Images are a brilliant Web 2.0 tool to use to help Learning managers support their teaching and help students better engage in their learning. Some great sources are: http://www.istockphoto.com/
Royalty-Free Stock Photos, Illustrations & More
According to iStockphoto website they are the web's original source for user-generated, royalty-free stock photos, illustrations, video, audio and Flash. Whether you're designing a school web paper project, showing presentation, collaborating on a Wiki or blogging away to peers on class work, there are millions of affordable images, vectors and clips to help your student in class tell their story.
Fotosearch and Fotolia are providers of royalty free and rights managed stock photography, illustrations, maps, video, and audio. They provide different stock agencies of "The World's stock photography at one website." This is great as students will be able to use these picture to support their web projects, school presentations, podcasting etc. All these products can be licenced and easily downloaded for use in your presentations, promotional materials, websites, etc. When you purchase a license to use an image, video clip, or audio clip, you do so based on the license agreement of the publisher of that particular content. The license agreement will be presented to you before purchase confirmation.
Analysis of istock, Fotolia and Fotosearch
Pros
Cons
Millions of images to choose
Virtually any topic
Royalty Free: Which means that once you paid for the image you have rights to that photo for school, business or home use without the worrying about legalities or copyright ownership.
Most images are not free and only royalty free
Back to Free.
Share and stay in Touch
Upload and organise you picture in categories
Crop,fix and edit online anywhere in the world
Explore a whole world of photos to share
The Pedagogy of Teaching using images supports students' learning.
We remember visually more so that by using words.
On average we remember 30% Visually and 7% audibly.
Therefore it is imperative to support teaching by using images.
Integrating visual literacy instruction and scaffolding into classroom curriculum begins by asking a some simple important questions to start and engage the students'critical thinking process. (Jakes Online 2006)
What am I looking at?
What does this image mean to me?
What is the relationship between the image and the displayed text message?
How is this message effective?
Just as professionals ask critical questions of messages they examine, students should be just as critical of the messages they see too.
In the visual design and interpretive world, similar questions are asked during message creation as well:
How can I visually depict this message?
How can I make this message effective?
What are some visual/verbal relationships I can use?
(Jakes Online 2006)
When students internalise these important key questions, not only will students be prepared to recognise and decode coded and simple messages, but they will also be better prepared to communicate with a higher level of visual sophistication that will carry them right through the "multimedia-dependent" environment of higher education and the modern working and social world. (Jakes Online 2006)
For more information about the power visual literacy please have a look at our Visual literacy website myself, Amy Kennedy and Andrew Webb designed, edited and collaborated virtually online.
Is Podomatic becoming Problematic then watch my video
Reaching students beyond the classroom with a podcast
Podcasting in the classroom - Reasons for students
Now, lets have a look at why students should be allowed to create podcasts:
* CREATIVITY:one reason is in the previous statement \"be allowed to create podcasts\". Getting your pupils invloved in making podcasts helps them to develop their creative skills. For some this might be expressed in their writing of a script, for others it might be in the performance and some might get their kicks creatively in the editing process. In other words podcasts form a fantastic creative platform for kids to express themselves...in the target language
* FOUR SKILLS: think about the skills which are needed to succeed in a foreign language: reading, writing, speaking and listening ? What are the four skill areas we have to somehow teach: reading, writing, speaking and listening. What four attributes are required to produce a podcast....I think you know the answer.... yesss Reading, writing, speaking and listening. If pupils are producing podcasts in the target languge they are quite simply putting all four skills to practical use for a purpose, not simply for the sake of an exercise.
* OWNERSHIP: if pupils are creating podcasts they are producing something which they own. They are scripting, recording and performing their own work and it becomes something which they can boast about.
* AUTHENTIC AUDIENCE: think of the times when you may have asked pupils to produce work for display. It may have gone up in the classroom or even in a corridor or a display at the school entrance. How many people, potentially, would see this work and have some kind of interaction with it. It could be a few hundred...With a podcast the potential audience is ....THE WORLD. Obviously it is highly unlikely that the whole world will listen to Robbie\'s take on regular -er verbs, but the potential is there. And this is what counts. Not only does this appeal to the average teenager\'s egocentricity but it is also a sure fire sysetm of quality control. They won\'t want to appear silly in front of a (potential) global audience.
* HIGHER LEVEL THINKING: the production of a podcast encourages students to use higher level thought processes such as analysis, synthesis and evaluation. For example in order to produce a podcast grammar guide pupils need to synthesise their knowledge of a grammar point and then analyse it to extract the relevant information. The process could then involve some form of self or peer evaluation according to a pre-prepared rubric.
* CO-OPERATIVE WORK: What I have found in producing podcasts is that there tends to be a role for everyone...even the pupils who habitually let everyone else do the work find something to contribute.
