December's Task

[Sharon Tonner]

What shall we do for December's task? What on line tool shall we use? When should we complete the task since we will all be on holiday at different times?

Put your suggestions below and remember to give time for others to place there suggestions on the forum before making your mind up.

This week will be suggestions and next week will be choosing the one for December.

Sharon

[Cathy Francis]

Hi Eva,
Good idea...am searching for a song as I type...
But thinking on from my last posting....what about doing it just like the 'Goodbye' task. Each making a Voki of THANK YOU in our own languages and then listening to and learning each others language. We could then fit the thank yous to creative present pictures as you have just said? No need for pics of children then, if this is a problem in some schools, as Sharon commented earlier.
Cathy

[Eva Rekkedal]

Hi Cathy!
Thanks for idea with coming up with saying instead of singing. We could also use Voicethread for this, but I'm not sure if people find enough time to reply with all the "thank you's" in the busy month of December.
Maybe we could let each child draw a present - put them into Photostory 3, let the pupils say Thank you for beeing my friend/You are my friend, thank you! - or Have a nice holiday (do we all have a holiday now?), and then use Googlevideo (or another video uploading area) to broadcast it (and give the embed code to Sharon).
I like it when each of my pupils get heard, and can see/listen to their own work - they feel even prouder when they can show their parents/family; "This is my work";o)
Best regards, EvaR.

[Anna Karidi Pirounaki]

I like your idea Becky! it's so cross-curricula..if I can say that-))
just let John to say his opinion from last year 'similar' job if it's easy to be done from all

[Cathy Francis]

HI Becky,
How about combining your idea of messages popping up across the world (as long as John reckons it's do-able)with Eva's words being 'Thank you for being my friend'. Because then we are all saying the same things as VOTW needs to be. To cover the seasonal aspect for everyone being different, the children's illustrations for the words spoken could be for eg....playing in the snow building a snowman at school, sitting round the Christmas tree with your family, surfing at the beach with your friends etc etc.
Cathy

[Sharon Tonner]

The greeting would have to be the same words by all an not too long as it then sounds like gobbledygook to the listeners of the other language. The map aspect is doable and does not require John's time, we can make a map and make it collaborative so that all can go in an do their bit. This would mean you would not need to send me the embedded code for every contribution making life simpler for me. The other aspect is the map John has is where we are from which I would like to leave this way rather than place seasonal greeting on it.

Googlemaps lets you embed videos for location which would then get around the aspect of using myvox which will charge you for your mobile phone time. If you read myvox it states that it makes money from playing adverts whilst you are waiting to record. With Googlemaps we can do all this without costing any money.

Hope this helps the discussions.

[Jane Lowe]

I have used Googlemaps and this way with photos which is very easy. As long as it is just as easy with video I think it is a great idea.
There have been so many good ideas so far for December but as this one also means that the whole task can be easily done by teacher rather than Sharon having to embed the code etc. is a good idea too.

[Vicky Sedgwick]

Sharon you can let all participants of VOTW join the wiki as members and then we could each add our own embed code each month to the page you have created. All changes are tracked so if something happens you can back up to a point where the page was okay if someone accidentally messes something up. You can lock pages as the month is complete so no one will accidentally remove something from a previous month or the home page, etc.

If you don't want everyone to be able to edit the wiki maybe you could just have the person in charge of the monthly task be the one to add the links for the month to save you from always having to do it for everyone. I'm sure it's a lot of work for you every time.

[Sharon Tonner]

Hi Vicky, I did share the wiki before but problem was that too many cooks spoil the broth. It is more work changing errors than doing it myself. As the project originated from myself I would like to keep ownership of the wikispace until the day comes when I feel I could no longer contribute to VOTW which does not look like happening. As you can see from the ning this is becoming more collaborative and I suggest if teachers want to create sub projects from VOTW please do as the more the merrier. Hope this clears your mind as to my reasons for doing things in a specific way. Sharon

[Vicky Sedgwick]

I understand perfectly about it taking longer to fix things than to do it the first time. I just wanted to bring it up as a possibility since I know it's a lot of work for you to get all of the embeds and have to post things each month.

Thank you, by the way. I appreciate all the effort you put into this - it's a great project.

[Marilyn Doore]

I think this would be great! Videos of our different places of the kids in school on a Googlemap. We all say the same thing, Thanks you for being my friend. I prefer this to a holiday specific theme. A short video could be made sharing something of yourselves. I agree with Cathy that the seasons would be represented then too.

[Cathy Francis]

I like the google maps with video pop ups idea as well...have always wanted to know how to do this and even better if it is free! Simple messages in each of our languages with ALL THE SAME WORDS are needed....'Thank you for being my friend' would be my suggestion but I bet there are more ideas out there.....
Cathy

[Anna Karidi Pirounaki]

We have to think if videos -instead of drawings/photos- make google maps a 'heavy idea':-)..