Gomeric Hill

A Tribute To My Dad

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 08:54:10 PST

My father died of pancreatic cancer in May 2007 and today would have been his 66th birthday. He had had two previous battles with cancer and when he started feeling badly earlier that year, he thought he was just having some gastrointestinal problems. Because of his prior health history we assumed he would be diagnosed with Stage 4 melanoma and were dismayed to hear that it was indeed cancer of the pancreas - the grand daddy of cancers. He received his diagnosis on April 6 and passed away on the evening of May 24 – just a mere 7 weeks. I still miss him everyday!

Richard Stewart Humphrey was born in Utica, New York on March 10, 1944 to David and Katherine Humphrey. He was the third child of seven having an older brother, David, and older sister, Margaret and three younger brothers, Robert, Ronald and Donald and a younger sister, Katherine. He graduated from Whitesboro Central High School and attended Cornell University where he earned a Master’s in Metallurgical Engineering. He joined ROTC in college because he wanted to be an Army officer. He married my mother, Lucretia Verrilli, when he was a senior in college and served a tour in Vietnam before leaving the Army with rank of captain. He loved to snow ski and he stayed very active until he got too sick. His favorite color was green. He was known for telling jokes and throughout the years, my mother, sisters and I often became the “straight man” for the unsuspecting victim. He was able to find humor and weave a joke into so many situations. It was truly a gift! He was an avid fly fisherman and took all four of his grandchildren, Maria, Caper, Eva and Greta, trout fishing at one time or another. Since his death, another grandson, Augie, has been born. Unfortunately, little Augie will not know the joy of fishing with Grandpa. He was a wonderful father and grandfather and it is hard to summarize someone’s life in a few paragraphs. I set up a wiki right after he died as a place to collect some of our important stories and memories.

My husband, daughter and I were with my Dad the weekend of his diagnosis. I asked him to wear an mp3 recorder around his neck and had thought I would have more time than just that weekend to record his voice. But, he began chemotherapy the following week and faded so quickly. I have about 23 hours of audio files that are so precious because it is his stories and his voice that I often miss.

We planned a memorial celebration of my Dad’s life in October of 2007. I scanned photographs and using some of his favorite music, produced a digital movie using Photostory 3. Recently, I showed the video to a friend who encouraged me to share the video publicly. The process of gathering and organizing the pictures and music and creating the video took me well over 60 hours. I cried a lot, but feel it was an task worth doing. It was my tribute. My daughter wanted to talk about her grandfather at the memorial, but was afraid she would be too upset. So we wrote an introduction she recorded for the video. The entire video is 20 minutes long and also includes my daughter reading the following email my father sent shortly after he found out he was ill:

In 1981, when the doctor told us that he must discontinue my chemotherapy for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma because of complications, we were offered the risky option of radiation therapy, with a small chance of success, a certain chance of extreme suffering, and an 85 percent chance of developing leukemia. I wanted to see my daughters graduate from college and get stated in life, so we took the treatments and hoped for a few more years of acceptable health and were rewarded with twelve truly great years. I was starting to believe I was the luckiest man alive!

In 1993, when my second bout with melanoma started, the oncologists refused to take a chance with me, (because of my previous problems with chemo), so we were offered surgery, with the (almost) certainty that the melanoma would return somewhere, sometime. I wanted to see my daughters get settled and give us beautiful, talented grandchildren, so we traded my movie-star looks for fourteen more wonderful years and all of the great blessings, including Maria, Caper, Eva, Greta, and Kandace's expected. As bonuses, I've had the pleasure of knowing all of the other additions to the family, and the luxury of traveling to enjoy more great quality time with many of them and more often than I could have dreamed. I was convinced I was the luckiest man alive!

Friday last, we learned that I have been diagnosed with advanced cancer of the pancreas (aden carcinoma), and I will start chemotherapy on Tuesday. The symptoms came on fast and furious, normal for this cancer, with no real prior warning. This is the biggest gun of cancers, with the toughest odds yet, and not a battle I look forward to, but I've been so impossibly lucky so far that I have fewer fears and regrets than some might expect. You can find my prognosis on many websites, but I suggest not looking. We did find one website that states it is the #1 cause of Agent Orange deaths among Viet Nam vets, reinforcing my feeling about all of my maladies.

For those family members who were contemplating the June Reunion, we can only offer some premature thoughts. The chemo should last about seven weeks (May 22), and only God can tell you how a big party in June will sound by then. I suggest keeping the dates in mind, and if we have to cancel, using the time to celebrate something else worthwhile. We put the house on the market yesterday, and though the odds of closing, let alone selling it by then, are low, we'd hate to have to host you in a campground somewhere. Send me more ideas if you have them, please. Maybe a Farewell Tour if the health improves and holds out.

Of course, our longstanding invitation to visit any other time is still open, and amplified. Anyone we missed before has an invitation now. We can't guarantee a perfect time, but the beauty and solitude of our home can be attested to by those who have been here.

Please pass these thoughts along to anyone we missed, and pray or keep your fingers crossed or make any effort for us that you may feel could be helpful, including offering secret cures and remedies. I'm already consuming mass quantities of Tibetan Goji Berry juice, green tea, Indian dye, black walnuts, wild blueberries, and even some medicines from my doctors.

I have tried to make this truthful, hopeful but realistic, and not too morbid, and hope it comes across that way.

Love and Peace,

Dick and Lu

The Luckiest Man Alive from Karen Montgomery on Vimeo.

We were so lucky to have him in our lives, albeit for far too short a time. I will continue to love and miss him always. Happy Birthday, Dad!

Blogger Editing Issue Solved with Google Chrome

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 09:45:32 PST

Chocolate Tools, originally uploaded by JanneM.

I’m the first to admit that I do not post to this blog as often as I should or would like. When I was posting this past Monday, my daughter noticed the New Moon countdown widget in the left sidebar. I signed in and selected the layout tab so I could remove the widget, but found when I clicked edit nothing happened. I could not edit any of the widgets, text, feeds, HTML/Java script, etc. in the sidebar or any of the page elements. I closed my browser, opened again, but it was the same result. I tried clicking the little “screwdriver and wrench” edit icon but still could not edit anything.

After searching through the Blogger help and not finding a solution, my next step was to search for help online searching for “not able to edit Blogger page elements.” I found information in several help forums that mentioned the problem existed when using Firefox 3.6 and using Google chrome solved the problem. I downloaded Google chrome and voila! my editing issues with Blogger were solved.

I have been a Firefox fan for about 3 years, but I am quickly becoming a Google chrome enthusiast. I am just starting to explore the Google chrome extensions like Fittr Flickr and Blog This! (by Google). I will write more on that soon.

