Month: November 2011

  • Discount this weekend: Playing with Media eBook 50% off thru Nov 20th!

    Thanks SO much for all the uplifting words of support and encouragement shared today after I successfully defended my dissertation for my PhD! There were so many kind comments shared I can’t reply individually to all of you tonight. It was an overwhelming response, and I am filled with thankfulness for the support of many…

  • Final Dissertation Defense: Impact Analysis of Phonecasted Lecture Summaries

    DEFINITION: “Phonecasting is a portmanteau of telephone and podcasting, and simply means recording and listening to podcasts with a phone.” This is the slidecast (synchronized audio and presentation slides) for my final dissertation defense in Curriculum and Instruction at Texas Tech University today. The title of my dissertation was, “Impact Analysis of Phonecasted Lecture Summaries.”…

  • Reasons to Invest in Education

    We need to be investing MORE in education today, not less, in part to ramp up workforce skills. Consider this perspective: The problem is that not enough people know how to use the new tools of the Internet, mobile, and cloud computing. The workforce as a whole does not have the right mix of skills.…

  • 3 External Microphone Options for iPads (Nov 2011)

    So you finally got an iPad, but you’d like to increase the quality of audio recordings in your videos as well as audio interviews? Here are 3 different external microphone options for iPad to consider. The iRig microphone ($60) is my top recommendation and the only microphone of these three options I’ve personally used as…

  • Captions and Cross-References for Automatic Page Numbers in MS Word

    Necessity can motivate us to learn new things, and that was the case today as I finalize my dissertation and my “List of Tables” following my table of contents. Although I’ve been using the provided “table of contents” feature of my word processor to automate pagination of major paper sections, I hadn’t figured out (until…

  • Pennsylvania Newspaper Article / School Tech Director Misrepresents CIPA

    (cross-posted from balancedfiltering.org) Update 11/16: Note the original title of this article has been changed, my intent in writing this is not to personally attack the reporter who wrote the article, but rather call attention to these issues which desperately need clarifying in our communities. Update 11/17: After reaching out to the newspaper reporter via…

  • Dewey on Book Work and Opportunities for Mistakes

    Here is a quotation worth considering in our communications landscape awash in information: From “Democracy and education: an introduction to the philosophy of education” by John Dewey, published in 1916. In Chapter Fifteen: “Play and Work in the Curriculum” he wrote: Doubtless the fact that children normally engage in play and work out of school…

  • American Teacher Documentary: An Answer to Waiting for Superman

    A new two hour documentary film was released in select U.S. theaters this fall about teaching and public education: American Teacher. It’s a direct response to last year’s “Waiting for Superman” movie, which (among other things) cast teacher unions as demons in educational improvement debates. See my October 2010 post, “Waiting For Superman: A Good…

  • Create a subdomain for a website as an add-on slot

    Last week I created a new WordPress website (learn.playingwithmedia.com) for the series of workshops I’m offering both face-to-face and via videoconference in December focusing on skills from my eBook, “Playing with Media: simple ideas for powerful sharing.” The main website for my book (playingwithmedia.com) is hosted for free by Posterous.com. The learn.playingwithmedia.com site, however, is…

  • Creating Oral History Interview Videos on an iPod Touch

    I’m working with an Oklahoma teacher who helped her students conduct multiple interviews last week and this weekend with U.S. military veterans for Veteran’s Day. She is exploring several project ideas for students using these recorded interviews, and I’m brainstorming with her to figure out how students could create oral history interview videos (like those…