Final Assignment

Dear Daniel, Ryan and class members:

All of us have done our tasks and made use of our blogs to share our learning. I have learned much from this module. I thank Daniel, Ryan and my class members for all their feedback and comments. I am looking forward to having more sharing in the near future. I am looking forward to having more cooperation with my partner, Lidia. After attending this module, I have great confidence in using Blog. My school parents want to learn more about Blog and want to know how to use Blog effectively. I will give help and assistance to the Parent-teacher Association (PTA) members in July 2007.

Thank you for your attention to the following five parts (A, B, C, D and E) of my FINAL ASSIGNMENT and my FINAL GROUP ASSIGNMENT:

(A) My Assignment about all my reflections:
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/MLIM6323Reflections20070528.pdf


(B) Final Group Assignment "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia":
My partner, Lidia Ho and I have paid much efforts and time to do our final group assignment. Our contribution and sharing of our learning, ideas and technical skills will be a great benefit to both of our secondary schools and students.


http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/FinalGroupAssignment20070528.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/FinalGroupAssignment20070528.html

- Macromedia Flash 8 is effectively used.
- Photos are used as the Flash background.
- Music "John Williams, Schindler's List Theme" is added as background music.

Our Final Group Assignment "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia" will be used with the Life Education teachers in September 2007 for Secondary One to Secondary Seven students. Happy Tree Social Services will give a briefing about the 2007 Christmas Cambodia Tour to our school students. Exhibitions will be arranged by Happy Tree Social Services at our schools, too. Students will be encouraged to pay more attention to the needy people of the world.

Life Education is an integrated curriculum composing six components, namely Social and Life Skills, Civic Education, Moral Education, Health Education, Environmental Education and Career Education. Through various learning activities, students’ moral and social values are cultivated. The curriculum is activity-based. Through learning activities like observation, exploration, case study, self-reflection, etc., students are equipped with basic knowledge and skills, and positive values and attitudes towards life are fostered.
Reference: The Curriculum Development Council, Education Department HKSAR, Personal, Social & Humanities Education: Key Learning Area Curriculum Guide (Primary 1 – Secondary 3), 2002, p.135..

Information Technology for Interactive Learning:
The goal of using information technology (IT) is to harness its advantage to promote interactive learning to make students learn better, not just for teachers to use IT to present the lesson in class. In designing the IT curriculum for students, we need to consider the development of students’ cognitive, affective and psychomotor skills.
Reference: Achieving Learning to Learn, Information Technology for Interactive Learning, Basic Education Curriculum Guide, 2002. p.1.


(C) "Report by Flash”
shows us the following information about our Final Group Assignment:
- Title
- Subject
- Target
- Aim
- Objective
- Why do we choose this topic
- How to Use


http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Report.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Report.html


(D) Supplementary resources of our Final Group Assignment:

(D1) Introduction of Cambodia Tour by Digital PhotoStory: Our secondary schools, teachers, students and parents will be invited to join a 5-day tour from Hong Kong to Cambodia in 2007 Christmas.
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CambodiaTour3.wmv

(D2) More information about the Children in Cambodia by Digital PhotoStory:
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/ChildrenInCambodia_2.wmv

(D3) Interactive Map of Cambodia:
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Cambodia.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Cambodia.html

(E) Other Resources for my school and students:

(E1) Introduction of My School Library by Digital PhotoStory:
It is a good resource for introducing the functions, facilities and activities of my school library to new students and teachers. I will use it for the new 200 Secondary One students in September 2007.

(E2) Development f Housing in Hong Kong by Slider (Flash):
It is a useful Project Learning resource for Secondary Two students. There will be a Collaborative Project Learning Activity about the “Development of Housing in Hong Kong” organized by Liberal Studies and School Library in October 2007. Students will be motivated to learn more.

