Desktop Publishing To Be or Not to Be?

Prompt: Given the current climate of new and flashy is always better, how do you view the future of low-tech tools such as desktop publishing software? Are we at the end of an era with other tools poised to take over? Is there still a worthwhile space for publishing tools in today's curriculum?

In chapter 9 of his book, Big Russ and Me, Tim Russert shares his experiences in seventh grade when Sister Lucille makes him the editor of his school newspaper. Sister Lucille tells Russert that he will give out assignments, edit the copy, lay it out, write the editorials and be the publisher. Tim goes on to say that because his school had no photocopier, the paper was produced on a mimeograph machine. Russert states, “…this was my first lesson that a newspaper or a broadcast required not only content, but an effective way of delivering it as well.” In 1963, after the assassination of President Kennedy, Russert said he learned, “that no publication is too small to have an impact.” Russert sent copies of his school’s memorial issue to Jacqueline Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and President Johnson and received responses from all of them.

Desktop publishing is not going to go away, but it is being refined with updated applications to allow for effective delivery. Just as Russert and his classmates in the sixties learned a lot about teamwork and marketing from their school newspaper, students today need to learn these same skills. While today’s papers may not be duplicated on mimeograph machines, the lessons learned are similar. It takes teamwork, dedication and creativity to compile the important content. Through the use of templates available from desktop publishing software like Pages and Publisher, students are able to spend time focusing on the content. It is the content that has the potential to make an impact on the audience. Desktop publishing software makes producing brochures, newsletters, flyers, posters and invitations easier, while still allowing for creativity as students select the formatting. In addition to developing the content, critical thinking skills are employed as decisions are made about fonts, font sizes and colors, images, and placement. The practice that students receive with their writing skills is another valuable plus to using desktop publishing tools.

In many private schools, students are required to take classes to learn to use desktop publishing tools so that students are able to create quality products that extend their learning for their various classes. In public schools, access to the computers is probably the major obstacle that keeps teachers and students from selecting brochures and flyers as end products for assignments. The goal is for a one to one ratio of students to computers. When that day comes, more may be done using the desktop publishing so that students gain valuable writing and critical thinking skills while creating brochures and newsletters. Desktop publishing software can and should be used across the curriculum. Brochures, for example, can promote candidates and books, describe countries and careers, inform about health-related issues and protecting the Chesapeake Bay. Students have to determine what is important enough to include and what to leave out. Students have to decide what is featured on the front and what is relegated to the back of their products. They need to make sure the products speak for themselves, without further support or explanation.

Creating brochures and newsletters will benefit students who go on to design wikis and web pages. The elements that work in desktop publishing are similar to the elements that work on the World Wide Web. While the process may be a little different than in Russert’s middle school days, the essence is the same. The skills developed while using desktop publishing tools are valuable and create a foundation for publishing in whatever formats may be created in the future.

Multimedia Design in Theory and Practice

Learning theories confirm that the best way to instruct students with multimedia tools is to keep it simple. The narration should accompany the visuals. Extraneous sounds and visuals should be eliminated.

Steve Jobs is a terrific presenter. To watch a master at work, view one of his WWDC keynote presentations.

2007 keynote:
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/d7625zs/event/

2008 keynote:
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/0806wdt546x/event/index.html

Enjoy!

Senior Superlatives 2.0

Yesterday, I was reading the Centennial High School newspaper because it listed where the seniors will be off to college next year. I find it interesting to learn where the students we have in grades 6-7-8 decide to go to further their education. This year HCC and JMU seemed to be the most popular schools chosen.

Anyway, also listed in the paper are the twenty Senior Superlatives, you remember, Most Likely to Succeed, Most Likely to be a Doctor, etc. Well, among the superlatives are:

Biggest Video Gamer
Most Likely to be a YouTube Star
Biggest Facebook Addict
Texting Addict

Times they are a-changin'.

Blogger Works for Me!

I chose Blogger as my Blogging platform because it is part of the Google package. I have had an iGoogle desktop for a while now and enjoy the gadgets and theme I have selected. I've used a number of the tools that Google provides such as Google Docs. In order to simplify my life, and not have to learn more passwords, I thought I would give this blogging tool a try. The associated aggregator, Google Reader, was another incentive to use Blogger. The tools work synergistically making use easier. Blogger was also endorsed by Doug Spicher, a tech guru I know.

