This site was a lifesaver after I by accident deleted an important essay. Fortunately I had kept a PDF-version of it, but using Google Docs I could only get a Rich Text copy – which didn’t solve my issue of getting an editable copy.

Enter Convert pdf to word!

This site enables the user to upload PDFs and convert them into .doc, .txt, .img or other. A neat feature is also the possibility to create a PDF of a website using the URL.

Italian officer reading his daily newspaper on a vaporetto in the laguna of Venice.

With the abundance of information overflowing the web and our daily digital lives it is a gust of fresh air when you come across something simple and clever as Daily paper.li which generates a daily newspaper based upon your Twitterstream (or Facebookstream).

Scanning and skimming the web for information is an important skill, and should be taught as a reading skill. I am trying to find ways of teaching about social bookmarking, social notetaking, RSS-feeds and general digital organisation, but I’m struggling to find effective ways. I think services like paper.li will be one of many ways of generating relevant content in the sea of information created.

The Internet can be a complex and spiderweb-like place to find relevant and reliable information.

Searching for information becomes increasingly an omnipresent activity for students and teachers alike. But how much do we actually know about how search functions? When I asked my students about what search engines they use they all laughed a bit and said “Google, of course…” They did know about other search engines like Kvasir, Bing and Yahoo, but they didn’t use them as Google “is better”. They added that sometimes they go directly to Wikipedia for search as well. A colleague of mine said that in his experience only 1/10 of students use the Internet for other things than consuming information. Considering this, isn’t search a skill on par with a reading strategy?

Read more here.

Nevertheless, I want to use Van Leeuwen’s concepts of functional importance and elaboration and expansion. However, it is challenging to distinguish the different modalities’ functional importance and relational role in the montagé as Løvland points out.

There are three modalities in the text: the first is text, Whitman poem, and the second is my two photos, while the third is my vote.

• textual
• visual
• auditatative

Extensions and depth

A given item of information can either elaborate or extend the information presented in other items of information. In the case of elaboration, it repeats or restates information for purposes of clarification. In the case of extension, it adds new information, linking it to the existing information in a particular way – for example, temporarily, or logically.

(van Leuwen, p. 222 Introducing Social Semiotics)

My choice on how I choose to use the poem leads to the emergence of a greater elaboration than an expansion. The reason for this is that the selection of photographs are committed to support the text to a larger extent than expand the meaning of the text. Examples are “free flight into the word less” and an open sky of the two stone pillars, or “night, sleep, death and light” in the darkness. Information links that arise here are attempts at expanding the text’s content. Regardless of this I find that the photos have functional gravity as they constitute the background of the entire montagé and are especially prominent. The interaction between the first photo and the second creates a transition between the light and the dark. I have deliberately sought a simple, minimalist expression during the course of working with this poetry montagé – from the white font on black background in the beginning to black text on gray background in the poem.

To the extent that the montagé has an expanding function can be related to the themes of the poem itself as well as my own interpretation of the poem as expressas as ideas of freedom quest, the static life and in death. But I do encounter a problem in my reflection on the multimodal aspect of the text as I then move towards my own interpretation of the poem. Naturally, this might perhaps be an inevitable consequence when one works with poetry?

Rhythm, tempo and layout

Rhythm provides cohesion in texts and communicative events that unfold over time.

(van Leuwen, p. 181 Introducing Social Semiotics)

In keeping with my intention to create a minimalist and easy installation I wanted to have peaceful transitions and effects, and get a sense of “airy” transitions rather than flashy gestures and effects. To highlight the text I wanted to read the poem after feedback from fellow students during the performance that it might establish more cohesion. I think this works well, but I could probably have worked longer with synchronity and tempo. As the montagé appears now the text is all too briefly on the screen before it disappears. This in turn led to me reading fairly quickly to keep up, but it works fine. I have also tried to have a conscious awareness of my own voice and tempo. I read quickly in some places (both as a consequence of the rapid rate, but also to create variation), as I read slowly and waiting for the last verse to just expand the text’s content.

When it comes to layout, I have deliberately chosen white text/black background or vice versa in order to focus on the text, while I wanted a simple and effective reading path by placing the different stanzas at various locations on the screen. The reading path follows the conventional direction in the West – from top-left corner to the right and back down. I mentioned in my presentation that I had thought of LP sleeve cover aesthetics, and also think that my use of black and white image and small text can support this inspiring association. U2′s Joshua Tree was mentioned, and Anton Corbijn photo cover art.