* 21 CENTURY COMMUNICATION: many of even the most computer literate students don\'t realise that much of what they do at their computer at home can be transferred into lessons and many find it difficult transposing the ideas of what they do on their bebo site into other applications. In preparing and producing a podcast pupils can learn about and practise the necessary skills for communicating in this day and age.
Podcasting - Reasons for teachers
TARGET LANGUAGE: We know that the best way to learn a language is to immerse yourself in it and that it is difficult to replicate this in 3 50 minute periods a week, so why not give your pupils the opportunity to listen to more TL. This could be in the form of supplemental information to lessons, or general study aids such as audio forms of vocabulary lists.
ACCESS FOR ALL: have you ever had a pupil off class long term, or been off yourself for a long time? Making a podcast could help absent students keep up or help your class stay motivated even if you are not present in
ENGAGE: podcasts are a great way to engage your students. In my experience pupils don\'t feel as if they are doing something as tedious (to them) as learning because they get to use the gadgets that form an integral part of their life. For some reason its not all that uncool to have some of the vocabulary guides I have produced on an mp3 player / mobile phone
21ST CENTURY COMMUNICATIONS. in creating podcasts you are entering the realms of 21st century communications. More and more people want to access content on demand rather than waiting for it. In entering this world you are not only providing yourself with endless cpd opportunities but you are taxing your creative side and helping your students learn at the same time.
Pros
- Podcasting is convenient especially for those who are very busy. People that are very busy usually miss their favorite shows on television, or on the radio, because their schedules don't permit them to tune in to them as they would wish. Podcasting, on the other hand, allows people to download all their favorite shows and enjoy them at a later, more convenient timeslot.
-Podcasts are easily distributable and are easily playable on pretty much any mobile audio or video technology. This means of distribution contributes greatly to the popularity of podcasts. In today's day and age, finding anyone without a digital mobile audio device is the exception. More and more people are moving to digital audio for their entertainment and information needs.
-The advantage of the human voice. People enjoy getting their information from a human voice. There are many things that can be conveyed to audio or video formats that wouldn't be easily transmissible via text format. The ability to transmit video and audio makes podcasts more enjoyable than text based syndications.
Cons
- Podcasts aren't easily searchable. Although there are many search engines that provide information regarding podcasts, it is most impossible to find anyone that would allow searching within the audio file itself. This could turn off many people especially when there are those that prefer gleaning their information by scanning through text quickly.
-While many people do indeed have mobile devices, not everyone does. Podcasting may alienate this segment of the market, leading to them looking elsewhere for their entertainment and information needs. There also those who would act negatively to having to download such from the Internet and play them on their digital recorders. They would rather read that have to wait for recommended audio file to finish playing.
They believe that they can absorb more information by reading-being speed readers themselves. They also their belief that podcasting should be relegated to entertainment instead of being the format of future information.
Conclusion
In the end, only time and technology will tell whether these advantages and disadvantages will still hold true. As technology and trends shift to the next generation, the pros and cons of podcasting could either multiply or lessen.
This blog will be covering the powerful use of teaching using images or visual literacy.
Animoto
Description
Animoto turns the pictures on your PC, Camera, iPod Touch,iPad, smart phone and the iPhone into beautiful music videos! It takes just a few minutes to make one, and then you can share and collect them with your friends. Make as many as you like--they're totally free.
Here's what a Learning Manager can make videos of for the classroom:
- Journals/Stories - Stunning Presentations - Show and tell - Learner who have difficulty expressing verbally what they mean but can express their thoughts visually - Share with Students,teachers,family and friends
Build killer videos from your site or app
Quickstart enables websites and applications to easily send images, music and video clips into the award-winning Animoto video creation system. In minutes, users of your site can be making videos with content that you provide.
Engage your students
Put your existing images and music to work for your audience. Animoto is easy, quick and fun.
Connect with students
Build brand loyalty and recognition interactively. Animoto is perfect for contests and promotions that bring your customers closer to you. Analysis Animoto seems like a great tool so long as you're prepared to pay for it.
I tried free sample one and strangely it only gave me a disappointing 10 seconds instead of 30 seconds of viewing as advertised (so disappointed..LOL)(I'll have to check the disclaimer)
In regards to student learning and taking advantage of this great web 2.0 tool, access to Animoto may be prove difficult financially.
Depending on the school that we get assigned to in the future financially this may not be good investment for them, however if the school recognise it's potential they may incorporated it into the budget and make education purchase with the company as a lot of companies will make a education discount based on high numbers of interest.
RSS is an abbreviation of either Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary; it depends who you talk to. RSS is the new standard for distributing news and information via the Internet. The information is published via RSS News Feeds.
