Atlantic City Rough Cuts

Technical Difficulties

2007-10-19T11:03:00.000-04:00

During the summer, the STAR-W site had technical problems which resulted in a about 40% of the site being lost. We are in the process of rebuilding.

Best laid plans...

2006-05-20T23:52:00.000-04:00

Introduction to A.C.-OPOLY

Please allow time for the movie to download.

As much as we wanted to complete this project on time, we fell considerably behind schedule. The institution of the Leslie Literacy Collaborative program was a huge undertaking that involved MANY hours of professional development and additional work both in and out of class for the teachers. While well worth the effort, the collaborative combined with heavy pressure to prepare students for the state test left little time for the work necessary to get everyone up to speed with iMovie and the skill set Andy had given us this summer. None-the-less the troops rallied and we were able to get a good product underway.

We decided to base our video of Atlantic City based on Monopoly (A.C.-OPOLY). That way we could handle it as a series of short videos done by different groups of students in each class. Because we have so many streets to do before the end of the year, our first rough cuts will be our somewhat final cuts until we have them all done. If there is time we will go back on clean them up based on the input you provide.

The good news is that we presented our projects on May 19 to fifteen other school districts in the STAR-W project. Because of the training provided by Andy Carvin, our student's rough cuts did our school proud! Our presentation can be found here.

In the coming days and weeks we will be posting our individual videos here for your comments. If you are a member of Blogger, you may add the comments to the blog entries. If you are not a member, you are welcomed to send your comments to acrc@starw.org and I will pass them on to the students.

In the meantime, here is the clip that I created as an introduction to the student videos. In the next few days, the students products will be posted.

USO's Spotted Over Atlantic City

2005-12-21T14:33:00.000-05:00

USO's Spotted in Atlantic City
(Low Bandwidth) (High Bandwidth)

Note: This is being posted for Janine Riggins and is a duplicate of her personal vblog entry.

Over the past few weeks, we have noticed unusual objects in the Atlantic City skyline!! At first, we thought they might be UFO's. But, we did some research...which resulted in this preliminary investigative report by my 3rd grade class.

(Please note: The script, video filming, Kar2ouche production, and news reporting was all created by my 3rd grade students. I supervised while small groups did all the work...and I helped with piecing it all together using iMovie. However, soon students will be editing iMovies on their own!)

Stay tuned for additional reports!!

Multimedia Memoirs

2005-12-20T10:38:00.000-05:00

Denita's Multimedia Memoirs Kar2ouche Multimedia Storyboard

Student at MLK are using the Leslie Literacy Collaborative. One of their first writing projects is the creation of a short personal memoir. Teachers are looking for one or two line in each memoir that are potential gems that can be used as seeds from which to grow great writing.

Denita turned her first effort into a Kar2ouche multimedia storyboard. She drew pictures to provide the background, inserted Kar2ouche characters, and recorded her work.

Bullies to Buddies Poetry

2005-12-08T10:06:00.000-05:00

Def Poetry from Bullies to Buddies Project: Friends Forever
(5 Meg -Windows Media Player) (2 Meg Quicktime)

I'm so excited! Art was in my office recording a students' story and he explained that people could go onto our web site and hear the creativity of our students! I have held 3 "Def Poetry Jams" at our school and many of the students poems were motivated by our "Bullies to Buddies" effort. This got me thinking....why not share this poetry with the world, not just the people that came to the jam. So, today we recorded some of the poets reciting their poetry! This is the first of the poems that we will post over the next week.

Aquil, Asmar, and Kyrell are all very talented writers in the 5th grade! They came together and wrote a poem that they could recite. Asmar and Aquil are identical twins. This poem is about when one of the twins is fighting with a mutual friend and the other twin is trying to motivate them to make up and continue their friendship.

Multimedia Storyboards

2005-11-28T09:24:00.000-05:00

The Search for Lita in the Castle Jefar's Fairytale - 52 meg download Please read below about smaller downloads

This animated movie doesn't have to do with Atlantic City history, but is a great example of what students are acompliching in STAR-W.

Students learned how to make multimedia storyboards using Kar2ouche software. As the final product of a fairytale immersion unit, some students elected to turn their original fairy tales into QuickTime movies using Kar2ouche. Here is Jefar's fairytale presented as a rough cut. This QuickTime download is very large (50 meg). It is also available in two smaller progressive load Flash downloads, both of which will start playing before the download is complete. The small verision is 4 meg and the large verision is 13 meg.

Witches and Aliens - Part 2

2005-11-17T09:59:00.000-05:00

Low Bandwidth(1.5 Meg) High Bandwidth (5.5 Meg)

Low Bandwidth(1.8 Meg) High Bandwidth (5.9 Meg)

Here are the videos completed by the other two groups. Please forgive the lack of titles and credits. We had time constraints. I've also posted a low bandwidth version of the first group.

I told the students that since they were all working from the same basic script the thing that would distinguish their movie from the others would be their selection of shots, the timing, and the quality of narration.

The students greatly appreciated all of your comments very much and are very interested in your opinion as to which you think is the best. If you view all three, I would also appreciate your thoughts. You can drop me a direct email about this or any other topic at awolinsky at starw.org . (The email address is written that way to foil spammers who harvest addresses from web pages.)

Witches, Aliens, and School Board Members

2005-11-07T17:09:00.000-05:00

Interviewing Board members at the New Jersey School Boards Convention (10meg download) Low Bandwidth Version (2.9 meg)

On Oct. 26 & 27, students from the Martin Luther King Jr. School Complex attended the NJ School Boards Convention and interviewed attendees. As part of the process, they turned the interviews into comics and presented them to the board members as mementos. Upon returning to school, the students wrote a script and created a storyboard. Today, they recorded the narration and began adding stills and video to create our first official rough cut.

