Category: Making Videos

I really flipping hope that this works!

11/30/2018

Someone recently posted something on Facebook or Twitter about branching GoogleForms. You can make a form where the user's experience depends on what they select for a multiple-choice item. It's like those Choose Your Own Adventure books that many of us remember from childhood, and I guess the rest of you are millennials who apparently just eat avocado toast and killed the mayonnaise industry.

Anyway, the point is that I got inspired by that post with a mystery author. [EDIT: I have shortened this post a lot from the original draft because you probably don't really care about why I am focusing on discussion skills.]
Today I assigned a different kind of flipped-video lesson. Students will access a GoogleForm, enter their name, and answer this item:

Depending which item they select, one of 6 pages will display. I have an example below:

Students will actually do this twice, because I want them to work on 2 different skills.

I produced six different video lessons (one for each skills), but they are all 4 minutes or less. My wife crashed a couple dishes at the end of one video, but I decided not to re-record it. Four of them were recorded last Sunday evening, and I did the other 2 very early Monday morning (after shaving sooner than usual!) while wearing the same red shirt. My hair looks less-than-impressive, but whatever.

Let's see if this works out as well as I hoped! Comment below if you want more details about how I made the branched GoogleForm, or something else in this blog post.

How long does it take to make a flipping video?

9/19/2018

That was the Bonus Question for Monday's #flipclasschat.
The accurate-but-lame answer is "it depends" but nobody finds that satisfying. Fresh on the heels of my recent blogging about this subject, I tweeted:

That response led to some good-natured ribbing from other tweeps, including:

@lucascconner replied, "...With my astronomy vids, I'm spending an hour planning content and quiz, 10-15 mins videoing, @screencasto makes the edits a breeze, then upload to Google Drive, set up everything on @Schoology, and roll it out to my Ss."

I felt a bit self-conscious afterward. For one thing, the issue I have raised here several times before (STEM flipping vs flipped humanities ... they're not the same but I can't quite figure out why) makes another appearance.

But still, what if anything am I doing wrong? How much of this relates to my ADD? Hey look a squirrel! Is this also just about the fact that I like making videos?

Today I made the next video, to be assigned on Monday so I feel delighted to be several days ahead. I used Powerpoint Mix to produce this one, and that ALWAYS takes more time. About 60 minutes to get the text boxes and transitions just right, and 25-30 minutes to record voice-overs. However, unlike the webcam videos, building from a slideshow gives me modules to reuse and rearrange in later years. In fact, I re-purposed a couple slides from a 2016 video for the first couple minutes of the newest one. Also it gave me an opportunity for some slapstick humor at the timestamp below. Pretty sure the kids will like that part....

Where the flipping magic happens

9/11/2018

Today's #flipblogs item is a short follow-up to yesterday's piece about filming my first video of the new school year. Behold, my grand recording studio!:

This video lesson is about the different philosophies of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Rousseau. You can see one of my props near the laptop: a stuffed tiger to represent Hobbes. I also used a padlock and a French flag. The folded binder near the lamp contains my Cheat Sheet in chart form. I use the school-supplied Macbook to import from the webcam into iMovie, and later I added a few simple titles and transitions. After a couple false starts, I did the raw filming in just 2 takes.
Producing this video took about one hour from beginning to end. Much better than some of the Powerpoint Mix slideshow-based videos that I have made in the recent past, which take several hours to get it all just right.
Here is the final product, just in case you want to brush up on your knowledge of Enlightenment philosophy: https://www.vimeo.com/289132982

This is not flattering.

Some flipping help for video production

1/28/2018

In advance of my guest-hosting gig for Monday's #engsschat on Twitter, this weekend I produced and posted some really short clips to illustrate multiple ways to produce video lessons. I remember that when I got started, the video-production step felt daunting and a bit terrifying.

