| |
|
Jim
Cornish of Gander, Newfoundland does a terrific job in each issue
of
Classroom Connect’s newsletter where he puts together a directed
activity
for using the Internet in the classroom. His “Destination” pages give
sites
to explore for an overview of a topic on one page and then that is
followed
up by a page where the major topic is broken down into subtopics with
objectives
and suggested websites. I’m suggesting we can take the fine work of Mr.
Cornish and extend it one step further in the classroom by taking the
explorations
and turning them into multimedia projects using eZediaMX. I refer to this as a Level I activity because I’m keeping it fairly simple while people learn to incorporate content and resources from the Internet with a multimedia authoring environment. This is only the beginning. The options to have the students add exciting features to each project are endless. (I especially like the power of the logic tools to help students apply higher-order thinking skills!) You can use these instructions to take your first steps toward doing multimedia using one of the Destination activities or you are at liberty to develop your own. Comments and suggestions are welcome. This is the first draft of these instructions as I take what I do and try and break it down into smaller steps. With a small amount of practice, you’ll be surprised how fast a multimedia project can go together. The tools I’m using are kept simple so that the average educator can also replicate this project. During Level I, you're going to see screen captures (that I've reduced in size so they don't overwhelm these webpages) of a project that I did during noon hour while assisting with an eZediaMX workshop in San Antonio that was part of the Multimedia Mania preconference event for NECC. Keep in mind that I am not a graphic artist nor do I consider myself an expert. I try to find the fast way to do things because, as a teacher, I just might not have much time available to me on occasion. Here's my strategy. After picking out my topic from the Destinations site or something I've done, I try to find a graphic I want to use to add drama or life to the first screen (Figure 1). I tend to pick out wild colors so having this graphic first narrows my choices and gets me to coordinate with the image. That reduces my time to prep this project dramatically! You'd be amazed how much time people will spend picking out colors, myself included!! I try to limit myself to 15 to 20 minutes of Internet searching at the pre-determined sites to find the one or two graphics I want to use as the backdrop for my frames. Remember - keep your focus on content and learning - that's where the vast majority of your time should be spent. The Destinations activity usually has 4 to 6 objectives plus accompanying websites. Each objective could become an independent eZediaMX project in the classroom. If that's the case, I would plan on a minimum of:
In Part 2, I'm providing you with a walk-through of the project with some screen captures of the finished project so you can see what I'm talking about. In Part 3, I'm giving you step-by-step directions to create a project. Finally, I will also post my completed Desert Project so you can use it with your students, if you want. Let’s begin!
|
