You need to fight for Pandora and NPR

Dale

nopandora A few weeks back I wrote about streaming music in your classroom. I left out the fact that Internet radio (like Pandora) is in jeopardy due to a possible royalty hike brought on by the RIAA.

Savenetradio.org explains:

The future of Internet radio is in immediate danger. Royalty rates for webcasters have been drastically increased by a recent ruling and are due to go into effect on July 15 (retroactive to Jan 1, 2006!). If the increased rates remain unchanged, the majority of webcasters will go bankrupt and silent on this date.

Tim Westergren, founder of Pandora, explained in a recent interview that this would cost Pandora millions of dollars. It would very likely end their business. It’s not just going to affect Pandora. Thousands of internet radio sites and even NPR will be subject to the increase.

Everyone understands that paying royalties is a fact of life but these prices are unreasonable. They are much higher than satellite radio. Traditional broadcast radio doesn’t pay any royalties to record companies or recording artists!

Visit SaveNetRadio.org to join the fight for the preservation of Internet radio. There is a bill in congress, The Internet Radio Equity Act (H.R. 2060), that would fix this. Call your congressperson to ask them to co-sponsor this bill. Tell your friends to do the same.

Abstinence Only? Not for my TV (or computer)

Dale

April 23rd marks the start of Turn off TV Week. Children across the nation will be pledging to abstain from viewing television for one week.The project is lead by TV-Turnoff Network, a non-profit organization with the goal of reducing the amount of TV children and adults watch.

Here is how they described themselves at their website:

TV-Turnoff Network is dedicated to the belief that we all have the power to determine the role that television plays in our own lives. Rather than waiting for others to make “better” TV, we can turn it off and reclaim time for our families, our friends, and for ourselves.

The site also provides many pages that vilify TV. Some pages claim TV causes violence, obesity, and ADD in today’s society.

TV-Turnoff Network doesn’t seem to have anything good to say about TV. How can a technology that inspired young scientists during the moon landings, made us laugh with Johnny Carson and helped us grieve during the September 11th attacks be so evil?

Like anything, TV has its problems when it is overused or misused but let’s not forget that it is a remarkable invention. TV is also a great educational tool. Growing up I watched many NOVA specials on PBS with my Dad. (As a matter of fact, there will be a brand new episode during Turn of TV Week.)

TV-Turnoff Network’s approach is all wrong. Simply pressing the off switch is not enough. TV is an important and powerful force in our society. You cannot turn your back on it. You must take it in warts and all. Set limits for children. Know what they’re watching. Know what lessons they’re learning.

TV is no longer the only important screen in our life. The status of computers has been elevated by the Internet. It won’t stop with computers. My new cell phone can display pictures, the Internet, TV shows, movies and more. Media will become ubiquitous. We will need to teach our children how to live in this world. I don’t believe slogans that basically tell you to close your eyes will help.

Research doesn’t favor notes via PowerPoint

Dale

Recent research on cognitive load theory suggests that PowerPoint is doing more damage than good.

From the full story in The Sydney Morning Herald:

It is more difficult to process information if it is coming at you in the written and spoken form at the same time.

Professor John Sweller states:

It is effective to speak to a diagram, because it presents information in a different form. But it is not effective to speak the same words that are written, because it is putting too much load on the mind and decreases your ability to understand what is being presented.

slide1If you wish to use a PowerPoint presentation, consider using it as a visual aid. PowerPoint should not be used to display only text. If you have notes to present [top slide] consider using images to emphasize your points [bottom slide].

When thinking about this topic, I’m reminded of this comment one of my colleagues wrote a few months back: “I love PowerPoint, but for me it’s used to enhance my instruction, not remind me of what I need to say.”

slide2Her statement took me back to a book I read several years ago by Clifford Stoll title, “High Tech Heretic: Why Computers Don’t Belong in the Classroom and Other Reflections by a Computer Contrarian.”