Let me know in the comments if this is helpful, incomplete, inspiring, offensive, or "other"

We need another flipping term

7/8/2017

That being said, it seems there are two kinds of flippers in this world: Those who assign videos, and those who do not. Some very smart people have pushed this point recently, like Robert Talbert in his blog and his book. So did Brian Bennett on his nodes blog (until last year when he seemed to change his mind). I have detected 3 reasons for this not-just-videos stance:

to make flipping more appealing & available in communities with tech access problems
to avoid dependence on ed-tech vulture companies, who I complained about in 2015
to emphasize the importance of classroom experiences/interactions over the production and consumption of video lessons

I've been trying for months to wrap my head around the flipping-without-videos concept. Robert Talbert's January 2017 piece described 5 different options, all of which involve a structured activity for the individual-space (usually homework) task: a game, a podcast, reading a text.... Even though he writes a bold-faced caveat that you can't just assign chapter 3 of the book and call it flipping, I fear this is still a misleading suggestion. ("But we have class discussions about chapter 3 the next day, in the group-learning space! That means I'm a flipper too, right?!" Uh, no I don't think so.) If we stretch the definition of flipped learning too far, then it will break.

I'm not talking about a civil war within the flipped community.* Maybe video-based flippers are a subset of the flipped-learning community; maybe we need our own label like the "in-flip" or "in-class flip" folks (Catlin Tucker has a well-read piece and Martha Ramirez wrote a mighty fine FLN item). Educators in this sub-group could share strategies for making effective videos, connections between those lessons and group-space activities, methods of accountability for the videos, etc. ... without talking at cross-purposes with in-flippers and other non-video-based flipped classrooms.

What would that term be?! I thought of vlipping, but that sounds terrible (David Walsh agrees) and we might have trademark issues with a Columbian company. Or we could try vid-flipping, but I don't love that term either. Wait, maybe that's why no one discussed this idea before: the brand naming seems impossible! HELP!!!

* But if it happens, then I claim the Captain America role ;)

Here's the story of my favorite flipping video

7/4/2017

It's the 4th of July, so of course I am not teaching in school today. If I were, then we'd surely focus on the Declaration of Independence; instead we usually explore this document in November or December. The holiday always reminds me of this video, which remains my favorite (and usually my students' too):

The material itself is not really unique. My content partner has taught the 5-part structure for many years, and the "break-up message" analogy has been noted by many other great teachers. The 5-finger mnemonic device (pinky = Preamble, middle finger = Tyrannical Acts, etc.) is the only element that might be a Mr. Swan original. The idea popped in my head sometime in 2012, when I was preparing this unit.
For the first 2 years of my current Social Studies job, I did most of this teaching in just one class. That includes the "break-up" skit, which I performed 4 times in one day. Exhausting!! And what about the handful of kids who were absent that day?? In 2012 or 2013, the idea of video-recording that performance occurred to me, but I didn't do it. What's the point? Where would I post the video? My colleague and I committed to flipping in the summer of 2013, but we used other people's videos for most of that year (or assigned really boring voice-over Powerpoint lectures -- yikes!).
     On Halloween 2014 (a Friday), I stayed late after school to record the video you see above; I brought in the white T-shirt that morning, which still shows evidence of the folds and wrinkles from lying in a bag all day. That year I was the faculty advisor of a video-news production elective, so I had easy access to a greenscreen and Kodak Flip camera with tripod. I story-boarded the video in my journal that morning, but basically it was just a recording of the in-class lesson I'd already given 8 times (4 sections a day x 2 years experience).

I first recorded the "handy guide" which appears at the end, but I already knew that would be the wrap-up segment. This required 4 takes. Fun fact: I had a perfect take in the middle, but near the end an intercom announcement about the 4:00 late bus interrupted my performance. I swore loudly, vigorously, and impressively before hitting the Stop button. I kept that 'blooper' on the SD card for a couple years but it got erased. Too bad.
Next, I did the 5-parts section you see in the beginning. The marker ink was barely dry on the props you see taped to the whiteboard. I recorded it all in one take, but I wish the tripod were higher so you're not looking up my nose!! Later, I used iMovie editing tools to cut out the bits where I moved each mini-poster onto the whiteboard ... that makes it look slick. I don't like the echo-ey classroom acoustics, so usually I don't record videos here anymore. Fun fact: that echo is very difficult for students with cochlear implants and other hearing aids.
   The "restaurant" performance got done last, although you see it in the middle of the video. By now it was about 5:00 and I just wanted to get the job finished. A quick costume change, a shift of the tripod to the previously-erected greenscreen setup, and a little Method acting later ... the piece was done. Rush home -- grab thick coat -- go trick-or-treating with kids -- a long day ended at 8:30pm! Well, except for the iMovie production that I mentioned earlier. It took about 2 hours of work to totally finalize the video and post it. Most of that work was adding the text titles in just the right spots so students could understand the lesson.

