projects in SL, but these don't even come close to offering good coverage for classrooms. They can be great activities, but that seems like a lot of effort (both on the class and developer sides) for isolated activities. I have seen some great lessonplans for use in SL, but they all seem to be reaching a bit.

What a computer program can piece together videos and pictures of places, procedures, and so forth and create the environment for you? That is essentially what EffectiveIU, Google Street View, and others are doing right now. In addition, these can then be augmented by creating hotspots, overlays, avatars, and other real/virtual enhancements. Take this a step further and it can be done realtime (as in virtual, realtime participation in meetings/classes) by powerful servers in the cloud. Client-side requirements are about the same as streaming video, which, with 3G and upcoming 4G solutions here and on the horizon, can be done on pocket-side mobile units (previously known as cellphones :)

In this view, development is as easy as taking a video (with your mobile phone or higher quality unit) or even with UCC videos and pictures available on the Web (Creative Commons of course) for basic design. Advanced design will still probably be out of reach of teachers, but they could do an amazing amount of work with the basics.

The beauty of this is that there is an amazing amount of both direct and indirect crowdsourcing. Every tourist, hotelier, businessperson, and advertiser will contribute to these spaces. Basic designs will get more complex/detailed as more images are added to the environment and as more people develop for the space. That which used to require hours and hours of animation work can largely be done quickly and by amatures with cheap, readily available video cameras.

I would have thought this science fiction just a couple years ago, but now I see it beginning to happen. Faster computers, faster data transfer, and faster software development make it likely that we will see many more movements in this area. Before long, I'll be virtually ringing your doorbell and coming in for a coffee in Chicago, while actually commuting to work in Seoul.

Cyprus Lip Dub - Don't Stop Believing on Vimeo

Cyprus Lip Dub - Don't Stop Believing on Vimeo

Not only a wonderful song, but an interesting project with students. I'm not sure what agreements vimeo has, but music videos on YouTube are ok (for many songs). Agreements have been made that allow even UCC music videos to remain up.

Show this to your students and have them make one of their own. There are plenty of possibilities for collaboration and cooperation. For instance, students need to create a storyboard, assign roles, learn the words to the songs, direct/take direction, edit the final project, present the final project, and so forth.


Cyprus Lip Dub - Don't Stop Believing from Brittany Bohnet on Vimeo.

Downes on Connectivism - UStream Video

Downes on Connectivism - UStream video

ekkoTV

ekkoTV

This is very cool and simple to use. It enables you to do a video chat with 2 other people. No muss no fuss. No sign ups or other hassles. Flash interface with your mic and webcam.

I don't see many options at this point. There is a link that you can share with friends (anyone you want to speak with) at the bottom of the screen. I'm not sure how long this is good for. Maybe you could add it to your blog or other page and use it as a regular meeting place.

They also have a text chat box, which is wonderful for sharing that text information that audio is terrible for. Things like URLs are easier to cut and paste that having to listen while someone spells it out for you.

Very cool application. I can't wait to see it grow up.

Dan

Mathmaticious - Sumersetinc

YouTube - Mathmaticious - Sumersetinc

This is really good. I don't know if he did it as part of a school project or on his own, but it really rocks. I would like to thank fletcher3836 for the link.



I'm not showing you this just because I think it's fun. I'm showing you because this is the quality that our students can produce. It's not that difficult. With the editing software available today, mixing your own music videos is easy. I'm not going to say that the whole process is an afternoon affair, it's surely not. However, it is reasonable to expect teams of students to produce works of this nature.

Next term, for the first time, I am going to try to have my conversation class (intermediate) put together a video. I've been looking for ways to get them more involved and I think that this would be a good method. I'll give them examples of scripts, complete with stage directions, and then have them write ones of their own. I'll put together teams based on who is willing to be an actor/actress (not many will volunteer). I'll also make it clear that we will upload these to UCC (user-created content) sites like YouTube, Cyworld, Naver, and the like. I hope this become more of a motivation tool than a source of anxiety. We'll seel.

Dan

Video: Twitter in Plain English | Common Craft - Explanations In Plain English

Video: Twitter in Plain English | Common Craft - Explanations In Plain English

Common Craft is at it again. Here is their video on Twitter.



