Artifact Reflections

Genius Hour Artifact Reflections

Genius Hour Intro (PowToon Movie)

I really enjoyed learning about this type of slideshow video creation tool. It was really neat how there are interactive moving images that you can include on the slides and I also really liked how you can very simply change when the images appear and how long it takes for each slide to display what. As someone who likes to be creative and take my time to adjust the little details I liked how I could pick from the templates and even the collections of pictures that they had on file as I always forget to include references for any images that I use. It is a fun and interactive way to have the students create a more creative slide show presentation for an assignment.

Genius Hour Proposal (Google Slides)

I had never used Google Slides prior to this class and I really liked the ease to which you can navigate them. And it was actually a whole lot easier to embed the slide show into my blog page than I thought that it would be. I actually learned a lot this week about how to embed the code using the HTML format and how to centre the slideshow on my blog page as well. I can definitely see the benefits to using this for students to access online for if them have homework over a break or if I am giving them an extra make up assignment.

Genius Hour Movie Trailer (iMovie)

This was one of the components of my Genius Hour project that I feared the most. I put it off until the end, avoiding it as much as possible. But once I finally sat down and started to create a concept that I wanted to do for it I began to get excited about it. I cannot get over how user friendly iMovie it! I opened it to begin creating my trailer and when I hit the button to create a new project up pops an option to use a template to create a Hollywood style movie trailer!!! I couldn't believe it, it was so convenient!!! With that being said, I wasn't able to completely do what I had initially envisioned when I began to tackle this part of the project due to the limitations of choosing to use a template instead of completely creating my own design. But, there were a few components of the program that I was unable to figure out...like how to import a song that I wanted to use, and that the majority of videos and pictures that I had chosen to include didn't quite fit the format that iMovie was asking for so there are a few minor formatting errors and blank spaces throughout the trailer. However, I am so pleased with the final project that I was able to create, and am really excited to be able to share it. 

Genius Hour Stop Motion Movie (Google Slides)

When I first saw the instructions saying to make a stop motion movie I will admit I kind of really freaked out because I am definitely not that tech savvy...but once I actually took the time to read it and watch the helpful instructional video it was a whole lot easier than anticipated. It was a lot of fun and way more simplistic. I actually had a lot of fun creating it and playing around with some of the details. Only thing I wish I could have done better was to be able to cut out around the image of me better and next time maybe I will try and put in some different poses as well to get a little more movement in the video rather than just the one pose walking across the stage. As a potential phys ed teacher I can see this being a fun way to have the students go about teaching the class how to demonstrate a specific skill or movement through the use of stop motion.

Genius Hour TED-style Talk (iMovie)

As per the theme that has emerged, I found this a lot easier to do than what I originally thought. I was really concerned when I read in the instructions saying that we needed to cut and paste together the different video segments and add transitions and make it more than just us sitting in front of a camera for 5 minutes straight. However it forced me to actually sit down and use iMovie...and oh my goodness is it soooo user friendly. I had such a fun time playing around with the timing and where to place the different little words and phrases that I put into it. I can really see how that would be beneficial when doing a flipped or blended type classroom as I can lecture and put some of the information that is really important into the video for the students to help grasp the important material. Also, I will admit that I did this before I did my movie trailer and it made me much more confident in my abilities to use iMovie to create my trailer successfully and way more stress free.