You Are Not A Beginner Unless You Have Begun

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 17:12:39 PST

Mount Hood, originally uploaded by klmontgomery.

If you have yet to put on snow skis, are you a beginning skier? When a beginning skier decides to take lessons to learn to ski, their skiing ability needs to be determined in order to place them in a class at the appropriate level. Skiing ability is based on a scale of ability levels from Level 1 to Level 9. In general, you might assume, Levels 1-3 are for beginners, Levels 4-6 are for intermediate skiers and Levels 7-9 are for advanced skiers. There is no Level 0. In order to be a beginner, you have to put on skis. You need to learn how to fasten your ski boots, step into your bindings and get your balance before you really begin. Beginner lessons focus on how to gain control, go at an easy pace and most importantly how to stop. Even after mastering these simple skills you are still very much a beginner, but well on your way! Whether you are four years old or 28 years old, if you just sit in the lodge drinking hot chocolate and watching the bustle on the mountain you are not a beginner, but an observer.

Over the past few years, it has often occurred to me when I am working with educators that when it comes to the use of technology by teachers and administrators we have to start redefining beginner. The Internet is loaded with websites dedicated to computer literacy for both students and adults. In computer classes everywhere, schools focus on computer literacy skills for students that include both fundamental hardware and software knowledge.

Computers are commonplace in our society and have been for a very long time. Can teachers be expected to use online applications and resources with their students if they are not even "computer literate" and comfortable with basic computer skills and using web-based applications? Are you a beginner if you cannot attached a document to an e-mail, save a file and find it later, tab browse or work in multiple browser windows, copy and paste or sign up for an account online? Is it a beginner or an intermediate user that can download photos to a computer from their camera? Should a beginner know how to save to a flash drive or the desktop? What about administrators who only read their e-mail from the hard copy printed by their secretary? I would argue that knowing how to carry out these activities are analogous to strapping on the skis before you start your first lesson. Never mind integrating the technology into the curriculum if the beginners have not learned how to accomplish basic tasks.

Instruction on how to use blogs, wikis, photo sharing, VoiceThread and social bookmarking with students inherently starts at an intermediate level. But is signing in to your Yahoo! account an intermediate skill? Teachers who do not use online applications personally will certainly struggle with using them for the first time in an in-service or workshop setting. Frustration is imminent in these situations when some participants lag behind. It frustrates the lagging participant and other participants and often the instructor. It is frequently not the function or use of the online resource that creates this frustration but the lack of familiarity with using the computer.

Just like in snow skiing, several levels of beginners are going to exist. There is a range of proficiencies and abilities at every level, but if you are at Level 0, you are not yet a beginner. As part of our Powerful Ingredients for Blended Learning (PI4BL) framework, Wes Fryer and I have divided our levels of use into four levels: awareness, personal use, adoption and invention. At Level 1, awareness, "PI4BL educators may comment on a blog or forum post created in the Powerful Ingredients Learning Community" We feel a beginner be able to comment on a blog post written by someone else. Setting up their own blog comes at the personal use level and using a blog with students at Level 3.

So how do you define beginner? Is a beginner someone who observes and watches others engaged in an activity? Is a beginner someone who knows about goings-on, but doesn’t actually participate? Is a beginner someone who is aware that technology exists but is not engaged in exploring and using technology? Are you really a beginner if you haven’t yet begun? Would love you to contribute your thoughts.

Documenting NECC 2009 with the New VoiceThread Mobile Application

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:26:33 PDT

It took something really exciting to get me to blog about it…

On Sunday, June 28, from 8:30-11:30 a.m., I am presenting a pre-conference workshop at NECC in Washington, DC on “Using VoiceThread and a Camera to Track Student Learning.” The 19 participants are in for a treat as I will be sharing the new VoiceThread Mobile Application. I have been talking (begging for) with Ben Papell and Steve Muth, co-founders of VoiceThread, about a mobile VoiceThread application and knew they have had something in development for quite awhile. I spoke with Ben Papell, co-founder of VoiceThread, earlier this evening and he provided me with the details on the brand new application, permission to blog about it and the okay to share with my pre-conference attendees. Although it is still in “Alpha,” and there are a few bugs, the new application has some amazing possibilities and allows VoiceThread users the ability to create Threads on-the-fly with a cell phone camera. My conversation with Ben and my initial testing of the application has me really excited about sharing and using it. This is something I have been looking forward to and think that I will make more Threads this way than with my computer.

VT Presentation, originally uploaded by klmontgomery.

My family and I are leaving tomorrow night and driving to Washington, DC. I have embedded a Thread below that I started with my iPhone to track our trip before, during and after NECC. I am planning to upload all the photos and comments from my iPhone throughout our trip starting tomorrow night. I have made the Thread public, if you'd like to add a comment, please do. Of course, all comments are moderated:-)

My 2009 NECC Trip

In order to use the VoiceThread Mobile App you must have a VoiceThread account, a camera phone and a data plan that allows you to e-mail photos from your phone. The application is very simple to use. Send a photo from your cell phone via e-mail to the VoiceThread mobile e-mail address. The e-mail account you are sending from needs to be the same as the e-mail associated with your VoiceThread account. When the photo is received, you immediately receive an e-mail from VoiceThread that tells you, “Just reply to this email and we'll use the media you attached to create or add to a VoiceThread.” But that’s not all. You can also do some really neat things by adding some text to your reply message, like:

• Include your 10-digit US/CA phone number, e.g. 5555555555, and VoiceThread will call you for comments.

• Include "share" and VoiceThread will make it public and send you an email with a link that you can send to all your friends.

• Attach more files and VoiceThread will add those too.

• Add a title to your Thread by typing title:anythingyouwant, e.g. title:My 2009 NECC Trip" And if your title matches one of your current Threads, VoiceThread will just add your media to it.

• Add a text comment by typing comment:anythingyouwant, e.g. comment:Can you believe I ate that?"

• Here's an example of a reply e-mail that calls you for a comment, sends you a sharing link, and gives your Thread a title:
5555555555 share title:I can't believe how beautiful Washington DC is!"

That's it!

Once you have created a Thread, you can continue to add more photos from your cell phone by putting the title of the Thread in the subject line. The first photo you send becomes the first photo in the Thread, so if you embed a Thread, the last photo displayed will be the most recent addition. Photos can also be added from a computer like any other Thread. With my new iPhone, I am able to send multiple photos with the initial e-mail, thus creating mobile Threads with more than just one photo. At this point, only photos can be sent, but VoiceThread is still working on the entire mobile feature set and it is literally changing hour-by-hour. You won’t see the mobile application, yet, which is why I haven’t shared the e-mail address used to create a Thread from a cell phone. Those participating in my pre-con workshop will have an opportunity to try it. Be sure to stay tuned.

