Creatively Distracted
Creatively Distracted
Similar to Microsoft Word, Google apps support the creation of templates for documents with particular pre-formatted layout and style requirements. Templates are a simple–often overlooked–tool for saving time by eliminating the repetitive processes of formatting and layout. Templates help reduce cognitive overhead by allowing users to focus on creating content.
How do you follow news online? We have so much access to information we can’t possibly read it all. Do you remember the episode of "I Love Lucy" where Lucy works at a candy factory? She has to wrap all the chocolate coming down the belt but it keeps moving faster and faster. The pace of news today can feel like this.
Have you noticed Google has been growing their list of Chrome-related products? The names are similar but the features are notably different. I was losing track of this growing Chrome universe. This article is an attempt to explain each tool and how you could use it in a classroom.
Have you been playing Pokemon Go lately? You have probably heard about it if you haven’t actually tried it out for yourself. Apart from cute Pokemons, one of the reasons this game is sensational is because it involves Augmented Reality (AR), which is a digital layer that can be seen on top of the real world through your mobile device, which is super fun.
There may be times you need to explain concepts that are visual in nature, for which you might want to annotate or diagram ideas for your students who are not physically in the room with you. This can be the case, for instance, if you are teaching an elearning course or if you are using a flipped classroom model in your class.
PopcornMaker is a free to use, drag and drop video editor that makes mashup-making easy, even with multiple types of media. This is no ordinary video editor. It goes beyond basic edits, enabling creators to augment video and audio files by layering media resources on top of the timeline.
Many of us use video in our classes, but sometimes we forget that video is a media format that is not as equally accessible to all viewers. Viewers who are hearing impaired will not be able to hear the voices, music, or background audio we include in our video. It is our responsibility to take steps to ensure that we make video content accessible for as many of our viewers as possible.
Prezi separates itself from conventional presentation platforms by breaking free of the linear nature of slides. That being said, how do we effectively take advantage of its unique capabilities? One of Prezi’s greatest features is the way in which it presents multimedia content. It enables presenters to guide viewers through images, text, video, and audio media in a way that highlights the relationships between the information and ideas presented.
Creating an interactive timeline can provide perspective on how a topic has evolved, and how events occurred along the way. By using a Google Spreadsheet template and resources on the website,Timeline JS, you (or your students) can quickly create a multimedia-rich timeline.
Augmented Reality (AR) has been mentioned in the last couple years’ Horizon Reports for Higher Education as one of the latest upcoming technologies for education. You may have heard of new wearable technologies such as Google Glass that will bring AR to the masses in the near future.