Does anyone remember endlessly playing with “Fuzzy Felt”

as a child?

Here is a wonderful wild garden animation made of Fuzzy Felt on

You Tube.  Enjoy!

(copyright Imogen Crest 2008.)

Having only started with web 2.0 over the last 5 months, I am really amazed at what a great resource it is for learning and teaching. A new enthausiasm has returned to both classroom teaching and the students themselves.

Students have really taken to blogging. They love going home at night, taking photos with their digital cameras, returning to school the next day and endless patience can be witnessed with the relatively tedious task of  resizing their photos and renaming them. In our school we have downloaded irfanview from www.irfanview.com This is a freeware program that is just wonderful for editing images and so easy to use. It will allow you to change the brightness and contrast, alter images completely, add titles, create panoramic shots for headers etc and most importantly, rename and resize photos. …….. And lots more.

Students need to be familiar with the needs of audiences and the various outputs that their photos might need to take. Any work on the internet, really needs to be downsized considerably to allow minimum download time. As some of our work is still used for printing, photos are still taken in high resolution form and bmp files. However, students need to rename files to jpg (or gif or tif) when using it in their blogs etc.

Photos can be stored at flikr or photobucket but some of these websites are now blocked at school. Storage space on our file server is now at a premium as more videos, photos, movies etc are being taken, manipulated and worked into digital content.

Online slideshows can add extra pizazz as well. We like www.slide.com as it is an online slideshow presentation that allows images, transitions and music in the final output. Images still speak a 1000 words and students with lower literacy skills can always say what they would like through images and some text. www.smilebox.com is a download that looks really interesting and I am about to try that one with my classes. www.slideshare.com also appears to have value.

Students still really enjoy working with MS Photostory as it is so easy to use, quick to complete and gives them lots of options for motion plus music clips that can be used. These can be saved in email format and then uploaded to an online video website eg teacher tube and then either a link posted or code used to embed on their blog. I am also going to look into animoto. Our students are encouraged to create their own music using Acid 6.0 to avoid all copyright problems. Animoto allows the photos inserted to take on the beat of the music and seems to produce eyecacthing videos that look really professional.

In September, these giant sunflowers turned their faces to soak up the sun, bright yellows and greens. In October, after the first frost, this sunflower field looks a little wild. In another month or two, snow will cover all but the flower heads. Madison. Wisconsin, USA.

photographed by barbara © 2007

As I said in the previous post, my parsley bit the dust, literally.

To read the rest of this essay, please click HERE.

Lori Gloyd (c) 2007

13 10 2007

Students from various levels at LaTrobe Secondary College are working on a collaborative Wall Hanging to depict the story of the Magic Garden.

This is a workshop that was presented at Healesville High School.

After Cora had told the story of the Magic Tree students chose leaves, worked in small groups and considered what magic powers these leaves would have. The inbuilt desire to have a money tree dominated but there were lots of other fascinating suggestions as well.

During the session they created digital images of the tree and wrote short creative writing pieces about the magical powers of their leaves.

They wrote their stories on leaves

and used Microsoft Word. They turned their images into JPG’s and emailed their documents and images ready to be uploaded on to the Healesville Weblog.

In another session they will learn how to publish themselves. During this session it was stimulating to witness problem solving and dogged determination to cross the line and publish.

The metaphor of gardening has often been used to describe the spiritual experience of women.

To read the rest of this essay, click HERE.

Image and text: Lori Gloyd (c) 2007

They are made of torn up images from a book of plant drawings, rubber stamped images, postage stamps and pictures from cigarette cards

Tonight, on my personal blog, I posted a small piece on Totem Animals.  I was sent an e-mail from a special friend of mine about Totem Animals.  As I answered her question, it struck me that it would be something a lot of people would like to read about, so I am posting my response to her as well as a challenge to anyone interested.

How do I find out who/what my Totem Animal(s) are?

Your Totem animals find you.  Any animal that appears frequently either physically, or in dreams, or in a creative aspect are Messenger and/or Totem animals. 

For example, my three earliest Totem animals, in order are: Owl, Penguin, and Fish.  Since those were given to me they are definitely Totem animals, as is Bear, and Dragon.  I also have been blessed with Cat, Horse, and Camel Totem animals.

 Now, Owl represents the ability to carry the Light into the Darkness and brighten it. 

 Penguin is a fascinating bird and Totem, for he symbolises the ability to move between the worlds of intellect (air) and intuition (water), since the Penguin ‘flies’ in the water, but he is still a bird, a creature of the air. 

 Fish, lives in the realms of spirit, much like the astrological sign Pisces.

Bear is the symbol of the protective aspect of femininity, a la the old adage about coming between a mother bear and her cubs.

  The Dragon is a lizard that flies and breathes fire.  It symbolises ease of communication between mind, body, and passions

Cat, our endearing, loveable and loving feline companions are representative of magic and mystery because of their contrary reputation. 

Horse, that powerful, gentle and intelligent animal symbolises power, freedom, travel, and expansion. 

Last but not least is the Camel, a fairly new Totem.  The Camel is a lovely symbol of endurance, and the ability to refresh oneself and go for long periods of time without needing more nourishment (reassurance, etc.).

Look for these signs to help you determine your Totem animals:

Are you drawn to images of them?

Have you been gifted with a nickname that is a particular animal?

Do they appear and reappear in your dreams and conscious mind?

Do you own images or effigies of a particular animal?

Once you have determined that a particular animal is your Totem, look into the details of that animal’s mythology and actions for clues as to what that Totem animal is trying to tell you.  If you see a particular animal over and over, look at the appearance of that animal. 

IE- you dream of a dog frequently, and it is the same dog.  A large, powerful, hunting dog, in its prime with glossy black fur and a gentle, loving disposition and he is always trotting beside you no matter where you go, even into places where one would not take a dog that isn’t a Service Animal.

I’ll let all of you come up with your own interpretations of what this dog is trying to tell you.