Tag: Keynote

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Kept it Simple: My 2017 ADE Application Video

I just found out I’ve been accepted in the Apple Distinguished Educator Class of 2017. I’m very excited to network with other ADEs and promote my favorite teaching tool – iBooks Author. Once you get past the pre-required Apple Teacher Certification (ugh … I don’t use Garage Band), the ADE application has two main components – lots of forms to fill out (easy) and your application video (hard).

I thought I might share my video production workflow to demonstrate how you can turn a seemingly daunting task into something that’s very simple.

  • I brainstormed a list of 3- 5 accomplishments that demonstrate why I should be consider for admission to ADE.
  • I put each item on a Keynote slide.
  • I used the Keynote “Play/record” slideshow feature to give a brief narration over the slides. (Your video can only be a maximum of 2 minutes, so this gives you a good idea of what leave out). In ended up with 9 slides in my final version.
  • Once I had a sense of timing. I worked on images to illustrate each point. I used QuickTime player to create two short video clips which I embedded in one of the slides.
  • I used very minimal style – solid black background and no transitions between slides.
  • I practiced a few times to get the slide timing down and to be sure I could deliver the slides in under 2 minutes.
  • I found a quiet spot and connected a decent external microphone to my laptop. Then I made a finished recording of the slide show. (All you can do is erase a recorded slide show and do it over. So when I got one I liked, I kept it.) It wasn’t perfect. I had a few minor hesitations, but after 4 or 5 tries I wasn’t getting much better.
  • Keynote has an export feature  – “File / Export to / Quicktime.”  I chose the “Custom” format and used 1024 x 768 H.264
  • It produced a very nice m4v video file that I used for my ADE application.
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5 Ideas for Teaching in a Digital World

have the courage to be less helpful

Life’s become an “open-book” test. So what does that mean for schools?

Last week I gave the keynote at 5th Annual Ed Tech Summit on the beautiful Southern Oregon University campus in Ashland, Oregon. I offered 5 suggestions for teaching in the digital world.

My talk begins at the 7:45 mark after introductions. (Approximate timestamps) 

  • The analog classroom (10:30)
  • The digital world (13:40)
  • We need to teach a new digital literacy (15:35)
  • It’s not the screen, it’s the choice and creativity (20:00)
  • Learning is social (24:00)
  • Ask better questions (33:24)
  • Have the courage to be less helpful (47:30)

View my keynote on UStream. 

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Teaching and Learning in a Digital World

Pappas keynote Ed Tech SummitI’m pleased to be the keynote speaker at the 5th annual Ed Tech Summit 2015 in Ashland Oregon (April 17, 2015). It’s co-sponsored by Southern Oregon University and the Southern Oregon Education Service District. It showcases innovations and best practices for integrating technology into schools and classrooms. Hands-on sessions are led by teacher experts in the field as well as technology hardware and software specialists.

Here’s the teasers for my keynote and two breakout sessions. Click here for more on my presentations.

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Tune into live screencasts of my keynote and two breakouts on Periscope. They are viewable in the Periscope app or your desktop browser. Follow me on Periscope app for auto notification in the app. Or follow me on Twitter @edteck and you’ll see a tweet as I begin each screencast.  (Copies of the screencasts are archived on the Periscope app for 24 hours following live post) 

Keynote: Teaching and Learning in a Digital World (8:30-9:15 AM Pacific)
Life’s become an “open-book” test. So what doess that mean for schools? Students are awash in a sea of text without context and they explore their digital world with an expectation of choice and control that challenges traditional notions of learning and literacy. This keynote will illustrate how to fuse digital technology and sound instructional practice to craft learning environments that motivate students with the opportunity to think like professionals while solving real-world needs.

Session 1: Leading for Connected Learning (12:45-1:45 PM Pacific)
This session is designed for administrators and other educators interested in the intersection of leadership, instruction and technology. Following up on the themes of my keynote, I’ll use a case study approach to demonstrate the essential elements of the connected classroom – one where students research, collaborate and share their thinking with an audience beyond their teacher.

The session will include key “look-fors” that leaders can to use to reflect on teaching, learning and technology in their schools.

Session 2: Teaching with Documents: Literacy, Tech and More (2:00-3:00 PM Pacific)
Who’s the historian in your classroom? This session will demonstrate techniques for blending historical thinking and literacy skills into an engaging student-centered classroom. Following up on the themes of my keynote, we’ll also explore some free (and easy) tech tools to help your students research, collaborate and share their thinking with an audience beyond their teacher. We’ll explore key components of document-based instruction.

  • How to choose the right documents.
  • How to guide students through a close reading of the documents.
  • How to frame the task around enduring questions, the kind that students might want to answer.

SOU Ed Tech Summit 2015

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Creating Presentation Handouts in Apple Keynote

I’m a recovering PowerPoint user that’s been using Apple Keynote for my presentations for about a year. I find it much friendlier to graphics and media. It took me a while to figure out how to create B/W six slide / page handouts that I could easily PDF to clients. Thought I’d pass it along. If you have any more suggestions, let me know!
PS. I use the Mac native pdf creation tools (too cheap to buy Adobe Acrobat for my Mac). For this illustration I’m working with a 108 slide Keynote presentation with lots of graphics.
Step 1: I open my Keynote handout presentation. I select File/ Print. Keynote defaults to Keynote in drop down box – I select “Layout.”
 Picture 1
Step 2: In the “Pages Per Sheet” box, I choose 6. Note: This “Pages per Sheet” choice doesn’t appear on the default “Keynote” print screen.
Picture 2
Step 3: I click “PDF” button in lower left and chose “Save as PDF” This gives me a color pdf – 6 slides per page. In the sample I’m working on, I have now created a 16 MB PDF file.
Picture 3
Now my goal is to convert to gray scale (for the client to photocopy) and to reduce the file size.
Step 4: Open the newly created PDF  handout in Apple Preview. I choose “File/Save As… “
Picture 4
In the “Quartz Filter”  selection box, I choose “Gray Tone.” I save that new gray tone PDF. Nice looking handout, but I have greatly increased the file size. (from 16 to 103 MB). Too big to send to the client!
Picture 5
Step 5: I open the newly created Gray Tone version of the pdf in Preview and do another “Save As…” Just like in step 4. This time in the  “Quartz Filter” selection box, I choose “Reduce File Size.” That creates a new PDF with file size reduced from 103 MB to 5.7 MB (Even smaller than 16 MB color PDF I created in step 3)
Picture 6
Since I am usually sending of lots of handouts to multiple clients. I have another blog devoted to distributing them. That way I can email a link to my “Handout Blog”  and let them deal with downloads at their end.
Hope this helps!