Check out this Great Video

This video should make you feel really good about being a part of the Globaloria Program here in West Virginia.  A passionate teacher makes a presentation about how education might look in the Google Age.

 



If you can't see the video, go here.
http://www.viddler.com/explore/geoffd/videos/50/

Finding Time to Reflect

With the Globaloria Learning and Teaching Progress Reports due at the end of the month, I thought it would be a good time to revisit a question from the Educator's Forum.

Group Forum/Worry about finding time to document and do rather intensive record keeping requirements.

Ingrida left a great idea on the forum.  Take a few minutes a day to get your thoughts down in a little note to yourself. Capture what happened during the class period, what went great, what were your challenges.  These types of quick reflections are exactly what needs to go into your progress report.  It would also be good to capture some specifics about your students.  Johnny asked this question, Mary reviewed this game,  Timmy is becomming a leader in his group by providing support for his team.

A few notes a day will go a long way when when pulling together your reflections.

Do you have any ideas?

Maitreyi's Globaloria Blog

Most of you have met Maitreyi Doshi. She is our Special Projects Coordinator for the Globaloria program here in West Virginia. Maitreyi is a gifted young lady who is going to bring a lot of energy and talent to our WV Team.  She has already conducted two training sessions related to graphic design and using images in Flash.  She has also really taken on the roll of collecting needed information from our schools.  All that paperwork that has to be done.

I am happy to announce that Maiytreyi has started a blog!  Check out her first post here.

My First Month at Globaloria

Welcome to our community and the MyGLIfe Network Maitreyi!

Talk:Group Forum/How do I combat competing school interests / activities? - WVwiki

At the Globaloria Academy in Charleston last month we had a great session that provided all educators to ask questions. We then attempted to have a group discussion around these great questions. However, time was not on our side and we had to limit some of the great discussion that we taking place. I am goign to try to continue that discussion here on my blog. The first question I will mention is about competing against school interests. I posted a response on the Educator's Wiki in the Educator's Forum and I am going to share it here on the blog as well for those of you who didn't go back and check it out. 

The first paragraph is notes from our discussion, the second is my response after the workshop. If you have any ideas, post them in the comments.

Crittenton team: You can offer incentives for the students to participate. We had an incentive every 3 months for those who continued participating. You can also offer different times than during activities and work around their times. You can also offer more than one time a day for the class so they can pick between the 2 times. You also can get the schedules of the students before you decide on your class times. Loretta: We encountered this in Year 1. We doubled up days in weeks when they were there. Having laptops that students could take home helped too.

Being Proactive

I think there is a lot to be said about being proactive. If you can plan ahead, get the word out early, and really empower the students to continuing to work even if conflicts present themselves, you can go a long way in reducing the impact of other school activities. If missing once or twice due to an alternative event doesn't slowdown progress in game development, because students know what they need to be working on as soon as they get back, then I think the program can still flourish. I have been reading a lot about being proactive and having an "abundance" attitude, sometimes it is hard, but is really powerful when you can think this way.--Lee 09:47, 21 August 2008 (EDT)

Talk:Group Forum/How do I combat competing school interests / activities? - WVwiki

Flash Skills: Use it or Lose It

It is really important that you go back into your Flash files and work on your games as much as you can. You know as educators, when you are trying to learn new skills that you may not have a lot of experience in, you need to just put in some real time "hacking" around. Just becoming familiar with the Flash user experience is important.

Here is a little flash movie I just made for you to check out. It is nothing more the buttons on layers over a screencap. You all know how to do that. You can make a lot of creative things just with this basic technique. Try it... hand draw a game interface and scan it or take a digital picture. Paste the image in Flash and lay buttons over each area explaining the interface. Remember to put your buttons on different layers.


(note: flash object may not appear in your email, go to the blog page to see it.)

Scroll your mouse over the different areas of the picture and learn what that area is called.

I hope that you are using it... your flash skill... so you don't lose it.

Good Luck!

Mrs. Ellis' Globaloria Blog Site

Natalie Ellis

Since the Globaloria training last week, I have been taking a few minutes each day and reviewing the information for Flash that we received in the class.