By the way, if you are interested in participating in the pre-conference workshop, you can still register onsite. There are 11 seats available. Attendees receive $25 worth of exports & are entered in a drawing for a school ($200 value) account.

Looking for a Few (Thousand) Good Photos

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 09:11:30 PDT

I have created a group on Flickr for sharing photos that students and teachers can use in VoiceThread and other applications.

How great would it be to have 1000’s of pictures in a group pool, search able by tag, that you felt confident you and your students have permission to share, remix and publish? That’s the goal.

Search by Creative Commons and the Creative Commons search on Flickr are terrific tools for finding Creative Commons licensed photos, but this group takes it a step further by having members give users kind of "carte blanche" to use their photos for educational purposes. Plus the group administrators are able to make sure all photos are G-rated. Group members will still expect attribution when their photos are used and users should make sure they give credit where credit is due.

If you have a Flick account and would like to share your "some rights reserved" photos, please join us on Creative Commons Licensed Photos for VoiceThread.

What Is Your School Planning For Earth Day?

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 08:32:52 PDT

The results of the latest Film on the Fly Pi Day challenge sponsored by KOCE-TV are in and the top three videos are:
Tied for First Place
1. "The Labyrinth: A Pi Day Cell Phone Film" by David Cosand and the Cosand Offspring

1. "Why We Need Pi" by Wesley Fryer and Children

Third Place
3. Pizza Pi During The Recession by yours truly.

Does your school plan activities surrounding Earth Day? Why not add the creation of cell phone videos to the events for 2009? The next Film on the Fly will be a two-day challenge, Monday-Tuesday, April 20-21 so the videos can be shared for Earth Day on April 22. Having the challenge during the week will provide a great opportunity for teachers and students to make videos at school. Start paving the way now with your administrators to allow students to bring and use their cell phones at school for the challenge days. Some persuasive arguments to use might include:

“Using cell phones and participating in FOTF may be the “motivating” factor to engage otherwise disengaged students who love using their cell phones,”
“FOTF is an opportunity for students to learn how to use their cell phones appropriately and professionally,”
“FOTF will provide a “real-life” opportunity to teach about copyright, content creation, protection of privacy and ethical use,”
“Participating in FOTF draws on student-based technology resources in a transformative fashion,”
“75-90% of our students own and are already “engaged” with using their cell phones in their everyday lives,”
“It is not about the “tool,” but the “engagement” and “motivation,”
“There is no cost to participate.”

FOTF is considering having the videos uploaded to TeacherTube, as well as YouTube, so they might be more easily viewed at school. If your school blocks TeacherTube, now is the time to get it on the white list for April.

If the obstacles are too great to participate at school, consider FOTF as a way to extend the school day by making use of spare time after school. Make it an optional or extra credit assignment which illustrates an authentic and engaging use of a technology with which students are already familiar.

Take the Earth Day FOTF Challenge with your students.

Pizza Pi

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 07:03:18 PDT

Okay, so my second Film On The Fly idea isn't quite so creative as my first and deviates from the prompt - a little. The Pi Day prompt was:

"Show how Pi determines the circumference or diameter of a pizza, carousel, Ferris Wheel or any circle near you."

On Thursday, I received the hint that circles would be requested for inclusion in the Film On The Fly Pi Day cell phone movies. I thought about all manner of circle by my house and decided that since the Pi Day challenge was on Saturday, I'd us the circles associated with my daughter's basketball game. Circles on the court, the ball, the lights, etc. But when I received the prompt we had already left the game - I did take some cell phone video - and were trying to decide where to have lunch.

The idea of pizza was in the story prompt and the diameter or circumference were to be shown, but I decided that during a recession it's a good idea to know which size pizza is the best value. I decided to show how pi can be used to calculate area and thus get the price per square inch for a 3-topping small, medium and large pizza.

You can view all the FOTF Pi Day videos on YouTube (search for "FOTFPI") or by joining the Film On The Fly Ning. If you join the the FOTF Ning you will also be able to rate the videos created for the Pi Day Challenge.

I want to thank the owners of Racanelli's in St. Peters, Missouri for letting me take cell phone video of the different sizes of pizza pans.

Now it's time to have cold pizza for breakfast!

Have Some Pi on the Fly

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 14:22:38 PDT

Pi Pie, originally uploaded by megpi.

Tomorrow is 3/14 or Pi Day. Great to have Pi after Friday the Thirteenth. Yesterday, I received an e-mail hint about tomorrow's Film on the Fly Challenge.

The Hint: Think about interesting structures, buildings or objects in your area that include the shape of a circle. (It is a Pi Day challenge, after all!) The story prompt you receive on Saturday will include a request to include one of these objects in your cell phone movie.

I'm on the look out for circles.

This will be my second attempt to create a Film On The Fly cell phone video. For the February 7 challenge there were 71 people signed up for the challenge and 10 submitted videos. I found out last week that my video "So That's Where It All Goes" tied for second place earning 4.5/5.0 stars! For Pi Day, 117 people have signed up to receive the story prompt and create a cell phone video.

For more information and to become a part of the growing Film On The Fly community check out the FOTF Ning. Even if cell phone video production isn't in your Pi Day plans, join the Ning and rate the videos!

Twitter Only! LOL!

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 11:38:31 PDT

I remember several years ago, when e-mail first reared it’s ugly head, a co-worker mentioned to me that she didn’t like to use e-mail because she was worried about people misunderstanding the “tone” of her communication. “E-mail is so impersonal and you can’t always be sure how someone meant something. I’d much rather talk to them on the phone or face-to-face.” Wonder if she uses Twitter? I think the widespread use of emoticons and LOL are part of an ongoing crusade to make certain our meaning is clear and not misinterpreted by our recipient. Or, maybe it’s to take the edge off what we really meant and keep the person from reacting unfavorably. If you write cryptically but add a “LOL,” you must be joking because you're laughing out loud. Better yet, forget the e-mail altogether and write all your messages with 140 characters or less and send them to several people at once being sure to include a tiny URL for those wanting more information or clarification. It's hard to find much hidden meaning in a couple of sentences ending with a ;-)

My Latest Favorite Apps for iPhone – Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 13:35:14 PST

Seven Enemy Polar Bears, originally uploaded by klmontgomery.

