My daughter brought home a “foldable” filled with notes on mathematical thinkers, perfect content for a Photostory slideshow. I put her to work, assisting me in preparing for my first Digital Storytelling workshop.
We found Photostory, free software from Microsoft, very easy to use. The program leads you through the steps of creating a digital story. Recording a separate audio file for each slide worked great. Customizing the motion and adding text was easy. The provided music options are a great time saver for those not wanting to find and import music. If you can’t find any tunes to your liking, you can import you own music. The trickest part was creating title and credits slides, since the program doesn’t provide options for creating such a slide. We used PowerPoint to create a credit slide, saving it as a jpg. We then imported this jpg into Photostory, just like we did all the other images.
We uploaded the production to Archive.org, because it is free and not blocked by the school’s filter. Then I used the Embed Media button in Edublogs to embed the production in this blog post. If you intend to embed the production in a blog post, be sure to click the Settings button during the Save Your Story step of Photostory, and choose “Profile for computer -1 (320×240).” The default setting is too large.
During Spring Break, my family traveled to Dallas, Texas to visit my husband’s sister and her family. We enjoyed touring the city’s World Aquarium. My daughter’s “assignment” was to select one animal from the aquarium to bring home to Missouri. She had to choose an animal based on its ability to survive in our habitat, as opposed to one she liked. No, the animals aren’t available for checkout. I was just once again using her as a guinea pig while preparing for my first digital storytelling workshop. Another part of her inquiry lesson was to collect video footage and provide narration. Below is our first digital story. Click the big triangle play button to stream the video, or right-click on the Download link and choose “Save target as” or “Save link as” to download the video.
The technicalities: Using Windows Movie Maker, we captured and cut the video. Then imported some images from our digital camera, and a few downloaded public domain images. After recording the narration, I added in some creative commons licensed music. The title and transition features polished off the project. Then I saved the project as “video for broadband (340 kbps)” in a Windows Media Video (wmv) format. I uploaded the wmv file to archive.org, where it was automatically converted into other formats and various file sizes (flash, mpeg4). I chose archive.org because it is free, and not blocked by our District’s filter. The flash version was the fastest to load, but too blocky for my daughter’s standards. The wmv file is the best quality, but a large file (better to download and not stream). It is the one I used for this blog post. But I’m guessing since this is a wmv file, it won’t play on all computers. Next we will publish a Voicethread version, and a then Photostory version. Please leave your recommendations, comments, or suggestions.
Google has just released it’s anxiously awaited Presentation, the newest edition to the Google Docs Suite. Like PowerPoint, Google’s Presentation is for creating slideshows. Unlike PowerPoint, it is free and browser based (no software to install). That’s not all. It provides options for collaboration, publishing, and on-line presentations.
You can import existing PowerPoint files, or create a new show online. These shows can be edited, shared, and published all on-line. Several users can be working on a show simultaneously. Collaborators can use the RSS feed to automatically receive notification of updates to the show. The audience can simply click a link to follow along as the presenter takes the audience through the slideshow. Participants are connected through Google Talk, and can use chat to discuss the presentation as they’re watching! This does not include audio.
For those of you new to Google Docs, this suite of Office-like tools is powerful and convenient. It is a great resource for your students as well. They can begin an assignment at school, access it at home/public library, without installing software of physically transporting a file via flash drive. Group project? No problem. You could even access their work to monitor progress and provide guidance.
Watch the video below, Google Docs in Plain English (Thanks, Allanah). Willard Staff: This YouTube video will be blocked at school, but is well worth your time to watch elsewhere. To learn more about Google Docs participate in my workshop in January.
While reading Suzie Vesper’s blog I learned about Magic Studio. Magic Studio is a free site for publishing Image Explorers and Timelines which can include text, images, video, and audio.
Image Explorers remind me of the note feature in Flickr. You click on any hotspot in the picture to have text, images, video, or audio displayed. Here are some examples:
The Timeline builder caught my eye since that is something my daughter’s 4th grade class is currently working on. Here are a couple screenshots of a timeline available on the site.
Readers can click on an event to display the accompanying content.
Code is provided to embed your publication in a website, blog, or wiki. It worked great using the widget button in Wikispaces. I haven’t been able to get it to work in Edublogs, even using the flash button. Obviously you can link to the publication as I’ve done in the examples above. On the webpage for each publication, there is a comment box available to logged in viewers.
You can choose to make your publication private or public.
Each creation can be licensed as Public Domain or Creative Commons. You can view, embed, and copy public items made by others. Tags are used for indexing. This tool has obviously been created for education purposes. It includes a Teacher Notes feature for identifying standards, prior knowledge, curriculum links, and more.
Content: You can access the public content uploaded by other users, or upload your own content.
Image - JPG (not progressive JPG) or PNG up to 64mb - but preferably not over 4000 px wide
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communication arts, digital storytelling, math, photos, presentations | Tagged: Archive.org, digital storytelling, edtech, k12, math, Photostory, PowerPoint | 
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Posted by Janetta Garton
Google has just released it’s anxiously awaited Presentation, the newest edition to the 
