Posting You Tube Videos and Flickr Badges to Blogs

This first clip explains how you can upload a video that you really like from YouTube onto your blog. It goes through the step by step process of what it involved in the upload process. It's a whole lot simpler than it seems too.

How to Embed YouTube videos to your blog

The second clip explains how to upload a Flickr Badge to your blog. I have uploaded one on my page that is on the left of my blog page. This tutorial also goes through the step by step process.
How to Embed a Flickr Bagde to your blog

How to embed a Flickr Badge to your blog

Assistive Technology

What is Assistive Technology

Assistive technology refers to a wide range of devices, services, strategies, and practices that are used to decrease the problems people with a disability have with doing daily tasks and leisure activities (Cook & Hussey, 2000)

In our tutorial we tried lots of different pieces of assistive technology. One device that I really liked was the 'Matias 508 One Handed Keyboard'.
This keyboard is a standard desktop keyboard that will allow both one-handed and two-handed touch-typing. Holding the space bar accesses the alternate keys that mirror the other half of a standard keyboard. The one handed typing capability can be switched on or off by the user, therefore can be used two handed as a standard keyboard. It just requires a USB connection for PC and Mac operating systems. This keyboard costs $280 from Star-Educational.

More information and pictures of this device can be looked at on:
http://www.star-educational.co.nz/view_details.php?detail=true&cat=35&subcat=&id=97

If a person has limited hand function the one handed keyboard gives them the option of only having to use their better hand and typing using just one side of the keyboard. This will decrease the fatigue that the person experiences as they dont have to move their hand as far. It also increases the speed of typing as the hand doesn't have to move as far around the keyboard.

References

Cook, A.M., & Hussey, S.M. (2000). Assistive technologies: principles and practice. St Louis: Mosby.
'Star Educational'. (n.d.). Matias 508 One or Two Handed Keyboard. Retrieved on 21 May, 2009, from http://www.star-educational.co.nz/view_details.php?detail=true&cat=35&subcat=&id=97

Online Communities

An example of an online community is 'Disability Forum - An online support website for people with a disability'.
The web address is: http://www.disabilityforum.org.au/

The focus of this community is to provide a support network for people with disabilities. The website allows people who have a disability to freely exchange information and learn from other people's experiences through a discussion forum.

The services provided by the disability forum is mainly the discussion forum. Various topics are discussed ranging from social chit chat to travel experiences and aids for disabilities. The website also has a range of different upcoming events and workshops listed for those who may be interested. There are articles and links on the website about peoples different experices of disability and information about disability.
The site is very interactive in the way that it provides the forum where people can talk about a huge range of topics that suit their specific need. Posts on the forum are not formal and you can put as many posts on the website as you want.

People contributing to this community may be seeking many different things. One reason people may contribute is because they are seeking understanding and help about their condition. Hearing other peoples personal stroies of how they have managed their condition often provides hope for people newly diagosed with a disability. The disability forum also provides a means of social connection for people with a disability, a place where some of their questions can be answered and also the website can offer people the opportunity to find out more about their condition.

A few of the different topics that are being discussed include:

• Disability support services at your place of study
• Travel Opportunities for people with disabilities
• Worldwide accessable washrooms
• Share tips on your custom fit clothes

Some ethical issues may arise with the use of this online community. The site has no ability to check if everyone who is contributing has a disability, people could be making up information. As it is an informal forum there is no ability to check the reliability of any information. Anyone can join the site and post information that is not relevant, the creators of the website will need to be continually checking for spam and people misusing the website.

The benefits of this online community include the ability for people with disabilities who are unable to get out of their homes to communicate with other people who are in a similar position to them. They have the ability to talk to people from all around the world, with a traditional community this would have not been possible at all. Another benefit is that the site can provide people with a large amount of beneficial information. The community can also foster understanding and unity between people who have similar conditions.

One of the downsides to this online community is the ability to misuse the priviledges of the website and mislead other people. Online communities may also give people a delusional reliance on a virtual world. The validity of the information is also questionable as anyone can post information on any topic they wish.

However the community does provide a great means for people with disabilities to communicate with a wide variety of different people from many different walks of life.

Video Production

YouTube is a website that allows you to share your videos with the world. You can upload any video you would like provided the content is appropriate to be viewed by others. YouTube displays a variety of videos ranging from movie clips, video clips, TV clips as well as amateur contect such as video blogging and original videos.
Anyone can watch the videos postd onto YouTube, however you have to be a registered user if you want to upload any videos yourself. Any videos that contain inappropriate content such as pornography, defamation and any videos breeching copyright laws are prohibited to be uploaded.
One of the key features of YouTube is the ability for videos from you tube to be uploaded onto other websites such as Blogger, bebo and facebook. Each video has a HTML code attached which can be copied onto another website which allows the video to be published there. You can also access YouTube on your mobile phones and upload videos straight from your mobile using YouTube Mobile.
YouTube does not usually offer users the ability to download other peoples videos, this is so that videos have to be viewed using YouTube.

