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Its Festive fun Making Multimedia Magic
 Over four hundred pupils from schools around the City visited Sunderland CLCs to make a multimedia Christmas card.
The activity allowed the children the opportunity to explore multimedia production techniques to create their own computerised Christmas card.
The day began with a visit to the TV studio to record their own karaoke version of a popular festive song complete with Santa hats and blue screen falling snow background. They then returned to the classroom to record a verse for their card into a sound recording program and have their photos taken. We then magically turned the children into the man himself using our now famous ‘Santarizer’ software.
Crazy talk - one of our favourite bits of software - was used to transform the children’s Santa pictures into a video of them reading their messages.
Having created everything they needed it was into Mediator to put it all together.
The resulting card was burned onto CD and put in an envelope for them to pass on to friends or family.
Judging by the smiles a grand time was had by all and the activity met many of the requirements for the QCA multimedia units. The CDs contained a couple of ‘Pressies’ as each child received a copy of audacity a free package for recording and editing audio, and The Santarizer so they could extend the work at home or back at school
We aren’t quite taking bookings yet for next year but the activity provides a framework that could be used in other curriculum areas. So if you would like to bring your students to experience a bit of multimedia magic give us a call.
The Suspects are VC Rock Idols
 Southmoor CLC recently played host to Rock Idol 2006. One of the rooms at the centre was transformed into a live video soundstage with the CLCs video conferencing equipment being used to allow the bands to perform live over the Internet.
The competition aims to give up and coming new bands the chance to perform, via video conferencing, to a panel of expert judges.
Not only were the judges able to see and hear the band perform they were also able to hear instant feedback on their performance. The bands were also streamed live to the Big Screen in Birmingham City Centre.
Having successfully got through to the finals 'Suspects' from Southmoor Community School performed in the national final of Rock Idol 2006 in November.
The band put on an excellent show and were very close to carrying off the ‘national crown’ in the established bands category.
They were just ‘pipped at the post’ by a voting margin of 1% by bands from Northern Ireland and the East Midlands.
The performances by all the bands that took part in this year’s event were extremely enjoyable to experience and we hope the bands that took part this year and other potential performers will have a go next year.
Rockit 2007 details are available at http://www.rockit2007.org.uk
Thank You Clive
 We would like to take this opportunity to say a huge thank you to Clive Bulmer, our CLC strategy manager, for supporting us so well in the first five years of our opening.
From September Clive is moving on to an exciting new job as Headteacher of Sunderland High Junior School We wish him every success in the future.
Encouraging Pupils to Think About Thinking
 Following on from the successful creation of A New Beginning by pupils from St Robert of Newminster RC School, several schools attending the CLC in a specially organised Secondary School Week have produced their own Educational Games using the Thinking Worlds authoring tool. The games are rooted in Blooms Taxonomy which classifies levels of intellectual behaviour in learning. Pupils were encouraged to think about how they think when learning new information and how best to apply this to users across the globe.
Some of the games created were of a particularly high standard. In fact one pupil, Anthony Rowell from St Robert of Newminster RC School & 6th
Form College was awarded the prize of an IPod Nano for his excellent effort. His game was voted the ‘best uploaded task’ by the boffins at Caspian Learning who created the software – high praise indeed!
Eager Beavers
 Congratulations to the St. Andrews Beaver Scout Colony who were all successful in earning their Information Technology Stage 1 Badge at the CLC.
Twenty Beavers, all aged between six and eight years old, completed a series of tricky challenges such as naming computer equipment, using a drawing package and making a poster. Let’s hope that by now they’ve all got their badges proudly sewn on their jumpers!
The visit by the Beavers is part of a number of community outreach projects undertaken by the CLCs.
MTV Boom
 Several schools attended the CLC to produce their own MTV music videos both during the day and at after school sessions.
Using a range of music from the pioneers of the music video (MTV), pupils planned and then created their own movies.
They used Apple Mac computers with iSight cameras to create and develop their masterpieces. Some pupils chose to create Stop Motion Animation Movies. Several of these movies have been entered into the MTV boom academy competition. Watch this space to discover whether there are any winners.
Inset For Safe Surfing
 In response to requests from a number of schools we have now put together a presentation on safe use of the Internet.
You will learn about the sort of activities your pupils will be using the net for. The rise of web 2.0 and social networking . What a blog is. What sort of information are your pupils putting on MySpace. Where does your school rank on ‘Rate my Teacher’
What information does the net hold about your school and students along with advice on protecting your staff user areas. You will also find out how to really know the origin of a website your students are using for their Internet research and how to spot more common examples of Internet abuse.
The presentation is interactive in nature and would fit very nicely into a one hour staff inset. This could be delivered at your school or you could come along to the CLC for a bit of a change of scenery.
The presentation could also be tailored for parents if schools feel this would be useful. If you would like further information contact us for details.
Websites are Fun
 Pupils from St John Boste Primary School have been working very hard on an after school project to create a website for their school with astounding results.
A small team of pupils were given website authoring training by CLC staff, to enable them to become website developers for their school. The children were also given instructions on how to create resources such as animation and sound files for inclusion in the school site.
The pupils worked diligently, enjoying both the fruits of their labour and the status they achieved as a web development group. The new website will be launched soon. We are sure that schools will be impressed and motivated to replicate this for their own school if needed.
Goin' Down to Southmoor Park
 A hearty congratulations to the hard working lads of St. Aidan’s school who used a variety of complex software packages to create some phenomenal South Park- style films.
The students found images of cartoon characters on the Internet then used image editing software to digitally remove any background details. The characters were then brought to life in a ‘talking head’ application before being composited in a film editing package. In your face, George Lucas!
Footsteps to Fame
 Four members of Kdanz dance school in Yorkshire visited the CLC to record footage for an original performance piece involving 120 actors aged between 3 and 17 years. ‘Footsteps’ was performed for three consecutive nights to over 600 people at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre in York. The girls had great fun making a mock TV talent show which featured them dressed as Simon Cowell, Jordan, Britney Spears and Ozzy Ozbourne. The film was used as part of a dance piece with the performers interacting with the footage on screen. Kay Jones, owner of Kdanz said "I’m amazed at just how professional the results were. Using the CLC has added a new dimension to how my students work and perform. We’re all very excited about this technology, the possibilities are endless! The children’s parents in particular were thrilled with what they saw, I still don’t think they can believe it!"
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