I came across something so absurd, and so initially shocking, I almost thought it was a joke. Unfortunately, it isn’t.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we have reached a new height in absurd uses of technology. I give you: TeachLIVE.

The name itself is a joke because there is no teaching involved, and it is nowhere close to “live.”

I wanted to write last night, but 24 hours later, I’m still so frustrated by this that I’m having trouble staying coherent. In short, University of Central Florida has decided that teachers learning to teach in real classrooms poses a threat to students. In fact, they believe learning to teach in a real classroom can be so harmful, they make sure you know this from the opening sentence:

TLE TeachLivE™ is a mixed-reality classroom with simulated students that provides teachers the opportunity to develop their pedagogical practice in a safe environment that doesn’t place real students at risk.

Somebody pinch me.

This program is selling snake oil at the expense of the profession of teaching. Again, from the about page:

In the TLE TeachLivE™ Lab, pre-service and in-service teachers walk into a room where everything looks like a middle-school classroom including props, whiteboards, and of course, children. However, unlike the brick and mortar setting, the lab is a virtual setting and the students in the classroom are avatars.

It makes me sad because this is being heralded as a new age of teaching teachers. Hell, if we can’t make kids fit standardized tests, let’s train teachers to respond to standardized kids, so it’s easier to give the tests when you’re in front of real children. Plus, kids are a real pain to deal with when you’re learning to teach.

There’s even a promotional video (which I had to keep pausing because the ridiculous jumps by a factor of 100). I posted it below, if you want to try and watch it:

Again, this is highlighting the sad fact that the teaching profession in America is being slowly eroded. I’m planning on writing a letter to UCF to express my utter dismay at the idea that training teachers on a simulator is an adequate substitute for authentic teacher preparation. I want to encourage you to do the same.

My schedule has been picking up like crazy, and I’m afraid this may be my last ds106 post for the summer semester. Maybe I can get one or two more assignments in, but I don’t think it’s going to happen.

That being said, it’s time to clear the air.

I know Alan posted that he is the creator of @IAmTalkyTina, but I’m here to set the record straight.

As I was getting into ds106, Ben Rimes was telling me about all of the role playing and storytelling that happened within the narrative of the course. I loved that it spilled over into the online interactions, so I thought setting up a ds106 character right from the beginning based on the Twilight Zone would help me get right into the swing of things.

So, officially, I am the creator and running of @IAmTalkyTina. She isn’t going to disappear, although my work will…there are still some twists in the ds106zone Talky Tina story. Keep your eyes out.` <http://www.twitter.com/iamtalkytina>`__ I’m still watching you…

Ben, I’m sorry if you’ve lost some sleep over me, but I sure had fun scaring the pants off you once or twice. I hope we can still be friends…

Short post this morning, but last night on my way home from work, I did a short drive-by reflection. I was thinking about connections and how those impact those around us. It’s in two segments, but edited into one file. The only major editing I did was to compress the files so the sound didn’t clip during playback. You can listen below.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/95996924″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

I’ve been diving into Google+ a little bit more lately, and this is stemming from some of the experimenting I did yesterday, when I posted how to record a Google+ Hangout with higher quality audio for podcasting or other interview-type things (great language, I know).

That led to a discussion last night with Lisa Nielson, who was trying to schedule a Hangout On Air for a discussion happening the following night. So, I did some research, and we messed around with Google Hangouts for a few minutes and found a solution. I decided to post everything I found on managing that Hangout here. So, I submit to you: how to manage Google Hangouts On Air so people can actually find the broadcast when it begins. I’m going to outline three possible solutions, and you can take your pick.

Please note that while I tested these sitting at my desk, they have not been tested in the wild, and you should do some testing before your event to make sure you’ve got everything ready to go.

The Dedicated Page

The easiest way to help people find your broadcast is to create a page on your blog where you embed the video stream. When you are prepping the broadcast, there is an embed code in the window. You can grab this code and update the link on your blog before you actually click “Start broadcast.” It will display a “Broadcast starting soon” placeholder until you actually begin the hangout. It’s a lightweight option, and you’ll need to remember to update the link, but it’ll be easy for your audience to find each time you run a show.

