Fall 2006

In This Edition

Announcements

Resources

Other Notes

New Multimedia Resource Center Web Site

Turf Wars

Using Podcast to Deliver Curriculum

Announcements

Get Rendered is a Colorado high school 2D & 3D animation showcase. High school students from all over Colorado can submit an individual or a team animation to be judged and awarded by industry professionals. On Monday, May 15th, 2006 at 8:00 am, the 2006 theme will be announced. Any student interested must register their team by November 1st, 2006 or late registration by February 1st, 2007 (late fee), and then all completed entries must be received by 3:00 pm on April 21st, 2007. The Get Rendered Showcase will be Saturday, May 12th, 2007 from 6 ­ 9pm at Smoky Hill High School in Denver, CO. For more information go to WWW.GetRendered.ORG

Resources

With each edition of the Multimedia Resource Center's Newsletter, we will provide teaching / learning resources. These will be on the Multi- media Resource Center web site but are noted in this publication to give each more attention.

One of the better and more complete resource site is EMC 546 Using Technology in Presentations. This site was created by Dr. Alice A. Christie, Professor at Arizona State University, for her education classes.

I always try to use video examples for my students. Adobe use to have great examples which were created by college students but I am unable to find any examples on their site lately. Good examples, that can be used for instruction, can be found on the CMF Podcasts. You must have iTunes installed to download this podcast.

Other Notes

Lab Top Battery Recall

Presently, three computer companies — Apple Computer, Dell and HP —are recalling many of their lap tops because the batteries may catch fire. Other computer companies will soon follow suite. If you own a lap top, you should continually go to the web site to check if your lap top battery has been recalled.

Multimedia Resource Center
E-Notes. . . . . October 2006

This is the first edition of the Multimedia Resource Center E-notes. E-notes will be published twice yearly. If you would like to contribute materials or projects to either this newsletter or to the web site. go to Submission and follow the directions. It is hoped you enjoyed reading this issue. The next issue will be in the Spring semester of 2007. Back issues of this newsletter will be placed on the Multimedia Resource Center Web site.

2006-2008
Ron Bruner of the Multimedia Resource Center. Rights reserved.

New Multimedia Resource Center Web Site

The Multimedia Resource Center is now open for business. This is a new teaching and learning resource center for both teachers and students. At www.MmResourceCenter.org, this site is small but will grow into a major resource for those who would like to use media in education or those who teach media education.

Presently, the site has resources and tutorials on CD / DVD development, electronic slide presentation, podcasting and OuickTime VR. The next materials which will be added are on e-books. Other tutorials will be added as they are produced.

The Multimedia Resource Center will also endeavor to be a repository for best projects. Ideas, concepts and especially new and exciting projects will be placed on the site to be shared with other educators. If you would like to submit materials for the site, go to Submission and follow the directions.

Visit the site often to see and use the new materials!

Turf Wars

The "Homies" are still fighting their little turf war, and quite frankly, it's time that they get over themselves! When Apple (Mac) first began to become a viable computer, the differences in file formats were amusing. For a time, I supported myself converting files from Mac to PC and vice versa. As the computer became more important, amusement turned to frustration. Now that the computer is one of the major tools for accessing the "Information Highway," frustration has turned to absurdity.

Education has really embraced the Apple podcast as a major new method for exchanging information and delivering curriculum. Duke University, Stanford University and University of Michigan Medical School are among a growing number of universities, colleges and public schools which are podcasting their curricular materials. Query a search engine for any academic subject matter and add the term podcast to the title (eg. American History podcast). There are 10,800,000 hits. If you query World History there are 25,000,000. The number of hits are hugh!

Now, begin to download and play some of these podcasts. Notice anything? The vast majority of the podcasts are audio because Mp3 sound will play on all operating platforms. What ever happened to the iPod for video and vidcast? Well—! Video podcasts are in an Mp4 file format and for nearly a year Mp4s would not play on a PC. Before Quicktime 7, Apple chose not to put the Mp4 codec in QuickTime for the PC. So if an educator wanted to create educational materials that could be used on multiple platforms, it is and has been audio!

A short time ago, a friend sent me an e-book (electronic book) that he had published. It was in a .lit format. I was totally unacquainted with the format, so I surfed the web to find and download a reader that I could use on my Mac. To my surprise, this is a preferential Microsoft file format and no reader exists for the Mac. Microsoft has not and does not plan on releasing Microsoft Reader for other operating systems. Here’s a posting from the Microsoft Reader FAQ:

Question: "Will there be versions of Microsoft Reader for the Macintosh, Palm, or Linux operating systems?

Answer: "We have not announced plans to develop versions of Microsoft Reader for other platforms at this time."

These turf wars have to stop! If Apple wants the Mp4 to be the standard for videos on the small hand held devices the codecs should be available for all platforms from the very start. If Microsoft is to be a major player in e-books, then the readers should be available for all operating systems. If these two corporations do not want to end these turf wars and provide the leadership in education, they should step aside and allow others to provide the leadership. The educational value of the materials in podcast or e-books which can be downloaded from the internet is more important than either Apple or Microsoft.

Our students, the Millennials, are technically savvy, always connected and great users of the information around them. Any group, company or corporation that continually plays little unnecessary turf games with this information needs to be told that they are interfering with the education of our students. As educators, we cannot sit on the sidelines, we must speak and act for our students. We need to loudly shout in the same way that Howard Beale shouted in the movie Network, "I'm mad as he _ _, and I'm not going to take it anymore!!!"

I you would like to express your feelings or frustration to either Apple or Microsoft, Click and follow the directions.

Using Podcast to Deliver Curriculum

Every so often, a technology comes along that could actually change the pedagogy of the modern classroom — the podcast is such a technology. I not necessarily referring to materials created for only Apple's small hand held device, I am referring to a small audio Mp3 file which can be published and played on any Mp3 player or on a computer.

The ability to create audio files for the classroom is not new, the cassette recorder was the first really portable audio device used in the classroom. Although some educators did do audio files, it did not really catch-on because publication and distribution was cumbersome. Today's Mp3 file can be recorded, edited, published and distributed over the World Wide Web in a very short time.

Duke University, Stanford University and the University of Michigan, to name a few, are already recording faculty lectures for conversion to podcasts. There are a very few secondary schools that are also beginning to explore the uses of podcast. WarrenTech, a technical high school in Jefferson County Colorado, is one of these secondary schools.

Three programs— Hospitality & Tourism, Med Prep and International Business— are going to podcast part of their curriculum. For more information on the creation of podcasts go to Podcast.