Dan

YouTube - 21 Accents

YouTube - 21 Accents

Fun video. While native speakers of English have no problem hearing most of the distinctions she makes in the video, non-native speakers often don't have an ear for most of those distinctions. It might be fun to show this to your students and ask them various questions about the quality of the accents (which is the most American? British?)

I'm going to use this with my pronunciation class.



Dan

Kant Attack Ad

Kant Attack Ad

Thanks to Clay Burell for pointing to this video. The video isn't great, but the concept is. In just about any class there are competing ideas, positions, beliefs, and so forth. This is a great approach to dealing with those AND this is a great example for teachers asking their students to do this or anything like it (I've seen this approach in some Language Arts and History classes).



And here is a Nietzsche attack ad



Dan

My Ustream Moment

Ustream.tv has interested me for quite a while. However, I've never been at the right place at the right time to really appreciate it. Today I caught a Tweet that Obama was speaking live in Virginia on Ustream. It was great.

I'm not committed to a candidate yet (in any party), yet there was certainly something special about hearing him speak live and in the moment. This just doesn't seem to come through as well for me in a recorded version. This is entirely mental on my side, but it just seemed to make a difference. I can now better understand the buzz about him.

This is really where video blogging will take off. I don't want you to polish it. Just send it to me in real-time with an option to go back and watch pre-recorded stuff. With the ability to stream from phones and cameras coming built-in to many new laptops, this will be a great movement. It will take citizen journalism to new heights. No longer are we only competing with print publications, but we are competing with broadcast news.

After watching Obama, I flipped around a little bit then decided to stream something of my own. Streaming Daehakro (University Street) in Seoul from the 2nd floor window of a Starbucks.

Not too exciting, but it does what I want it to do. It shows that a scene like this in Korea isn't too much different from scenes in other major cities. Too often we exoticize (is that a word?) other cultures. We focus on differences and exotic elements in other cultures that have very little to do with the day to day lives of people in those cultures. Korea is often portrayed with Hanbok (traditional dress for men and women) and kimchi, even by Koreans in America (or other country). Showing similarities doesn't cut it on international day at school :)

There is a lot to be said for the mundane. Show videos of street scenes like this. Show videos of subway riders. Show videos while walking through the Seoul downtown. Korea has come a long way from villagers in huts as portrayed by M.A.S.H., yet many people don't have a sense of this. Though they might have daily interactions with Koreans, they often think that they escaped in impoverished existence by immigrating to [country name here] to start a new life. For anyone who lives here, that is silly, but it is a common belief that I have heard many times before.

Cheers to Ustream.tv and other services that allow us to broadcast the mundane.

Dan

YouTube - Did You Know 2.0

YouTube - Did You Know 2.0

I'm likely behind on promoting this video, but better late than never. It isn't a new message, but it's a great new way to present the message.

What is the message, you ask? It's that our approach to education (and policies across the board) need to change in order to compete in the 21st Century. Education needs to stay ahead of the change instead of consistently lagging behind.

We, as a global society, need to consider not only how our physical neighbors will fare in this change, but how the rest of the increasingly connected world will as well. I'm weaving in my personal interpretation here, but I have a feeling that the producers would agree.

Enjoy.



Dan

Video debating website

Learning technology teacher development blog for ELT: Video debating website

Thanks to Nik for pointing me to Think Big. It is an interesting idea.

Essentially, There are a number of questions posed and experts contribute their answers. These can then be commented on by users.

This will be useful for a class that I'm teaching now called "Current Issues". This type of debate scenario is already how discussions are structured. The ideas provided both by the experts and commenters provide great starting points (guide points) for discussion.

Dan

Where is Dora the Explorer for Chinese?

YouTube - Culture Cubs

Maybe I shouldn't even make this comparison. Dora the Explorer is certainly Spanish-lite and not necessarily a good teaching tool. The rush to teach Chinese is hardly subsiding across the world and in the United States. However, while it seems that many parents, educators, and even the government are on board, instructional materials are lacking.