What is an RSS News Feed?
An RSS news feed is a list of topics which is made available from a web site, using RSS. To read the feed, the user installs a newsreader and enters the URL for the news feed. RSS news feeds are a replacement for email newsletters. Eventually, everyone will be reading their news via an RSS news aggregator.
This way you have full control on what you will receive, without the need for visiting web-sites. The RSS way of reading news also helps to protect you from spam, because you can keep your email address private.
Prezi is a brilliant presentation as it a concept map for presentations. Recently I watch two presentations that embedded Prezi as part of the presentation and was very engaging to the viewers. Students would learn more easily due to the eye catching visuals in the form of text.
Prezi may soon help students engage in learning through Collaborative Presentation Editing using Google Wave.
Largely thanks to Google Waveallows Wave those with Google accounts) users to embed Prezis and collaborate live.
In Wave you can embed different applications to work with. These gadgets will allow small groups to show Prezis to each other and even edit live.
Analysis
Strengths
Weaknesses
Opportunities
Threats
Very engaging for students
Easy to use/user friendly
Plenty of online support and tech video support.
Able to Zooming into details of a Text/picture/image
Make Dynamic Venn Diagrams
Embed YouTube videos
Relies on Adobe flash which can be unstable and buggy
May get boring to students if used regularly as it will loose its originality and students will disengaged
Students will recall more information that just an ordinary presentation.
Share their work globally.
May be able to collaborate and edit online with different users.
Use Prezi as a mind map and help students with disabilities to learn more easily.
Help student with their vocabulary.
Have Students Create Graphic Organizers to Understand & Represent Thinking
If Presi becomes popular the cost may rise and restrict to only students with money
This do it yourself (WYSIWYG -What you see is what you get) web site builder is an excellent web 2.0 tool to build your own website however is very useful is collaborating teamwork as individual can add or modify their work when they want without having to wait upon other group members.
I had the wonderful privilege of working with Amy Kennedy and Andrew Webb in collaboratively building our Visual Literacy web page that we used for our Visual Literacy presentation.
Due to its own success I worked on our next project alongside with Amy Kennedy and Andrew Webb as well asLynn Camilleri and collaboratively designed and built as group our Digital Literacy Portfolio on Weebly.
What can I do with Weebly?
Create a free website including blog facilities
Easy drag and drop interface
No technical skills required
Over 70 of professional designs
Free domain name hosting
What we found difficult with Weebly?
Could not add tables but had to embed using HTML code
Weebly was very slow in responding
Uploading was slow and moving text around was difficult
The designs menu were mostly horizontal rather than vertical and after so characters a part of the menu list was out of view
Most of the good technologies like uploading a video were only available in the Pro edition which meant paying for it.
Easy website creation.
Weebly was named one of TIME’s 50 Best Websites of the year in 2007 and since that time made the service even more powerful, while keeping it simple. Weebly has over 3 million customers who comment that there’s really no better place to create a website online – here’s why:
Start creating your site in seconds!
Powerful, Drag Drop Website Editor
The core advantage is the easy drag & drop website editor. Videos, pictures, maps, and text are added by simply dragging them to your website. We love it when new customers are totally surprised at how straightforward it is to build a website with Weebly – no HTML or technical skills required!
It’s Free
It is completely free to create and publish a website with Weebly. You can opt to buy a pro account upgrade for a small fee, or purchase your own domain, but our free service is and will remain 100% feature packed.
Hosting Included – No Restrictions
We provide the hosting so you don’t need to pay for a hosting provider. We don’t impose arbitrary bandwidth restrictions, storage caps or limits on the number of pages allowed, either. Going to be featured in the New York Times? Great! Our hosting infrastructure is backed by an army of servers that provide reliable stability for your websites – all for free!
70+ Professional Designs (or Customize Your Own)
Deciding on a look for your website couldn't be easier. We have dozens of professional designs to choose from and add more regularly. Want to bring your own? You can completely customize the template of your site, or build your own with HTML & CSS, right in the Weebly editor.
A Variety of Content Elements
If you can imagine it, you can do it with Weebly. Add pictures, videos, music and audio, documents, maps, and photo galleries. Sell products, accept online bookings, create a contact form, or arrange your pages in multiple columns. Drag on sideshows, files, forums, games, RSS feeds, or any other HTML embed code -- all by simply dragging and dropping.
Powerful Blogging Features
Post your thoughts and receive comments using our super slick blogging features. Weebly supports an unlimited number of blogs within your website, with full comment moderation features allowing an open, moderated, or closed conversation.
No Annoying Advertising
There is no advertising on your site, and according to Weebly they never will. Some “free” website providers force advertising to be placed on your site, but you won't find that around here. In fact, we've even integrated with Google AdSense to allow you to easily enable advertising – as simple as entering your email address – letting you earn money from your site!