YouTube Live URL

YouTube and Google are peas in a pod, with a lot bleeding over into the other. Hangouts are the same. When you run an On Air Hangout, YouTube will automatically record and archive the video in your channel so people can go back and check it out if they miss the live broadcast. But, there are a couple things you need to do first in order to get that to work. Rather than reposting it, here is a Google+ thread with all of the setup that needs to happen in order to get Hangouts On Air to work properly. It isn’t as much as it sounds like, but it’s a good idea to check to make sure you’re not stung at the end.

Okay, back to how YouTube makes this easy. Once your account is verified and your channel linked to your Google+ profile, you can grab a super-awesome new URL that will always be the live stream in the future. I learned this from ReelSEO’s channel, and you can take a look at the video if you want to see the whole process. In short, share the following URL with your audience for any On Air broadcast:

http://www.youtube.com/user/USERNAME/live

Obviously, replace the USERNAME with your username. So, mine would be http://www.youtube.com/bennettscience/live for any On Air broadcast. When you’re not live, viewers will be redirected to your YouTube channel.

Why should you do this rather than embedding a link on your blog? One word: Backchannel. YouTube’s interface includes a comment box to one side where your audience can discuss the broadcast. Engagement is always a good thing.

The Event

The third, and most circuitous (but most robust) way to plan a Hangout in advance is to use a Google Event. This is the method I’m least familiar with, and honestly the workflow is a pain right now (even Google admits it), but it is powerful if you can get a system worked out. I think this would work well in conjunction with either the YouTube URL or the blog post embed.

So, if its confusing, why use Events? A couple reasons. Events link to your Calendar, so management becomes very easy. They’re also listed on your Google+ page. So, if you have subscribers connected there, they’ll see it in their stream. They can also RSVP right through the Google+ stream, so you can begin engaging before the show. It will also send a calendar reminder to people who have RSVP’d, so you’ll have a higher attendance rate (in theory.) All of that is great, but it’s the actual implementation of the show that could use some improvement.

I pulled the tips from this Google community thread, and I suggest taking a look at it. In short, here’s what you would do:

1. Make a new regular event. You have to make it regular in order for it to work properly. If you create an “On Air” event, it just means it shows up in your public stream. You can still make the regular event public, you just need to share it with that group in the creation page. This is how you’ll get RSVP’s for the broadcast. In the description, you can also add a reminder to check back for the URL once you’re live.

2. Before the scheduled event, create a new Hangout On Air like you normally would, and share it with those participating. This is where using the YouTube link would really be helpful, as you only need to invite those people in the hangout with you, not those watching.

3. Copy and paste the Hangout URL into the Event details (see screenshots). This can be either the Hangout itself if you want people to join, or it can be the YouTube live user link from above to direct people to the broadcast.

4. 

   In your Google+ Events, click on carrot in the top-right corner of the Details card.

Click on Advanced, and then Show More Options. You can then add a URL to your in the **website URL** field. If you try to add the link in the YouTube URL field, it’ll return an error. Thanks to Elayne Whitfield for pointing this problem out in the comments.

So, I like Events, but the workflow to actually begin the Hangout from the Event isn’t there. Again, the Events workflow is documented well in the [community thread](http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/google-plus-discuss/N_W2X7Jaj44), so take a look there for more discussion.

I’m working on a super-secret project right now (more to come this summer…bear with me) which will require me to record interviews via Google Hangout. Now, I know I’ve written before about how to screencast on a Chromebook using Google+, but the quality of those recordings, in particular the audio, can leave something to be desired. So, I went looking for an alternative.

I fell down the rabbit trail of apps that do this and that, but none of them really did what I needed. I knew I wanted to use Audacity to record and edit, but I couldn’t find an easy way to record both my microphone as well as the system audio for the people I’m speaking with.

Luckily, I’m currently going through ds106 with some radio geniuses who where able to help. I can’t go any further without giving ScottLo a MAJOR shout out for helping me work this out. Rather than type the entire process out, I’ve got a video showing how I set everything up to record the Google Hangout. Beneath that, you can see the tools (with links) and their settings written out.

