The Diary of Anne Frank Project Options

Our journey through the short life of Anne Frank has revealed a person, I think it's safe to say, that we could imagine as a friend. We've seen face to face the fear and the longing, the unfairness and the brutality, the sadness and the horrors of the Holocaust. And we've seen it all through the eyes of this remarkable 13-year-old girl.

To complete our experience, it's now time to explore topics, feelings, and moments in Anne's story and create our own responses to them. Here is a link to the Anne Frank: Final Project Options. If anyone is going to DC next week, you may want to take a look at them now to get a jump start. You will find a wide variety of choices for all different interests. Choose a project that fascinates you and jump in! I'm also open to hearing other project suggestions, so please don't hesitate to ask.

Experiencing Anne's story one last time, whether in poetry, artwork, dramatic monologue, eulogy, essay, article, presentation, digital collage, will be the grand finale to end our journey. Take the time to sink in deeply to a part of the play, certain character, or experience. Afterall, we read about other people's lives so we can learn and have our own lives changed. Let your project, no matter the format, be one that you complete with a spirit of excellence and one that you will remember long after we've closed the pages of her story.

                                       

When I Grow Up, I want to be a YouTuber! TED Talk #3

When I grow up, I want to be a doctor, photographer, policeman, fireman, teacher, veterinarian, YouTuber!  Wait, what?!  A YouTuber?!

If any child mentioned YouTuber on a list of dream jobs ten years ago, people wouldn't have had a clue what he was talking about.  Boy, has things changed.

Media has changed.  Communication has changed.  No longer is the Internet a place for professionals and computer geniuses only.  Everyday people are creating and jumping in the deep side of the Web.  It's the ultimate technological power-to-the-people movement.  In this case, the power to create video.  

The pool of video online is wide and deep!  Sometimes funny.  Sometimes sweet.  Some well made.  Some  very well made, but, honestly, most are really, really, really bad.

What fascinates me is that even a horrendously horrible video can still score hundreds of thousands of views. That's right, hundreds of thousands.  It's crazy!

Why do some videos go viral and some fizzle out?  What is the key to getting a large audience for that video of your cat playing the piano?

This guy knows.  I bring you this weeks TED Talk from Kevin Allocca.

Kevin Allocca is YouTube's trends manager.  That means he gets paid to watch YouTube videos all day!  He's got some deep thoughts about web video today.  In this talk from TEDYouth, he shares the 4 reasons a video goes viral.

Here's the link.

Enjoy the video and keep those cameras running when you, your friends, your cat, your parakeet, your dog, your grandpa, or your brother does something interesting.  You never know who will be the next trend in YouTube videos.