The following animated video was made to summarize the article, “Digital Ghosts in the Modern Classroom” by Ashley Hinck (link attached below). I found this article very insightful on aspects of education in the modern age. I agree with the idea that students should be provided with more opportunities for trial and error, instead of just being given the correct answers. This really applies to more than digital media as I believe all subjects taught could benefit from this approach. So, using media in classes other than just computer science and using this media in novel manners is the best way to make adequate use the technology we have available. Hopefully, this will enable students to become better critical thinkers, and to not fear making mistakes.
I decided to use Powtoon to create my digital artifact for this article because it seemed very interactive and visually appealing. Once I started to use the website to create an animation, I had a bit of a struggle. It took some time to learn the system and how to edit in pieces of animation. Here is an example of what the Powtoon looks like both in the editing stage and out of it:
During editing stage:
Preview of final product:
Once I had a basic understanding of editing, the process was fairly simple in making the actual animation. The main issue I ran into was that after having a free trial for four days, Powtoon removes all of their ‘PRO’ items from your presentation before allowing you to export it.
Thus, I had to go back and find new items available on the free platform. This process took a lot of time and was a little frustrating, however, I am better off for it as the next time I create a Powtoon it will go much more smoothly. Another issue I noticed after publishing the Powtoon I created to Youtube, was that a few words of the voiceover were cut off in many of the sections. This was not happening on the actual Powtoon website, so I will have troubleshoot this in the future. Hope you enjoy my video!
Here’s the Powtoon I’ve created, posted to Youtube:
Here is the link to the original article by Ashley Hinck: http://hybridpedagogy.org/digital-ghosts-modern-classroom/
Thanks for watching! Let’s get rid of those ghosts!
-Brandon Miner