Robots Lesson resource (Your Easter present!)

These fabulous Robots were created recently by my Year 7 class (28 kids working in pairs on A2 blue sugar paper). They enjoyed it so much I thought I might share it and the resources. The robots are produced using coloured chalks over a 1 hour lesson with main aims including using the media, producing a character and getting a 3D effect. I’ll upload a lesson plan below and I think its easily adaptable for older or younger artists. Mine started off the week before using 4B pencils to produce individual simple robots built of 3D shapes (emphasis on 3D forms). This was the task that really enthused though – I wouldn’t mind seeing other kids’ efforts on the same or similar?!

Lesson Plan

Robot lesson (pdf download)

Sample resources

These images were selected from an image search for ‘sci-fi robots, 1950s robots, tin toys’  and the prints laminated on A3 (both sides).

Demo piece

I produced this in front of the kids sketching out with yellow chalk and adding tone to the body section before they got started. As any groups wanted help with 3D tone I completed further sections. When at this stage I blue-tacked to the wall.

Kids’ Feedback

“Loved doing this!”

“Really messy, I like smudging”

“My Robot is rusting, so I used orangey-brown on his body”

“The white chalk highlights where the lighting is”

“Can we do a life-size one now?”

Xtranormal – text to animated movies

Xtranormal.com offers a free service to convert text to an animated movie – a good alternative to D-Film!

 

Stage from xtra

The advantage of D-Film is that it has a really easy to use interface and a style that learners can relate to; it’s games like and has a great sense of humour. Likewise, Xtranormal is perfect for your next level up of learner.

The whole thing looks like Macromedia Director and the level of control is outstanding. Having shown it to some Y11 Media students, they think it is usable as a planning tool for pre-production. The lighting features make this great for learning studio basics too.

Check out the website as there are loads of examples in the gallery. Oh, did I mention it is a free resource?!

QuarkXpress tutorials needed

A search on google for #quarkxpress tutorials – any recommended? Loads of leads but unsure of the quality and relevance – I would prefer screencast type rather than print out and keeps too. Yes, I do have the For Dummies book!!!

Autology.org – great resource

Fantastic search tool that looks up info as you type and the beauty is that every bit of info is from a reliable education resource.

Type in Harold / William and 1066 and before you complete your sentence you have a list of resources. How useful is this for your GCSE class?

Twitteachers – newbie resource

This Scribd resource gives people new to Twitter an idea of how to use it for educational as well as social reasons. Follow the link below:

Twitter Handbook for Teachers

Online collaboration

I have been giving some thought to online collaboration tools. I have used Skype for a while as a communication tool and have shared documents between small groups in Google docs. Working with Colin at Uni, we wanted an integrated approach.

So Colin and I agreed to work online collaboratively every Wednesday evening from 8 to 9 pm. We initially started using Skype (tested during Day 1), however, audio can be a bit hit and miss at times depending on the network and your physical site of your computer. Colin, I believe was in a public library! Consequently, he set up and sent me the link today to his Groundwork trust ning social site… this worked really well and we were able to share our progress, ideas, resource files and even slides. Read through our Forum commentary here. Suitably impressed by Colin’s ning site, I have created one for my work colleagues, although it may be difficult to tear them away from Facebook.
Explore Colin’s ning social site at: http://groundworklearners.ning.com/

Interesting that others’ sites were done in pbwiki and wetpaint. Room for some more discovery research here.

Second Life research

http://20.me.uk/blog/?p=220

Some great reference information from someone experimenting with possibilities. rather than repeat the information on my blog, I present the link here for your own reading. Virtual worlds have great potential for the future of online chat and collaboration. Much has been written but case studies remain inconclusive.

Extending Flickr

Has the novelty started wearing off your Flickr account? Well, I decided I didn’t want to share my travel photos anymore so I deleted them. What else can I do with Flickr now? Here at http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/ there are some great “toys” for keeping your interest in your Flickr account and making some wonderful photo ideas. Try it out – they’re free!

New iPhone design

A great way to get involved with the new iPhone design is to create your own widget badges for the applications on your Phone. Use this handy tutorial to help:

http://tutorials20.com/design/design-your-iphone-widgets/

Shelfari – virtual book club

Shelfari is a great place to recommend books and find similar recomendations from others. You can join groups, rate out of 5, invite friends etc.
A fantastic feature is the option to find similar tastes and interests – and a retail button to buy choices if you want!

A great educational use would be to get learners to peer review books and write reviews for each other. What about Shelfari developing a non-social site for the under 14s? Wouldn’t take much to develop a ‘younger’ site for kids only.