As I continue to explore new apps on my iPhone, I am striving to post about two types of apps each time: a game or fun app and one that is educational or increases productivity in some fashion. Also, I plan to highlight one free and one purchased app each time. We’ll see how it goes.

In Part 1 of My Latest Favorite Apps for iPhone, TapDefenese was in the game/fun category and i-Clickr for PowerPoint Remote was my educational/productivity app.

In Part 2, I am focusing on the Crazy Penguin Catapult game and Yummy. Crazy Penguin Catapult is one of the games offered by Digital Chocolate, Inc. There is a lite version of the game which allows you to get a taste of the first 6 levels of launching penguins in the air and knocking out polar bears to capture territories. The premium version of the game is $4.99 and gives you an additional 24 levels (30 in all) as well as second strategy game where you can command armies of penguins and capture polar bear territories. Most of the levels start with catapulting your penguins and getting them into position to take out the enemy polar bears. If you can catapult your penguins through the burning ring, they will be on fire and this helps burn through the ice when attacking the polar bears. In some levels, you catapult your penguins to collect items like candy, bananas and squid. At each level there is a minimum number of collected items or dead polar bears you must reach for a successful mission. If you don’t get 100%, you can keep replaying the mission for a better score. As you successfully master levels, you get to choose from upgrades or “power-ups” such as increasing the number of penguins from 6 to 8 to 11, more bounces to kill enemy polar bears, dynamite to help break the ice or the Ninja power-up which allows your penguin to direct a Ninja-like kick. The only criticism is that there are not enough levels for the $4.99. Maybe the will be more levels in a future update? I also found the game here.

Yummy is a free bookmark manager app for the iPhone that allows you to search you delicious bookmarks by date, tag(s) title or notes. Yummy also lets you add bookmarks to delicious and edit bookmarks right on your iPhone. There are some other interesting things you can do such as open a link in Saf ari, send a link by mail or by Twitterific (another awesome iPhone app). Download the Yummy from iTunes App Store and check out the great Yummy blog to get you started! By the way, I tweeted “Does anyone use yummy, delicious and safari to successfully add bookmarks to delicious from their iPhone. Looking for guidance.” so that I could start bookmarking from my iPhone and @sdarlington replied,

Now how cool is that?

My Latest Favorite Apps for iPhone – Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 15:52:47 PST

I have two new favorite apps for my iPhone – one free and one which I paid $9.99. The free app, and not a lite version, is TapDefense. TapDefense is a tower building strategy game. The object of the game is to keep demons, succubi, gremlins, firecats and other hellish creatures from traveling from the gates of Hell and entering the gates of Heaven. You have 20 lives or can let 19 foul creatures enter Heaven as you try to negotiate the best strategy for the 43 levels which get progressively harder as you advance. As you finish each level you earn gold based on number of kills you’ve made plus the amount of gold you have on account at the end of the level. You begin the game with 75 in gold and a 14% interest rate. Buying towers depletes your gold and killing enemies as they crawl along the path toward Heaven earns gold. At certain levels you earn “halos” which allow you to research and add more devastating towers or increase your interest rate. Gold also allows you to upgrade your towers, making them more powerful. I have mastered the easy game with the help of the tips and tricks posted on the TapDefense Facebook Community. I have gotten to level 40 on the medium game. Additionally, I have been able to master the “This Is Sparta” and “Silver Spoon” challenge games. Caution: This game can be very addictive!

i-Clickr for PowerPoin t Remote lets you to use your iPhone/iPod Touch as a remote control for PowerPoint. Using your PC's WiFi (Standard Wireless/GPRS) and Bonjour (iPhone) you establish a remote connection between the PC and iPhone. Once your connection has been established, you select the presentation on your PC, set the presentation alarm on your iPhone and then navigate your presentation using forward and back buttons, sweeping your finger across the iPhone or by double-tapping to advance to the next slide. Some of the features of i-Clickr that I really like are that you can see you notes right on the iPhone, jump to any slide in your presentation quickly and put up a blank screen at anytime using your iPhone. Selecting “Toggle Peek Mode” lets you to see the next slide on the iPhone before you advance. This feature is great, if you’re like me and sometimes forget the order in which you have your slides. The one drawback it you cannot click hyperlinks, but you can play embedded videos if you have them set to start playing on a mouse click.

To get i-Clickr go to iTunes and download the i-Clickr App and subsequently install the i-Clickr software to your wireless capable PC from the Senstic website. The free or lite version allows you to navigate presentation with up to 15 slides. I tried out the lite version and immediately purchased the $9.99 App for those times when I have more than 15 slides.

By the way, I was presenting at a high school last week and showed this to the assistant principal who had his iPhone. Because we were both on the wireless network, he was able to “see” my presentation and we were able to simultaneously navigate the PowerPoint I was using. This could be useful or a nuisance depending on where you are using your iPhone as a remote.

So what are your latest favorite apps?

Film on the Fly Mobile Phone Challenge: Secret Prompt & 20 Hours to Make

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 10:17:42 PST

Last Saturday, I participated in the KOCE-TV, PBS “Film on the Fly! Mobile Phone Video Challenge.

“Film on the Fly! is the latest and greatest in mobile filmmaking challenges! On the day of the contest, you'll receive a text message with a secret story prompt for your video. You’ll then have up to twenty hours to make a mobile phone video and post it to YouTube. Since this is a global challenge, you'll be able to see mobile videos that are created from all over the country, and maybe even the world!"

I signed up for the event on January 7 and received a test text message on January 15 to confirm that I would be able to receive the story prompt I needed on the day of the contest. So far so good, text message received as planned. No other preparation was required at this point since the prompt was secret and I would not be let in on the secret until sometime February 7 between 10:00 and 11:00 a.m. PST.

I received an e-mail on January 25 alerting me to the Film on the Fly practice run. The e-mail stated that my FOTF group had 53 participants representing 5 countries and 17 states. The main purpose of the practice was to make sure you could upload your video to YouTube and tag it. The prompt was simply: Show us something interesting outside your house. And the tag was: FOTFPractice. It seemed easy enough. It was then that I realized I could not take video with my iPhone. Actually, this had occurred to me earlier, but now I had to figure out how to make my mobile phone video.

My husband’s Motorola Razr will take video, but I could not get the video clips to e-mail or Bluetooth. Unfortunately, he does not have an adapter to sync his phone, so I had no luck retrieving the video from his phone. I decided to use my old PPC 6700 Smartphone. I took several short black and white video clips of my dog on my snowy deck. After reinstalling Microsoft ActiveSync to my computer and setting up a relationship with the phone, I finally had my four QuickTime videos and was ready to start editing to create my final 30-second practice video. I do not have the software to edit QuickTime videos (I did purchase QuickTime Pro at one point, but have never used it), so my next step was to send the videos to YouConvertIt.com to be converted to .wmv files so I could edit in Windows Movie Maker. I imported the video clips, added a few fades and some titles. I then used a “work around” by creating a 30-second music clip using Photo Story 3 and adding it to the audio track.

