I did a video for our our school and played it on the in house morning news show and posted it on Facebook.  The PTA did a fundraiser and the winning class got to tape the AP to the wall with duct tape.  It was a great idea and our AP was a champ to play along.

Tt is a pretty good video, not great, but pretty good.  It is a bit slow for the first minute, but it is a engaging watch after that first minute.

On Facebook, it has done ok, but not as good as I would have hoped.  I usually feel that any post that does more views than we have total likes as a win.  And this should have, but it didn’t.  We had maybe 15% less?

So, how could I recut the video.  The current video is . . .

1. Introduction from PTA president (0 – 1:03)
2. First 5 people put tape on the Assistant Principal.  (1:04 – 2:06)
3. The rest of the tape is put up in.  Every 8 seconds the speed doubles, flight of the bumblebee plays. (2:06 – 2:48)
4. Back to normal time.  (2:48 – 3:28 )
5. Close up of the AP’s feet, hanging 1 foot of the ground. (3:28)

For Facebook, the start is boring. For the school the kids know the PTA president, the teacher in the background, the AP, and the kids.  For Facebook, which the first impression you get is a full minute of watching people talk, not as good.  In part 2, it spends too much time in normal speed. Not by much, but like 15 seconds less would have been enough Part 3 and on was good.

So I need to re-cut it so the taping is teased at the front. So people know why they might watch it.  And the PTA introduction probably needs to be shorter.  Or maybe do something towards the end.  Or on a voice over?  I’m not sure.  I’ll have to play with it.

 

Things to work on when I get back to work.  Hustle and being “in place.”

I tend to zone out at meetings.  Wednesday in my overly large school district I had a meeting of other instructional technology people. We were talking about a subject I was interested in.  And I just could not stay with it.  The paper helps, and I should get into the habit of putting everything else away and just using the paper.  It was helpful at VSTE.  My VSTE notes are great.  My Wednesday meeting notes are nothing.

I feel like I did not have great hustle this week.  I mean, I got some stuff done.  We did the first BreakoutEDU at my school.  But I don’t feel like I hustled.

	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Your hustle needs more hustle	Nope	Nope	Nope	Nope	Nope
If you’re in a place, be in that place	Nope	Nope	Nope	Nope	Nope
Notice people	A bit. For Pineapple Week, we built in an ask to email thanks after a visit.  I emailed a thanks for those people	I tweeted at some people, but no one in my building.	Nope	Nope	Nope
Experiment	I’ve been experimenting with making a social media content calendar. I’ve got a basic one mapped out for January.	I wrote out some formatting for anecdotal notes with teachers, but that is as far as I got. I also atteneded one CLT with the aim of just seeing how I could support on the fly.  I had a couple of good moments.	I borrowed a BreakoutEDU set to play with my school	Started planning out the twitter experiment	No
Ship	Going with the social media content calendar, I’ve done the picture posts for all the ones I can do ahead of time.	Nope	Nope	Yes	Did the first BreakoutEDU.  Got the room cleaned (sort of)
Plan ahead	Said picture posts are scheduled in Hootsuite.  The social media content calendar is planning ahead as well.	Nope	Nope	Nope	Set a couple of social media posts to go off during the week.
Sharpen the Saw	Nope	Nope	Yes, when to county in-service	Nope	Nope

So I am going to run a Twitter experiment. I am going to tweet a book. Not a book that I have written, I am picking one of the books available on the Project Gutenberg site.

I’m still working on the process. I don’t want to post 160 characters at a time, so I’ll be

doing pictures of paragraphs. But, I know posting pictures of text can be a bit of a jerk move, because there is no way for people who rely on screen readers to read the text. Someone suggested, and I can’t remember who, posting it to Tumblr first, and then posting it to Twitter from Tumblr. That way you generate a link that people can click, and read there.

 

To make the actual images I am starting from the text in Word, each paragraph imports to a different slide in Powerpoint, and then exporting each slide as a JPEG.

I am thinking about doing a different background for each chapter. Our good friend Adobe Spark is a fun way to make backgrounds. I little drawing on each would be neat, but I can’t draw. But there has to be something possible.

I need to figure out a good posting solution. IFTTT can take posts from Tumblr and send them to Twitter. But, getting them into Tumblr is the issue. I have to post each image, and the text that goes along with each one. I could sit down one afternoon and batch a bunch of them all at once. But, that is time intensive. I tried doing it in Hootsuite, and I don’t think it is any easier.

 

 

• Your hustle needs more hustle:  Not great.
• If you’re in a place, be in that place:  Not Great.
• Notice people:  I tweeted at some people, but no one in my building.
• Experiment: I wrote out some formatting for anecdotal notes with teachers, but that is as far as I got. I also atteneded one CLT with the aim of just seeing how I could support on the fly.  I had a couple of good moments.
• Ship: Not Great
• Plan ahead: Not Great
• Sharpen the Saw: Not Great

Also, I am going to do a end of the week, or maybe midweek post instead of daily.

Things I like

• I like the business card boxes.  The one of the right that has “List From sight words fun” I was going to print out a list from the website.  I never got it done.  The one on the left is a sketch of one of presentation slides.
• I like that it is on paper.  I agree with the work by Princeton faculty Mueller and Oppenheimer.  I feel my processing is better on paper.  When I note take digitally I don’t process the information like when I have to write it down.
• I love the pictures.
• Using more space.  When I first started I tried to make everything as tight in as possible, to take up the least amount of space.  I don’t want to write for the purpose of taking up space, but more processing on paper should be better than less.

 

Things to think about

• No color.  I’ve been using the Pilot G-2 Pens (.5 and .38 widths).  I do have Black, Blue, Red, and Green, but I tend to only pick up one color and go from there.  I also need a process for WHY to use color.  I’ll maybe experiment and go from there.  Or maybe some highlight colors with pencils.
• I wonder if there is some way to add in a mind-map.
• I know I don’t always go back and revisit those questions and todo lists. Should I?  Do I need to build in a time to go back and look at my notes. For the VSTE notes I’ve spent a while reviewing notes to figure out what I should talk to teams about.  For my every day notes, I don’t review as much.

So, how did I do today on the Magnificent Seven?

• Your hustle needs more hustle: Nope
• If you’re in a place, be in that place: Not really
• Notice people: A bit. For Pineapple Week, we built in an ask to email thanks after a visit.  I emailed a thanks for those people
• Experiment: I’ve been experimenting with making a social media content calendar. I’ve got a basic one mapped out for January.
• Ship:  Going with the social media content calendar, I’ve done the picture posts for all the ones I can do ahead of time.
• Plan ahead:  Said picture posts are scheduled in Hootsuite.  The social media content calendar is planning ahead as well.

  

• Sharpen the Saw: Nope

So, places I fell down today.  Hustle, being in the moment, and sharpening the saw.

 

 

SpeakIT Chrome Extension was good, but Natural Reader works with everything, not just text in the Browser. But, if you can’t install software locally on your computer, it is a great way to go.

I’ve never been too much of a gamification person, but someone I respect a great deal saw something neat with using Credly with her staff. Worth a second look.

Ozobots look cool, but I don’t know if the price is worth it.

A co-working has a few Breakout EDU sets and is ok with me borrowing.

Jigsaw Planet will let you make your own Online Jigsaws, they were used in one of the Breakout EDU games.

I don’t know why Computational Thinking in the new ISTE standards are important.

sightwordfun.weebly.com has a focus on Ipad Apps, but I think  80% of it could be done on Wixie.

Jame Casap is pretty fascinating. (none of the following are quotes, just ideas he talked about)

• We are preparing kids for jobs that don’t exist at workplaces that have not been build yet.
• Don’t ask what do you want to be when you grow up, ask what problems they want to solve and what they need to learn to get there.
• Education is set up as single player sport, but the world is set up as a team event.
• Phoenix Coding Academy

See you on day 2!

Kevin