The Creation of Our Short Films

In our Participation in Occupation class we were asked to create our own short films that we could then post onto You Tube.
Planning was a large part of the video production process. As a group we had a huge variety of ideas as to what we could produce a video on. We brainstormed a few and came up with 'Parking Problems on Campus' as we had all experienced the fristration of not being able to find a car park.
We used a story board to plan each of the different clips that we would shoot. This aided the process hugely as when we got out to shoot the film we only had a short space of time to shoot the whole film. We had a clear plan of what we would do for each shot and we were able to quickly move from shot to shot and we finished filming in time which was really helpful. If we hadn't planned what we were going to video then we would have wasted time and we would not have been able to finish the shot film.

Our Short Film - Parking on Campus

Creating a Blog

A blog can be described in many different ways, as a personal diary of someones thoughts and ideas, a memo to the world or a breaking news outlet. A blog gives you a voice on the web where you can share your ideas and personal opinions about everything that is going on around you. What ever you want to say blogger can help you say it.

Services offered by Blogger

Engaging Your Friends

You can control who reads and writes on your blog, its all up to you.
Blogger Comments - These allow anyone, anywhere to give you feedback on your posts, you can choose if you allow comments on a post by post basis and you can also delete any comments you dont want on your blog.
Access Controls - These decide who can read and write on your blog. Group blogs allow families, teams, groups of friends to communicate all in one blog. Or you can have an individual private blog where you have a space to share your thoughts, share links and websites that are of interest to you, you can keep this to yourself or share it with others.
Blogger Profiles - These allow you to find people and blogs that share yours interests. You can also allow people to find your profile.

Designing Your Blog

Templates - The collection of templates offered by Blogger allows you to get started with a professional looking page without all the fuss of having to learn how to use HTML.
Custom Colours and Fonts - When you have mastered the basics of Blogger, you can move on to the next step and customise your blog to suit you. You can customise the templates, colours and designs to create a blog that is just for you.
Drag and Drop Page Elements - This tool allows you to decide exactly how you would like your blog to be set up. You can decide where you want your posts, profile, archives and other parts of your blog go on the page.

Posting Photos

Blogger allows you to share any photos you would like. You can upload photos straight from your computer to your blog using the upload photos button in the blogger interface. Or you can upload a photo that is already on the web, you just simply have to tell blogger where it is on the web. You also have the ability to send photos straight from your mobile phone to your blog.

The fastest way to understand blogging is simply to give it a go, its simple, easy and you may even enjoy it as I am discovering. The best part is, its all free.

Why use Blogger for Occupational Therapy

The internet is such a widely used tool in the world today, we have access to so many different tools and resources such as blogger. Blogger is a way that we can create a webpage that is devoted to a specific topic such as Occupational Therapy where we can post different links, photos and videos that relate to our topic of interest. We can use blogger as a resouces for many people who have an interest in Occupational Therapy, they are able to see exactly what we do, why we do it and the benefit of occupational therapy through many different posts linking in different areas of our profession.

Other Blog Hosts

Another blog host is Blogtown NZ, this is a free blogging site for Kiwis. The link to this website is: http://blogtown.co.nz/?gclid=COiyxrGqgpsCFQwxawodvT0QcQ

Digital Camera use and applications

New Technology vs Old Technology

Digital cameras have rapidly over taken the use of film cameras, digital cameras are easy and simple to use, they are cost effective and images taken are easily transferrable to other information storing devices. It is easy to see that digital cameras are the way of the future as they become more and more developed and as they become cheaper and more accessible to the general public. When digital camera's first came out they were just as popular as the film cameras as the quality of the digital photos was not as good as the film. The first digital camera's that were produced had low megapixels and the lenses were not as good as the film cameras. People at first were not convinced that digital cameras were an improvement, i know myself that I wasnt convinced at first. The digital cameras were no match for the range of manual manipulation of photos that film cameras were able to do such as the manual focusing on objects and lighting etc. However as technology has progressed as it always does the lenses and megapixels of the digital cameras have become much better and you are now able to produce photographs that look just as good as film if not better. Now SLR digital camera's are becoming more and more common and they seem to be able to have many of the similar functions if not more functions as the professional film cameras. As technology continually changes we will be forever updating our technology to have the newest model, however new doesn's always prove to be best in terms of what the technological device can do.

There are a variety of ways that digital images can be manipulated. Images can easily be transferred from the camera memory card to a computer. Once they are on the computer they can be transferred to memory sticks, put on the internet, printed and then also be manipulated and changed using photo editing programmes. Photoshop is one of the most common photo editing programmes that allows you to do many creative things with your digital photographs. There are also online photo editing sites aswel.

