The Pixel Farm

Hello, blog!  Sorry I’ve been so lax with posting.  I just got back from my summer teaching assignment out in Mallorca Spain. This year, as in previous years, I taught a section of “Educational Applications of Technology” for a group of amazing international school teachers and administrators.  Our class blog is available here if you want to check out what we covered during the summer term.

The summer palace of King Juan Carlos (visible from my old apartment!) - This is where Michelle Obama is meeting the royal family this week on her vacation to Spain.

Mallorca Graduation Summer 2010

TCNJ Mallorca Graduation Celebration, July 2010

Now that I’m back I’m focusing on getting the new version of ZooBurst up and running.  This new version contains a host of new features that were suggested by the comunity of over 3,900 (!) teachers who have signed up since May 2010.  These features include:

• Sound effects via a searchable sound library
• Audio recording to allow your characters to “speak” using your own voice
• Customizable backgrounds
• Advanced page management features (reorder, drag and drop, duplication, etc.)
• Privacy options
• Classroom management mode for teachers
• … and some other surprises!

We’re shooting to have this new framework up and running in time for the beginning of the school year here in North America.  I’ll keep you posted as the release date gets closer.

Ok, back to work!

Thanks to everyone who attended my Augmented Reality workshop this afternoon at the NMC 2010 Summer Conference!  I’ve posted all of the materials referenced in the session, including downloadable versions of the Flash templates that we covered in class .  Everything is accessible via the ‘Getting Started with AR’ link at the top of this page.

If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to get in touch – thanks again for a great session!

T-minus 9 days until the premier educational technology event of the year – the annual New Media Consortium Summer Conference! This year’s program is looking better than ever with sessions and workshops focusing on a wide range of topics, such as educational gaming, virtual worlds, mobile applications, geolocation technologies, cloud-based learning systems, digital storytelling techniques and yes, of course, Augmented Reality!

NMC 2010 Summer Conference

This year I will be presenting a half-day hands-on session in which we will explore emerging educational applications of augmented reality as well as introducing ways in which educators can build their own AR environments.  I’m busily preparing a number of fun tutorials for this event, including:

• Hands-on activities that will let participants experience augmented reality first-hand (printed markers included!)
• A series of “quick start” code libraries that are designed to help educators construct their own AR learning applications, and step-by-step instructions on how to get up and running fast.  All participants will leave the session with their own working AR project on their blog or website.
• A preview of the new version of the ZooBurst digital storytelling tool which includes a number of new features, including live audio recording capabilities, classroom management features and even an augmented reality presentation mode.

If you’ll be in Anaheim CA next week and would like to join us feel free to register!

Thanks to everyone who sat in on my ‘Augmented Reality in the Classroom‘ presentation at the NMC Symposium on New Media and Learning.  This year’s event was held completely online in a private instance of the Second Life virtual world called ‘Hakone’ – here are a few snapshots from the space:

Welcome to the NMC's Symposium on New Media & Learning!

Milgram's Virtuality Continuum

Looking out over the Hakone landscape with some random AR 'props'

And here are some resources that I referenced during my talk.  If you have any questions please feel free to drop me a line!

• Zooburst Augmented Reality Pop-Up Books
• Live demo:  Earth / Moon
• Live demo:  Solar System
• Live demo – Labyrinth Physics
• Live demo – Catch a Star (Assistive Tech) (motion tracking augmented reality)
• Live demo – Virtual Gardener (color tracking augmented reality)
• The Whisper Deck: A voice-controlled augmented reality search engine
• SimSnails: An augmented reality ecosystem that helps kids learn about and experiment with the concepts of directional selection and evolution.
• Frontline Digital Nation (PBS)
• Topps Baseball Cards in Augmented Reality
• Live demo – Plug into the Smart Grid (GE):
• Esquire Magazine – Augmented Reality Edition
• Hallmark Augmented Reality Greeting Cards

Thanks to everyone who came to see my talk this morning at the NJEDge.Net Faculty Best Practices Workshop!  As promised, here’s a link to my presentation (”Emerging Interfaces in Education: How Augmented Reality, Social Computing and Mobile Devices will change the way we Teach, Learn and Play“)  Be warned, some elements of the presentation may not load quickly – it weights in at about 30mb due to a fair number of embedded videos.   In addition, here is a listing of websites that I referenced during the presentation:

Mobile Computing

• Poll Everywhere: Create your own web-based poll that lets students vote using SMS text messages sent from their mobile phones.  Poll Everywhere polls can easily be embedded into your existing PowerPoint slides.
• Text Marks: Set up SMS text messaging distribution lists.
• PhotoSynth: View and construct rich 3D walk-through scenes using a collection of static photographs (note: you can view a PhotoSynth on any computer, but you need a PC in order to build one yourself)
• Qik and Ustream: Live video streaming apps that turn your mobile device into a live video camera that can be broadcast out to anyone watching on the web.
• Google Maps: Construct your own geo-referenced maps that can be displayed on the web or on a mobile device.
• Next Exit History: A joint project by the Universities of West and South Florida that allows you to discover more about Florida’s history using geo-referenced video and audio clips.
• NOAH (Networked Organisms And Habitats): “Noah is a tool that nature lovers can use to explore and document local wildlife and a common technology platform that research groups can use to harness the power of citizen scientists everywhere”
• Historic Earth: “Drawing on the world’s largest online collection of geo-coded historic maps, Historic Earth allows you to virtually travel back through time in many locations”
• Drop.io: Gives you a free 100mb file sharing space in the cloud.  In addition, all drop.io sites come with their own telephone number, allowing you to call your drop from any phone to record an audio message that will instantaneously be converted into an MP3 file.  Drops can be subscribed to just like any other RSS feed, allowing you to create ad-hoc podcasts on the fly.
• Instapaper: Add a “read later” button to your Firefox toolbar that automatically sends a copy of any website – including images – to your mobile device for later reading.
• ChaCha: Text any question to Cha Cha (242-242) and receive a response from a real live human in under 5 minutes!
• Pandora: Provides you with a customized Internet “radio” station of music that fits your individual tastes.
• Midomi: A music search engine that lets you identify a song by humming or singing

Augmented Reality:

• Zooburst Augmented Reality Pop-Up Books
• Live demo:  Earth / Moon
• Live demo:  Solar System
• Live demo – Labyrinth Physics
• Live demo – Catch a Star (Assistive Tech) (motion tracking augmented reality)
• Live demo – Virtual Gardener (color tracking augmented reality)
• The Whisper Deck: A voice-controlled augmented reality search engine
• SimSnails: An augmented reality ecosystem that helps kids learn about and experiment with the concepts of directional selection and evolution.
• Frontline Digital Nation (PBS)
• Topps Baseball Cards in Augmented Reality
• Live demo – Plug into the Smart Grid (GE):
• Esquire Magazine – Augmented Reality Edition
• Hallmark Augmented Reality Greeting Cards