Here is an excerpt from the chapter title The Plague of PowerPoint:

Want to make a splash at your next public talk? Know your material so well that you can speak off the cuff, without computer, laser pointer, or video projector. Scribble your important points on a chalkboard and emphasize them with your voice. Face your audience, not that computer monitor. Throw out that tired clipart and the cliches about the explosion of technology, the challenge of the future, and the crisis in education. Let me hear your voice, not a pre-programmed sound effect. Show me your ideas, not someone else’s template.

Stoll has a point. When was the last time you walked away from a lecture and said, “wow, that lady’s PowerPoint was awesome!” You can read the entire chapter here.

The bottom-line is that PowerPoint is a great tool when used correctly. When used poorly it can be boring or distracting.

But you don’t have to delete all your shows. Here is a tutorial to help you improve your presentations.

Music in the Classroom

Dale 1 Comment

If you like to play music in the classroom, consider these sites.

Pandora: Enter a song (or artist) that you like; Pandora will create a radio station that plays music similar to the song you entered. You can tweak the profile by giving a thumbs up or down for each song.

pandora

Musicovery: Pick a mood, decade, or genre; Musicovery will play songs that match what you’re looking for.

Both sites are a great way to discover new artists. Enjoy!

Play YouTube Videos at School

Dale

From time-to-time I find videos online that are perfect for the classroom. At school we can look for online videos via Google Video.

Now that Google purchased YouTube, you can find YouTube videos in Google’s search results. YouTube is another online video website that is becoming more and more mainstream. For example, some of the 2008 presidential hopefuls are using YouTube for major announcements.

Unfortunately, our school district blocks access to YouTube. Perhaps this is the right decision for our students but I have ranted in the past that it is wrong to block teacher access.

So, if you find a YouTube video that you’d like to use in class, here’s a work-around:

  1. Copy the URL displayed in the search results of Google video

    Figure 1

  2. Visit Vixy.net and paste in the YouTube URL

    3. Figure 2

  3. Choose “MOV for Mac” in the drop down (this is the video format that will work at school)
  4. Click Start and Vixy will convert the video for free
  5. When the video is converted, you’ll be prompted to download it

Disclaimer: YouTube has had its share of problems with copyrighted material. Please consider copyright and fair use when using Vixy.

My Video Podcast Trek

Dale

I’ve been tinkering with video podcasts the past few weeks. My goal is to use the podcast so students can review:

  • notes from the past week
  • the practice problems at their own pace
  • demonstrations and lab activities performed in class

I started off by writing out my notes with GE’s Imagination Cubed and then did a screen capture with Windows Media Encoder. It works but the video of the Imagination Cubed came out choppy and the Windows Media Encoder does not give you many options when outputting the video.I really wanted the video to be available as a Flash video— similar to what YouTube does. The best video converter I found for this job was the free version of Riva FLV Encoder. It was easy to use, provided many options and converted the files quickly. If you have several videos to convert, you make want to download the trial of Riva Producer. It does batch converting and allows you to edit your videos in a timeline.

To play the videos, I chose the Flash Video Player. This free player is easy to configure if you read the directions. I had one snag with the slider but I solved this by using the proper metatags in my flv files. To fix the metatags I used FLV MetaData Injector. Again, this was explained in the installation directions. To host Flash video at your site, you’ll also need to update your webserver’s MIME types to include the flv extension.

The best piece of software I encountered on this trek was Camtasia. It is not a free program but they do offer a fully functional trial version for 30 days. Camtasia is primarily a screen capture program (used to produce screencasts) but I found it does so much more.

Here are just a few highlights:

  • edit and trim your video
  • add zooms, pans and transitions
  • add a second audio track
  • insert captions and overlays
  • export to a wide variety of formats

Camtasia was easy to use and provided timeline style editing. After I finished editing the video, I was able to produce a Flash version and an iPod friendly version in just one step.

There is something weird about seeing your lesson on an iPod. What’s even weirder is seeing students use it!

The last step to any podcasting adventure is the most crucial—create the rss feed. Your media can not be called a podcast without it. The rss feed is a text file that contains specific information about your show and describes each episode. You update the feed each time you create a new episode. I used several templates as an example to make my feed. (examples: 1, 2, 3) If you want to be iTunes friendly, you’ll need to follow some of their special formatting rules. You’ll also want submit your feed to Apple so users can search for your podcast right inside iTunes.

