Mobile Presentations

When it comes to large scale projects and assignments, I tend to favor a computer.  I feel that a larger monitor set at eye level and a full keyboard with mouse is much easier to see/use when manipulating text in a document or pictures in a presentation.  This past week I was without my computer and my patience was truly tested...

This week's creation assignment was to create a mobile presentation with at least five images.  Seeing that I did not have my computer, I was left to create my presentation using my iPad.  At the start of the week I was very excited to do this since I had not done what I would consider a quality presentation on my iPad yet.  After reviewing the tools Dr. McCullough suggested, I chose Prezi.  Prezi (on the computer) is something that I am familiar with and my students like using.  Since I have an educational account I figured I would download the application for the iPad and give it a whirl.  I have presented Prezi's from my phone via my SMART Board (when the internet is down) but I have never created a presentation using the application.

First I took pictures using my iPad of Smith Mountain Lake (my family and I were on vacation).  I then used an application I downloaded called PicShop to edit my photos.  I believe the application was originally $4.99 but I was able to download it for free a month or so ago when AppsGoneFree (another free application) posted that it was free for a day.  While I have taken many pictures with my iPad, I have never used a photo editing application prior to this assignment on my iPad.  (I was a fan of Picnik when I completed my M.S. at Wilkes.)  In my presentation you can see how I adjust the color and frames around many of my pictures.   The kids use these types of tools when posting to Instagram and appreciate having these applications available.  I have BookCreator on all of my student iPads and plan on adding PicShop so that the kids can tweak their photos for their creations.

As for image hosting sites, a long time ago I created a Flickr account to upload photos.  However, I see little to no value in sharing my photos or storing my photos on an image hosting site (I prefer an external hard drive.)  I am very particular about my privacy and do not like the idea of my vacation photos being uploaded to a website.  Even with secure settings, accounts are "hacked" and photos "borrowed" or used in an inappropriate manner.  The only place I currently share some of my photos is Facebook (and I share very few photos outside of my dogs.)

Back to my presentation, I have had many experiences creating presentations on my iPad with Keynote, Educreations, ExplainEverything, ShowMe, iMove, Animoto, and HaikuDeck.  Since I had not created a Prezi on my iPad, I chose to try that application.  I was able to complete 95% of the presentation before becoming so frustrated I had to pull it up on the computer to finish the presentation.  I struggled with positioning and sizing the images and text so that it was appropriate for the presentation and editing the path.  As for presenting a Prezi on a mobile device, I can speak from experience when I say that it is a piece of cake!  I love that I can have access my Prezis on my computer, tablets, and phones.  As I mentioned before, the wireless internet is frequently down in my hallway.  By having the Prezi application on my phone I can use my 4G to present my Prezi to my students on the SMART board.  My kids get a kick out of it when I have to "ghetto rig" my SMART Board for the day's lesson with old speakers I plug into my phone and the long cable I use to connect my phone to the SMART Board. 

All in all, I highly recommend the integration of what I refer to as creation applications for students.  As a STEM teacher I strive to provide my students with opportunities to produce their own unique projects.  In order to do that they need a variety of tools available.  If I were to assign this creation assignment to my own students I would make a handful or presentation and photo editing applications available to them so that they could explore and find what works best for what they are trying to create.

To see my Prezi on Smith Mountain Lake, click HERE!  (I just couldn't stretch it to ten full slides...sorry to disappoint!)