Teach With Video

Stop-Motion Animation Challenge 2

Steven Katz — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 12:05:57 +0000

This is the second challenge for my middle school movie-making club that is creating stop-motion animations. The challenge is “Build Something.” Below is the animation I created as an example for this challenge. You can also take a look at Challenge 1 and the Movie-Making Club wiki, where I am documenting what we are doing.

Create Dashboard Widgets Using Safari

Steven Katz — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 11:23:27 +0000

One of my fellow ADEs, Rolly, showed me this trick recently. It is a great way to have important “web clips” always within reach.

Stop-Motion Animation 1

Steven Katz — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 03:38:49 +0000

Next semester I will be sponsoring a middle school club that will be doing stop-motion animations. My idea for the club is to give the students several short projects at the beginning of the semester, and see where it goes from there. I have never taught this skill before, so I am making some animations to use as examples, and I am documenting the process on the club wiki. Below is the animation I created for the first challenge, “Move object across desk.”

Mac Basics Professional Development at Seoul Foreign School

Steven Katz — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 12:49:33 +0000

Below are some links to support the Professional Development for Seoul Foreign School November 19 & 21, 2011.

Mac OS Basics

Preview

iPhoto

QuickTime

How to screencast

iMovie

Tutorials

Video projects in the classroom (previous presentation)

Screencast Using QuickTime

Steven Katz — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 05:08:04 +0000

This tech tip from my middle school Tech Gurus.

See more of my student’s tech tips.

Screencast With QuickTime –

MOvember

Steven Katz — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 22:41:55 +0000

This is the second year I have participated in MOvember, a fun activity to raise awareness about men’s health, specifically prostate cancer. What we do is grow a mustache during the month of November and try to raise as much money for prostate cancer. Last year I shaved my beard (that I have had for 20 years) & let it grow back. This year I am set on not letting my beard grow back until December, so that I can really highlight my “mo.” I’m getting lots of questions about shaving, and I have even received a few donations on my MO page. My goal is to raise $200.

Below is my MO, two weeks old.

Make a donation to support the fight against prostate cancer. Your support is greatly appreciated.

Laptops at the Sleepover: Over/Under 4.5

Steven Katz — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 07:56:39 +0000

My 12-year-old daughter is having a sleepover with 8 friends. They all own laptop computers.

I have set over/under for how many of her friends will bring their laptops at 4.5. What do you think? I’ll let you know the outcome in a few days.

(If you are unfamiliar with this type of wagering: You select if you think the final number is over or under the specified number. In this case, if you think that 5 or more of my daughter’s friends will bring their laptops to the sleepover, you bet “over.” If you think that 4 or less will bring their laptops you bet “under.”)

PS. Just a fun bet. No money will be exchanged.

Newton’s Laws Video Project

Steven Katz — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 00:07:07 +0000

Over the past few weeks I helped a middle school science class to create movies demonstrating three of Newton’s Laws. This is one of the projects that the teacher is especially proud of.

Remove Duplicate Photos in iPhoto

Steven Katz — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 03:33:39 +0000

I have been working on consolidating my photos from several different computers into one definitive iPhoto library with all of my digital photos. After reimaging computers at school and restoring files to the way they were before the reimaging (as best we could), we had several people with multiple copies of photos in their iPhoto libraries. Duplifinder solved this problem for me.

When I began searching for a solution I came across a thread on Mac Rumors that led me to some possibilities. I spent a couple of hours researching the different software solutions, reading the literature, and testing them out. I really liked Tidy Up!, which I found on the OS X Mac Tips & Tricks blog. Tidy Up! will also find duplicates in your iTunes library and several other places on your Mac. The reason I decided not to buy it is the $33 price tag. I also checked out Duplicate Annihilator, but didn’t get the visual representation of the photos I wanted. The software I finally decided on is Duplifinder. Only $7 and it went through my entire 13,000+ iPhoto library, found all the duplicates, and gave me the option of deleting all the duplicates in one click, or one at a time. Duplifinder is a great tool at a very reasonable price. I recommended it to my entire staff.

Screenshot after finding duplicates

Scratch Projects

Steven Katz — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 23:43:05 +0000

I recently posted about the “push start” Jane Harris gave me for integrating Scratch (programming) projects into the curriculum. I had been working with an advanced high school math elective class before Jane gave me all the great advice about how to set up the projects. I think that the students and teachers did some great work and I would like to share it with you. Please feel free to leave comments on the student blogs about their project or reflection. I know they will appreciate the feedback.

The projects:

Jane – Get the keys to save the princess.
Justin – Avoid the administrators & get across the court.
Leo – Run & jump to avoid the obstacles.
Peter – You are the goalie. Don’t let them score.