Just Jarah…

Well, I just finished my Internet Scavenger Hunt, and it was actually really fun:) I decided to base the hunt around a high school English lesson on Edgar Allan Poe.  I happen to love Poe’s work, and I think that he was a really odd kind of guy (which usually makes for extrordinary literature).  Plus, I remember in high school, I was always super excited to read Poe’s work because it’s basically like having Halloween every day of the year–he’s pretty creepy.  Anyways, I tried to find trivia-type questions that involved Poe, but also related to pop-culture.  I actually learned a few new things about Poe myself!  I used a podcast for my instructions because I just wasn’t ready to take the leap into the world of webcasting–but don’t worry, I will soon enough.  I incorporated twenty-three Poe-related questions, each with a link to the site where the answer could be found.  For my emerging technology incorporation, I used a video from youtube that was actually really, really interesting.  It’s only five or six minutes, and contains the answers to three of the scavenger hunt questions.  I think the video is my favorite part of the assignment.  It’s just really cool and insightful.  It teaches a few things about Poe that most people don’t already know, and that they will likely find intriguing.  So, check out my Internet Scavenger Hunt today!

So, check this out!  This week, I decided to explore Gabcast for my emerging technologies research.  I thought you might like to see (or should I say HEAR) first-hand, just what Gabcast can do for you!  Click the link below to listen to this blog post…

click here

So I guess you could call this “Part 2 of Picasa2″.  I almost forgot to answer the following reflection questions regarding my thoughts about Picasa2 in terms of its educational usage…

How would you implement the technology application (Picasa2) in your educational setting? Well, as I’ve mentioned before, I am not currently working in a classroom, but I hope to be teaching either English or Speech sometime in the near future.  With that in mind, I think that there are many ways that I could use Picasa2.  I was thinking that a really cool way to incorporate it in a Speech class would be to first introduce it to students, then have them create a slide show to use as a visual aid in a Speech.  Forget the old-school poster board visuals.  We could take visual aids to a whole new level!  How cool would it be to actually show a slide show of, say, vacation pictures, while giving an informative speech titled “What I did Over Spring Break”?  The possibilities are endless, as most teenagers now have their own digital cameras, which are jam-packed with pics of the things that interest them.

What issues may arise? And, how could I work around those issues? Obviously, there could be content issues.  I definitely wouldn’t want inappropriate pictures showing up on a big screen in my classroom!  I think a reasonable solution would be to require that students get clearance of all pics that they plan on using.  I would personally have to “sign off” on each student’s plans.  Another issue could be that maybe not all students have personal use of a digital camera, computers, etc.  Hopefully, the school would be well-equipped with tools that could be checked out on a loan basis, but if not, then this assignment could get tricky.  I would certainly be willing to check into local libraries or other places that might lend out equipment for free.  If no equipment is available, the use of this program could be optional.  I think the key here is to try everything in my power to acquire the needed resources, which I’m willing to do.

Does anyone have any other suggestions for me?  What are some other ways that I could use Picasa2?