Week 10 Film Identity

Halverson writes, “As a result, education researchers interested in giving all youth opportunities to acquire and use new media literacies must understand the specific learning processes at work across these different media spaces” (p. 2353). For those of you who are currently teaching, or have taught in the past, in what ways have you allowed your students to use new media in your classrooms? Have they worked with a wiki, developed a blog, or created a screencast? Have they engaged in digital storytelling, as the author discusses? How did you approach this in the classroom setting? Was this considered a “fun” extra, or part of a mandatory assignment? How did you go about assessing this project?


New Media literacies in the classroom often take place as a result of the instructor being competent and literate. Before introducing students to new media concepts, websites or idea, it is important that the teacher master the website first so a teaching can be thorough and successful. When I use new media in the classroom I often test out the program first as it is essential for me to guide students correctly in instruction and using the media correctly. It is also highly important for me to show the students the exemplar or final product resulting in using the media. Foe example, students this year, have explored with google classroom, blogspot, google docs, prezi and cacoo. The multi-media they engage in is used for a variety of reasons such as collaborating, composing well-crafted pieces, or even presenting. Halverson states “the ability to adopt alternative identities for the purpose of improvisation and discovery as one of the core media literacy skills is necessary for successful engagement in society". Students often feel engaged and take ownership with multimedia because they are able to share their perspective and their story to a wide variety of students as the author discusses. Story telling has given the opportunity for students to share and be involved in work.

I approach these assignments by creating a list of step by step instructions for students and also completing the list of step by step instructions visually to assure that students are completing the task with multiple resources for access. Normally, I consider multi media projects an assessment grade being that they are completing a common core standards and using multiple sources I assure that assignments are graded. It will assure that students are also taking their work seriously.

Week 9 Copy Right Blog Post 7

                                              Copyright Blog

    After watching several of the videos located on the five-minute film festival, my understanding of copy right is much clearer however there are still some underlying questions that the videos do not address. First and foremost, the video that allowed me understand how copy right is used, was the YouTube video with the animated puppets because it made it clear how owners to videos have the right to take down stolen videos. Although it was highly informative in assuring that viewers understand copyright laws and dispute claims, It did not inform the audience on how to give credit to copy right owners. The video was quite hilarious and appropriate for all ages in allowing the audience to understand the mere basics of copyright for YouTube videos. This video would be appropriate for a wide variety of users but it may not necessarily prevent audiences from avoiding copy right infringement and its entirety because it did not discusses mashups or taking parts of the video and how that works with copy right. The video was certainly successful in having the audience understand and keep these thoughts in their mind. I would have liked to see ways in which to avoid these fairly common mistakes to be added to the YouTube video.

Another video that caught my interest was Understanding "Fair Use" in a Digital World because it was a lesson that made copyright laws accessible to young students. Many of the students were provided videos and given an opportunity to discuss and evaluate whether the video was breaking the law or not. It allowed students to carefully understand and analyze some of features of the video and come together as a group to decide what was considered fair use and what was breaking the law. this video was effective for educators in trying to help students become aware of fair use and copy right laws however it would be relatively difficult for other audiences to relate to the video.

I decided to read "The Educator's Guide to Copyright and Fair Use" article because as teachers we often copyright work without realizing it. If we do copyright work, teachers often justify themselves and copyright for the purpose of teaching others. I found that even photos must be copyrighted or referenced when using material. The article gave an example of students using photos and songs on a multimedia course; those photos and songs must be referenced or permission is needed. The article was highly informative; personally I believe it is relatively difficult to find the vendor and write a proposal to ask for permission to use a photo or website. As teachers, we create lesson plans on a day to day basis often adjusting our lesson on student progress. I find it impractical to wait for permission from the vendor to use their resources. This may take months to obtain permission. I think it would be appropriate to reference the site and photos.

References 

"The Educator's Guide to Copyright and Fair Use"

http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/curr280.shtml

Understanding "Fair Use" in a Digital World

YouTube Copyright Basics

Week 8 MMP Update #1

I created a screen-cast of some necessary and helpful changes I made for the MMP project. These change are reflective of the self assessment. To thoughtfully understand my project, please join my students by viewing the blog I created for them. Americandreamunit.blogspot.com 

Click On this Link Sceencast