In today's complicated world, I try to streamline what I do.

Less is More

and

Keep
It
Simple

are my mantras!

Cognitive Load Theory Reflection

While the Cognitive Load Theory itself may not be something in the forefront for educators, I believe teachers understand the concepts it represents after a week in the classroom. If teachers are gauging their students’ understanding of the material, than whether or not they are teaching the material effectively is part of that assessment. Evaluating lesson effectiveness includes: am I overwhelming my students or am I not giving them the material in a variety of ways so that they can all acquire the concepts I am teaching? I believe teachers have always done this minus the cloak of CLT that someone needed to develop in order to earn a doctorate. I believe this because the concepts of CLT are common sense.

I have had a lot of conversations with teachers about hype. Our students come to us now all hyped-up. They have been watching edutainment since Sesame Street was introduced in 1969. Once kids had been introduced to Sesame Street, education changed. Students didn’t want to learn material in the traditional lecture format they once accepted and that worked well. Students’ expectations changed with Sesame Street and all of the other TV shows and commercials that spun out of the program. Teachers have obliged and found materials that support instruction that vary the delivery.

I can’t speak for all teachers, but I can for the teachers who I work with, they are targeting the objective they are teaching with the resources they choose. There are so many objectives to cover each quarter that the students are accountable for on the quarterly assessments. Teachers have no time to go off on tangents. UnitedStreaming has been well received for that reason. A segment of a video can be shown that supplements the teachers’ comments and hones in on the very concept being taught. Regrettably, discussions don’t bubble up in classrooms very often any more because there is no time for them.

In the event there is a teacher in my building who does not get this, and I can’t think of any, I will share some of the PowerPoint slides that are horribly designed alongside slides that have been “clarified.” I believe I will be preaching to the choir.

I believe it's our hyped-up students who will benefit from this lesson more than the teachers because they always want to use every background, transition, fly-in, and sound that they discover while completing assignments. We have a number of teachers who have shared a few minutes Steve Jobs’ keynote presentations in order to convey that simple, clean and pertinent is the goal for their PPT presentations.

Conversational Style Rules!

I know that I will enjoy blogging because I enjoy typing my thoughts. For whatever reason, my brain works better when I write, than when I speak.

This week has held numerous learning curves for the students in the cohort. We've been learning about content in the form of CLT and about applications like del.icio.us, Blogger, and Google Reader.

What struck me this week was the stark contrast between the blogsite:
Creating Passionate Users: Crash Course in Learning Theory by Kathy Sierra and Dan Russell
and the article
Cognitive Load Theory and Instructional Design: Recent Developments by Fred Paas

I completed reading the thirteen pages on the blogsite and thought there is a lot here, I may want to reread this when time permits. There were numerous sections, that if read in the chunks, would be a series of terrific “how tos.” It was a bit much to absorb reading it straight through, but there were visuals, great examples, the text width was manageable and it was written in a conversational style. The information flowed.

Then, I opened the five-page PDF article, which was dense in its appearance. I felt like I was looking at an article written by a professor who was adding to his article quota in order to remain on staff at a doctoral university. The juxtaposition of the two “writings” made the comment in the aforementioned blog absolutely hit home. The blogger said, “Use conversational language. Conversational writing kicks formal writing’s ass.” If it’s true for me, at midlife (or just beyond midlife, yikes) then it must be true for young people who have grown up with the Internet and social writing. The PDF of the article was enough to make me ill, just based on appearance. The fact that the appearance and the academic language contradicted the message of the article is a story for another day. The blogsite was attractive, colorful and written in the conversational style that encouraged me to keep reading.

Lesson learned.

Instructional Design of Multimedia Materials

Wow! What a terrific start to our fourth course. We have networked our network, or is that networked squared?

I love the excuse to use the cool tools we learned about tonight. It will be interesting to see what each of us discovers, bookmarks and writes about.

The saying used to be each one teach one, I wonder how far what we learn will go...