Some New Software
At the most recent CIESC Elementary meetings, we had a chance to experiment with some very exciting software packages that will be available for the fall. But we always want to do something different.

Inspired by an entry in Danika Barker's blog entry about creating Mushroom Risotto, I decided to stay away from embarrassing myself with my cooking skills and head to my computer skills. It also was an opportunity to work with Adobe Photoshop Elements 7, SMART Ideas, an interative website, and Comic Life. All in an hour or so! We're such a quick group.

So, here's what we did.

In partners, individual groups had an opportunity to explore a new interactive website. As they explored, it, the groups were also created a Mindmap using SMART Ideas illustrating what it would take to be successful getting started with the website.

That was fun and took a little while. Then, the work started.

In a folder on another computer, each group worked their way through the steps that were recorded in the graphic organizer. At each major step, a screen capture was taken and brought into Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 where a little cropping and image enhancement was done before saving.

So, for example, if you were going to work in a wiki, the first thing that you would do is log into it. Rather than show an entire screen, let's crop to keep just the important part.

After a while, we have enough graphics to bring them into Comic Life where we used captions and speech bubbles to fully document the process in a fun and colourful manner.

Then, the day was done. I just hoped that the activity would be worth remembering for the fall.

Hah!

I get home and the CIESC from Harrow Junior did seem to enjoy the activity. She also liked the presentation on the homegrown countdown timer for the FirstClass system. Using all of her talents, she created this instructional document from Comic Life.

Way to go, Telva.