The Flip Video is a great piece of equipment. Two of my grandchildren got hold of it yesterday and had a good time playing with it. The size and chunkiness of the unit means that even the four year old was able to comfortably hold and operate the camera. They were able to quickly work out how it worked. Quite quickly it was evident that”selfies” were more popular than filming their uncle or grandmother. One thing I will do before they grab it next is put it on a neck strap so that they can wander around more comfortably.

Footage from the camera is easily imported into Movie Maker 2.

I was also able to view camera footage on the eee PC which would make the little computer a great conduit for uploading to YouTube or other video sites. As I have no editting software on the eee PC I was not able to test that function. I was able to easily upload to my own webspace. I believe it works just as easily with iMovie on the Mac but as my Mac is being babysat by a daughter whose desktop is ill I was unable to prove that for myself.

If you are looking for a camera that’s small and easy to carry around, has no extra rubbish and takes good footage then the Flip is a good choice. If you want to shoot footage for the classroom or for the web it’s a great piece of equipment. This is not the camera to shoot for TV or DVD quality. It’s not HD or high resolution.

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Cool.

Then I read about getting back to basics and teaching kids wordprocessing skills so that they can function in a wired world. One writer went so far as to rubbish the idea of kids making movies and slideshows because that’s not what’s done in the real world.

For certain, it would be great so see more people become more comfortable with a keyboard and to be able to use more than one finger when they type. But, hey, the Intermediate school kid in this house has never been taught how to type. He can type a report or story very quickly (just like he can IM or text message very quickly).

Back to slideshows and movies. And spreadsheets and databases. And web applications.

A few months ago we hosted a couple of Canadian women from the Galileo Foundation. I can’t remember which of the women said it, Dr Pat Clifford or Dr Sharon Freisen, but the point that they made was about children being able to present in the “media of their times“.

That idea really struck a chord with me. Kids today are surrounded by all sorts of media that is very different to the media that surrounds us as adults. Have you ever watched kids’ TV and seen the way that things are presented? It’s very different to the dinner-time news that we watch. Kids magazines are really different to the periodicals that I read. Their music is different. Not better or worse just different.
This week I worked with a teacher and some great kids to make a couple of very short movies. The kids had all sorts of ideas and ways to do things. The teacher knew how to do things and how to organise and structure information. He also knew how to get the best from his kids without slowing or stopping their creativity.

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