After saving my movie, “Black & White,” I uploaded it to YouTube, making sure to tag it with “fotfpractice.” By searching the tag, it seems that ten others participated in the practice.

On February 6, I received the next FOTF e-mail with a reminder the FOTF was starting in less than 24 hours and briefly outlining the guidelines for the challenge:

The super secret story prompt will be sent to you tomorrow between 10-11:00 AM Pacific Standard Time. (Text messages will be sent with a back-up email.)
You'll have up to 20 hours to make your video, upload it and TAG it on YouTube.
The web link for viewing and rating the Film on the Fly! videos will be sent to you on Sunday, Feb. 8. (Videos may be added to the playlist as late as Monday because the time to search on YouTube will depend on global usage.)
Highest rated videos will be given the overall "prize!"

I received a text message (and e-mail back-up message) at 12:00 p.m. CST on February 7 with the prompt: Everything changed – when the box mysteriously arrived at my doorstep. My first reaction was that they had to be kidding! The only mysterious box I could think of belonged to Pandora. I spent the first two hours after getting the prompt looking for ideas by searching online for terms like “box” and “mysterious box.” My inspiration came from the blog post Mysterious Box full of wonders on the True Stories of Life as a Goble blog. Everyone experiences losing items like your keys when you are late or the mate to a sock. What if you had a mysterious box in which items appeared when you need them, including all the socks that ever disappeared in the dryer?

I enlisted the help of my daughter and husband to “act” in my video. After getting all the video footage with my PPC 6700 I connected it to the computer to retrieve the videos. Now the fun really began! Every video I tried to play would get “Error - 2041: an invalid sample description was found in the movie (.mp4).” What?! This worked just fine two weeks ago.

I searched for “Error - 2041” online and found a great Apple discussion that even mentioned this particular issue when using a PPC 6700. Evidently, it is a QuickTime 7 issue with the file extension. It seemed the two most plausible file extensions to try were .gp3 and .m4v. I renamed the first video with the file extension .gp3 and still the same error message. Next, I renamed the first video with the file extension .m4v. This time the video would open, but would not play. I decided to convert the videos to .wmv files using YouConvertIt.com, but the website seemed to be gone. What?! This worked just fine two weeks ago. Plan B: I converted my videos using Zamzar instead.

The videos converted, but there was a definite degrading and lack of quality. At this point it was the best it was going to get. I added some titles, fades, transitions and music (FTC SoundPak) using Windows Movie Maker and entitled the final video “So That’s Where It All Goes.” Just for fun, I used Jodix iPod Video Converter to convert the video and uploaded it as a QuickTime video to YouTube tagging it with “fotfbox.” The original tag was “FilmOnTheFlyBox,” but I received an e-mail at 8:12 p.m. that there are some search issues on YouTube with long tags.

The last step is to rate the videos on the Film on the Fly Ning. You must join in order to see and rate the videos. You can also see all the February 7 fotfbox videos on YouTube. I was disappointed that only 9 videos were created.

Interested in participating in a Film on the Fly Mobile Phone Video Challenge? The next KOCE-TV, PBS challenge will be on March 14, 2009 - Pi Day or 3.14. I’m planning to participate again. I personally learned a lot. No matter how much you think you’ve planned and practiced there are always issues, problems and pitfalls, especially when using mobile phones and free applications, but there is always
another way to get it done!

Want to try this with students? Schedule the challenge for after school or on a weekend, so school mobile/cell phone policies will not be violated. Maybe do it as an introduction to a new concept (prompt) by having students research the concept and then create a 30-second video to illustrate the concept. Set up a wiki with the rules and guidelines. Use either SMS or e-mail to send students the prompts or send them away at the end of the day with the prompt. Can't upload to YouTube? Try TeacherTube or SchoolTube or have students save videos to DVD or flash drive and upload to the wiki. Be creative!

VoiceThread Groups For Sharing

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 15:17:57 PST

VoiceThread has added some new sharing options that educators will love. Teachers can now create individual groups from their contact list. Specific groups can be created allowing VoiceThreads to be shared within and across groups. Want a student to have access to a VoiceThread? Add them to the group. Have a new student you want to have access to a series of VoiceThreads? Add them to a group and share all the VoiceThreads available to that group. When you decide to share a VoiceThread you now have the options to share by sending a link, selecting people from your contacts or to creating individual groups.

For details, check out the VoiceThread below:

I'm Back...And Ready For Action

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 14:55:56 PST

It has been 3 full months since I last posted to my blog. During that time I had a feeling of unimportance due to being “surplussed” from my job. Do you realize that is not even a word, but is thrown around as a euphemism for laid off at AT&T? Try spelling is with one “s” or two after the “u” and your spell check will underline it. When I received my surplus notification letter, I was stunned. I never expected this to happen to me. I work hard, I care about what I do, I try to be helpful and do more than what is expected of me. Although I am doing my best not to take it personally, it certainly feels very personal when it happens to you (ask one of the millions who have lost their jobs recently). Those who are close to me know all the gory details and I will not spill them here. Suffice it to say I have rounded out my resume with corporate experience and I am looking for my next dare-to-be-great situation. I want to thank everyone who has been so supportive with the e-mails, phone calls and tweets. To paraphrase some of my favorite advice, "I will not just survive, I will thrive!" and "I am not unemployed, I am a self-employed, free agent."

Election Reflection

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 15:03:31 PST

For my presentation on VoiceThread for the Francis Howell Tech Fest today, I created a “Reflect As We Elect” thread for reflecting about Election Day 2008.

The goal of today’s session was to allow the participants to use VoiceThread in a manner that is very adaptable for many content areas and grade levels. Unfortunately, the standing room only crowd did not get a chance to add their reflections due to issues with the LAN and wireless access. I hope that some will attempt to leave their reflections tonight or within the next few days. I am inviting you to also reflect on the VoiceThread and share it with others, including your students. The reflection questions the thread focuses on are as follows:

Today we elect the 44th president of the United States of America. Who was your favorite president? Why?
Some of the Top Issues of the 2008 Election are:
Education

Energy and Climate Change
Health Care
Immigration
International Relations
Iraq
Security
The Economy
And Trade
What issues are most important to you? What issues do you think should be important to everybody?
In your opinion, what are the most important qualities that a person running for President of the United States should have?
What encourages people to vote? What are some reasons people may decide not to vote?
I am proud to be an American because…

I look forward to your reflections and comments:-)

That 21st Century Feel

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 07:54:32 PDT

A couple of recent activities in which I am participating have made me feel very 21st century.

