Ewan McIntosh | Digital Media & Learning

QUIZ: What are all the plot devices in Plot Device?

I'm running a workshop on digital storytelling this next two days at Taipei European School, Taiwan, and Tom introduced me to Plot Device, the ultimate vid featuring, I think, every plot device you could ever come across in a film clip.

So, here's my challenge. Can my audience of occasionally faithful readers help decipher each and every one of the plot devices in this clip? Answers in the comments, below (and try to write the time of the device beforehand: e.g. 06:09 Sci-fi, Independence-Day-like invasion with flared video.

Do I Have Your Attention? II

This is one of my favourite moments in the film, The Social Network, that has been remixed as a beautifully produced Kinetic Typography project, in Adobe After Effects, set against the dialogue from the film.

While we're thinking about attention, how often do schools and teachers assume the attention of youngsters, of parents, of our colleagues? My gut feel: nearly all the time.

• We assume that learners want to learn because they chose subjects.
• We assume that learners will want to learn because we like the way we do something.
• We assume parents care about their child's education.
• We assume that our colleagues want to learn how to do their jobs better/differently.
• We assume that adults know how to learn on their own.
• We assume that chuldren don't know how to learn on their own.
• ...

We need to work consistently at gaining attention, retaining attention and turning that attention into value, much in the same way as a tech startup like Facebook would do (check out Dave McClure's busy but genius presentation on attention and metrics if you want to delve more into how). I'm fairly convinced that somewhere in these tech startup metrics are the assessment tools for the new forms of learning that are emerging, but fighting against assessment structures of old that don't fit anymore.

And in using new metrics to measure success, we can engage in new learning with more confidence, new learning that is almost certainly more likely to get the attention of those around us.

I'm grateful for a constructive formative feedback that took place on this blog and led to the incredibly talented Angel, who made it, changing some minor errors to bring even more impact back to its message.

Related articles

• What are Learning Analytics? (elearnspace.org)
• The economics of gaining attention (radar.oreilly.com)
• Do I Have Your Attention? (edu.blogs.com)

Do I Have Your Attention?

This is one of my favourite moments in the film, The Social Network, that has been remixed as a beautifully produced piece of Prezi, filmed, and set against the dialogue from the film. It's let down by an apostrophe that doesn't belong and a lack of dictionary or spellcheck use, infuriating since the rest of it is rather clever.

Update: a corrected version and the backstory published now on this blog.

While we're thinking about attention, how often do schools and teachers assume the attention of youngsters, of parents, of our colleagues? My gut feel: nearly all the time.

• We assume that learners want to learn because they chose subjects.
• We assume that learners will want to learn because we like the way we do something.
• We assume parents care about their child's education.
• We assume that our colleagues want to learn how to do their jobs better/differently.
• We assume that adults know how to learn on their own.
• We assume that chuldren don't know how to learn on their own.
• ...

We need to work consistently at gaining attention, retaining attention and turning that attention into value, much in the same way as a tech startup like Facebook would do (check out Dave McClure's busy but genius presentation on attention and metrics if you want to delve more into how). I'm fairly convinced that somewhere in these tech startup metrics are the assessment tools for the new forms of learning that are emerging, but fighting against assessment structures of old that don't fit anymore.

And in using new metrics to measure success, we can engage in new learning with more confidence, new learning that is almost certainly more likely to get the attention of those around us.

Related articles

• What are Learning Analytics? (elearnspace.org)
• The economics of gaining attention (radar.oreilly.com)

Technology is not an 'either/or'

Ever want a compelling reasoned argument for those we meet who'd rather "young people learnt how to play outdoors in the sun and get away from all this technology"?

John Connell vents some mild frustration at the Luddite brigade who proclaim that all this technology is good and well, but…:

"Call me a grumpy old man, but I want my students to engage with ‘old’ technology – books, journals, articles, conference proceedings. face-to-face discussions in real time, learning to think on their feet…too often ‘new’ technologies get reduced to gimmicks and Wikipedia – I want students who can operate the tool between their ears (another piece of pretty old technology)…"

The eloquence of Stephen Fry in this BBC Virtual Revolution rush, above, provides some common sense to even out the 'grumpy old men' and women who proclaim the computer between our ears is what needs played more often.

