More fun with photobooth

Solana loves it-- can see the possibilities for creative writing with students...

Photobooth: another reason why schools should use Macs

I'm lucky to be working with school that has a Mac laptop cart. A technology teacher showed me how he's using Photobooth with students: you basically use your Mac to snap an image of yourself or make a short movie. You can really play around with your photo images using different effects. I liked an image that a student created of himself in a digital story using an effect called "Pop Art," so I decided to make one at the office with Eileen's help: wow! So cool! Looks like an album cover! Eileen also showed me how to make a movie using Photobooth, which I had seen on other blogs:


So easy and versatile-- so many classroom uses!!! This is elementary to Mac users, but as a recent convert I continue to be blown away.

Teachers creating digital stories

At one school, I'm working with middle school teachers of special education to create our own short digital stories as a way of modelling for students as well as familiarizing ourselves with this form of communication. Here are a few short examples teachers created their first time using IMovie. The first, "Labrador Retriever" by Sherilynn Saporito, is an example of how you could use Imovie, powerpoint, Moviemaker, photostory or another program to have students write about content in a science or social studies course. The second, "Dallas" by Katrina Hammerl, is one I'm most interested in: telling a personal story using music, words and images.

Imovie rules

I'm experimenting with digital stories using Imovie with a group of middle school teachers. I can't even begin to describe how much better Imovie is than Windows Moviemaker: yet another example of how Macs are superior. This is a quick short I created with some flip cam summer footage (mostly filmed by Solana-- more shaky camera action). (Thanks, Eileen!!)