Monday, April 8, 2013

Instagram

I've recently been encouraged by my students use Instragram in the classroom.  Initially, it had all the hallmarks of a classic time-wasting social media app, but as I've come to use it more, I'm learning it may have some educational value to it.  Following my students' suggestions, I initially hosted a photo contest simply stating that submissions (marked with #7econtest) had to be original.

What I Learned:

  • Because Instragram is a public place, anyone had the ability to submit photos.  As such, I had a few photos submitted from people outside our class.
  • Students actually had a pretty good eye for good photographs. I will further instruct them on principles of photography, but--whether they know it or not--they do already have a bit of an eye for good images.
  • Tools like Instaport make collecting and downloading the hashtagged images really easy.
  • This activity was really fun.  Students were engaged and were curious as to when the next one would be.

Contest Rules

Winning Photo.  Courtesy: LSCO (as voted by my class).

There is no shortage of great ideas out there:


Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Audacity

Audacity has long been an open-source software package which can be used across platforms.  It boasts numerous audio-editing capabilities.  Much has been written about its use in education including Audacity's own education wiki.

Education:


Tutorials:

Resources: