Week 4 reflection: Multi Media. Flickr Voki and, Windows media maker.

As a future teacher, i wanted to explore all of the new on-line multimedia websites that i would learn about in this weeks activities. This week i aimed to use three of the tools to create an on line lesson that anyone could use to learn one of my favourite songs on guitar. The implementation would depend on the viewers willingness to participate and, as this is my first on-line guitar lesson, I have know idea what the results will be like.

Images: Flickr.

In order to explore the wonderful world of images located on the internet, I signed up to flickr. flickr allows for people to share photographs in a manner that ignores the laws of copyright with the users consent. Prior to this experience, I had never been on tumblr  or instagram or any on-line photo sharing community. I didn't know what to expect in regards to educational purposes I could harvest from this website.
I did note that the website was very easy to use. i was able to upload images with out any trouble and navigation between photos was also easy. Users are able to comment on each others photos, however this is
the most interactive part of the experience. I was able to search Flickr for pictures that would interest me and found some unique and rare photos.
For the first part of the on-line lesson I wanted to use images to display the different chords that were involved in the song. This would be used as preparation to get the learner ready for the upcoming lesson. I used Flickr to get different photos of chords that gave a degree of clarity that my photos did not. This was good because some of my uploaded chords were unclear as to my finger positions.
Flickr could also be used for different subjects across the curriculum. This includes science and art were photographs can be uploaded for the sharing of information.

Audio: Voki

Voki's are a  great engagement tool. Not only are they easy and fun to make, but they offer a wide range of modifications so that you can create a personalised voki. The creating of your character is just as easy as uploading or recording your voice. The creativity is awesome for students to use and engage with. I used the voki in mine as an animated Jimi Hendrix saying one of my favourite quotes about pushing yourself and achieving goals. I couldn't think of how else I could fit it in to my on-line lesson, how ever I believe that voki's offer as a better tool for the student to make. Students could research historical figures and create a voki that recounts there historical achievements. 
One draw back though is the computer generated voice. When typing in what you would like your character to say, the annunciation is incorrect at times. To correct it, you must type the word in phonetically. This is bad because it has the potential to cause confusion regarding spelling with younger students. The possibility of students learning incorrect spelling is present. In the higher grades of primary school, students could learn how to write phonetically and the flaw could be used as a small English lesson. 

Video: Windows Movie maker

This part of my experience was going to be the core of the learning. The video targeted people who were absolute beginners at guitar. One of the negatives i learnt early about using a video as an education tool, is that you don't have a measure on the learners prior knowledge and experience. Because of this, i found myself explaining every little detail. Another negative that i found with the process was that the construction of the video was very time consuming. Although these are slight draw backs, videos have great potential for use in the classroom as they are great sources of knowledge and understanding. Along with this, teachers are able to keep videos that they make themselves or there students make. Creativity can be easily applied by the user to there video through windows movie maker. Because of this, I believe it would be a great tool for students to use to create there own videos as it offers a range of editing tools that will engage both the advanced and beginner video editors. Factual videos that students make will require the students to aquire and analyse gathered information in order to make the video. Another engageing purpose that the creation of videos allow is there ability to include every student in the process. This will give shy students the chance to express themselves on camera. This can also be seen as a negative though as it may cause extra shy students to not want to participate at all.