Reflection and Engagement Week 4
We would be covering a range of multi-modal digital resources in week 4, audio, images and video. Incorporating these ICT medians into the classroom can enhanche learning and higher order thinking in many ways.
Engagement Activity 1- Resizing and Uploading Digital Photos
MobaPhoto, an online automatic resizing tool for images. It was like all my dreams had been answered at once. I'm no tech savvy but I have sat in front of a computer for hours on end trying to upload pictures from a holiday to Facebook many a time! It allows the user to use their original high quality pictures and resize them automatically, either individually or in batches! It is also has recommendations on what size to resize the image to, i.e. uploading onto the internet or converting to a CD/DVD. Alternatively you can resize it to your own specified size. If only I had known this tool existed when we were trying to enter a cute dog contest of our little Poodle! Poor old Peppie had to forfite before he was even entered due to my technical ambivilence!  This toll is useful in the classroom as it can be saved straight onto a flash drive and used on any computer. When students take an excursion to Canberra to visit Parliament House and they take riviting political pictures by the hundreds, no longer will the teacher be required to either resize the images individually- a long and arduous task, or use the time in class to upload these, often taking hours, they can now be resized and uploaded easily! I resized some of the images of my Peppie for you all to enjoy! 

 Okay so here were my uploading results- Resized by MobePhoto, 6 seconds, Original Photo off iPhone- 1 minute and 8 seconds!! Now the Resized image is the one on the bottom, but the difference in quality is barely noticeable, and both images adjusted themselves to the same visual size on my blog. If teachers and students are saving an average of a minute per digital image upload this turns into a considerable amount of time spent in the classroom engaging in more meaningful tasks then simply pushing buttons and watching the upload bar slowly fill.
Engagement Activity 2 (4)- Digital Audio Recordings
Good Afternoon, today I will be showcasing my voice recording abilities! Providing students with the ability to create their own sound files to either accompany a visual production, such as a movie or PowerPoint or to be used in funky little tools such as Voki. It gives the students the ability to present their work and make it come to life! There is nothing more tedious to a student than creating an essay, written on paper. By allowing students to create a multi modal presentation with their voices it allows them to create something that is engaging and entertaining and most of all personal! It allows the learner to evoke emotion in their audience, the power of communication is given depths when enhanced with ICT. To the side bar I have used this transcript in a Voki.
Engagement Activity 3 (5)- Using Web Based Podcasting
The range of podcasts that are available to the public is unimaginable. Any topic, any viewpoint, any form of presenting the audio file is available either through a device such as an Ipod or through a simple google search. In my context as a pre-service teacher using podcasts would be valuable to me in many ways, we are currently doing a year 10 Shakespeare course. The Elizabethan pronounciation of words is not setting well with my students. Through one search on Itunes U I uncover hundreds and hundreds of podcasts reading out specific parts of Shakespeare's plays. This will give my students the ability to hear the way the words should sound. Allowing my students to read along at the same time is targeting two of Gardner's Multiple Intelligences - The visual, through reading, and auditory, through listening. As listening to a play for long periods of time may be arduous the task could be easily broken up, asking students what they thought the passage related to and what they understood happened in that scene. By doing this students have an oppertunity to show understanding and comprehension. There is also podcasts on Vocabulary Building, this is used for general words or context specified words, I found a podcast similar to a word of the day calander, every day a new word would be provided along with a definition and nuemonic. This type of podcast is great in helping students build their vocanulary. The real fun with podcasting is allowing students to  create or listen to ones made especially for them by the teacher. In doing a Shakespeare unit, the teacher could provide a spelling list that had Elizabethan terms. This would assist the students in reflection and their vocabulary understanding of the topic. Students could use podcasts to create a talking diary about their classroom. Collaboratively working on documenting critical information, the students interpretations and what activities they undertook. The use of Podcasting in the classroom is only limited by the teachers imagination, and even when that is limited their is a huge range of resources online to support it.
Engagement Activity 4(6)- Creating a Podcast and how you would use it in your classroom
Link to my Podcast, where I complete this engagement activity!
Engagement Activity 5(7)- Create a Movie using windows movie maker

Windows MovieMaker is a useful and easy to understand tool, it allows the user to create movies either from still images, as the one I have done here, or from already processed video clips. The user can then input an audio file over the image or movie or alternatively a narration of the video. This tool is easy to use and would be of great benefit in the classroom. Students can create their own movies in minutes, they can then edit it with transitions and filters and then easily upload to the internet. It is often said that if students hears, sees and does something they understand. This is why using a movie maker in class is an invaluable tool, it brings the subject of the lesson to life in creative ways! Some ways in which High School students could use their own creations from Windows MovieMaker is, video essays, PSA's, poetry interpretations, filming themselves in preparation for a job interview and creating their own films that depict a certain historical event.