Personalise by publishing your Weebly with your own Domain Name
If you already own your own domain, use it with Weebly, at no charge. You can publish to your own domain name (ie. www.example.com instead of example.weebly.com) and we’ll still host your website for free. You have the option to purchase a domain directly within Weebly which we instantly setup, or you can configure a domain that you already own!
There's a whole lot more that Weebly offers you.
We're only scratching the surface of everything Weebly has to offer. Customize your favicon, set your footer message, tweak advanced SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) settings, integrate with Google Webmaster Tools, password protect pages and much more. There are countless other features we don't have room to mention here that you'll have to discover for yourself. You've made it this far – what are you waiting for?
Wetpaint lets you build a rich, online community around the whatever-it-is that you’re really into. Utilizing the best features of wikis, blogs, forums and social networks, Wetpaint mixes everything you need so you can create, collect, and organize content on your own social website.
These website are known as "wikis"
#NB From my recent testings there appears to be a substantial flaw in the design code of "Wetpaint" Wiki as it will run properly only in the Internet explorer browser and not in open source browsers such as Firefox, Google chrome or safari. As a Learning Manager this can be frustrating as some schools only use Apple mac which use safari browsers or PC with Linux which only use open source programs such as Firefox. So I recommend using "Wikispaces" or "PB works" instead.
So what is Wiki?
"A wiki is a database of pages which visitors can edit live."
The building blocks of wikis are the "comments" from visitors.
You can generally edit a page in real time, search the wiki's content, and view updates since your last visit. In a "moderated wiki," wiki owners review comments before addition to the main body of a topic.
Additional features can include calendar sharing, live AV conferencing, RSS feeds and more.
Do Wikis have security risks?
Are you building a freely editable and public wiki, or do you need to be conscious of privacy and security in your enterprise? There can also be issues of legal liability and risk to reputation, particularly if you publish to the web. Options such as a moderated wiki format, user agreements, and locking some pages from public view can offer protection.
What can a Wiki doe for student learning?
A wiki makes it easy to swap ideas and information on projects--whether for a family vacation or a complex business enterprise.
A wiki opens the door to experts and shy silent types alike, increasing creativity, expertise, and productivity all around.
Wikis end the waste of ricocheting emails and communication breakdowns--wikis literally get everyone "on the same page."
What is a social website?
A social website is a type of website with pages that anyone can edit and contribute to, including text, photos, videos, polls, and more. Unlike most websites that only technically savvy programmers can create, social websites can be easily worked on within your web browser. Because many people can contribute to a social website, the content grows quickly as a result of collaboration. Users can easily and quickly build on the work of others by adding new content—and even new pages—to the social website.
As with any group project having multiple contributors, accountability is important. So, every change made to a social website is recorded. As easily as content can be added, content can be removed and the page reverted to a previous version. Most social websites also provide various permission levels that can allow people to edit and view only certain pages that you select.
These social websites are ideal for groups of people who are connected by a common interest and need to collaborate. Instead of sending email back and forth, a social website can be used to centralize the knowledge of a group. Because the social website can be edited by anyone with the proper permissions, you can keep everyone in your group up-to-date and actively involved.
Wetpaint — Publishing 2.0 at its finest
Wetpaint has been a web publisher capitalizing on disruptive changes, specializing in scalable content platforms. Our first platform reached 10 million monthly unique, all with user-generated content. We are now building our next proprietary publishing platform designed to produce premium branded media destination properties with professional content — across an array of categories with 5-10X economic advantage over traditional web publishing models.
Recognizing that technology and audience expectations have changed media forever, Wetpaint has rethought what it takes to create, monetize, and distribute top-shelf content efficiently — and how to package it in compelling experiences that earn audience loyalty and brand distinction.
Founded in Seattle in 2005, Wetpaint has $40 million in funding from the same venture firms that backed companies like Facebook, Starbucks, Glam, Photobucket, and others.
The current generation of students learn and speak ICT with ease. They thrive on its functionality, portability and adaptability. They use ICT to play and live.
As the use of ICT continues to grow globally, students and their parents are increasingly demanding an education that embraces ICT.
To help schools engage and motivate this new generation of students, they must realise the full educational potential of new technologies.
All these products can be licenced and easily downloaded for use in your presentations, promotional materials, websites, etc. When you purchase a license to use an image, video clip, or audio clip, you do so based on the license agreement of the publisher of that particular content. The license agreement will be presented to you before purchase confirmation. 
For more information about the power visual literacy please have a look at our Visual literacy website myself, Amy Kennedy and Andrew Webb designed, edited and collaborated virtually online.