(E3) Introduction of Beijing Tour by Digital PhotoStory:
Students are eager to know more about Beijing before the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. After the final term examination, my school students will be arranged and invited to watch this Digital PhotoStory about Beijing and search the website http://en.beijing2008.cn/ for more information about the 2008 Olympic Games in June 2007. I think it will be one of the most attractive activities.

Activities and Tasks

Our class members have paid much efforts to do our activities and tasks which are useful to our work place and they are good enough to improve our technical skills and enrich our knowledge of Interactive Visual Representations:

1. Design a single slide PowerPoint display of information introducing myself.

2. Design of information object (visual representation) on topic of atmosphere.

3. Design a simple learning object to help student understand what impacts shape of a rain drop.

4. Digital Storytelling: "Introduction of my school library", "Introduction of Beijing Tour" and "Introduction of Cambodia Tour" with user-friendly technologies .

5. Designing a storyboard of my final assignment with my partner, Lidia by using Flash ~ The Daily Life of Children in Cambodia.

6. Designing a prototype of my final assignment with my partner, Lidia by using Flash.

7, Design sliders: "Development of Housing in Hong Kong", "History of Cambodia" and "Changes of Children in Cambodia" by Flash.

8 Interactive Map: "Interactive Map of Beijing" and "Interactive Map of Cambodia"

Reflection on Last Lesson

We had our last lesson on 8th May, 2007. My facilitators and class members have provided good feedback and always share each other during lessons and through our blogs. I am sure we can master and apply our learning from this Module to our workplace.

I have aleady made use of my blog to:
- provide reflection indicating new things I have learned,
- discuss changes in my thinking
- provide links to other resources
- invite class members to provide comments and feedback
We have opportunities to visit class members' blogs and provide comment. Blog is a kind of reflective journal and platform for us to develop a portfolio that demonstrates our learning progress.
I was blogging because it contributed to my learning and I enjoyed it.

Lida and I will make use of the coming weeks to get our assignment done. This assignment is useful for both our secondary schools. Although we can't change the world, we can change the attitude of our students and their parents towards poverty. Members of Parent-teacher Association (PTA) wll be invited to join the Cambodia Tour in 2007 Christmas.

Macromedia released Flash 8 in 2005. Macromedia Flash 8 is the advanced authoring environment for creating interactive websites. swf files are completed, compiled and published files that cannot be edited with Adobe Flash. fla files contain source material for the Flash application.

In 1998, the Government announced Information Technology for Learning in a New Era: Five-year Strategy – 1998/99 to 2002/03. The Five-year Strategy heralds the beginning of our efforts to integrate information technology into learning and teaching, and transform school education from a largely teacher-centred approach to a more interactive and learner-centred approach. All schools are connected to the Internet; teachers have acquired at least basic skills and embracing IT as a teaching tool; students are using IT and the Internet in project-based learning.

IT for Interactive Learning is one of the Four Key Tasks, and IT skills are one of the nine sets of generic skills. I strongly agree that if IT can be applied effectively in learning and teaching, IT can be a useful tool for students to explore and collect information.

Reference:
The Information Technology in Education – Way Forward,
Quality Education Division, Education and Manpower Bureau, March 2004.

Reflection on Feedback

After getting much feedback from class members, Lidia and I are going to make the following improvement:

1. Title will be centred.
2. Star buttons: when the mouse is near the button, it will change colour from yellow to red.
3. Introduction: bullet points and simple text will be used.
4. Children in Cambodia: bullet points and simple text will be used.
5. Music: "John Williams, Schindler's List Theme" will be added.
6. History: A slider will show the history of Cambodia from 1979 to 2006.
6. Changes of Children: Slider will be made to show the changes of two children, Rath and San.
7. Changes of a Cambodia girl, San: A slider will show San's history from 2001 to 2006.
9. Changes of a Cambodia boy, Rath: A slider will show Rath's history from 2000 to 2006.
10. Response Activities A and B are added. Students will be invited to take part in the following meaningful activities:
Response A: "Join the 2007 Christmas Tour", from Hong Kong to Cambodia.
Response B: "Donate some money" to help the children in Cambodia.

