As an ed tech teacher, I try to deliver content to my students in interesting, meaningful ways. I’ve struggled with ways to share large amounts of information with students. I have created an ePub using Pages, but the workflow is tedious for me and my students. So far, creating a website with pages, links, and videos is the best solution I’ve found. iBooks Author hopes to give educators an easy way to create and distribute content as an iBook.

To get started, download iBooks Author for free from the App Store. 165 MB later, iBooks Author opens, and lets you choose a template. This isn’t the type of thing that you create in an hour–expect to spend some time writing and organizing information. After all, this is a textbook that is being created. The great thing, however, is that your textbook doesn’t have to be 200 pages. You can make a textbook for every unit, every week, or every day.

As a teacher, this is huge. With Apple’s typical drag-and-drop interface, I can quickly and easily create an interactive document for my students. It is simple to create a Review (interactive multiple-choice questions. It is simple to add a Keynote presentation that I already have. It is simple to create an HTML link/embed to content I already have online. It is simple to add an interactive image with various views and descriptions. Again, this entails a considerable amount of work, but the opportunities for my classroom are huge.

My favorite part of iBooks Author so far is the preview. Previously, you had to create a document in Pages, export it as an ePub, add it to iTunes, sync your iPad, and open iBooks on your iPad. Now, connect your iPad to your computer, and you have a preview in seconds. I stopped creating ePubs for my students because the workflow was terrible. With this workflow, I will be creating many iBooks for my class.

Apple makes is fairly easy to distribute your content. You can export it as a .ibooks document, and add it to your website or email students. You can publish it to the iBooks store. This takes more effort, and involves signing up for and downloading iTunes Producer. However, you can sell (or give away) the book through the Store in iBooks. It seems like we, as teachers, finally have a way to create and distribute large amounts of content.

I uploaded every photo to a set on Flickr:

• year 4
• year 3
• year 2
• year 1

If you look at each year, you’ll notice that I tagged and described photos differently (depending on the year). I like the tagging system of year 3 the best. I recommend adding all 365 photos to Flickr. Once a photo is uploaded to Flickr, you have to manually add it to a set (Actions > Add to Set > Project 365). This step is tedious, but allows you to maintain organization throughout the year.

Think about what camera(s) you’ll be using. For year 4, I only used my iPhone 4 and Instagram. That made it easy to upload to Tumblr and Flickr, but was limiting in the types of photos I could take. I also forced myself to decide on the instagram-a-day AS I WAS TAKING IT. If I found a more interesting/epic shot later in the day, too bad. In contrast, for my first three years, I had no limitations on my camera. I’d recommend this style for a first year 365 project. Make sure you always have a camera with you–if you don’t have an iPhone, but a decent Canon point-and-shoot camera and always keep it with you. Always.

Some people have monthly themes (February: high key, June: self-portrait, etc), or take a similar shot each day of the week (black and white Fridays, macro Tuesdays, etc.). I never did this. It works for some people, though, and it makes following people a bit more interesting.

Create a blog/website to host your 365 photos. These days, I recommend Tumblr. Use your Tumblr website for ONLY 365 photos–it makes life significantly easier that way. Avoid photos of your kids that aren’t part of the 365 project–they’re cute, but the websiteshould have exactly 365 posts. At some point, you’ll miss a post and you’ll need to figure out which photo didn’t get uploaded to Tumblr. Having extra photos makes that more difficult.

For my fourth year of photo-a-day, I named the photos chronologically: Instagram 1/365, Instagram 2/365, etc. It made it easier to organize and quicker to upload, but it’s not as creative.

Some people struggle with remembering to take a photo every day. I never did, though I did take many shots as I was about to fall asleep. If you need a reminder, there’s an iPhone app called Project 365–it can remind you to take a photo at a given time every day. So, if you need it, set a reminder every night at 10pm, and the app will help ensure that you take a photo every day… it won’t, however, ensure that the photo is great. Don’t worry about that–just worry about consistently taking photos. If you can regularly take photos, the quality will improve.

Feel free to begin this project on any date–my projects began mid-December and early November. It doesn’t need to be January 1 to December 31. Once you get into a habit, it will be strange to not think of taking a photo every day. Keep at it, and remember that quantity will improve the quality.

You can customize the fonts, cloud shape, and colors. You can even customize the search source–a Google search is default when they click on a word, but you can have the search on your website when they click on a word. This is excellent for websites you’ve created that are full of resources. When a student click on a word in your Tagul, it searches your website and displays relevant posts and pages.

Here are my notes from my TeachMeet presentation in Kentucky on Tagul:

Here’s the workflow for using Tagul:

1. Sign up

You need an account to create a Tagul. You are able to create up to 20 clouds (recently increased from ten!).

