Screencasts and Instagram

Screencasts are a great way to teach mini lessons for students, especially those dealing with a technology tool. This is a very handy technology tool that can be extremely useful to teach others!


Below is the link to my Screencast on how to access the Alexandria Library (How to search for a book) from home. I uploaded my Screencast to Youtube making it easier for public view.

http://youtu.be/1hha4Vmqiyw?hd=1

With the technology immersion that is all around us in 2018, students' are becoming more and more technological thinkers, meaning you cannot expect them to learn and you cannot teach them how students were taught ten or twenty years ago. Instagram is a platform that can be used for educational purposes!

Below is the link to my Instagram video:

https://instagram.com/p/BpKkQXhlS-s/

Infographics

Teaching with infographics is a creative way to grab the students’ attention! Infographics provide a visual representation of the information that the teacher is teaching the students! There are infographics all around us!

As an English High School Teacher, I have even seen infographics in the English STAAR Exams. In the English I or English II STAAR Exams, students are tested on media literacy questions, they are given an infographic related to the reading selection and must be able to correlate and answer the designated question correctly.

 So for this assignment exploration, I explored and reviewed the following three sites, EASEL.LY, PIKTOCHART, INFOGR.AM, but in the end I chose to use a different site to create my infographic. I used Venngage. https://venngage.com/templates/infographics

EASEL.LY

https://easel.ly/

Easel.ly’s design is simple and the web page layout is not very conducive for those who are not technologically savvy. It would be more geared to an intermediate user who is used to adding media or hyperlinking sites into their design. The text features are all on the same text bar which can make it a little bit confusing when editing your infographic. Overall, this is a good site to create more in-depth infographics for those users who are not beginners.

PIKTOCHART

https://piktochart.com/formats/infographics/

PIKTOCHART webpage layout is more advanced, it has scroll down features and a Q&A section for questions you might have about creating your infographics. This site offers more customization for the infographics you are trying to create and can provide you with the high end edge if that is what you are looking for. All in all, this is a good site for experts or professionals.

INFOGR.AM

https://infogram.com/

INFOGR.AM is an amazing website to create infographics on because it is already linked up with current events or articles and it already provides premade examples for you. This site is for those looking to create infographics, reports, charts, dashboards, maps and social media visuals. Overall, this is a great site that takes customization of your data to the next level!

VENNGAGE:

https://venngage.com/templates/infographics

 I used this infographics site because I am familiar with it, and have used it in past assignments. It provides templates that you can customize and add your information and data into. This one is the one I found most user-friendly and teacher friendly, that once you create your infographic it can be immediately published and shared for free!

Below is the link to my infographic that I created using information from an article in the Pew Internet Research Project.

Infographic from:

https://infograph.venngage.com/ps/2VoCntFQk/how-nonprofit-organizations-use-live-streaming