Thing #4

Here is the link to my first voicethread. http://voicethread.com/share/1032169/

I see this as having lots of possibilities for student interaction. It's not face to face but more like an improved message board. You can hear someone's voice which conveys so much more than just text. I like that you can comment by voice, video, and draw on the scren as you explain your comment or initial voice thread narration. I can see posting a picture of a staff and having students draw notes on it to show what they know about rhythms or tonal patterns. Each student could go and comment each demonstrating what they know. Colleagues could comment on music program videos and give suggestions or ask questions or just give encouragement!

Here is my second voice thread. I was having fun here so I was myself and a few others who decided to comment on the voice thread in different ways.
http://voicethread.com/share/1032246/
This could be shared with other music teachers via my website or emailing them the link. They could view the content and then start the conversation.
I discovered how to embed a voice thread. Here it is. I think you can add a comment directly in this embedded voice thread.


I found this voicethread on a music teacher's website for her recorder players. She posted dorectons and a tune for the kids to play for a playing test. They log in and play the song for the teacher to grade. I want to do this next year.
http://voicethread.com/#q.b309107.i1651621
She also has one for kids to sing a new endings to a song she sang the start of on the voice thread.

I think I have done something like podcasting. I have posted audio clips of my students making music. Parents and students can comment on the blog post containing the clips so seems like a simple sort of podcast. Check out mrconniff.com. Click on the link in my bloglist to the left labeled Music Education Mr. Conniff Music and scroll down the blog page to find the audio clips.

Thing #3 continued

IMG_2045
Originally uploaded by conniffmusic

Here is a photo on I uploaded to my new flickr account. It seems you can't embed the photos like you can from Picasa web albums. There is no embed code to copy and paste into a blog post/ page. You can post to your blog from inside flickr. You need grant flickr access to your blog with a few click that are pretty easy to follow. One downside to flickr might be storage limitations unless you upgrade. I need to check this out more. This seems to be a good place to house pics. Has the standard editing tools (you can also house video here too).


I take it back! Once I made my photo public...anyone can see it...I was able to grab the HTML code to post in a blog without going through flickr. The new downside is that you can't have a private photo that is then posted to a website. Not good for student pics!Free account limit: 100MB worth of pics per MONTH and two 90sec videos per MONTH. Otherwise $25 per year. hmmmmmm.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Thing #3

        We have used Picasa for a few years now and really like it. I just recently uploaded to picasa web albums to try it out. I haven't really used it for much of anything but I might start. All my pictures are on my computer at home and picasa offers an easy way to get them uploaded. You can have private or public albums which is good for privacy issues with school websites. You can have student pics in a private web album that is then linked to a password protected or invite only section of the site. That will have to be my solution for my website that hopes to service my elementary music class population that totals near 800. The editor Picasa offers is pretty good. Crop, color and white balance adjustment, red eye removal and resizing for emailing and posting are key features.

        A few years back we set up a photo bucket account to share pics with family. We didn't end up using it very much and kinda forgot it was there. Upon researching for thing 3, I visited photobucket again and resurrected my account. I was impressed with the set of editing tools they now have or have expaned (didn't use 'em last go round)It had all the features you could want. There was also a "save as copy" so you can retain originals. this is especially nice for cropping for specific purposes but still want the original for other things. Here is an embedded picasa web album slide show. I used a bunch of pictures of a recent woodworking project.

Thing #1

           OK, so my first impression was how easy it was to actually get going on a blog. When I looked around at other blogs to see what they had set up they seemed so complicated. The basic functioning blog was really not too hard. The dash board was pretty easy to navigate and figure out. I also talked to my sister-in-law who has maintained a blog for a few years to find out how some of the features worked; I had wondered about tags, categories, blog rolls, and how the older posts were archived for later viewing.

            I wanted to try this blog thing but I also wanted it to be about something worth while. I saw several blogs that were not very interesting and others that really caught my eye on topics that resonated with me. About this time, Kentwood admin was talking to the essential arts teachers about program visibility in the community. It struck me that a blog would suit this visibility and communication goal for my elementary music program!

            I began talking to those who I knew that had websites and blogs to see where they hosted their sites and how much they cost or what you got for free. These were teachers at Discovery who were starting sites on shutterfly. This site is designed for photo sharing and so the teacher pages are really geared for picture media. I knew I wanted to be able to post video and audio as key elements. Others I talked to were Brooke Storm and got some more information as well as My brother in law who I found out hosts websites and has wordpress intalled on his server.

            I ultimately went with my Brother-in-law for the personal support and the fact that he offered his services at the family rate...free. I use word press to build and manage the blog. I learned about plug-ins that add features to the site. Specifically, I had an audio player installed and will shortly have a video player installed. Audio and video files stored in the media folder can be linked to the plug-ins so they show up in the post as a playable/ viewable object.

            I have gotten great feed back from people regarding the blog I created (mrconniff.com) and finding it really a useful and convenient way to provide resources to my students and parents. Many kids have already told me how they went to the website to check out the links and videos embedded there. So far, so good. I am really enjoying putting it together!


         



     

Thing #2

I was introduced to Delicious by a Southwood teacher who was taking a class in web 2.0 tools. It came at a time when I was getting frustrated with my technology. As a music teacher I had been using You-Tube videos of songs to teach them to my students. I teach in two buildings and was searching for videos and other content at home. I started bookmarking the links in my computer's browser after getting tired of going to you-tube and searching for the video every time I needed to use it. However, I found that I wasn't consistent in having all the videos bookmarked on each school's computer and got caught a few times having to stall class while I searched the video on you-tube! Then comes the introduction to Delicious. When I learned how social bookmarking worked, it was like Christmas all over again. This was precisely what I needed to keep everything at my fingertips.

I have used it for bookmarking those song videos I used to teach the songs with, collecting links to videos of good singing examples, as well as links to kid music sites I later included on my website.

I also have a tag category for all the Kentwood related sites like gradebook, online email, KALPA and NING. No more hunting for the address on google or the KPS website. Very convenient! I use it every day!

Here is my link...
http://delicious.com/conniffpeter

Thing #8 (related)

Here is an embedded mpeg4 video stored on screencast.com. I like that this player loads quickly and plays right away. It is perfectly sized to fit in a blog post.





I was watching the great clip of Sir Robinson where he talked about creativity! I've seen this one many times and he has a quote in there that applies to this project. He said, "If you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original." I like to finish that with "you'll never get better at anything". So, click away!