Mobile Phones and Online Art Gallery
Mobile phones are a truly powerful piece of equipment. In Secondary Schools, most students have one in their pocket and so do the teachers. Schools traditionally see them as a threat since they can have a very destructive effect. The stories of students recording teachers in embarrassing poses and posting the footage on to Youtube are well documented. Teachers have a good right to be wary and many students have some unsavoury material on their phones that I would not want to see.
But the powers of these devices are just too great to be ignored and I feel that with the right management they are an amazing learning tool. A mobile phone gives teachers and/or students the ability to:
Take photographs and /or videos
Send/receive files free via bluetooth
Record sound
This means that I can take a photograph of a students artwork, in the lesson, quickly and easily then email or send it to the student via Bluetooth.
I can record a verbal assessment of a students work on my phone and send it to them via Bluetooth or email.
We can create short films and/or stop frame animation then upload it to a blog or host site.
I can record my revision notes as mp3 files then send them directly to the students phones, who can then walk home listening to them in their headphones!
I can record parts of my lesson on my mobile video and upload it to a hosting site, where students can replay important parts of the lesson over and over. As long as this is done in a secure responsible way then I don't see any problem with that, though I know many female colleagues who NEVER allow themselves to be video recorded.
Another excellent way to use mobile internet technology is to combine it with Blogging. In this way I can send pictures, videos and sound files directly to a class Blog. The students can then access this information instantly from where ever they are, at home or in school, etc.
Internet Art gallery
I use my mobile phone in conjunction with an image hosting site to create a very easy and effective online art gallery.
Using my iphone and a website called Flickr. I can take a photograph of a students art work and then email it directly to a group image gallery. There are no cables, no wires, no uploads or problems with images or connectivity. It really is as simple as Click, Email, Online. I enable the site with permissions so that I have to approve all images before they are displayed. I also can enable the permission for students to be allowed to email their own photographs and/or artwork too, so that I do not need to become involved, other than to monitor and make sure that the images are suitable.
You can even upload videos too.
Here is how to do it. Firstly, make sure that your mobile phone supports email. Most do these days, but you might need to set it up first. Look in the manual or ring your service provider for help. (You might ask a teenager to help you. They will usually grunt at you and tell you how stupid you are for not knowing but they usually love the opportunity to ridicule you)
Once your mobile is working you will need to go to the image hosting website and set up an account. You do not have to use Flickr. There are other image hosting sites such as Photobucket too.
Once you have your Image hosting account registered you will be able to upload photos and arrange them into groups and sets.
All you need to do now, is take a photograph, click: Send via email,
enter the email address provided and wait. It usually takes a couple of
hours for the photo to appear. When it has appeared you can enter the
students name, title of the work etc and any details about the picture.
Another really cool thing to do is to open the page on a PC in your classroom and have students evaluate the work by typing into the description box under the photo. That way the student who has done the work can see what other people think about it.
The student is able to open this gallery site at home and see all of the artwork, and show Mum and Dad their work etc. If they have their own social sites (who doesn't these days!) the students or teacher can add their artwork to their own page simply by copying and pasting the code.
In my school this gallery is linked from the school website so the students can easily show their work at home.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gems_art/sets/
It really is very simple and very effective. One piece of advice though is that I prefer to use the Pro version of the software. It doesn't cost much, about 20 English pounds per year. The benefit of this is that the site will not carry adverts. Some of these adverts can be a little risky, though certainly not offensive. I am just not comfortable with hosting any site where students can see anything untoward and I don't think I want to put my reputation at risk either.