Next week, on November 4, I am presenting two sessions (delicious and VoiceThread) at the Francis Howell School District Tech Fest for teachers, librarians and administrators. The coordinator for the event, Gina Hartman, created a wiki so Tech Fest presenters could post handouts and other presentation links. I have taken full advantage of this opportunity by posting links and session information. I applaud Gina for using a 21st Century Web 2.0 tool for organizing the Tech Fest presenter materials and her school district for supporting the use of wikis.

After much conversation and deliberation, the Midwest Education Technology Conference has a new Ning social network. The ME TC Ning is a place for those interested in and planning to attend the conference another way to communicate and collaborate before, during, and after the conference and will continue to be available, hopefully, well into the future. It is a terrific step for the conference and its participants. Even if you are not able to attend the conference in person, the Ning along with METC2009 Twitter updates will keep educators current on the conference happenings and provide valuable resources and information from its member community. I am happy to report at the time of this posting, the METC Ning has 6 members in the first 24 hours. Additonally, all METC presenter handout materials will be available online as part of the METC searchable program. With all of these "tools of engagement," METC is not just "talking the talk," but "walking the walk" and providing ongoing value to educators in the 21st Century. R U There?

It’s A Web 2.0 Evolution

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 06:37:13 PDT

In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed. – Charles Darwin

Is it my imagination, or are a lot of my favorite Web 2.0 websites are coming out of beta, unveiling a new version or just getting a face lift? In the past few months there have been loads of changes to the sites where I have accounts. As long as my free accounts still offer me the same features as before, I usually don’t mind these changes too much and accept them as the evolution of Web 2.0.

In July, delicious, my favorite social bookmarking site, got a facelift. Overall, I like the new look and enhanced features of the site. I think delicious looks like a site that will be around for awhile and that makes me feel good about publishing my bookmarks on delicious. The main inconvenience for me was changing del.icio.us to delicious on my wiki and making new screenshots for my (mostly for backup) PowerPoint presentations.

In August, Jott notified me that they were coming out of beta, offering a new set of paid plans and giving me time, as a beta user, to choose to a new plan. I could keep my free ad-filled account, too. Now that many of the free features I liked about Jott now require payment, I really haven’t used my Jott account since the change. By the way, I do not like the Jott for iPhone!

On August 26, Animoto announced it was coming out of beta with several additions to its platform. The user-interface looks the same and the free version still allows you to make unlimited short video and you can pay as you go for longer videos. The ability to download, watch on your iPhone and upgrade to DVD quality videos are great additions.

In September, I was notified by Cellfish that their new site would be unveiled soon and I should download all of my personal files before the unveiling or I would lose everything in my locker. And Read The Words sent me an e-mail that they were going in for some major changes in their website and I had the option to preserve up to 5 recordings of my choice, but the rest would be deleted. Of course, I could download all the files I wanted as mp3 files. Neither of these distressed me too much. I got plenty of notice that the change was coming and I acted accordingly. Neither of the new sites seem to have any cosmetic changes and look exactly the same as they did before the upgrades.

Also, in September, VoiceThread updated and upgraded to a new fresh site. This change really didn’t cause me too much difficulty. And the new site looks great without looking too different. Again, a change in some screenshots just in case the Internet was acting up during a presentation was really my only hiccup in using VoiceThread.

On October 16, Flickr welcomed its members to a new homepage. This change was so upsetting to some that groups were formed in protest and in response to the utter outrage people felt about the changes. Some users even changed their user names with additions like “hates the new Flickr.” As I have stated before, overall, I like the tweaks. I just had to invest some time to learn where everything is and how it has changed. At this point, I feel pretty comfortable on my new Flickr home.

As this trend continues, I think there will be more negativity on the part of those who find change unsettling. I give them credit for using the applications in the first place, when so many do not. They are part of the global conversation and they collaborate. It’s okay to express you dissatisfaction and participate in the discussion about how the changes have impacted your life online. Personally, I feel it’s a good thing when a 2.0 website finishes its beta testing and is still around to modify and update its website. It’s easier to adapt to a few changes than to find out your favorite website or a really cool tool no longer exists. Of course there may be an alternative, but finding that, and learning how it works will definitely require a greater adjustment and investment in time. Change is hard. Change can be unnerving. But change online is inevitable. If you are using a Web 2.0 tool before it comes out of beta, you define early adopter. If you can still find as much use after beta has concluded, you’re an early adapter. Good luck in your evolution!

A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives - of approving of some and disapproving of others. -Charles Darwin

The Great Pumpkins, Charlie Brown!

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 21:20:32 PDT

The Great Pumpkins, Charlie Brown!, originally uploaded by klmontgomery.

Late last Friday afternoon, my husband, daughter and I made our annual trip to the "pumpkin patch" to buy some pumpkins. My favorite part of this is walking out in the field where they grow the Cucurbita maxima or giant pumpkins. Every time we go, I cannot help but think of Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin. We walked around the field with our little red wagon in tow looking for just the right giant gourd-like squash.

And the winner is. Stay tuned...it will be a jack-o-lantern soon!

Flickr's New Face Lift

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 09:18:01 PDT

Wow! Much to my surprise I signed into Flickr tonight and was greeted by a message welcoming me to my "sparkly new homepage." The Flickr blog has the official announcement with FAQ and a screencast. The most obvious change I noticed right away was that the thumbnails of "Your Photostream," "Your Contacts" and "Everyone's Photos" are now on the left side of the page and instead of seeing 4 of your contacts photos, you now see 8. A new "Your Groups" and a new "Explore" link have been added to the homepage. The new "Explore" allows you to refresh and toggle between "Explore/The Commons," "Explore/Places," "Explore/Everyone's Photos," "Explore/Interesting in the last 7 days," and "Explore/Groups" and quickly link to each choice. As "Explore" refreshes it shows "Thinking.." until it loads.

As is my nature, I started clicking around to see what is different and hopefully improved. "Upload Photos and Videos" looks exactly the same. All of the drop-down menus at the top have not changed. Probably the biggest changes are to "Recent Activity" and the "Stats for your account." Just as I was trying to figure out which view I liked the best, I noticed I had Flickr mail. It was an invitation from one of my contacts to join the "FLICKR! The new homepage is dire (straights)" group. The first (latest) discussion in the group is entitled "So does anyone still hate the homepage?" The discussion focus on the changes Flickr has made and most of the replies are negative especially with regard to the mixing of "Recent Activity."

