Thursday, June 30, 2011

Create Talking Images

This post is an extension of the last post I made where you can attach sounds or speech to shapes.  In this activity you can drawing shapes onto an image and then making the shapes transparent.  This idea was inspired by acolleaue of mine and her great site on using ICT in the Early Phase . 
Ways to apply to learning are:


• Describing the words in a tag cloud

• Describing aspects of an artwork

• Discuss aspects of a photo

• Add music to reflect the mood in an image

• Eye spy photos

To start insert an image into PowerPoint.  Draw a shape over an area of the image.  This can be done by selecting a shape or freeform shape.  Attach the sounds to the shapes as explained in the last post.


Now to make the shapes transparent,  right click the shape and select Foramt Shape.


Move the transparency bar to 100%


Select Line Color and select No Line and your shape will now be transparent.

 
Now you cannot see the shape on top of your image.  To test go to slideshow and move your mouse over the screen, when you click you should hear the sound.

Create Interactive Multimodal Content

Recently I was working with Asian Language teachers who loved learning about creating interactive content by adding speech to shapes in PowerPoint. By combining images, text and sound you are able to create rich multimodal content.

First you create your slides with images or shapes.

Decide what you want to record. Open Audacity and click on the record button and speak to record your voice, click on stop when finished (headset with a microphone is best for this).


Select File – Export as WAV

Go back to your PowerPoint slide, click on the shape you want to attach sound to and select the Insert tab and Action.

If 2003 version right click the shape you want to attach sound to and select Action Setting.



Select Play Sound and scroll down to Other Sound.  Select the sound you recorded in Audacity.  You can test if it worked by viewing as slideshow. When you move your mouse over the shape and click, you should hear your recording.


This activity can be created by the teacher or students can apply their learning by creating their own.


Here are a few examples of how this process can be used:

• a talking ebook

• a talking map

• a talking timeline

• add sounds to music notes

• add music to images

• add avatars and create talking characters

• add voice to photos

• flash cards

• add voices to speech bubbles in comics

• learning languages

• attach speech to images and students give description

• students identify aspects of diagrams or cycles





Saturday, June 18, 2011

Creating Digital Multimodal Texts



With the introduction of the Australian Curriculum, there is an emphasis on the use of Multimodal Text in English. ICT offers a great range of tools to allow students to create digital multimodal texts, such as comics, animations, digital storytelling, video & audio, ebooks, poster & cover design and game design .


What are multimodal texts?

A text may be defined as multimodal when it combines two or more semiotic systems. There are five semiotic systems in total:

1. Linguistic: comprising aspects such as vocabulary, generic structure and the grammar of oral and written language

2. Visual: comprising aspects such as colour, vectors and viewpoint in still and moving images

3. Audio: comprising aspects such as volume, pitch and rhythm of music and sound effects

4. Gestural: comprising aspects such as movement, speed and stillness in facial expression and body language

5. Spatial: comprising aspects such as proximity, direction, position of layout and organisation of objects in space.

Multimodal texts can be delivered via different media or technologies. They may be live, paper, or digital.

(Bull and Anstey, 2010)








Photostory 3, Windows Movie Maker, Audacity, Soungle, Free Sound Project






Use software usch as powerpoint, publisher, paint.net or photoshop


Tag Cloud: Wordle, Tagxedo



Anstey, M. & Bull, G. (2010) Helping teachers to explore multimodal texts. Curriculum Leadership, 8 (16)



Create an eBook using free software

A colleague of mine is famous for his fabulous workshops where he shows teachers how to create ebooks using Flip Flash Album free.  So I thought I would share some information about this application.  It is a free software you can download.  Students can add images, text and flash animations to create an interesting ebook.  This is great for storytelling, presenting a research task, the alphabet, learning a language, instructional manual, art portfolio, digital photo album, etc.  The album can be exported as a flash file.


You can choose the size and template.  Add an image one at a time or select a folder of images.



Select one of the pages and add text and flash animation


Wednesday, June 08, 2011

Comix - Free Online Comic Creator

I love looking for new ways students can create comics. A colleague of mine passed on a link to me called Comix. It is described as a free preschool online game. It is very easy to use with simple click and drag on the page functions.


The site offers a range of images students can choose from. In the Draw section ,there are text options with speech bubbles or text box. You easily change the size of the cell and add more. Students can also draw and upload their own images. The great thing about this site is you don’t need to register and you can save the image as a jpeg when click on Publish. (It asks for author's name but you don't need to fill it out to save)

Students can use this site for many purposes:


  • Creating a multimodal text
  • As inspiration for a story
  • To interpret a story
  • Practice spelling words
  • Create a sequence
  • Create Big, Bigger, Biggest images
  • A poster