Tech Idea for the Art Classroom

I found this idea from a popular Edublog that I follow, Edudemic.

In this article, they were suggesting a great way for student to learn about color and pixellated work using an PhotoShop image filter.

Since our MLTI laptops do not have PhotoShop, I checked Acorn, a light-weight photo editing application on all MLTI issued laptops.  Acorn, which is similar to Photoshop in its language, workflow and terminologies, does this feature as well.

A student could take an image of a famous work, like the Mona Lisa, or their own images and pixellate them to study color relationships, tints and shades.

Users can adjust the filter amount applied

Example from Edudemic

MLTI has a video feature of Acorn from their MLTI Minute site (highly recommended as a frequent visit).  MLTI's Anna-Marie explains how users can use Acorn to paint, however this introductory video will help demo the use of Acorn.

MLTI Minute - Stickies

I would like to give a Shout-Out to MLTI's MLTI Minute.  I'm not sure if any of you are aware of this.  MLTI posts, regularly, easy to swallow, roughly one (1) minute videos featureing several important tid-bits and gold nuggets of information about making the most of your MLTI Macbook laptop.  From keystroke shortcuts to explanations of all of the programs on your device.  You can access these right from MLTI's website.  Each video can be downloaded from the site.

In my travels I find several faculty that love to use Stickies on their Macbook device.  I want to feature a great little bundle of videos for those who love to use their Stickies and want to learn how to make them work for you more.

Here are the links below to five, 1-min, videos that reveal some important features of Stickies

• Episode 7 - Quick Stickies
• Episode 24 - Making Floating Stickies
• Episode 61 - Backup Stickies
• Episode 83 - Restore Stickies
• Episode 117 - Six Stickies Tips

 You can also subcribe to MLTI Minute podcasts through iTunesU in your iTunes application; every MLTI posts a new video podcast your iTunes library will automatically retrieve it.


I will post something later explaining the great resource of iTunesU later.

Accessibility: Enlarge Web Site Text

A great tool that can be used on ever MLTI Macbook.

When on a web page that you would like to enlarge the text (i.e. new article or selection of text), go to your browsers top menu bar and click View > Zoom.  Make sure Zoom Text Only is checked.  When you are ready, you can either go back to View > Zoom and click Zoom In, or key stroke Command+ (plus).  When you want to zoom out, Command- (minus).

Did you know you have an instant Dictionary on your MLTI Macbooks available anytime?

In any MLTI application you are working on (including your web browser)  you, or your 1to1 students, can access an Apple Dictionary with Thesaurus and Wikipedia simply by highlighting the word, or phrase, and Control+Click.  You will notice in the drop down contextual menu the option to Look Up in Dictionary.  Apple's Dictionary will automatically launch displaying your selected word's definition.