I’ve spent tonight putting together a presentation I have to give on Saturday for a group of Teacher-Librarians. It’s about the experiences I have had with Literature Circles and Digital Storytelling. I presented at last year’s ASLA conference in Adelaide and have been asked to give that presentation for the Melbourne audience I’ll be speaking to.
Things have changed for me in terms of presentation style since Adelaide. I’ve become a convert of Garr Reynold’s approaches to presentation and as a result have spent some time reworking the slides so that it is visual rather than text driven with bullet points. I’ve also had access to SlideRocket so have reworked the presentation using this new application. (Reading their blog suggests that the public beta release may be soon!)
SlideRocket continues to impress me. I’m loving what you can do with images. When you insert a picture you can upload from your computer or can select to upload from Flickr or Yahoo. If you choose Flickr you can select to use creative commons pictures. The pictures to select from load from within SlideRocket – far easier than moving out of the application to Flickr itself. You can easily scroll through options. When you find what you want you double click on the picture and it uploads to your slide. When you hover your mouse over the image the photo credit details appear. Brilliant! Acknowledgement for the creators is immediately apparant.
Each time I use it I discover more cool features. It doesn’t support wmv files so I’ve had to convert the files i’m using to flv format. I did this by uploading them to YouTube and then saving them as an flv using keepvid. Zamzar probably would have been faster, but i’ve never uploaded to YouTube before so have learnt something that will be useful in the process. Now when I get students to upload I’ll know what I’m doing. Always an asset to look knowledgeable!
When I’ve finished I’ll upload the presentation here so you can take a look. Not tonight – getting very late again!!
Lucacept - intercepting the Web 
Thanks for the lead…as more and more of our apps move online, and connectivity becomes more ubiquitous, the need to carry our documents around with us (and even our laptops for that matter!) will be minimized.
I continue to tell teachers not to worry about learning the technology, because it will change. It’s more and more about the increasingly web-based nature of information that will cause us to rethink how we teach and learn. This is another example of that shift in form.
Jeff
I’ve been hanging on since you started twittering about using SlideRocket to create the presentation. 😦 but still have wait just a little longer until you share.
Can’t wait to see the presentation Jenny. I am working with Grades 4 & 5 from August, and grade 5’s do Lit circles. Would love to see how it can be integrated with technology.
Hi Jenny
Thanks again for an inspiring presentation today! What a brilliant and powerful way for students to demonstrate their learning!! I just wish I had more than 3 computers in my LRC for the students to use for digital storytelling!
I came home after your session and downloaded Photo Story 3 and have added some pics and music and made a little movie! Like you on your initial attempt…I’m proud of my simple effort too, but I know that I’ve started the journey to develop some new skills! I ‘m going to set myself a goal to use Photo Story in my own teaching next term to hopefully engage my students in the literature units I plan to do with them.
I’m looking forward to seeing your SlideRocket presentation.
Enjoy a well earned rest…