This week was all about playing. My guide this week was David Kapular's recently created Top 25 Web 2.0 Sites for Education (2011). Since there are so many Web 2.0 tools out there, it can be hard to know where to start. I had to go in with a plan.
My goal: to advertise for the library.
My tools: Prezi and Glogster.
My computer: busy.
I found Prezi earlier in the year and watched (open mouthed) my first ever Prezi presentation. I loved the dynamic, cohesive way that it was presented and it managed to keep my attention for the entire presentation (something that is difficult when Grey's Anatomy is on). I wiggled with excitement going into this week because I would finally have a reason to use this tool myself. (Insert squeal of delight here! I'm such a geek, but I love it!)
Prezi is quite simple to use (and, dare I say it, easier to use than powerpoint even). After a simple sign in, a new user is directed to a series of how to videos. I love a good how to video. Honestly, I only watched the first one and then assumed that I would now be a pro at using Prezi.
I guess they knew that many of us skip the how-to videos because they have a mini hands-on learning tutorial as soon as you sign in to create your Prezi. Many of the videos that I watched about creating Prezis stressed planning, so, even though this is a Web2.0 course, I pulled out my trusty side-kick, Mr. Pencil. I have missed him. Here is what he and I created together.
Making this plan on paper helped me to visualize what I wanted to include and how I wanted to link the components together. When I was faced with the white Prezi background I wasn't as overwhelmed as I would have been if I went in blind. I copied much of the information from my planning page onto the Prezi page and added YouTube book trailers for each book. Prezi makes this addition so simple! With the Insert bubble you can add files, YouTube videos and shapes. Changing the colours is easy too. One thing that would be nice is the ability to change individual fonts in the free Prezi download, but then there would be no incentive to buy Prezi Pro.
The most confusing part of creating my Prezi was trying to choose the path for the presentation to maximize its readability and impact. At the end, my paths looked like this:
My final presentation is great promotion for our school library that highlights some of our new books. One of my goals is to try to get book trailers to the students and this presentation allowed me to link them up with seven trailers in one place! This will be going on our new Facebook page asap! Here is the full presentation.
While reading about Twitter in my Google Reader feed, I came across a blog post that linked to this Prezi presentation below. (Did anyone else notice how 4 different Web2.0 platforms were totally interrelated there?!)
CHCS Tweets on Prezi
I found the use of an image as the backbone of a Prezi inspirational. That is something that is being filed away in my brain for future Prezis (this may be foreshadowing for my final project).
Prezi is searchable and it pointed me to some more Prezis created by the same author, Kelly Tenkely. Her Prezi, Breaking Free of Vanilla Education, is a stunning example of what Prezis can be. I can only dream of creating something that involved.
I have already told quite a few students about Prezi. I can't wait to see what they create!
Prezi - I love it.
Now for Glogster EDU, an online poster creator for educators. I have seen quite a few student-created Glogs and I have generally been underwhelmed. Most of them are a busy background, a few different pictures copied from the web, a video and a few lines about the topic. This does not demonstrate new learning or critical thought.
My negative perception of Glogster began to change when I came across Glogpedia: The Best of Glogster. These Glogs demonstrate the integration of multiple sources, focused writing for an audience and, critical thinking while teaching the viewer more about the topic.
In the end I couldn't hate Glogster anymore when my burning questions about QR codes were finally answered in this information-filled Glog.
I think that teachers need to ensure that there is learning happening as the Glogs are being created. Are the student's own thought being given? Are his or her opinions presented? Is there an argument? Is the material student-created? Does it show knowledge growth? While Glogster is an easy-to-use program with simple controls and a significant amount of content, there is still a significant amount of teaching that needs to go along with them. I think that I would use Glogster with students to demonstrate the outcome of critical thinking projects or other projects which don't simply allow for cut and paste from Googled sources.
The other way that I would use Glogster would be to create a visual compilation of information or quick links to YouTube videos, links and more. This would be an easy way to have all of those links in one place that can be easily accessed. Here is a Glog that I created to highlight the changes that have taken place this year in our high school library.
To learn how to make my own Glog, this quick video gave me a general overview of Glogster and then the rest I learned by just playing around.
Glogster's ability to use the computer's webcam and microphone to capture video, audio and photos of the user and embed those into the poster make this a good tool for teachers who want to include instructions or directions for the poster's components or follow-up work. There are definitely lots of possibilities here!
My final assessment: I can't wait to use Prezi and Glogster again.... Soon!
Other fun sites to check out that can be used in conjunction with these tools:
- Blabberize
- Wordle
- LinkBun.ch (currently offline because it is being revamped)
- StripGenerator
- Popplet
- The Pursuit of Technology: Integrating Educational Technology has a long list of other Web 2.0 tools for educators.
References
Kapular, D. (2011). Top 5 web 2.0 sites for education. Retrieved on March 6, 2011 from http://cyber-kap.blogspot.com/2011/01/top-25-web-20-sites-for-education.html.
Tenkely, K. (2011). Breaking free of vanilla education. Retrieved on March 9, 2011 from http://prezi.com/1bmvnznjhnbq/breaking-free-of-vanilla-education/.
Tenkely, K. (2011). CHCS tweets. Retrieved on March 9, 2011 from http://prezi.com/kgfokf9t3lds/chcs-tweets/.
Tenkely, K. (2011). Twitter in the classroom and Twitter posts. Retrieved on March 9, 2011 from http://ilearntechnology.com/?p=3738.
TheOhioBloke. (2011). QR codes in education. Retrieved on March 10, 2011 from http://theohiobloke.edu.glogster.com/qr-codes-in-education/
Zimmer557. (2011). Integrating educational technology. Retrieved on March 10, 2011 from http://www.edutechintegration.com/2011/03/integrating-educational-technology.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+edutechintegration%2FrBlN+%28The+Pursuit+of+Technology+Integration+Happiness%29
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