Learning in the Lou

This post was created to support the LHS English PBL classes.  Feel free to print this guide to help the students think and plan their shoot. 1. What do you watch now? This question helped frame our thinking around the videos we watch and why we watch them. What videos do you watch now? Why do you keep coming back? 2. Balloon - shot on an iPhone 6. We watched this video without any context the first time. For the second viewing, we split the class into six small groups. We then rewatched the video while the teams looked for one of the specific topics below. The big idea was to see how these video elements added to the overall story. angles the video was shot in movement of the camera sound/audio lighting cuts in the video who was the intended audience 3. T.H.I.N.K. This acronym was designed to help when shooting on a mobile device. shoo T with this storyboard or that storyboard H old that camera steady I nteresting surroundings N ot too soft, not to

This post was created to help support an upcoming lesson for an English 3 class. This is blog 2 of 3 in this series. Sometimes just listening to people talk about ideas is awesome and sometimes it can be rather boring. What if there was a way for a speaker to gather insights from those in the audience, do you think this might make a difference? One fun way might be to use a web app called Slido. The biggest suggestions we can give to the English 3 students is to make sure the questions and polls you use during your presentation are meaningful and add to the conversation. Getting Started Visit Sli.do and sign up by clicking the button in the upper right side. Next Steps 1. Create event . 2. Name the event. 3. Create . You are then presented with either crowdsourcing questions or running a live poll. Not sure what either of these mean? Just watch the tutorial video listened in each section. I chose the live poll for this post. Running a live po

Many of us have team pages both on Facebook and Schoolwires. Did you know it is wicked easy to just embed your Facebook feed directly on your Schoolwires page? Follow these quick steps to merge these two. Start by visiting the Facebook Page Plugin site. 1. Cut and paste your page's exact address. 2. I recommend deselecting the friend's faces option. 3. You should see this appear. 4. Click Get Code . Click IFrame at the top of the popup window. Copy the code that appears. Log into your Schoolwires page. Click the name of the page you want to add your Facebook feed to. Click the gray box. 1. Scroll to where you want the feed to show up and click. 2. Click the little < > button. Paste the code and click OK . Click Save .

This post was created to help support an upcoming lesson for an English 3 class. This is blog 1 of 3 in this series. We were given the task of helping the students keep their audience authentically engaged when they present their research to the class. This post will show the mechanics of setting up Backchannel Chat and in class, we will discuss how to effectively use this tool to elevate the engagement. Pro Tip - It might be a good idea to identify someone to be the moderator of the chat.  Start by visiting Backchannel and click the big blue button. (Try for FREE as a TEACHER) Enter in the necessary information.  The most important part of this step is to make sure the name of your Backchannel is related to what you are going to be talking about. You should see a short code at the end of the address on the next screen. Your participants will need to use this EXACT code to enter into your new Backchannel. It is highly recommended that everyone use

QR codes are some of the fastest ways to access any online resource. Just scan and BAM! For this example, we are using a simple word and creating a video of me saying it. Then we upload it to our YouTube channel, linked it with a QR code and the magic just happens. I wrote this on a simple sheet of paper.  Then I used my device to record a short video of me saying the word. I uploaded that video to my YouTube channel. Next, I created a QR code to link to the video. Creating a QR code is pretty simple, just follow this post . To access the video all I need to do is scan and the video will appear.

The Google QR code tool, goo.gl, is going away. This post will detail how to use a new tool, QRCodeMonkey, to create some interesting looking QR codes. Start by copying the address you want to convert and then open the QRCodeMonkey webpage. Paste the address in the URL box. You can add an image if you want a somewhat fancy QR code. Pro Tip - You can also set the colors if you are printing these with a color printer. On the far right. 1. click Create QR Code when you are finished. 2. Click Download PNG. The QR code will show up at the bottom of the browser window.  I usually just drag to the desktop. You now have a QR code ready for posting and printing.