PROTOTYPE

Topic: "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia"
Subject: Life Education
Group members: Lidia Ho & Candy Yiu

Part 1:

An idea of our final product:
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/GroupAssignment.swf http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/GroupAssignment.html


Part2:
Storyboard about our final assignment by PowerPoint:
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Storyboardppt.ppt

Part 3:Storyboard about our final assignment by Flash:

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CambodiaStoryboard.swf http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CamodiaStoryboard.html

Part 4:
Introduction of Cambodia Tour by Digital PhotoStory: Our school teachers and students will be invited to joint a 5-day tour from Hong Kong to Cambodia in 2007 Christmas.

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CambodiaTour3.wmv

Part 5:
More information about the Children in Cambodia by Digital PhotoStory:

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/ChildrenInCambodia_2.wmv

Part 6: Interactive Map is used to introduce Cambodia.

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Cambodia.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Cambodia.html

• As Kavitha says (April 13th, 2007), "designing and presenting the interactive represtation in one page, keeping in mind the audience is definitely going to be a challenge in this project".

we must consider this point carefully and design the most appropriate visual & interactive. We are looking forward to getting your feedback. Thank you for your comments!

Slider

Lession 8 is a good time for reflection on 17th April, 2007.
We have more opportunities to discuss and ask questions about our Group Assignment with our lecturer, classmates and group members.

We are planning to use slider to introduce Cambodia History of our Group Assignment "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia" with my partner, Lidia.

The step by step video showing how slider is crated and used are useful for making the slider to introduce the "Development of Public Housing in Hong Kong" which is the topic for project learning for Form One students in my secondary school. I am planning to have collaborative teaching with Social Studies teachers. This slider shows us about the development of Public Housing in 1953, 1954, 1973 and 2002:

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/DevelopmentOfPublicHousingInHK.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/DevelopmentOfPublicHousingInHK.html
Your comments are useful during planning our collaborative teaching and learning.

Reflection on Lesson 7 "Photo Story"

After completing my Digital Photo Story ~ Functions and Activities of School Library, I really feel a sense of success and satisfaction. It is useful for a teacher librarian to introduce the school library to students and teachers, especially to the new students.

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/SchoolLibrary_2.wmv

Enjoy your visit to a secondary school library in HK and nice to receive your comments!

Storyboard "Group Assignment"

In order to prepare a single representation display of storyboard, we use Flash instead of powerpoint to do our Storyboard with my partner, Lidia Ho, for our Final Assignment of "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia". It is more attractive and effective.

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CambodiaStoryboard.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CambodiaStoryboard.html

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/ChildrenInCambodia_2.wmv
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/CambodiaTour3.wmv
The Digital Storyboard of "Children in Cambodia" shows more photos about the children in Cambodia ~ the children of Cambodia want peace, not war. The population of homeless people, namely children, countinues to increase in the capital city of Phnom Penh. They are thirstier for knowledge. However, the cost of a public education prevents many families from sending their children to school.

The Digital Storyboard of "Cambodia Tour 3" is about a 5-day tour in 2006 Christmas from Hong Kong to Cambodia organized by Happy Tree Social Services. We joined this tour because we wanted to visit Cambodia's children and sent Christmas gifts to them.

Title of the Final Assignment: Daily Life of Children in Cambodia

Aim:
To provide an opportunity to let students to see what a difference they can make in children's lives in Cambodia.

Objectives:
- Students can use their vision, their resources, their love and their lives to make a difference for a needy world.
- Students are encouraged to show concern for the needy of the world.

Response:
- In what ways can you share your resources with others?
- Becoming a supporter by making some donations to the children in Cambodia operated by Happy Tree Social Services in Hong Kong.
- Find out which organizations in your local community need practical assistance in providing various kinds of resources to those in need
- How can you show love in your own contexts: home, work, school, community, church?
- Becoming a Child Sponsor in a developing country.
- How can you put the sharing of your life into practice?
- Becoming a Tree of Life representative in your school.