2. Paste information

You can paste text or a URL to generate the cloud. URLs are great for displaying hierarchical ideas because Tagul makes more frequent words bigger in the could. Pasted text could be useful if you are studying a book or article. Important words will pop out, and students will immediately see the big ideas from the text.

3. Customize

You can eliminate frequent or unimportant words (like: the, as, I, we, so, etc.). Customize fonts, shapes, and colors to match your website or the mood of the text.

4. Preview

Click Generate Cloud to see a preview. Every time you click this, a unique cloud is created. If you don’t like the look, either click Generate again or go back and modify the cloud.

5. Embed

Be sure to click save to keep your updates. Tagul gives you embed code that you can paste into your website or blog.

Examples

• http://www.billselak.com/educ514/
• http://www.billselak.com/educ448/
• Word cloud blog post

Resources

• Tagul tutorial (by @ShellTerrell [video]
• Blog post on Tagul & Tagxedo

Integrate into the Classroom

• analyze text
• introduce a new book
• home page of teacher website/blog

The Details

When I finished part one of this post, all the essentials of EdCampSFBay were in place. We had a Twitter handle, a website, a Facebook page, a Google group, and a PayPal account. As the date began to approach, dozens of details popped up. Some were small like picking up a colleague on the way to the event, and others were large like designing a shirt in six hours. (By the way, if you are organizing your own EdCamp (or other unconference-type event), take care of the shirts early. Seven days beforehand is not enough time.) I was surprised to learn that our sponsors were anxious in helping with these details. I thought they would just donate money/swag and be done, but they truly helped put on this event. A huge thank you to both Edutopia and Collaborize Classroom for making such a positive difference in EdCampSFBay.

Lessons Learned

1. Design shirts early. I already mentioned this one. We weren’t sure exactly how much money was coming in, so we waited until the last minute to design and order shirts. Everything worked out, but we could have ordered more for the same price if we had purchased them 14 days ahead of time.
2. Plan the after party and the pre-party. We had the after party planned well before EdCampSFBay. Hopefully, everyone at the EdCamp knew about the plan, and felt welcome. What I didn’t think about just beforehand was the pre-party. I drove up to Santa Rosa to visit Collaborize, help with swag, and visit Russian River Brewing. I mentioned the plan to a few people, but I should have made a huge announcement on Twitter, Facebook, and our website. It was a pretty big opportunity to get to know other EdCampSFBay attendees before the event. And, the beer was epic.
3. It’s all about connections. A big goal of an unconference is to develop relationships with other educators. Arrive early, hang out between sessions with folks, and go to the pre-party and after party. It’s a rare chance to spend with with passionate, creative teachers.
4. Be flexible. There were tons of last minute changes. Some were minor, others were a big deal. Enough said.
5. Charge your iPad. You probably won’t walk around with a laptop, and your iPhone isn’t as easy to be on all day long.
6. Get to know other tweeps. I have way more fun talking to someone if I’ve already developed a relationship on Twitter. Lots of tweeps that signed up for EdCampSFBay also filled out the Introduce Yourself part of the website. Make sure you’re following those people on Twitter before the event.
7. Bring contact info. The next time I attend an EdCamp, I’m going to have a QR code with my Twitter URL. I might wear it, add it to my business card, or get a giant sticker made for my iPad. If you have a way to stay connected with folks, the conversations from EdCamp will continue.
8. Education is often a hybrid word. EdCamp was the first example. EduAwesome, EduEpicness, and EduBrisket are also appropriate uses of the term.

Now that EdCampSFBay is over, I’m helping organize EdCampOCLA. I have already learned that each EdCamp crew is completely different. Each group has their own personality (in a good way). So take this post with a grain of salt–your EdCamp experience will be nothing like mine.

1. From a DVD.
2. From a website.
3. Created by a teacher.

Here are websites that have great educational videos:

• YouTube
• KeepVid
• TeacherTube
• SchoolTube
• Discovery Education (UnitedStreaming)
• PBS Teachers
• iTunes U
• Jing
• Screenr
• Screencast-o-matic
• SymbalooEDU

Here is software you need to quickly create your own videos:

• Article on Using HandBrake
• DVD Knife
• DVD-ripper article
• FairMount
• HandBrake
• Handbrake VLC faq
• KeepVid
• Mac the Ripper
• MPEG Streamclip
• Perian
• VLC player

Here are notes from my TeachMeet Presentation in Nashville about Blabberize:

Here’s the workflow for using Blabberize:

1. Upload a photo to Blabberize

• Visit http://blabberize.com/make.
• Find a picture with a large mouth.
• Heads directly facing the camera look better.