The bit I particularly appreciate when dealing with grumpy olds is this:

"Where people make their fundamental error and criticise all this I think it's a danger and it's reducing our capacity to act as proper human beings is they think it's all this. Either sit in front of a screen of some kind tapping away all your life, going lol and, and, and being childish and not writing in proper English sentences or, you sit in an old fashioned study with books and you read properly and you engage property and you go for walks. Well I do both! And most people do both, it is not one or the other.  "

You can download more rushes from the BBC Virtual Revolution programme and make your own version of the documentary. In fact, what a great exercise for students learning how the media can alter the outcome of a set of interviews purely by editing.

Can your students make a viral sports video reply to Andy Murray?

Andy Murray, Scotland's greatest tennis player and the only Brit who stands a chance of winning Wimbledon this year, takes to the streets of London to warm up his skills in this great viral for his sponsor. It almost makes me want to take up the challenge to try and beat him, but I'm pretty poor at tennis.

It got me thinking, though, that we all have incredibly talented sportsmen and sportswomen of the future in our schools: why not see if you can post a video response this week to Andy's video with your own sports virals?

Don't forget to get parents to sign a permission form (why not adapt the ones that East Lothian Council have used if your school doesn't have them already: under 16s, over 16s)?

Games really are taking over the world

Animation by Patrick Jean

The learning capital in analogue

The T-Shirt War from Ibrahim Nergiz on Vimeo.

From Tim, the above film is indeed a triumph of preparation. For a 3-minute film, two days, 222 t-shirts and a fire extinguisher are required (along with, arguably, one of the most relentless editing sessions going). As Tim says, the exercise of simply reverse-engineering the clip is superb for understanding filmmaking and animation. However, for an increasingly burgeoning merry band of us (I know Davitt joins us in this camp) it's the joy of mixing analogue skill with digital, the t-shirt art and screen printing with the digital video stop-frame animation and traditional film.

Another example of grown men oohing and aahing on analogue are our chums at BERG. I met Matt Jones, BERG's Director, Design, on Thursday and felt a warm satisfaction as he showed the video, below, about four minutes in. It's an advert this, ten minutes long, for a Polaroid camera. But hidden in here is a lesson in angles and the physics of light even Mr Meyer would have been proud of (except the 1972 hair styling and music is more retro than either of us would ever manage).

But the craft of the actual camera makes me long for one more than any compact digital oblong that I might find on sale these days. I also have the feeling it has a lot more to teach me about stuff than a digital camera ever could. Like "aspheric".

Tips For Better Ideas

A pop-up book guide to (un)structuring your thinking to have better ideas. The one I have to think about more: think first, execute later. You?

A Perfect Palindrome: The Lost Generation

Thanks to SwissMiss for the link to this lovely video palindrome, showing how some scrolling text on iMovie can make the difference in explaining, understanding, passing on meaning.

End-Of-A-Decade Top 10 Lists: Where Are The Videogames?

Scotland's games industry makes more cash for the UK than the film industry. My six-figure investments this year in the sector seem small-fry when held up against the seven-figure investments made by independent companies themselves in the hope theirs will be the next big hit. Dundee's Realtimeworlds has had to attract over $80m to produce its 2010 release, APB, above.

Yet, as Jack Arnott points out in his Guardian column, the daring and skill demonstrated in studios around the world is barely honoured in our annual plaudits. You rarely see end-of-year "best of" or "top ten" lists in your glossies that include video games:

For games, however, [these end-of-year lists] acquire some extra significance. The lists you may find dotted around national newspapers this Christmas reflect an increasing slice of cultural cache for a still emerging medium. For a lot of people, arts critics especially, video games are still very much a poor relation to their more well-established siblings.

Even in its own media-luvvy domain, games are still looked down upon by those who see the craft of film-writing or programme-shooting as more, well, 'noble'.

The same snootiness is still visible in education despite the work of dedicated, tax-payer funded units like the Consolarium and legions of empassioned expert teachers like Mark Wagner. Video games are on a joint-pegging with the television and the internet in children's media habits, yet tend to feature only on the last day of term for most youngsters. The potential to learn in the game, as well as learn from their production, is lost to all but the most culturally open and connected of educators who want to expand their students' understanding of gaming beyond simply picking up another coin.

As we hurl ourselves into the last days of learning this decade, we might not see top ten lists of computer games in our holiday special bumper magazines. It is with hope, though, that more educators will realise: videogames are not just for Christmas.