Reference:
http://www.happytree.org.hk/
Happy Tree Social Services is an official charitable organization in Cambodia.

We hope this Final Assignment is useful for our secondary school students: Lidia and Candy.

Thank you for your comments to our group!

Interactive Map "Beijing"

I would like to take this opportunity to introduce Beijing by Interactive Map. Beijing is the capital of China and it will be more well-known because of 2008 Olympia. I went to Beijing with my family in 2006 summer holiday. I am interested in using buttons and action script to introduce Beijing by Flash.


http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/beijing.swf
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/beijing.html

I hope you will enjoy to share with me the Beijing tour by Digital PhotoStory:
http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Beijing.wmv

Digital Storytelling

I learnt from the 6th (online) lesson on 3 April, 2007:
http://www.learnactivity.com/ds/
especially the self-paced tutorial.

I hope I can design educationally effective digital stories with user-friendly technologies after more practices.

Daniel said "I recommend Microsoft Photo Story because it is powerful enough, free of charge and extremely user-friendly."
(Photo Story 3) http://www.microsoft.com/photostory/

http://www.jasonohler.com/storytelling/
Being "technologically literate" means not just understanding how to use technology, but also when and why to use it.

What is Digital Storytelling? It supports students' engagement, creativity, multimodal thinking and expression, collaboration, project work.

Storyboard

What is a Storyboard?

I got some ideas from lesson 5th (27th March, 2007) about Storyboard with various examples.

I am going to write the Storyboard of Final Assignment "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia" with my partner, Lidia.

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Storyboardppt.ppt

Lesson 5

Interactive Map of Hong Kong
It is a good sample to motive us to learn Flash and it is successful to develop our skills to design interactive materials with Flash.

I am going to use interactive map to introduce the capital of China, Beijing.

Reference Books:
- Illustrating with Macromedia Flash MX 2004, Robert Firebaugh, (call no. 510.7834 FIR)

- Visual QuickStart Guide Macromedia Flash for Windows & Macintosh, Katherine Ulrich Peachpit Press (call no. 510.7834 ULR)

"Proposal of Final Assignment"

What interactive visual representation I intent to develop with my partner, Lidia, as a part of our final assignment.

• Reasons for our decision
• Purpose of the final representation

During the lesson on 27th March, 2007, we had an opportunity to look at the example of an interactive map of Hong Kong develop with Flash. We get some fresh ideas about the interactive map and want to prepare another topic "Daily Life of the Children in Cambodia " which was visited during 2006 Christmas.

We are going to introduce the daily life of poor children in the capital of Cambodia "Phnom Penh" in order to encourage students to show concern for the needy of the world. Sharing resources and sharing love can make a difference for a needy world ~ Life Education.

"Rain Drop"

• Task 3 ~ Improved Flash "rain drop" by Lidia & Candy
  
  
  
  http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/flashraindrop.swf

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/flashraindrop.html

• Thank you for your comments!

• We find this reference book "Flash 2004 Animation in Art" is useful. It is borrowed from the Kowloon Public Library.
  
• Reference book: Robert Firebaugh. Illustrating with Macromedia Flash MX 2004. "Explains how anyone can create professional looking vector graphics, regardless of artistic talent". "Covers a variety of illustration styles including solid fill art, cartoon, manga, photorealistic, and experimental". "CD-ROM includes tutorials and a tryout version of Macromedia Flash MX 2004".

• We also find this website is helpful http://www.kidzone.ws/water/index.html.
  
• Reference Book: Katherine Ulrich. Visual QuickStart Guide Macromedia Flash for Windows & Macintosh: Peachpit Press. "Teach yourself Flash the quick and easy way! This Visual QuickStart Guide uses pictures rather than lengthy explanations".