Mrs. Ellis' Globaloria Blog Site

This is great!  Natalie is finding a few minutes to work on the skills she learned in the workshop and she is blogging!  Way to go Natalie.  I hope that everyone will try to follow your example.

Flash Animation in a Game

Here is a great example of a frame by frame animation that one of our educators put together this week in our workshop. This animation was part of a great game that allows the learner to consider the important balance needed in life between protecting our environment and having the energy our world needs to maintain our needs and healthy lifestyles.



Flash File is Here.

The technique is to actually change the assets (in this case the wheels, truck bed, and coal) in scene on defined keyframes. This allows the game developer to create the illusion of animation.

Globaloria Workshop: Prototypes and Flash

In day two of the Globaloria workshop everyone did a great job prototyping their games. As educators were divided into four groups and given only about an hour, they all came up with some great ideas. The teams, Team Green, Team Go, Team Odd Man Out, and Team EnviroBalance, all pulled together a paper prototype and presented it to everyone. Each of the games really started to take shape and all were based on great educational or social change issues.

Later in the afternoon everyone got to really take a look at Flash and how to draw their prototypes in Flash. It was cool how everyone educator in the class stepped up and was drawing a section of their game. This is Team Greens Game flash file based on their game pitch.






Today, day three, the educators will continue to build their game design concepts and will be presenting their final ideas, in Flash, to the entire group. It should be exciting.

Barry Joseph on Gaming in Education

We are sitting in Barry Joseph's session on Games for Social Change. He started the session by asking us to interrupt him. He is providing a history of serious games and games for change. Mention's Senator Clinton's legislation regarding the indecency of games. He has stepped through and is now talking about SecondLife. Mention's program from MacAuthor Foundation.

Mentions Games For Change conference. MacAuthor announces a Game school in New York City. Scratch. - helps with game design.

Video clip of Principal who likes Global Kids.

Jan 2008 - interest in program continues.

Study said the making a game was useful for learning. A single game could teach a complex issue.

June 2008 - Library gaming... Librains guide to gaming.

AMD Foundation announces games initiative. "Changing the Game". Shows a video clip.

Gaming langauge has become acceptable over the past six years.

The question for us is.... Are we ready?

Rezed.org - best practices for education.

---

The Session continues....

UPDATED

Continued Live Blogging from Barry Joseph Session...

http://holymeatballs.org/
Barry is providing a quick overview of a list of games and we will decide what we want to play. We decided to play Free Rice. The game helps you with language and the rice you win will be donated to those in need. Heidi scored 560.

Idit discusses how we might be able to better show the community gain at large.

Next Game: Consumer Consequences... really not a game at all, but students experience it as a game. The main goal is to be aware of the concept. Just get the idea across. You have to make decisions in your own time and own space and that is often where issues come from.

Next Game: September 12... it is not really a game.... talked about issues around the game.

The session went into a great group activity that I will go into in another post soon.

Globaloria Academy Final Plans

The WorldWideWorkshop Foundation has been working hard these last two weeks creating the first of two Globaloria Academy Workshops to be held in West Virginia this summer. Finalizing agendas, talking with speakers, getting the logistics in place.... everything needed to support a learning experience. It is also so great to be working with our partners at WVCPD on this, they are always so helpful!

This first workshop is all about putting our educators in the "learner" role. We will be providing some overview of the network, some context on the program, and then we are going to jump into learning about conceiving, designing, and building a game that provides value for anyone who plays it. The three day workshop will engage our educators in becoming part of the virtual social network that we call MyGLife and help them become participants in the network. As part of that participation they will begin to shape their ideas and start the process necessary to bring them to life, that is, create a playable game.

It is our goal to really model how the Globaloria program can be implemented in the classroom and provide the educators with a context for collaboration and game creation through technologies that mirror 21st century work models and skills. I am particularly excited to observe last years educators begin to build on their existing skills and experiences and take their games to a new level. Of course, that does come with the concern that they might go to work for EA Sports! For those of you coming next.... see you there!