Door Animation

As in "Watch out for that DOOR!"

Yes, I'm still playing with Frames.  And my students start using it this week.

Playing with Frames

I'm at a Clay Animation training session sponsored by my employer.  I've done stop motion animation before, but not with Frames.

I'm really liking Frames.  My previous animations have all been compiled in iMovie or (against my will) MovieMaker.  Those programs work, and are often pre-installed on computers, but Frames was designed specifically for stop-motion animation.  Most of the concerns I had going in were resolved in an "Oh, so it can do that" way, followed by an "Oh, you mean it can also do this?!" moment.

I'd write more about it, but I have to go back to playing ... er, I mean learning how to use this software.

(Oh, and if you liked the music, Bre Pettis made it.)

Ask me ... anything?

So I submitted a proposal for this year's MICCA MSET conference, and since I'm under the delusion that I might actually have my proposal accepted I'm researching even more web based tools that could be used to enhance classroom instruction.  This is one of them.

I withhold my opinion on it until I've had a chance to kick the tires a bit, and I'd like your help with that if possible.

So go ahead.

Ask me anything.

You found me.

If you are in my Technology Concepts class and you are reading this now, congratulations - you found my blog! Now good luck on today's test.

New toy.

New toy.,
originally uploaded by TheArtGuy.

Used some Christmas cash from my parents to buy my first digital camera in years - A Canon PowerShot SX120 IS.

10x optical zoom, full manual mode, 10 megapixels, AND it still fits in my pocket since that wonderful zoom lens retracts almost completely into the body.

Does this mean I'll be taking more pictures (and ones that aren't from a blurry little cameraphone) this year?

Oh, I hope so.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

PUWT Bingo

I'm at the PUWT conference again, and it's awesome as usual.

That being said, here's some things that I've encountered at every conference I've ever attended (click to make it bigger):



There's some good and bad in there - there always is - but if you look you'll see the good vastly outweighs the bad.

And that's something that helps make it awesome.

Things to do at the new job:

1. Start Monday. (Woohoo!)


2. Use no textbooks.  Textbooks, especially ones about technology, seem like they're out of date before they're shipped.


3. Avoid handouts whenever possible.  Papers have an annoying habit of getting lost, "lost," or simply ignored.  Also, I've never seen a school copier go more than 4 weeks without having a spectacular meltdown.  Handouts have their uses, but I refuse to be one of the teachers staring at a copier exuding the magic blue smoke 5 minutes before class and wondering what I'll do now that my entire day's lesson plans are shot.


4. Avoid paper whenever possible.  When I first played with the form feature in Google Docs, my initial thought was "I could use this to build a test!"  I don't think I'll be using Google Docs for everything, but I will find ways for students to hand their work into me digitally.  I'm looking at a Drupal installation for this at the moment, though I might play with Moodle if Drupal doesn't fit the bill.


5. Use wikis.  They're easy to update, tamper resistant, and can replace textbooks and handouts in my classroom.  The best part is I expect my students to have a sense of ownership if they know that they helped make the class "textbook."


6. Tie art in with everything.  It's an art class.  It's a computer class.  It's both.  I intend to keep it that way.  The technology aspect is hard to avoid when teaching in a computer lab, but one can lose sight of the art when dealing with MS Word.


7. Avoid busywork.  As any former substitute will tell you, a class can sense fear.  They can also sense when you're wasting their time.  Every lesson I plan will have me asking "When will they need to know this?"  I'll ask, because my students will be asking as well.


8. Have students blog.  Maybe not every day.  Maybe not every class.  Maybe not in a way that allows the whole world to see everything they write, but every day people are using social networking platforms in ways that will hurt them in the long run.  One of my goals is to teach them how to do it responsibly.


9. Blog more.  This is a new position with a very open curriculum.  There are frameworks in place, of course, but I have a lot of freedom and that means I'll be trying a lot of new ideas.  I intend to share what does and doesn't work.