Three groups worked on their own version, all using the same basic script. One group was able to complete their first cut today. The other two will complete it when I visit next week.

This rough cut was completed in a little over 3 hours. Prior to this, the students' exposure to iMovie was limited to stringing video clips together. During this 3 hours, students learned the Ken Burns effect, how to time pictures, splitting and locking sound clips, creating stills from clips, and more. Not bad for 3 hours!

Introducing iMovie to Mrs. Clark's Class

2005-09-16T08:16:00.000-04:00

Intro to iMovie Sorry folks. I almost got ahead of myself. The video will be posted as soon as we have the signed permission slips.

Production Notes:

This week I introduced Mrs. Clark's 5th grade class to iMovie and our video project for the year. We talked about the importance of writing and how images are chosen to go hand in hand with the script. We viewed a movie without sound and tried to figure out what it was about. Then we listened to another movie without any video the see if we could imagine the pictures we would see.

I introduced them to the concept of A-roll and B-roll film and discussed interview techniques with them. We talked about the role of the interviewer and the importance of prepping the interviewee to respond with full sentences as if they were telling a story, rather than a short response in answer to a question.

We then did some impromptu interviews and as the class watched, I used iMovie to edit them. Later that day I came back and shot some B-roll footage. Next week, we'll discuss this video and see if the students can suggest ways of making it better. Your comments are certainly welcomed at any time.

Thumbnails of AC Rough Cuts Videos

2005-08-21T20:09:00.000-04:00

Here's a cool little script that generates a collection of thumbnails taken from each of the videos posted to AC Rough Cuts:

Thanks to Andy Carvin for this one!

Docummercial Removed

2005-08-11T16:35:00.000-04:00

Docummercial posted here previously has been removed. It was not a commercial venture on my part and was done as a way of practicing what I had learned this summer. It was none-the-less a commercial and not appropriate for this site.

However, the idea of doing something similar without focusing on specific businesses to bring light to the positive aspects of Atlantic City, is a viable vehicle for the 1-3 minute videos.

I apologize for once again living up to my e-mail tag line. "I am perfectly capable of learning from my own mistakes. I will surely learn a great deal today."

:)
Art

The Philly Boys First Time at Bat

2005-07-16T19:35:00.000-04:00

John and Joe make their iMovie

This video was completed just before getting a visit from Pinky Karvitz, an Atlantic City TV and radio personality who provided us with a wealth of information that will help us organize our thoughts as we gear up to working with the children on our documentary of the city. I shot an hour's worth of his visit and came to the realization that managing files and clips is going to be a major challenge as we move forward. We have a server on order and are shooting for a terabyte of storage, but we have to figure out how to limp along with our iBooks until it gets set up.

Art

Pre-Production/Day One

2005-07-14T15:34:00.000-04:00

Day one of preproduction

Raina did a great job starting our project research. She visited the Atlantic City Free Public Library and Garden Pier. While she was there, she bumped into local legend, Pinky Kravitz. We touched base with him later in the day, and he will be visiting us tomorrow. Stay tuned to see our next vlog, featuring Pinky!!

Art's First Rough Rough Cut

2005-07-13T23:15:00.000-04:00

Day 2 with Andy My very first attempt at a video documentary...

We will critique my first attempt as part of the next day's training. I'll wear my T-shirt with the target on the back. It's a good thing I have a thick skin.

HELLO

2005-07-13T14:13:00.000-04:00

WANTED TO SAY HELLO TO EVERYONE.

Bleeding Edge Eduvlogging

2005-07-13T12:20:00.000-04:00

Video of me talking about our new video blogging project.

- Janine

First on Rough Cuts

2005-07-13T12:12:00.000-04:00

This is my first attempt to post on our new blog. Janine and I already filmed ourselves, and are anxious to see if they could be posted. However, Art said we are not quite ready for the teachers to post the videos. Soon!

Brook's Birthday

2005-07-13T12:00:00.000-04:00

Hey world...it's my birthday!

Hello from Joe

2005-07-13T11:56:00.000-04:00

This is my first post. We are having a workshop on how students and teachers can work together to create documentaries using technology, and by doing so, we will be using all of our knowledge and skills to achieve higher educational goals. JC

Welcome from O Caldwell, Atlantic City Schools

2005-07-13T11:54:00.000-04:00

Hello All,

I am a 5th grade teacher at Dr. Martin Luther King School in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Our school has had the unique opportunity to participate in an enhanced technological project which has been funded by the State of New Jersey, Department of Education. We have been able to guide the students to a more fulfilling educational experience by incorporating the use of technology to expand their educational quest for learning.

In the future, I will provide you with updates that my class is learning about and vingettes on their progress.

Olivia Caldwell
5th Grade Teacher

Hi to all

2005-07-13T11:50:00.002-04:00

Hello from the resource room of MLK.

Hello from 6th grade MLK

2005-07-13T11:50:00.001-04:00

I am so excited to have technology access this year. My students will enjoy using the computers and the new software. Although I was fortunate enough to have the star w training, my incoming students are well advanced in the star w technology....

Hello from Ms. Bell

2005-07-13T11:50:00.000-04:00

This is just an introduction to introduce myself. I am a fifth grade teacher at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School Complex in Atlantic City, New Jersey. I am excited about blogging.

Hard At Work

2005-07-13T10:51:00.000-04:00

Here's a video clip of Amy Wiggins-Brown working during yesterday's documentary workshop at MLK Jr Elementary School in Atlantic City.

Download the Video

Atlantic City Rough Cuts: Developing the Idea

2005-07-12T21:49:00.000-04:00

Video of today's documentary and video blogging workshop at Martin Luther King Jr Elementary School in Atlantic City.