• Reference: Mayer, R.E. (2005). The Cambridge handbook of multimedia learning. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Multimedia learning hypothesis: "People can learn more deeply from words and pictures than from words alone". "Learning as a process by which people build mental representations from words and pictures".

"Atmosphere"

• To design a visual representation on the topic of "Atmosphere".

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/Task2Atmosphere.ppt

By Lidia & Candy, please give comments!

• Information can be presented in visual way. We have to make sure that our information is not misleading and making a student to construct misconceptions. We have to maximize amount of information that is communicated.
• We need to comprehend that information for transfering the text to visual.
• The main ideas from the original text and the designer's cognitive and interpretative abilities.
• The process of transforming that information from text to visual representation can be understood as high level information work.
• Reflection: I was impressed by these five visual displays with the high-quality illustrations. When taking a closer look at them, I discovered the new visualization techniques. They help me to get a deeper understanding of the visual presentation and how to emphasize the “message”.
• Reference: I am impressed by "Visuals can communicate complex ideas with clarity, precision, efficiency and convey the most knowledge in the shortest time in the small space.” Tufte (1983)
• http://www.graphic.org/goindex.html
  Definition: Mind maps are brainstorming diagrams based on a central idea or image, typically used to aid in organisation, problem solving and decision making. Mind Mapping applications are computer-based visualisation tools that allow users to build mind maps as an aid to problem solving.
  

"Text-to-visual"

• Reflection: "Text-to-visual"is a good task for students to follow the text description to draw and design their visual in order to let us know their ability of understanding, comprehension and expression. I am sure 'Text-to-visual" can change the lesson to be more meaning and interesting.
• Reference: Churchill, D. (92006). Towards a useful classification of learning objects. Educational Technology Research and Development. "Educational context in the terms of the definition indicates that a learning object affords use in variety of foreseen and unforeseen circumstance, for example, a teacher may use learning objects as a demonstration and presentation aid", p5.
• Reference: Gershon, N., Stephen G. Eick, S.G., & Card, S. Information visualization. Interactions, March, 9-15.
  "Visualization provides an interface between two powerful information processing systems – the human mind and the modern computer". p9.
• Reflection: This picture clearly show how well the child has interpreted the text through visual representation. I agree with Tam Po Yee says (5th March, 2007): "The idea of "text to image" that is a good strategy to help children learn reading and comprehension. It also helps children to develop skills in memorizing information by translating it into images".

"Five Effective Visual Display"

• Lesson 2 Reflection
• Visualization is any technique for creating images, diagrams, or animations to communicate a message.
  
• To my surprise, we can present a lot of information in a small screen space, communicate complex ideas through visual simplicity. Through technology it is possible to create dynamic and animated displays and to add audio to visual displays.

"Power Point Presentation"

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infographic
  "Information graphics or infographics are visual representations of information, data or knowledge. These graphics are used anywhere where information needs to be explained quickly or simply, such as in signs, maps, journalism, technical writing, and education."

• A single slide PowerPoint display of information introducing myself.

http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/TeacherLibrarian.ppt

• Who am I? http://iln.cite.hku.hk/com/1374/users/klyiu2/WhoAmI.ppt

Candy's Blog

Welcome to Candy's Blog!

• I attended the seminar organized by EMB on 9th March and 16th March, 2007, "Using Weblog to Promote Cross-curricular Activities in Secondary Schools" with my partner, Lidia. This seminar is useful and remind us to make use of Weblog to promote cross-curricular activities.

• References:
• Blogging for Dummles
  Brad Hill, Author of Google for Dummies
• Blogosphere: Best of Blogs
  Peter Kuhns & Adrienne Crew http://www.blogsbestof.com/
• Blog Design solutions
  Andy Budd, Simon Collison, Chris J. Davis, Michael Heilemann, John Oxton, David Powers, Richard Rutter, Phil Sherry