Free Resources from the Net for EVERY Learner » engagement

Scratch – Extra Special Learning Resource par Excellence!

Paul Hamilton — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 20:51:59 +0000

Extra Special Learning Resource

In my estimation, there are certain digital learning resources that offer something extra special. This is the fourth in my series about what I’m calling Extra Special Learning Resources. So far I’ve written about…

Today I’m re-visiting another truly remarkable free learning resource.

Scratch is a program with tremendous potential to engage, while facilitating skill building and creative problem solving within a meaningful context. Scratch also offers learners multiple ways of showing what they know by putting together interactive multimedia projects. For example, I have seen Scratch used effectively by learners with autism to complete assigned social studies projects.

If you are involved in primary or secondary education, I believe you owe it to yourself and to the learners you support to be familiar with Scratch. Learners almost everywhere can use Scratch because it is truly cross-platform software, with downloads available for Windows, Mac and Linux.

Scratch: overview from andresmh on Vimeo.

I first wrote about Scratch in September of 2007. Since then, the program hasn’t changed. The people at MIT who are behind Scratch, have just added some excellent tutorials and support material.

The Scratch website sums up the program well…

Scratch is a programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art — and share your creations on the web.

The online Scratch community enhances the engagement potential of the program hugely. Learners can not only share what they create, they can download and build upon what others have made with Scratch.

The screen shot below shows Scratch’s intuitive user interface. Blocks are dragged from the left into the center and locked together to create programs. Backgrounds (scenes) can be created within Scratch, or imported into it.Variables can be adjusted. Music, narration, and/or sound effects can be added. The music can even be created by using musical instruments built into Scratch. This is just ‘scratching’ the surface of what is possible.

Engagement with Immersive Media’s 360° Interactive Videos

Paul Hamilton — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 20:33:41 +0000

[Note: The video at the bottom of this post begins playing automatically. You may wish to scroll down and pause it. The video does not show up at all on an Apple iDevice.]

A priceless fringe benefit of my job is regular travel through incredibly scenic terrain. I spent most of the past week working on the magnificent north end of Vancouver Island, in the communities of Port Hardy, Port Alice, and Port McNeill. While working on the ‘North Island’, I always stay at a delightful waterfront B & B, aptly named ‘At Water’s Edge‘ in Port McNeill. This week, my hosts Chris and Karen Stewart made sure I was aware of an iPad app that shows off some of the area’s spectacular natural beauty.

The Nimmo Bay Helicopter Fishing and Wilderness Adventures app for iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch was produced by the proprietors of the Nimmo Bay Lodge, which is situated on the mainland BC coast, across the Broughton and Queen Charlotte straits from Port McNeill.

The app offers an interactive 360° helicopter’s-eye view of the region’s breath-taking natural beauty. By interactive, I mean that the user can zoom in or out to adjust the field of vision as the helicopter travels. Or, the viewer can choose where to look–ahead, behind or to the side. The video is made possible by technology developed by immersive media.

immersive media has developed a low-cost ($1.99) iOS app called im360 for showcasing and sharing its interactive video. After the initial purchase, a great deal of free content can be downloaded to the device from within the app. I believe the potential for engaging learners in classrooms with some of this content is tremendous. There are helicopter tours over cities and other landmarks, as well as land-based videos of museums, parks, wildlife, sports, arts, and more. It would work well to use a data projector to share some of these videos in classrooms.

I have embedded below the video version of Nimmo 360. You can interact with the video by clicking your cursor on the video and dragging. At the conclusion of the video, if you click on ‘Find More Videos’, you will be directed to the free content that is available to be viewed within the im360 app.

On a side note, the delightful musical accompaniment for the video is Leonard Cohen’s ‘Halelujah‘, sung by the Canadian Tenors. It so happens that Clifton Murray of the Canadian Tenors is also part of the Murray family who are the proprietors of Nimmo Bay Lodge.

Engagement Factors

Paul Hamilton — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 15:37:48 +0000

I had a pleasant surprise earlier this week when I checked to see if there was a Wikipedia article on the Comox Glacier. This magnificent glacier is the defining landmark that looms over the Comox Valley, where I live on the east coast of Vancouver Island. The Comox Glacier is also what is pictured here in the header of my blog.

Not only was I pleasantly surprised to find that there is indeed a Wikipedia article about ‘our’ glacier, I was downright delighted to discover that one of my own photos has been used to illustrate it.

This picture is from one of my Flickr sets entitled Comox Glacier. As is the case with everything I share online, the picture is licensed under the Creative Commons. I don’t take pictures for other people, but it sure warms my heart when anyone appreciates, enjoys or otherwise uses something that I have created and shared.

Another way of saying this is that my engagement in photography is multiplied many times over because I share my work with a global audience. Sometimes I even get feedback, and that feedback is almost invariably positive. As a result, I’m even more motivated. I’m pretty sure that the increased engagement and motivation results in me setting higher standards for myself. It certainly means that my photography gives me a great deal more pleasure.

It is significant that I own the task, that I take pictures for myself. My engagement, motivation, satisfaction, and enjoyment, however, are all enhanced greatly because I have the opportunity to share what I do with an authentic audience.

If we want learners to be truly engaged, it is imperative that each learner owns his or her learning. This is as true of the learning tools used as of the learning tasks. If the learner is to own it, it is essential that the learning task be both meaningful and authentic for the learner. I’m completely convinced that the opportunity to share with a global audience can only help. In today’s world, there is no excuse for not making this opportunity available.

Flypaper (downloadable program)

Paul Hamilton — Sat, 17 May 2008 15:01:15 +0000

CAST rightly says that a universal design for learning (UDL) requires multiple means of representation, multiple means of expression, and multiple means of engagement. Without multiple options, we simply cannot meet the diverse range of learning needs and learning styles that are present in EVERY classroom. The sad news is that options are still severely limited in today’s typical classroom.

The good news is that, with the technology available today, there is a plethora of tools available to provide numerous options for every learner. Because most of the emerging tools are free of monetary cost, because they are readily available to anyone with a computer and an internet connection, and because they are easy to use, there is no excuse for teachers who do not use these tools or make them available to the learners they support.

Flypaper is a versatile presentation tool with an infinite range of potential uses by learners and teachers–to engage, represent, and express. Flypaper is easy to learn and use. It is a downloadable program for the PC, so it can be used off line when an internet connection is unavailable. Still, you can easily share your work online in the Flypaper “community”, or embed it wherever else you want to. Flypaper has made it easy to turn your presentation into a flash file, and you can even upload it directly to Youtube from within the application.

In a Flypaper presentation, you can include virtually anything you choose–text, graphics, audio, video, action buttons, hyperlinks, etc. I particularly like the fact that it is convenient for the presenter to add voice narration. A presentation may be a single page, or it may contain multiple “chapters” with as many pages as you want.

Flypaper encourages you to download “models” created by other users, and to use these models as templates for your own work. Flypaper offers tutorials for new users, as well as user forums. There is also a well organized 114 page user manual in pdf format.

I’ve embedded an example of a Flypaper presentation here that merely hints at the potential of the application.