From the Flickr website:

"The new Recent Activity has more information and more tools to help you look at that information. You can save a default look, mix up what you want to see at the moment, and even mute images you don’t want to pop up anymore."

Flickr invites members to provide their feedback on the [Official Topic] Feedback on your new Home Page.

I tweaked mine to only show the comments and activity on my photos in the last 7 days. I can always tweak my settings again whenever I want to. A little different than before, but I do not feel too strongly about it. My first impression is that there is a lot more settings than before and that the default setting may not be the best setting for everyone in the Flickr community. I am presenting "Picture Yourself Using Flickr in the Classroom" in two parts at the Midwest Education Technology Conference in January 2009, so I am excited and compelled to invest time in learning all the new features and settings.

I really like the new stats. It show you a graph of daily aggregate views on your account; view counts from yesterday, this week, last week and all time; most viewed photos from yesterday and all time; referring domains for your account and a breakdown of your photos and videos which gives you all kinds of great information like how many photos are public or private or how many are geotagged or not geotagged. My stats show that my 3,036 photos have been viewed 31,470 times and one photo has been viewed 2,337 times.

Overall, I like Flickr's face lift and I'm glad it still greets me in different languages.

Creating Short Photo Stories Long On Creativity and Ideas

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 20:26:36 PDT

I've lost count on the number of times I have presented Flickr as a tool for the classroom. I learn something every time, whether it's a lecture presentation or a hands-on workshop.

This past Monday, October 6, I led 11 teachers and librarians in a 2 hour Flickr workshop at the Midwest Instructional Technology Conference (MITC) sponsored by MOREnet. A few things went very right with this time. I submitted this session for intermediate level attendees and required that everyone come with a Yahoo! ID and password and a flash drive with at least 20 photos or a digital camera. Anyone who knows me knows that I have often repeat the mantra "embrace the beginners," but sometimes it is a nice to change work with a group who have the basics mastered and the technology becomes secondary to the topic at hand. Does this mean I will stop proposing workshops for beginners? Of course not!

The workshop was scheduled for 2:00-4:45 p.m. with a 45 minute break from 3:00-3:45 p.m. in one of the conference computer labs. Once we got rolling, the majority of our time was spent going over the features directly from the Flickr website. At 3:00, I told the group it was time for a 45-minute break which no one opted to take, so we continued. By the end of 2 hours we had accomplished everything I had hoped to accomplish including posting visual stories to Tell a Story with 5 Photos for Educators.

The group now has 114 members and 57 stories. Monday's group used the photos thay brought or spent time during the session to take photos to create their 5 photo stories. Check out the new stories (or the older stories). I am always at the creativity teachers show in their work - especially near the end of a two-hour workshop.

As a side note, I used jog the web to create a Web 2.0 hotlist "Discovering Flickr for the Classroom" for the workshop. Although I did not use it during the presentation I certainly like it for collecting websites and having them live for review after the presentation.

Make A Digital Wish

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 15:58:20 PDT

Birthday candle, originally uploaded by PappaJack.

I spoke with Heather Chirtea, Lead Staff Development Trainer from Tool Factory earlier today and she told me about a very exciting website all teachers should know about. I called Heather to tell her about involving Tool Factory in the Storychasers project. Storychasers is a multi-state educational collaborative founded by Wesley Fryer and Kevin Honeycutt that has been created to empower students and teachers to responsibly record and share stories of local, regional and global interest as citizen journalists.

I asked Heather about linking Tool Factory’s Flip Video Mobile Lab and Mobile Podcasting Lab to the Storychasers website. The Flip Video and Podcasting Mobile Labs have everything in one case for podcasting and video production for classrooms. Teachers interested in Storychasers should definitely check them out.

Our conversation turned to funding sources for technology in schools and Heather told me about Digital Wish. Digital Wish is an online community of educators sharing resources and digital lesson plans. I addition to teacher-created digital lessons, there are also fundraising for creating a technology fundraising campaign and grants resources to help teachers and schools obtain technology tools for their classrooms.

Digital Wish encourages teachers to create a profile and a wish list of needed technology products for their classrooms. Donors can then access the site looking for schools needing technology and either buying items from teacher wish lists or by donating money directly to a school. Contributing vendors include both hardware and software companies alike. So, if you are a teacher who is struggling with a dried up technology go make a digital wish. It just might come true.

Stepping Across the Digital Divide in Rural Missouri

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 17:58:47 PDT

On Monday and Tuesday last week I presented at the 4th Annual Southeast Technology Conference held at Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. It is a small conference with just over 200 participants from 90 school districts. I presented three 1 ½ sessions on mobile phones in the classroom, using flickr and wikis. The flickr and wiki sessions were held in a computer lab with 26 computers. The flickr session had 22 attendees and the wiki session was overbooked with attendees doubling up at 4 of the computers. It was great to see this number, of mainly rural teachers, exploring Web 2.0.

Jane Doe who teaches 8th, 9th and 10th grade science in a small rural community stayed after the flickr session to ask a few questions about ideas for her science class. I am choosing not to give her real name because I would not want her comments to put her in jeopardy with others in her district or town. She clued in when I said I was a former teacher. One of the flickr examples I showed was an annotated photo of a horse labeling the parts. Jane’s background is in agriculture and she related to this from her equine studies classes. As we continued our conversation, I learned that the only “technology” in her classroom is an overhead projector. Not a projector mounted overhead, but 40-year-old technology. She projects onto a dry erase whiteboard which has a horrible glare. I would venture to guess that Jane’s overhead projector is older than she. She has no glassware, no microscopes and no dissection kits. She offers extra credit for students who furnish supplies for classroom activities. She is considering buying a used laptop from her brother and we talked about looking for a used projector from the university, a nearby community college or pawn shops.

I have long been aware of the digital divide, but it really slaps you in the face when you have conversations with young teachers like her. There is a computer lab in her school, but as she put it, the computers are really old. The computer lab is where the only SMARTboard in the school is located and because no one has been trained to use it, no one is using it. Jane would like to use a SMARTboard in her classroom. Jane and I paid a visit to the reseller exhibiting at the conference and he helped her with some ideas of how others have found the funds to buy equipment. Things like trivia nights or PTA sponsored events or placing nameplates on equipment donated by local businesses. She is ready to take this on, but will she succeed?

During our time together, she mentioned letters to the editor complaining about the salaries being paid to the teachers in her district and the low MAP scores. ‘Tis a puzzlement.

