Web 2.0 for the Classroom Teacher

The link to "The Owl at Purdue: Free Writing Help and Teaching Resources" will be finding its way to my class page as a research writing link! The information housed at this site will be a great resource for my English students as they complete research assignments. I found the site to be very user friendly and packed full of all the information needed to correctly format papers in APA or MLA style.

PSE Techniques -- Final Podcast & iMovie

For my podcast I used images from our yearbook curriculum guide. I selected each image from the PDF folder on my curriculum CD and transferred them all to PhotoShop Elements, saving each as a jpeg to use in my iMovie. I cropped each of the images with people in them to include only the part of the picture I needed. I applied text to nearly every slide, using simple inner and simple emboss techniques to the slides with the question mark backgrounds. I placed frames around the “planning” slide and the “conducting the interview” slide.
Before creating the iMovie for my final project, I spent time editing several photos in Photoshop Elements 6. I used the glowing edges effect for the first photo of each “chapter” (photos 1, 4, 7, 11, and 14) and the magic extractor tool to remove the background and highlight the staff member working at her desk in the “Writers” chapter. I also used the crop and sharpen tools for the photos of the three girls working at their desks and the girl shooting a free throw.

Final Project iMovie

FINAL PODCAST

FINAL PODCAST

Photoshop

For the past few weeks, I've been experimenting with several photos in Photoshop Elements 6. Though I haven't finalized my photo choices for my projects, I have imported photos, added text, and used the magic brush and magnetic lasso tools. I've also tried adding a variety of filters to my file of project photos and would like to create a collage or merge photos for my movie. The auto enhance tool is handy, and it seems like I almost always need to sharpen my digital photos. Because I only have about 8 days left on my trial version, I need to finalize my project plans this week to avoid having to use my clunker 2.o version.

Podcast Subscription

I've found the Grammar Girl podcast to be very worthwhile. As a matter of fact, the latest episode is about the compound-complex sentence, exactly what I've been working on with my students. I like Grammar Girl's matter-of-fact attitude as she tackles a new grammar issue each week. Not only do I plan on sharing the episodes with my students, but I also intend to have my students create and share their own podcasts explaining various grammar rules (lay vs. lie, comparatives & superlatives, affect/effect, etc.). Hopefully this is another activity I can incorporate to help my students transition from information consumers to information producers!

Podcast

I've subscribed to Grammar Girl and listened to several podcasts. I'm hoping to use these as openers in class a few times a week.