Final reflection

Working on a poetry montagé was useful in the sense that it creates some reflective thoughts about digital didactics in the work of multimodal texts that go beyond the technicalities. Terms such as expansion and elaboration, I find difficult because they do blend easily, while the functional weight can be easier to relate to. Cohesion between the different modal components, is probably equally open to subjective interpretation of the poem, but to be conscious about one chooses to extend or deepen when a worker (or assess student’s work) is certainly useful and interesting.

I used Mac’s Keynote and iMovie when I made my poetry montagé, but other presentation tools can easily be used. Powerpoint or Open Office are good choices.

How do you engage students to discover good reads, use digital tools, talk in front of their peers AND teach them some Japanese phrases? All in one day?

Today I had a very good day as a teacher. I had four lessons of English as I had to make up for two lessons I lost to P.E. last week, and I had planned to challenge the students with a literary task. As we are reading Lord of the Flies at the moment, and some students love it while others find it a bit tedious, I decided I wanted to take some of that criticism and frustration on board and created a literary challenge for the students where they had to produce a stunt presentation under time pressure.

Stunt Presentation
Every student had two lessons to prepare a stunt presentation on one of their favorite reads. They could choose the way they wanted to present it. Here are some ideas I gave them:

a reading
a glog
a blog entry
a powerpoint
a poster
a dramatization
a stand-up
a a photo story
a drawing
a diorama
a poem
a painting
a multimedia presentation
a song

After one and half hour of intense work among most of my students (some struggled with their creative inspiration) they were ready to present. Some students had made ordinary posters (among them Wolf Brother, while other had made Google Presentations (for easy sharing and swift transitions) or glogs. I have permission to display this one for instance on Before I die. One student even made a quiz using Google Forms. She had chosen the Harry Potter-series and explained them briefly before she went on to engage her fellow students in an interactive quiz on the Smartboard. Very popular indeed!

Learning Outcome
In terms of language all students got to use their oral skills in their presentation, but also their written English in presentations, posters, glogs or other products presented. They also had to use literary terminology when they had to convey to their fellow students why they liked their book of choice, and they also used their digital competence.

Students expressed afterwards that they enjoyed the four lessons as it was creative, fun and they learned about 20 other books they either hadn’t or heard about before the presentations.

One of the students presented a glog on the Young Warrior-series where the student taught students some Japanese phrases and then a glog on 13 reasons why which really challenged the students as the topic of the book is suicide. What is appropriate literature for teenagers? Luckily I have planned a topic later this semester on Teen Literature – that can get interesting.

Dette er et undervisningsopplegg for 9. trinn i norsk. Utgangspunktet er ytringsfrihet og litteratur med litteraturhistorisk bakgrunn og åpning for klassediskusjon om grensene mellom det offentlige og det private (Knausgård). Bør Vær Varsom-plakaten gjelde for forfattere også, eller er “alt lov” for forfattere?

Jeg har lagt inn lenker til NRK Skole og tv-klipp for de fleste nevnte forfattere. Lærebokverket jeg har brukt er Cappelen Damms NB! Prezien er åpen for gjenbruk under CC-lisensiering.

The early evidence suggests, that digital immersion may alter Net Geners’ visual systems, especially the speed of their visual reflexes. It may also alter the way they like to take in information and what they remember. But does it also affect the way they think?

(p. 106, Tapscott. Grown up Digital)

In English today I taught literary appreciation and analysis, and ceased the opportunity to use Alasdair Gray’s The Star (Amazon link). The students are working on Lord of the Flies, but I figured it would be nice with a break and something different, yet something dealing with literary terms such as imagery and metaphors. I used Prezi as a presentation tool as it enables me as teacher to be flexible in terms of what tasks I want to use. I inserted most of the tasks suggested in our hand-outs.

The students enjoy the interface of Prezi on the Smartboard and it works as an attention grabber and you have the visual overview of the tasks ahead. My wobbly hand-drawn red star stirred some giggles and curiosity was aroused. I want to mention the student’s responses as I asked them afterwards to give me some feedback on how they found this way to approach a literary work. Some comments:

• Made us think.
• We had to discuss and not only listen or write all the time.
• We had to use our own experiences.
• I like the Smartboard.
• Something different.