As cameras are becoming more and more common and the ability to copy and share photos is becoming easier and easier there are many ethical issues that arise. People may upload photos onto the internet without the permission of those who the photograph is taken of. People may also manipulate the photographs and change them as they wish. Now that digital cameras are installed on many cell phones it is becoming easier and easier to capture moments on camera, people may use these digital imaging devices inappropriatly and cause harm to others. We need to take care with cameras and ensure that we use them appropriately so that no one is exploited with the use of these.

In occupational therapy practice, the use of digital cameras is becoming more and more common. In the physical rehabilitation setting occupational therapists have the ability to take photographs of houses that need to be modified to give funders and builders and idea of how they can modify the house. In the mentak health setting digital cameras may be used when clients are participating in activities and occupations and the occupational therapist may take photos of what the clients have achieved.

Flickr.com is a website that allows you to create an account where you can upload photos. It allows you to edit your phtographs using the online photo editing tools, organise your photos and share them with friends online.

Another photo sharing website which offers similar services to Flickr.com is photobucket.com. Photobucket allows you to store, edit, share and upload photos to your facebook profile page and blogger account.

Camera's have a digital and optical zoom. Optical zoom works just like a zoom lens on a film camera, the lens changes focal length and magnification as it zooms in closer to an image. The image quality stays high throughout the zoom range. Digital zoom simply crops the image to a smaller size, then enlarges the cropped image to fit the frame again, this results in a significant loss of quality and clarity of the photograph.

A megapixel is a term used for counting the number of pixels in a photograph. A pixel is a contraction of the term Picture Element, pixels are the small components that make up a picture, a regular photograph is composed of millions of tiny squares. A megapixel is 1 million pixels.

Information Technology and Ethical Issues

What is information technology?

Information Technology noun: the use of computers, telecomunications, etc in electronic processing, storing, retreiving, and sending information
Allen, R. (consultant editor). (2004). The penguin english dictionary. London: Penguin Books

This form of technology - computers is incredibly prevalent in our society today. We use them everyday for a huge variety of uses. As student occupational therapists we use the internet and computers for researching information specific to our profession so that we can learn from a variety of sources. As students generally we use computers for a variety of purposes, for example social networking sites such as facebook and twitter, for writing assignments and studying and keeping in contact with others with email. Technology is used everyday for so many different purposes, it has become an integral part of our society.

There are many IT devices that I feel competent using as I have grown up using ever changing technology. I use my computer everyday, alot for checking emails and playing music. I also use my cell phone everyday to keep in contact with everyone. There are other technology devices that I use very often such as my iPod or my camera. I am constantly surrounded by information technology so I have become accustomed to using it all the time.

In the Occupational Therapy setting, technology is being widely used. On my recent fieldwork placement I was in a mental health setting where we used email and phone everyday to keep in contact with the other mental health teams. Computers are used for typing up documents and storing patient notes digitally. This makes the whole process alot simpler and more efficient.

Many ethical issues arise as we use information technology and become ever more reliant on this technology. On social networking sites anyone can upload photographs of their choice without the consent of others who may be in the photographs. Information stored electronically can be copied easily and information can very easily get sent to a variety of sources. The biggest ethical issues in my opinion is information and photographs being put onto the internet without the permission of those involved. As it becomes easier to upload information, it is more common that peoples privacy can be breeched. Other information technology devices such as mobile phones are also a means of sending information very quickly with txt and pxt messages. As technology becomes more and more advanced it is becoming much easier to access information.

Computer ethics is a branch of practical philosophy which deals with how computing professionals should make decisions regarding professional and social conduct.

Retrieved February 14, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_ethics

In law, intellectual property (IP) is an umbrella term for various legal entitlements which attach to certain types of information, ideas, or other intangibles in their expressed form.

Retrieved February 14, 2007, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property

Social justice mostly refers to an ideal of society, where "justice" refers to economic status rather than to the administration of laws. It is based on the idea of a society which gives individuals and groups fair treatment and a just share of the benefits of society, although what is "fair treatment" and a "just share" must remain unclear or subject to interpretation.

Retreived Februry 14, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_justice

Informed consent is a legal condition whereby a person can be said to have given consent based upon an appreciation and understanding of the facts and implications of an action.

Retrieved February 14, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Informed_consent

Having a good understanding of information technology will help us to embrace the changing world that surrounds us. We need to keep up to date to changes in technology so that the world doesn't change around us without us noticing. In our occupational therapy practice it is important to keep up to date with new methods of treatment and therapy so that we can offer our clients the best care possible.

The first attempt!!

Welcome to my blog and the first post for Participation in Occupation. I've spent hours on the internet before procrastinating and wasting time on facebook, but I've never made a blog before. So here's my first attempt at it, i guess we will see how it goes.
I will be adding posts regularly about the different topics we have covered in class.