   Total time for this video = about 7 hours from planning --> recording --> editing (not including the rehearsal/workshopping for two years previously).
On the other hand, I never again need to perform this skit during class. I can (and do) recycle this video lesson every year. Also I can (and do) share this performance with Facebook friends on the holiday, just because. That seems like several hours well-spent!

Home from Providence!

3/31/2016

We got back this evening from a full day at the New England League of Middle Schools conference at the Convention Center in Providence RI. For the second year, my colleague and I presented to fellow educators about our flipped classroom -- it was quite well-attended, and we got some great questions and feedback from the audience. That included some requests for examples of our video lessons....

I made this low-tech video at home, with very basic visual aids. The students' quiz results were very high, which shows we don't always need bells & whistles.

This is a point-and-shoot video I made in my classroom. I wrote notes on the whiteboard behind the camera, which is why my eyes occasionally glance to the side.

I made this with Office365 Mix for Powerpoint with a basic microphone. It's worth $7/month for topics that benefit from images and graphic organizers.

One of my favorites. It took more time than most to produce, but saves me from performing it 4 times a day!

This is an example of screen-casting: recording whatever's on the screen. I changed the font color from white to black in a Word doc.

I used the "movie credits" text feature in iMovie. Then I recorded on the webcam while I saw the words scrolling upward to stay in sync.

Transmogrify Your Slideshow into a Flipping Movie!

8/19/2015

all credit due to Bill Watterson

I have recently produced most movies with a simple camera and iMovie, but there are many more ways to produce your clips. If you already have multimedia presentations, wouldn't it be great to convert them into your homework videos? Yeah it would. Sometimes the process is simple, sometimes it's more complicated ... depending on your original version.
If this blog post is missing a crucial step or a common computer program, or if you find an easier solution, please let me know!

Turning a Powerpoint slideshow into a movie

If you have the newest version (Microsoft Office 2013), this is really easy:

You can "Record Slide Show" to record the narration on each slide and click through the transitions.
When that's finished you can export the slide show to Create a Video. Make sure to select "Use Recorded Timings and Narrations" so your preparations are included.

However, you probably have an older version of Powerpoint. Its movie export feature only records the transitions and NOT your voiceover narrations. Bummer. This is the best workaround I have found:

Go to "Set Up Show" to it will playback inside a window [not full screen!].
Then click to "Start Slide Show."
Now open up the application Quicktime Player and go to File -- New Screen Recording.
You can click-drag the point to select just the Powerpoint slideshow playback window. [This online pdf contains many more details about Quicktime's features.]
Then you can record the voiceover while clicking through the transitions.
IMPORTANT DETAILS: Make sure that you click the white triangle button on the right to
This screen recording will be saved as a .mov file that you can upload elsewhere. Done!

If you don't have Quicktime Player, you can use Screencast-o-Matic (free) or Camtasia (not free) or a similar screen-capturing program to do the same thing.

Making a movie from Inspire or a similar app

Follow the steps for the workaround described above: Quicktime Player or another screen-cap program.Huzzah!!

Converting an Explain Everything project into a movie

When your project is finished (including voiceovers if needed), export by clicking this button:

Choose the circled option below. You will just see one of these, depending on your version of the app:

Within a few minutes the job will be done. If you had the left-side window, then you will have to tap "Save Video". Finished!

Converting a Keynote project into a movie

Follow the 4 steps illustrated below, and then you will have an Explain Everything presentation.
View it to ensure that all the transitions were converted properly.
Then scroll up to see the directions for converting an Explain Everything project to a movie. Wahoo!