Tag: Edcanvas

Learning

Adobe Voice

Sonya terBorg

In addition to the workshop on Building a PLN, I am also leading a workshop on using Adobe Voice in the classroom as a tool for students to use their voice to tell their story.

‘Story’ doesn’t just mean fairytale.  It could include:

  • reflection on a book they have read
  • description of the theme or characters in their books
  • explanation of how something happened in history
  • description of a person, place, or thing
  • personal narration of their own learning journey
  • a guessing game about themselves using their voice and images of importance to them
  • a summary of their learning within a unit
  • a weekly check-in in which they reflect on goals they have set themselves
  • recording their voice in a foreign language as they describe images
  • timelines of events in history
  • narration from the perspective of a character or iconic historical figure

The options are virtually endless!

I have been using Voice with students from EC5/6 (5 and 6 year olds) to Grade 4 students (9-10 year olds) and all have been really successful in making powerful presentations.

If you are unfamiliar with Voice, I would highly recommend giving it a go.  It is a free iPad app, and it is beautifully designed with loads of functionality.

In the spirit of sharing new tools,  I have created an Adobe Voice ‘lesson’ using Blendspace.  This used to be known as EdCanvas and I posted about it last year. It can, in it’s most basic form, be a place to store content related to a lesson or unit – videos, websites, images, documents.  Dig a bit deeper and you will see that once you create a lesson, you can share it with a class of students (student and teacher accounts are free).  Students can give the content you post a ‘thumbs up’ or they can add comments about their understanding (or lack thereof).

Click on the image below to go to my Blendspace Lesson on Adobe Voice:

Screen Shot 2014-11-18 at 21.57.50

21st Century, Innovation, Internet

Google Apps for Education: EDCANVAS

Sonya terBorg

This morning I was taking a look through Google Apps for Education.  Here is one I thought was pretty interesting and worth sharing:

EDCANVAS

If you are familiar with Padlet (formerly known as Wallwisher), this is fairly similar. It is a place for you to store your research on a particular topic.  Sources of information can come from: your Google Drive (documents you have saved), YouTube, Flickr, Dropbox, Google Images and Searches, specific web addresses, files uploaded from your computer, and previously bookmarked links. Basically, anywhere! When you find the resource you want, simply drag and drop to your canvas, add a description of the resource and move on to adding more.

Sign-up is through your google account – which all my students have – so is seamless and easy, and upon signing up you are invited to watch a 30 second video explaining how it works.  I would recommend watching as it really is 30 seconds and it really will answer any questions you might have.

Once created, you have options for sharing your Canvas publicly, sharing it with select people, or keeping it private.  You can email, tweet, facebook or embed your canvas – or even share via QR code. My only complaint is that the embed code doesn’t appear to work with WordPress (grrr).

In addition to simply being a place to store resources, you can play your canvas to share your work with others.  Videos you have placed on the canvas will play within your presentation, documents will load up from your Google drive, websites will open and can be navigated on screen within the presentation before moving on to the next part of your canvas. I find there is a slightly higher quality to adding downloaded documents as opposed to uploading from your Google Drive, but that might just be me.

Here is my first canvas: Passion

For further information, check out the ABOUT EDCANVAS GUIDE