The Video

Proof of concept mp3

The Setup – Links below take you to downloads if you don’t have the software yet.

System Audio

• Set to Soundflower (2ch)

LadioCast

• Input 1 – Soundflower (2ch)
• Input 2 – Your microphone
• Main output – Soundflower (64ch)
• Aux output – Built in output/headphones (for monitoring)

Audacity

• Input – Soundflower (64ch)

Google Hangout – This works the same for Skype.

• Input – microphone/built in mic
• Output – Soundflower (2ch)

Again, if you need help setting this up, send me a tweet (@bennettscience) and I’m happy to help.

I was able to squeak out another audio assignment today for the zone. While it isn’t Twilight Zone based, sometimes reading Craigslist can feel like its own alternate universe.

I chose to beat Craigslist because…well, because finding a ridiculous post was pretty fun. I made sure to stick local, so I humbly submit the following performance using material provided by my community:

This was pretty simple, as I stuck to GarageBand loops and samples. I recorded my voice right into the program and then added the radio voice effect to brighten the sound a little bit. It’s short, but it was fun.

If you don’t believe this post is real…I beg to differ.

…there’s no escape.

I wanted to catch up on assignments for the ds106zone, so I hopped in on this week’s audio work. An easy one to get in was create a radio bumper for the ds106radio channel using a short clip from The Twilight Zone.

I deviated a little from this week’s episodes by watching Five Characters in Search of an Exit, and it struck me as a great parallel for my foray into ds106. I’ve dabbled, I’ve asked questions, and I’ve explored. Now that I’m fully into the fold, I don’t think I can ever leave. The community is fantastic, and even though I haven’t kept up with the “official” class, I feel more creative accomplishment than I have in a long time.

For kicks, I also decided to throw together a very simple Twilight Zone themed radio banner. Maybe I’ll GIF it. Maybe not. If you want to remix it, you can grab the .xcf and have at it.

Now, I just need to listen to the radio show constantly to see if ScottLo decides to use it…

I posted earlier that I’d been having a hard time working with the assigned episodes this week. When I got home, I decided to watch a different episode and see what would happen. I turned on Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up? from season two of The Twilight Zone. I hadn’t ever seen this one, and the episodes with UFO’s and aliens involved always intrigued me.

(As a kid, I borrowed a TON of UFO books from the library, and then I started to get freaked out, so I stopped.)

I loved the disparity between the characters in this episode, and I thought I had it all figured out. Well, it turned out that I forgot I was in the Zone, and Serling pulled a fast one on me. Again.

I decided to do another minimalist book cover for this episode, mostly because the image popped into my head immediately. Plus, I figured the one I did on A Clockwork Orange was done before the class started, so technically, I’m not redoing a project I’ve already completed.

I used a couple tricks taught to me today by Shannon Tate after commenting on her beautiful House of Leaves book cover. They really helped me achieve more texture in the image overlay and the text, which made me happy.

I feel like I’m back on the horse and I’m looking forward to (maybe) getting another project done this weekend, and definitely starting fresh next week.

—

Book image photo credit: ~Brenda-Starr~ via Compfight cc

Man, this has been a long week. Aside from the remodel I began on my house, we had family visiting and a sick wife to boot. So, my ds106 work had come to a relative halt. I worked on some here and there, but couldn’t really sit down and put in some time.

I decided to do a sound story in which the United States revisits the giant’s planet…and let’s say things go a little bit differently. The story is below.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/94827778″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

This is actually about half sound effects from freesound.org and half from my own house remodel, with the different noises being used mostly for the machines that come out of the spaceship. The woman is caught off guard this time, and well…you tell me what happens.

In a perfect world, I would have had a design assignment to go along with this, but I’m just not going to get to it. If I do, I’ll be sure to post it.

We all need time to do things we love. But, time is not always on our side. Neither are the people around us. Henry Bemis lived a life in which he found solace in books, and contempt from everyone around him. In Time Enough at Last, he is given an opportunity to forget the world and live in his books, but the Twilight Zone had other ideas.