Where are the quality instructional materials for learning Chinese, especially for children? Do they cost too much to produce? Possibly. But, come on, if we can't do it cheaply in China with Chinese, where can we do it. I would love to see a company get its foot in the door in this area. I see nothing but growth in this area in the coming decades. If done right, you could just modify the script for any language that you want to teach to. Sending it to France? Change it from English to French. It would just take a couple studio hours to record the French speaker.

A friend of mine recently sent me this video that is a fun introduction to some words in Chinese (Mandarin), though it could just as easily be for Mandarin speakers learning English. I think that it's a great production. If used in conjunction with other materials and possibly a teacher (online or face-to-face), it could be extremely motivating and effective.



Imagine a program like this that grew with students. They could start with the basics and advance as their students advanced. They could go beyond vocabulary learning and branch into learning culture, critical literacy, and so forth. A program like this would cost to start, but the long tail on something like this would provide revenue for many, many years. Not to mention, the first ones into the schools will stay in the schools.

Now that I'm talking about it, I wonder if I could carry it out. Unfortunately, I lack both the production abilities for this sort of animation and the Chinese speakers. Oh, well. I hope that this gives one of you the impetus to check it out.

Dan

Happy Thanksgiving! - Turkey singing "I will survive" parody

Cool Cat Teacher Blog: Motivational Monday: This Turkey will Survive!

Thanks to Vickie for this video.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of my family and friends in the States.



Dan

Play Web 2.0 Truth AND Dare

Cool Cat Teacher Blog: Play Web 2.0 Truth AND Dare

Vicki Davis passes on some great resources and often adds unique insights to them. This is one of those postings. I'll embed the video below, but I encourage you to check out the link above to see her questions. They are a great conversation starter.



Dan

Commoncraft "...in plain English" videos

Commoncraft has a series of "...in plain English" videos that are great. I'll embed some of them here.

This one is about social networking. This is a fundamental concept that you should understand.



This one is about RSS, which is the most popular standard for XML syndication.



This one is on social bookmarking, which will be central to my presentation.



This one is on using Wikis.



This one is on using Google Docs.



Dan

Web 2.0 Workshop

Web 2.0 Workshop by Vicki (Cool Cat Teacher) Davis

This looks like a really great workshop on a large number of topics regarding the use of Web 2.0 technologies specifically in education. It is organized into a series of short videos that can walk you not only through the technologies, but also the rationale behind using them.

The videos are free for now, but I'd get in there fast to take a look before they disappear.

Dan

VoiceThread

VoiceThread

This is a cool tool. You upload photos for a slideshow, then you can comment (audio or text) on each of the pictures. What's better, though, is that others can also comment.

Here is my sample (terrible production value, but I can work on that). It is a few pictures from a 4th of July parade. http://voicethread.com/view.php?b=5299&invite=4AbMIeWWvU.

I'd like to point out the URL above. You can share this slideshow with others, but it has to be make public to embed in a blog (external website). So, I created a friend (my other email) and "shared" the show with that friend. That led me to this URL. While I don't mind my presentation being public, I don't really want all users of that site to be dropping in and leaving messages. This would be particularly problematic if you were using this for a class. So, either get all of your students in your friends list, I do something like I described above so you can post a link to the content.

This could be a great tool to elicit iCBT-type test responses from your students, or other contributions of voice or text. While it does not work as a threaded discussion, you could have serial discussions through this medium, which is similar to what you get with most blog commenting features.

This might also be good for tutorials. Users could see a screenshot or other images and listen to or read the instructions/descriptions. I picture this as being good to use in one window with the software interface in another window (using audio puts less focus on the image, but it's there if they need it).

Dan

The Fischbowl: Blogging: In Their Own Words

The Fischbowl: Blogging: In Their Own Words

Really a must see video for those of you thinking about using blogs with your students or even if you have hesitated. The video features teachers and students talking about blog usage in their school with great insights into the benefits of using this technology. The the video also provides some good ideas for using blogs in your classrooms.



Dan

Video Editing 2.0: 8 Ways to Remix Online Videos

Video Editing 2.0: 8 Ways to Remix Online Videos

Don't have video editing software? No problem! Here are some online versions that will take you a long way. Not only do the software exist online, but so do your videos. So, your students can easily work on their videos at school and home and not worry about software or transportation of large video files.

Dan