2. Place a mouth wireframe onto photo

• Lasso entire lower jaw.
• Move green dots into position first, then modify the location of the purple dots.
• The big green dot adjusts the sensitivity for how far the jaw moves.
• You will definitely go back and fine tune these positions.

3. Add a voice

• Record from your microphone.
• Louder sounds move the mouth farther.
• Experiment with different volumes to achieve the desired effect.
• Go back to Place Mouth and fine tune positions.

4. Share

• Click save.
• “I want this on video” saves it as a movie.
• Embed the video.
• Link to the video.

Examples

• Return Library Books
• Scary riddle
• George Washington

Sharing: Hosting Options

Once you record your content, you need to upload it. SchoolTube requires a teacher’s email address, but it is rarely blocked by districts.

• SchoolTube
• YouTube
• Self-hosted
• Viddler
• Vimeo
• TeacherTube

Integrate into the Classroom

It all started on a dark and stormy Sunday evening. The sun has just set beneath the quiet, yet smoggy Southern California foothills when I received a direct message from @seani on Twitter: “Would you want to help organize an edcamp in San Francisco?” My enthusiastic, 140 character response: “Yes.” And so, it was borne, standing on the shoulders of giants: I started to help planEdCampSFBay.

Last January, I attended EdCampOC. This absolutely changed the way I interact with teachers, and has been the single greatest day of professional develop I have experienced. I was so stoked on the day that I blogged about it and dedicated an entire podcast episode to EdCamp. So, when @seani invited me to help out with EdCampSFBay, I knew what I was getting myself into, and was eager to assist.

The first glimpse behind the curtain of organizing an EdCamp was the shared Google Doc spreadsheet. @seani modified a copy of a planning doc from EdCampOC. This simple spreadsheet is a to-do list–organizers simply signed up for jobs they wanted. And so, the gears slowly began turning.

The next step was to create a Google Group. @dowbiggin set up the group, and invited folks that were on the spreadsheet. This is my first experience with Google Groups–so far, I’m a huge fan. When you reply to a thread, it automatically emails everyone in the group. It ends up being several emails early on, but it’s a great way to quickly communicate, delegate, and move forward in the planning process.

Meanwhile, I signed up on the spreadsheet to create the EdCampSFBay logo. I visited the official EdCamp logo page (on the EdCamp Wiki ) and downloaded the high resolution EdCamp logo. I started a thread in our Google Group for the logo, uploaded logo ideas (to my server, billselak.com, notto the Google Group), and we voted informally in the threaded discussion. @VisionsByVicky brilliantly revised the logo, and we were all in agreement.

Several other people were working on amazing things at the same time. I know that @Dave_Orphal secured our location, and @dowbiggin set up a PayPal account for donations. We suddenly had a Facebook page, and several retweets about EdCampSFBay… I don’t know what else was happening at that point, but I suppose that’s the point of helping organize an EdCamp. I do have a good excuse, though, because…

I started building the website next. Again, I started a new thread on our Google Group and got plenty of input from everyone. Since I already have my own domain with BlueHost, I could create a new WordPress website for EdCampSFBay. Essentially, it only cost $10 (for the domain name), and we had our own website up and running. For a week or so, I spent about three hours every night building and fine tuning the site. I took/borrowed/stole the basic organization of the site from the EdCampOC website, and modified it to meet our needs. I added some contact forms and we were set.

At this point, we had a:

• website
• Twitter account
• Facebook page
• PayPal account
• Google Group

At this point, I should stop and mention that I already knew nearly all the organizers from Twitter. I met many of them face-to-face at EdCampOC in January 2011. Other I met at CUE 11 in March 2011. I think it’s important to have already have a relationship with some of the organizers before planning an EdCamp. If you’re reading this and you are a teacher that’s not on Twitter, get on it! Seriously, start now–follow all the people on my visit the EdCampSFBay website and follow @EdCampSFBay on Twitter.

My favorite part about being on Twitter while the news broke was the ability to interact. Quickly, I found several articles and people tweeting about the news. Before long, I found @reallyvirtual, aka Sohaib Athar, who lives in Abbottabad. He famously wrote, “Uh oh, now I’m the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid without knowing it.” We serendipitously have a transcription of this historical event thanks to Athar.

Since Twitter’s archives go back only a week, I quickly copied @reallyvirtual’s twitterstream. Here is 12 pages of @reallyvirtual’s twitterstream, as a pdf. The transcript is in reverse chronological order, and dates from May 1st to May 2nd, 2011 (during the attack). Download and use this transcript freely.