I tackled the One Story/Four Icons design assignment to get the juices flowing. I had a lot of great ideas after watching Tim Owens and Jim on the ds106.tv show about design yesterday. One I had known about was The Noun Project, but I had forgotten about it until the show. So, I hopped over there to grab some images and get going.

I started with 5 icons (full disclosure here) and then combined the man’s head with the mustache to make myself a Bemis. So, in the end, I still ended up with four icons (I’m not a cheater.)

To get the broken lens, I simply used the circle selector and chose the space inside the glasses icon. Then, I grew the selection (Selection > Grow) by 3px to grab some of the edge. Then, I used the Transform tool to skew the lens (we’re getting deep here (yes, that is a terrible pun)) to show some depth. Filled in some lines, and you’ve got yourself a cracked lens. This didn’t take me too long, so I decided to beef it up a little and give myself another star in the process.

Rather than a still image, I decided to GIF this into something a little more interesting.

(I played with the timing a lot. I’m happy with what I came up with).

Just like Mr. Bemis, he thought things would turn out one way, only to find that circumstances often get the best of us, no matter how much we plan.

— CC Attributions —

Person designed by Antonis Makriyannis from The Noun Project

Mustache designed by Fernando Vasconcelos from The Noun Project

Book designed by Diego Naive from The Noun Project

Explosion designed by Bohdan Burmich from The Noun Project

Glasses designed by Thomas Hirter from The Noun Project

On a side note, this episode makes me really, really sad.

3 Design Stars

Rounding out my assignments for the week, I’ve got a brand-spankin-new piece of vintage clip art for you to use in your next PowerPoint (because PPT is so much fun).

The original image came from a SONY ad for a projection TV from the 1980’s. I found this on VintageAdBrowser.com, which has ads from the early 1900’s, categorized by ad type. It’s pretty awesome.

You can grab the HIGH RES PNG if you want to use it for some ds106 fun:

…or the smaller file for something easier to use.

This one was mostly about selecting out the original baseball image, and then cleaning up around the hands still in the frame. If you want to change the resolution, here’s the .xcf for your riffing pleasure.

The first week of ds106 is coming to a close, and I needed to finish my design work for the week. I clicked on “try a random assignment” and got the D&D Monster Manual assignment. I’ve never played Dungeons & Dragons, but the imagination and storytelling that go into the game are very attractive. (On a side note, if you’re near South Bend, I’d love to learn how to play some time.)

As Ben Rimes is 100% responsible for introducing me to ds106, it was only fitting that he become my monster.

This project took me a long time because the mage I pulled was just a line drawing. I also had to re-learn how to select out different parts of the image as layers to get clean colors. To add to the complexity, I had to play with the fill opacity and style to get the grainy look. I’m not 100% happy with the color in the lettering, but it would have been too hard to read if I had done it lighter. Finally, GIMP’s fonts aren’t so wonderful. But, GIMP does tie into my Mac’s system fonts, so I went online and grabbed one for the front from fonts101.com, and Dosis for the back from Google’s Web Font repository. Both free, both now living on my computer for use whenever I want.

The story part was a lot of fun. I had to do a lot of research into how D&D actually works with monsters (and I’m still not sure I got it right), but thinking up how it would act based on how I know Ben was a fun extension. There’s probably also some kind of backstory in there that I might come back to some day.

If you want to grab the .xcf files, here’s the front, and then the reverse.

Last night, I posted a photo set of images taken every mile for 20 miles.

Today, they’re alive and in color.

This was the hardest GIF I’ve done to date. First, I imported everything into GIMP as layers. Then, I had to figure out how to create a GIF where only a pice of it was animated. After searching, going to Twitter, and searching some more, I came across this tutorial from our very own Jim Groom did on how to animate just a portion of the frame. I had the right idea when I was working on it, but I didn’t know you had to apply the layer mask.