Technically it was rather easy to set up, although students are not involved in the digital material. They could however have been interactive with the Smartboard themselves and challenge each other when working on some of the tasks.

Please feel free to use the Prezi as it is licensed for educational use.

Testet ut bruk av Glogster i kveld som publiseringsverktøy. Det minner meg om andre publiseringsverktøy som Prezi eller Wordle og Tagul. Det fine med Glogster er at det kan minne om den tradisjonelle veggavisen/posteren som mange lærere er vant med. Jeg kan se for meg Glogster som en nyttig verktøy for elever til å publisere sammensatte tekster (tekst, hypertekst, bilder, lyd og filmsnutter). Elevene kan enkelt legge den ferdige ‘gloggen’ (?) på egen blogg eller vise den på en interaktiv tavle. Stilig og ikke minst miljøvennlig! Vurdering av et slikt produkt bør inkludere kildebruk, grad av egenproduksjon og kanskje prosess? Hvordan vil du vurdere et slikt produkt kontra en tradisjonell veggavis?

Kom over Glogster hos Eva på hennes fabelaktige blogg.

Dette innlegget er også publisert på fagblogg. Egen nystartet blogg for digital kompetanse-modulen på masterutdanningen.

Geografi er ingen begrensing for å dele din verden med verden.

Clay Shirky skriver i Here Comes Everybody (2008) hvordan vi alle er i ferd med å bli kringkastere, eller “media outlets”, eller er i stand til å være det etterhvert som terskelen for å ta bilder, filme og gjøre lydopptak med billige og enkle verktøy, som for eksempel mobiltelefonen, er blitt lavere. Som forfatteren og fotografen Chase Jarvis sier: The best camera is the one you have with you. Mobilitet er et nøkkelord.

Podcasting, videocasting og fotostrømmer er alle eksempler på enkeltpersoners muligheter til å kringkaste mediainnhold fra hvor det skal være, når det det skal være og om hva det skal være. Smarttelefoner med internetttilgang og applikasjoner gjør mobiltelefonen til kamera og mikrofon. Dette gir deg utrolige muligheter til å starte dine egen TV-kanal (Ustream, Qik), egen radio-kanal (AudioBoo) eller din egen fotoblogg (Flickr). En kan sågar publisere egne bøker (Blurb) eller digitale publiseringskanaler for egen musikk (MySpace etc.).

“Each of us is simultaneously an individual person and a global publisher.” (Clay Shirky)

“We spend more time figuring out whether something is a good idea than we would have just trying it.” (Clay Shirky)

(Sound has been removed in an editing program in the latter.)

The ease of transfer of photos and videos from the iPhone wirelessly to YouTube, Mobile Me or email gives it an edge compared to the Flip, but the Flip on the other hand has an upperhand when it comes to video quality with resolution of 1280 x 720 compared to the iPhone’s 3 megapixel camera.

A quick comparison of cons and pros:

Flip Mino HD

Pros

• Arm with the USB plug
• High Quality video
• 60 minutes of recording time
• Charges on connection to PC
• Easy and simple navigation
• Simple zoom
• Very good sound
• Very decent playback
• Easy transfer and works well with iMovie 09
• Possibility to take stills from videos

Cons

• No wireless transfer
• Limited space 4GB (60 minutes)
• No editing possibilities

iPhone 3GS

Pros

• Simple touch-based zoom
• On-the-go editing
• Wireless transfer to Mobile Me and YouTube
• Reasonable capture in daylight
• Possibility to email/MMS
• Good playback
• Okay sound capture

Cons

• Limited capture to good lighting
• Plenty of space (16 GB along with all the other data on an iPhone…)
• Limited zoom

Conclusion

All this said, I find that the two devices compliment each other. I always have the iPhone with me, and for the most part I capture photos and stills, not video, but if I do it does the job. The Flip is great to take along for occasions such as birthday parties, family gathering, babyswimming, student performances etc. The biggest problem is all the video data which amounts when one captures more and more. This is why I actually find the limit of 60 minutes on the Flip as a good kind of limitation. It helps me not capturing a 3-hour long childrens’ party.