Here is my final product. I welcome feedback, questions and comments.

No Time to Search—Try ChaCha

Dale

chacha Today, a student asked me if Florida had a sales tax. So I thought I’d put ChaCha to work. ChaCha is a new search engine that uses social searching.

As well as traditional algorithmic search, ChaCha offers the ability to have an on-site IM [chat] conversation with a “guide”, who will then go out and find the information for you. They’re launching with over 2500 guides, including college students and stay-at-home moms. What’s more, these users need to climb a hierarchy before they can get paid.

I typed my question into ChaCha’s and a guide began searching. When I came back they had the answer.

Give it a try . Enter a question and choose “Search with Guide.”

Change your Homepage

Dale

changehomepage Make any website your homepage. Change the homepage by:

  1. visiting the website that you want as your homepage
  2. drag the icon in front of the address over the house button on your toolbar
  3. click ‘Yes’ to approve the change

That’s it! Your done!

VLC Plays it All

Dale

vlc Sometimes I get video or sound clips that won’t play in Windows Media Player. To get around this, I use the VLC media player. The VLC media player “…is a free media player that supports a large number of multimedia formats…” without any special updates or other huddles.

You can download (not at my school) the player for just about any operating system (Windows, Mac, Linux, BeOS…); they even have a portable version of the player that can be downloaded and installed onto a removable USB flash drive.

Stop blocking teachers

Dale

I recently stumbled upon a story at the Science Friday website. It was an interesting article about a new plane design that hopes to produce aircrafts that are super-silent and even more fuel-efficient. As a physics teacher, I thought this audio program was worth sharing with my students. I was about to download the audio program when, much to my dismay, I was blocked by our schools’ filtering software.

This is not the first time my school has blocked something that was obviously educational. It is almost a weekly occurrence for me. Some days I’m persistent; I fill out the necessary form to request that the site is unblocked but persistence takes time. As we all know, time is a precious commodity in any teacher’s day. Some days I just give up.

Where do all these restrictions come from? Much of it is related to the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which was passed in 1998. While the intent of COPA was to protect students, it has taken the control from teachers and placed into the hands of your IT department. In my opinion, this matter is only getting worse. On July 27, 2006 the Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives. With the fears stirred up by horror stories about sites like MySpace.com, this bill may require school’s to prohibit access to websites that allow online profiles, social networking, chatting and other online collaboration.

At first this may sound fine – I don’t need to chat online at work! But consider the implications. Any site that allows chatting could be blocked. This means all discussion boards, forums, and comment sections can be prohibited. Any site that allows users to create an online profile could be blocked. That would include sites like the College Board’s AP Central or even NSTA’s SciLinks. Any site that allows users to create an online journal could be blocked. This will ban any blog such as ScienceBlogs. It was the need for collaboration among scientific researchers that spawned the invention of the Internet but now science teachers and students may be locked out of this opportunity to collaborate.
We hear reports about the digital divide in this nation that explains how inner city schools are at a disadvantage because they lack the funds to purchase adequate classroom technology. I believe that this is a problem, but I also think we are overlooking a more subtle issue. The fact is that we allow ourselves to be treated like children. The students’ Internet access is our Internet access. If a teacher’s access to emerging resources is continuously restricted, it is easy see how schools will always remain at the back of the line in regards to technology.

DOPA does allow exceptions to its restrictions if the content is for adult users or educational purposes. However, it doesn’t include language that requires schools to provide systems that differentiate an adult’s access from a student’s access. I understand that we need to protect our students and in some cases overprotect them but teachers are a different story. We have the degrees, licenses and experience that show we know what is appropriate for our classrooms. We should not have to grovel to our IT departments for permission to use a certain teaching method.

DOPA will eventually go before the Senate for approval. Please contact your Senators to express your concerns with DOPA. In the meantime, go bug your IT department about technology in your classroom—we’ve all earned the right to.