Thanks to everyone who attended the Pre-Institute Session at the American Classical League Summer Institute.  I enjoyed working with Cindy Caltigiorne who was honored at the ACL this year as a Merita Award Winner. On the first day of Pre- Institutue, Cindy presented PREZI a interactive presentation tool. She also shared an album of photos from her last Rome In Situ workshop and the attendees used these fantastic images to insert in the Prezi to create thier own teaching tool for their Latin classes. If you would like to learn more about PREZI go to https://prezi.com/. On the second day, I presented another great tool that can be used in the Latin Classroom, TouchCast – interactive video for the web. TouchCast can be by teachers and students for active learning.  With TouchCast your students become the creators of the technology not just the consumers of the technology. Teachers are having great success using TouchCast to “Flip “their classrooms.

(For more information on Flipped Learning the definition and pillars view this informative PDF from he governing board and key leaders of the Flipped Learning Network (FLN): http://fln.schoolwires.net/cms/lib07/VA01923112/Centricity/Domain/46/FLIP_handout_FNL_Web.pdf.)

To learn more about how you or your students can create interactive touchable videos, visit http://www.touchcast.com/education/.  For information about the The Padcaster, which serves as tripod mount for your ipad, go to http://padcaster.com/ (The insert pops out and it can be used as a cage for your DSLR camera.)

Special thanks to my friends at Ancient Coins for Education, Inc., James R. Clifford, Wayne G. Sayles, and Reflector for donating prizes for the session.

Here is a quick example of a simple TouchCast made with two FIRST TIME attendees at the ACL conference.  We used the green screen and added a background of an internet search for ACL. You will be able to click the image of the ACL website when you see it POP into the video and it will take you to the ACL website In real time. All this is done within the video.

https://www.touchcast.com/embed/104360

And this is just the tip of the iceberg!  You can insert polls, twitter feeds, white boards, and sound effects.  There is also a built-in teleprompter and more.

What did attendees think of these sessions? Here’s what Laura Saltzman of New York thought: http://www.touchcast.com/magistrazee/09dd3e847e/?ref=magistrazee&p=channel

While at Institute, I had a chance to make a couple of short TouchCasts. Here is some of what you missed:

See Dawn Carlin hard at work:

http://www.touchcast.com/magistrazee/acl_1/?ref=magistrazee&p=channel

Amy Elifritz tells us about the Junior Classical League

http://www.touchcast.com/magistrazee/f8564e04cc/?ref=magistrazee&p=channel

Favorite Latin Quotes: http://www.touchcast.com/magistrazee/acl_latin_quotes/?ref=magistrazee&p=channel