Thing 3 : Photo Sharing

I have to start out this post by admitting that I am a photo addict. I have thousands and thousands of photos, mostly of my children. I have been known to spend hours editing, creating photo projects, and backing them up on numerous hard drives because I am terrified of losing them.

My latest obsession is the "Auto Awesome" feature embedded in Google Photos. The last time I updated Picasa on my home computer I must have somehow turned on the auto backup feature, which I LOVE, because as I said before, I'm terrified of losing my photos.

Anyway, Auto Awesome automatically creates fun new versions of your photos and videos when they are uploaded with certain criteria. You can read more of the specifics here.

If photos are taken in quick succession, it will automatically generate a .gif file. I can not get enough of these! Auto Awesome calls this feature "Motion." Here are a few of my recent favorites.

 

 

See how amazing they are!?

Below are just a few more features.

 

This photo was created using the "Smile" feature. Auto Awesome will choose the best shots of each person in your image and merge them into one photo. Basically it automatically swapped Chloe's head (the baby) from a different picture!

 

Here is the original photo from which the smile was taken

 

This next effect is called, oddly enough, "Snow" It's seasonal :)

 

 

Finally, this one is called "Mix." If you've taken a series of portraits sharing similar background elements, Auto Awesome will compile these photos into a photo booth style grid. This style works best with close-ups of faces.

 

 

I hope you learned something new from this post and I hope you have as much fun seeing what Auto Awesome can do with your photos as I have.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thing 2: Online Communities & Personal Learning Networks

 

Option 3: Veteran Tweeters

While in no way do I consider myself a veteran tweeter, I chose this option because I've had a twitter account for several years, but apparently have not really used it to it's full advantage!
I do get ideas for the classroom from Twitter all the time, but I don't participate in twitter chats or tweet my own stuff very often. I did not know you could create a list in twitter (like this one by Polly Alida-Farrington).

I used the advanced search feature and search for "common core" and #tlchat and got some great results.

I was confused by a line in Cool Tools Blog post that read "follow the hashtag #tlchat." Can you follow hashtags like you can users? I'm still not sure how to do that.

I LOVE the #tlchat hashtag. I have found so many new people to follow. I want to spend some time creating lists. Because I use my account primarily for work, I need to come up some relevant categories for my lists. I think I will keep library specific tweets on one list, ed tech on another, and publishers on another.

I am excited to share all the new things I learned about Twitter with my students and co-workers. I think I may feature some of this at my presentation during this months faculty meeting.

I still think I have a lot to learn about twitter and am looking forward to trying out some new things. Thanks to the blog post by Allison Kowalski, I have just started experimenting with TweetDeck.





Completely unrelated side note.

During this weeks assignment I came across this twitter war between a comedian and a salsa company. It turned out to be a prank in the end, but it was the most fun I've had reading tweets EVER.

Thing 1: Blogging

My name is Sarah Jones. Previously I taught health at Southside High School in Elmira. I was a ninth grade teacher there for eight years. I made the jump to Library Media Specialist last year. I currently work at Horseheads Middle School and am loving it!
I'm taking this course because I am attempting to take more of a leadership role in my building by offering monthly volunteer professional development opportunities to staff. I also offer a monthly tip at faculty meetings and thought this might be a great place to get some ideas.
I wish I had these resources two months ago! I started blogging with health classes here recently and it never occurred to me to show the Common Craft video to them (even though I am OBSESSED with them). We are using KidBlog and they really seem to like it. I wish I could get them to engage in higher level questioning and conversation a little more with less prompting from me, but maybe in time.  I agree with Paul Wagner when states that we do a poor job of teaching the cyber safety piece. Teachers are SO crunched for time already, I know many can't possible imagine adding one more thing into the mix.
I'm excited to learn new things with all of you this year!

Sarah