Then, I went through each frame and lined it up with the rear-view mirror on the base image. There is still some wiggle in the top right corner and around the mirror, but I’m happy with how it came out, considering I may or may not have been driving while trying to snap the picture.

If you want to spruce it up or riff on it, here’s the .xcf

I was in Centralia, IL all day today (5/22), which is about 5 hours from where I live. Somewhere in between hour 1 and boredtodeathville, I was trying to think up something I could do for ds106 while I was driving. My mind flashed back to an assignment in which you take a photo every step for 10 steps, and then create a collage.

I’ve wanted to do that one following those rules in my back yard, but it seemed like a good place to start. So, I decided to take a photo every mile for 20 miles. What I got is shown below (click the thumbnail for the full-size image to see details, all 4000px worth).

The hardest part for me was convincing myself to only take one picture. I wanted to maintain the heart of grabbing a raw image and then sharing the flow of time, space, and imagery. And that included the blurry photo. I had to almost tell myself out loud not to take a “better” picture.

I have another plan for this image series, but that will have to come another time.

As always, the GIMP .xcf file is available for remixes.

I’m traveling today and tomorrow to lead some training on Flipped Learning and let’s just say it hasn’t been the smoothest trip so far.

First, I thought (my own fault, btw) we were doing Mac training. Turns out, we’re doing PC. So, I partitioned my hard drive and managed to get Windows installed before I left.

Second, I’m tearing out my kitchen this weekend to begin a big remodel. So, while I was packing to leave, I was also trying to straighten out my junk so my pregnant wife didn’t have to do it all on her own. Oh, I forgot to mention that my entire family is coming to help. I love them all dearly, but its going to be a packed house for a couple days.

All of which brings me to my third point: in my haste to leave, I left my computer’s power cord at home. Ugh. Rookie mistake.

I got down to the very cozy bed and breakfast that was arranged for me, and I began thinking about how I could keep up with my #ds106 work for this week using only mobile apps. Thankfully, Ben Rimes, Jim Groom, and Scott Lo came to my rescue. This network really is amazing. Everyone is extremely encouraging and eager to help. I’m loving my experience so far.

Anyways, I opened up SketchBook Express, which is the mobile version of the SketchBook platform for OSX. It’s a pretty powerful drawing program which gives you all kinds of different brushes and tools as well as layer editing. Exactly what I needed. I decided to take a stab at the “Looking at Yourself” assignment because it would give me a chance to play with the app a little more.

Dang, I love it.

As always, the photo is free to use.

I was able to create the image using a previous shot from the camera roll and layering a quick screenshot on top. All of the editing, including the trimming, positioning, layering, and transparency were done in the app. It’s free, and definitely worth downloading.

I’m wondering if I should try and do as many assignments as I can using mobile only. As a former teacher, I’m a big believer that mobile is going to be the new normal in schools, and having a broad range of experience creating on mobile might be useful in the future.

Anyways, just some things to chew on. Now, I’m finally going to get some sleep.

Week 1 of the summer ds106 course has begun, and I’m trying to stay on top of the work and do as much as I can with the rest of the summer cohort. I feel like I’ve got the chops, I just hope I have the time.

Today, to kick things off, we have a Design Assignment from the bank. This assignment asked us to create an image for a fictional character with the title of “How to _____.” (Meaning, how to emulate said character.)

I’ve been on a ST:TNG (follow the link if you don’t know what that is) kick recently, so I decided to model my guide on the ever-present Commander Riker. Always there, letting his beard shine out (at least after season 1), playing sweet brass tunes on his trombone, and in general, being a 24th-century-bad-ass-womanizer when Worf wasn’t around.

I did this by grabbing a picture of Riker online and then using the free select tool in GIMP to grab his beard, hair, and to chop out his mouth. Then, badabing-border, badaboom-text, and there it is.

In the spirit of remixing, I’m also going to post my GIMP files on my server that you can download, remix, and play with. It should save some work for everyone in the end. You can grab the Riker .xcf here.

In a spinoff from the

Colorize It and Focus on One Color, I took a photo of my desk at home and then colorized some of my favorite things that surround me each day.