When I returned from the conference I received an e-mail from Jane say, “I just wanted to thank you again for all your knowledge sharing and help in getting technology for my classroom! I am truly grateful!” There is so much more I wish I could do for teachers like Jane.

Another Bryozoan

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 10:24:35 PDT

Another Bryozoan, originally uploaded by klmonty.

You know how it is when you first become aware of something new? Like noticing an actress and then seeing her in a film you've seen before, but had a lesser awareness previously. Or, hearing about a person, idea or concept and then hearing about it over and over in a short span of time. Or, seeing a colony of Pectinella magnifica in a lake and then noticing a similar colony in another lake. After documenting my encounter with bryozoans at Table Rock Lake, I saw another bryozoan colony, or what remained of it at Kentucky Lake. Eerie. If I had not seen the gelatinous masses on the shore, I would have walked right by this one.

Documenting Family History with VoiceThread – A Project in Progress

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 10:26:01 PDT

As some who might read this know, my father, who I was very close to, passed away about 14 months ago. He was 63 years old and was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer on April 6 and died just 7 weeks later on May 24. It was devastating loss for my mother, sisters, me and our families. It has made me look at a lot of things differently over the past year. It feels at times that life is about hurt and that the best we can do between the times of sorrow is do what makes us the happiest.

Last week, I attended my husband’s family reunion at The Moors Resort on Kentucky Lake. Family reunions, as a rule, are not all that unique, but this family has been getting together almost annually since 1986. I have “been a part of the family” since 1994 and became an “outlaw” in 1996 when I married into the family. I have attended several family reunions, but my husband has the distinction of never having missed one reunion. The die-hard family reunion purists in the group are quick to point out that, here and there, a couple of years were skipped, but essentially, the Richardson Family has been gathering for the past 23 years. There are three generations of family members who attend the reunion each year. As one outlaw commented this year, “Most people are surprised when I tell them we get together for more than a backyard picnic every year.”

Over the years, I have done my share of fussing about having to go to the Richardson Reunion every year. There have been times when a week of vacation has been spent at the reunion, when we spent five days or when we were only able to spend three, but it is always part of every summer’s vacation plans. I have started to see things differently for the past two reunions since I lost my dad. This is what life is all about and it is important to take time and spend it with family.

The core group of first or eldest generation Richardsons include my husband’s mother, Elsie (Aunt Elsie to most, Grandma to us), her sister Frances (Aunt Fran), there brother (Uncle Allan) and their three spouses, Uncle (Grandpa) Francis Montgomery, Uncle Loyd Wicks and Aunt Marlene Richardson. The six meet every year for the entire week: the weekend before through the next weekend when the entire clan gathers. I should also mention, there was another brother, Jim, who has been deceased several years. Although there are a few other cousins and relatives belonging to the first generation who sometimes attend, the families of the four Amos Richardson siblings are the mainstay of the reunion goers each year. The venue isn’t always the same. Some years it’s Kentucky Lake, some years it’s Branson, Missouri. Reunions have been planned in Wisconsin and Georgia, too. But each year, a nucleus of family members and a few others come together.
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The second generation is composed of the first cousins and their “outlaw” spouses. Any given year one, two or three children of each first generation siblings will pack up their cars and travel to the reunion. Together, there are 11 cousins who have continued to attend regularly for many years. In 1986, they were in their 20’s and 30’s; now they are in their 40’s and 50’s. Looking back at the old photographs from reunions past, you can see how much things have changed in 23 years. In 1986, there was more hair, fewer wrinkles and a flock of very small children.

Those small children make up generation number three. These are the second cousins and with the exception of my daughter, who is 10, they have now grown into their teens and twenties. Reunion photographs from the early years feature children, toddlers and babies. It is sometimes hard to figure out who was who or remember that so much time has passed.

My mother-in-law a.k.a. Aunt Elsie brought photo albums this year with photos from every Richardson family reunion in chronological order. What fun to look back at clothing and hairstyles from the past 20+ years! Wish I had them digitally!!

Some of the annual reunion traditions include special reunion foods like Aunt Marlene’s spaghetti or Aunt Elsie’s ham or the wonderful selection of cookies baked by Aunt Fran and Aunt Marlene, the reunion dinner on Friday night when everyone has finally arrived, the golf tournament, a white elephant auction and the family photos. Each year also brings new stories, new events and new family fun. There are sayings and expressions that carry from year to year and fresh ones created that may or may not stand the test of time. In the evenings and late into the night the Richardson cousins (and second cousins) talk and laugh and drink a few beers.

On the last night this year, conversation turned to the past: the activities of the first generation a long time ago before the second generation was born. Who did what? Who moved where? When was the family house in Steward, Illinois built? It dawned on me as this conversation based on guesses and speculation continued that this was a perfect VoiceThread project. I am planning to borrow photos from the photo albums and upload them as well as scan and upload some of the very old photos of the Richardson ancestors. I hope to have all the photos put together in the next few months and then starting with my mother-in-law, add the history and the comments about where the family came from and who is pictured in the old faded black and whites. It is something I can leave for my daughter and the rest of the family. I’ll keep you updated as the project progresses.

Brush with a 500-Million-Year-Old Species

noreply@blogger.com (Karen Montgomery) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 10:25:10 PDT

Pectinella Magnifica, originally uploaded by klmonty.

Over the weekend, my family and I spotted three of these gelatinous masses near the shore at Table Rock Lake.

After seeing the first disgusting blob and realizing that this was not a one of a kind, I ran to the house to get my camera so I could "take one with me" and figure out what it is.

I took several photos and looked around for something to provide scale - they were all about a foot in diameter and four inches thick. My husband quickly volunteered his arm and thus some perspective on their sizes. Huge gelatinous masses!

I showed some of my friends at the lake the photos and asked if they knew what they were. The answers ranged from, "never seen one before," "to some type of mushroom, like a "puff ball," to "accumulated tree sap." None of the answers quite suited me.

I subsequently did some research on my iPhone in the car on the way home and found out that these jellylike accumulations are actually colonies of a byrozoa, Pectinella magnifica. Pectinella magnifica, which is sometimes called "jelly-ball" is actually animal not plant. Much of the published information is scientific studies about bryozoans online, many in French. I found the most useful and easy to read information from Connecticut Windows On The Natural World. I vaguely remember learning about bryozoans in my many biology classes in high school and college. Seems they appeared on Earth roughly 500 million years ago. They are harmless, but quite creepy. There are some pictures online on a few websites, but I must say I took some of the best shots of a large colony I have seen. Have you ever seen one?