Flat+Stanley

 = Flat Stanley =



You can find Flat Stanley's adventures with the EDT 6010 class in 2009 @ http://edtflatstanley.wikispaces.com/ My page is found @ http://edtflatstanley.wikispaces.com/Suzanne+Brazeau Description of Assignment: Our assignment was to download Flat Stanley and either print him out and color him, or use PhotoShop to color him in. Then, we needed to take at least 3 fun pictures with Flat Stanley in some of our adventures. Part of the assignment was to use some of our readings about picture taking and cropping to enhance our photos, and make Flat Stanley stand out. We were also encouraged to try an audio or video with Flat Stanley. **
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 * Process**: Being the 3rd grade teacher that I am, I decided to print Flat Stanley out and color him in! Then, I took a picture with Flat Stanley at the beach on a beautiful, sunny day on my trip to DE. I also took one with him changing the radio station in my car, since we spent so much time in it! Finally, I went out star gazing and found a way to take a picture of Flat Stanley in the bottom left 1/3 of the page and the moon in the top right 1/3 of the page. That night was a little chilly, so we headed inside to warm ourselves by the fire. We listened to some Christmas music that was appropriate (//Baby It's Cold Outside).// I uploaded the pictures and video to my computer and made the files small enough to upload onto the Wiki site. My pictures were all about 20 kb. Then I uploaded my video to YouTube and inserted that embeded Widget onto the Wiki. All except the picture taking was new to me! Even trying to change the focus of the picture was new.

 I only wish I could be as tall as the Empire State building!


 * Reflection:** I thought overall this was a very productive and exciting learning experience. The most interesting part for me was learning how to take a great picture. I have always been one to take my people pictures completely centered. I started working on taking pictures with the focus in one of the thirds of the shot. I also found this to be an exciting project that would be an easy way to incorporate technology into the classroom. You have to have an idea about Flat Stanley, but then you can take him anywhere, and everywhere, and often times people know who you are carrying and what you are doing. This is an excellent example of 21st century skills (picture taking, uploading pictures, using a Wiki). When uploading pictures, I learned how to created files that were smaller, so they would fit on the WIki. My camera has such high quality/high resolution that it creates large files, so now I know how to make them smaller to send to friends and family. I feel very comfortable using a Wiki now, which was new to me. I could see making my own Wiki for Flat Stanley if I used this in my class. I now know what an how to embed a Widget, and I would like to try out some of the other Widgets available. From creating the page on the Wiki, I was forced to learn how to upload a YouTube video, but from a video I took with my camera. Then I was able to upload that video in the Flat Stanley Wiki.