This also makes me think about how much junk I have on my desk. Maybe it’s time to make some strategic decisions and cut down on stuff I haven’t looked at it too long.

I did this pretty quickly in GIMP. I took the photo, duplicated the original and made the copied layer monochrome. Then, I applied a white layer mask and used the free select tool to get nice, crisp lines. I then filled those spaces with black to erase the mask and let the colors show through.

The thumbnail will take you to the full-res photo.

It’s that time of year again: summer. Conferences are picking up and I like seeing where everyone is headed. So, I give you, my summer travel/life schedule.

• Kaskaskia Community College, Centralia, IL: 5/22 – 23
• Clintondale HS, Detroit, MI: 6/7
• FlipCon13, Stillwater, MN: 6/17 – 20
• ISTE 2013, San Antonio, TX: 6/23 – 26
• Lincoln, NE:6/27 – 28
• Another Flippin’ Conference, Yorktown IN: 7/15 – 17
• BLC, Boston, MA: 7/21 – 23
• Warsaw eLearning Conference, Warsaw, IN: 7/20
• eQuip eLearning Conference, Plymouth, IN: 7/21
• Screencast Camp, Okemos, MI: 8/2 – 3
• GAfE Summit – Rocky Mountains: 8/13 – 14 If you’re going to be in/around any of these areas this summer, let me know in the comments, or send me a note on Twitter, @bennettscience

I’m a big fan of minimalism. So, when I saw a minimalist book cover assignment in the DS106 Assignment Bank, I knew it had to happen.

I recently finished reading [A Clockwork Orange](http://www.amazon.com/Clockwork-Orange-Restored-Text/dp/0393089134/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1368718245&sr=1-1&keywords=a+clockwork+orange), and it was more powerful than I anticipated. The book is also very dense with Burgess’ made up dialect for Alex and his gang, so I thought a minimalist cover might be a good juxtaposition with the way the book reads.

My initial thought was to use a knife or a record for the cover because of Alex’s dispositions. At times, he is murderously violent, while at others, he is thoughtful and poetic, especially when he’s listening to Beethoven. However, I didn’t feel like those really carried the main theme of the novel. After some searching and some rough trial and error, I ended up using a dentist’s chair as the main image.

If you’re not familiar with the story, a chair plays a major role in Alex’s development. At first, it shows relaxation, or comfort. But, in the context of the story, it is a tool in a method of curing social disease. It is a tool where the occupant loses freedom, choice, and ultimately, self. It is a symbol of terror and carries the weight of the story along with it.

People say life gets more complicated as you get bigger. Well, I’m at 42, and I couldn’t disagree more.

I might not be as quick or nimble as the 19’s, but I sure am a heck of a lot more agile than the 52’s or even the 48’s. Admittedly, I don’t get out more than once a week or so, but when I do, I can get the job done. I mean, why go out if you’re not going to make a big difference? Seems like a waste of time and energy to me.

Anyways, why is life less complicated? Well, for starters, I have an established routine. When I go out, I know exactly where I need to go, and what I need to do, and pretty much how long it’ll take me to do it. There isn’t much variation, really…I just try and make sure I don’t hit any rough patches along the way. I haven’t changed my habits for years. If it ain’t broke, why fix it?

Sure, I can’t always see too well, being 42 and all, but, I usually manage well enough. I’ve been doing this work for a long time, so I can adjust on the fly without too much trouble. Sometimes, it can also get a little bumpy out there, but, that’s just the way it goes. I roll with it. I may be at 42, but I’m still solid as a rock when I need to be.

I enjoy the patterns. I enjoy the predictability. I enjoy seeing the line ahead of me, and the change that is left behind after I pass. There’s no guesswork, so I can let my mind wander and just do what needs to be done. I guess if I really think about it, 19’s could do the same work, but it would be nearly as efficient. I’m proud of that.

When I’m not working, I can rest assured that I’ll be needed again. I’m always needed, which is comforting. I don’t have to worry about becoming irrelevant any time soon. I’m patient and I’ll be here, ready to go.

Life as a “42-er” is great.