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  16.06.09 — Natasha Mitchell

  Hi Sofia, Joe and

  Hi Sofia, Joe and Janjer

  This interview on ABC Radio National's Life Matters program today struck me as being relevant to Artaptation!

  Really interesting USA guy thinking about digital tools and classrooms etc...Marco Torres is President Barack Obama's technology in education advisory committee

  http://www.abc.net.au/rn/lifematters/stories/2009/2599225.htm

  Natasha

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  12.06.09 — Natasha Mitchell

  (Note to wider public -

  (Note to wider public - these comments should be taken in the context of this being a university class exercise! These RMIT projects are very sophisticated, and we welcome much simpler and entirely amateur contributions to Gene Pool too!).

  Hi team (Sofia, Joe and Janjer),

  When you presented this idea in the symposium at RMIT, I thought this was potentially an ambitious project for the timeline you had (recording in schools can be tricky in terms of getting Dept of Education approvals etc), but it looks like you enjoyed a great collaboration with the class - congrats. I love the way the Grade 4 students are the narrators of your project - you get a real sense they owned the process - and it's great to involve primary school age students in a digital media project as collaborators. Linking your production talents with real world contexts is where I reckon digital tools and skills can have the most exciting potential, and power.

  I *love* the kids drawings, and their wild and wonderful "constructed" adaptations. Superb. There's a book in it!

  Question: Do you think the children would mind if we uploaded some of their pictures up as individual items on Gene Pool. We'll credit the Artaptation project of course?

  Few quick comments:

  - The kids seem to have made their own great "fantastical" changes to the creatures, but do you think the project gave them a sense of how habitats are being impacted in the real world in response to climate change?

  - I couldn't see the information on the Charles Darwin page - is there a problem with that page?
  http://artaptationproject.tumblr.com/post/106593306/who-is-charles-darwi...

  - Some of the video presentations and particularly their presentation on Tumblr seem a bit disjointed and roughly edited. Eg. smoother x-fades between the frames etc would help, and I would have liked to have heard a more sophisticated multi-track sound mix on some of the clips eg. "the class begins" video for example eg. the frogs were used (cute), but you muted the kids entirely, and I wondered why you sought that effect?

  - I wasn't sure the Global Warming primer was ideal - it features Google Ads for example, and its layout on the kids.net.au page is pretty average in the browser I was using
  http://encyclopedia.kids.net.au/page/gl/Global_warming
  Perhaps it would be worth writing your own, more suitable to your primary student users?

  - Watch out for user friendly colour contrasts between text and backgrounds eg. blue writing on dark or tiled picture backgrounds are really hard to read. Hot pink is hard to read too, text wise. Maybe check out the ABC's Kids website for some ideas of how to be colourful but legible with the web-friendly palette of colours.

  This whole project is a fabulous idea, with great contributions from kids. Thanks again for adding to the Gene Pool. And good luck with your next projects.

  Feel free to add your thoughts here too.

  P.S You word play with the title of this project Artaptation has meant that you've spelt adaptation wrong in a few places (might want to check that, don't want to confuse the kids!).

  Natasha Mitchell
  Presenter + science broadcaster - ABC Radio National
  http://abc.net.au/rn/allinthemind
  +
  Gene Pool coproducer

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