GANG VIOLENCE

TODAY WE LEARNED MORE ABOUT VIOLENCE AND HOW IT'S HAPPENING ON THE STREET AND TRYING TO COME UP WITH WORDS DESCRIBING VIOLENCE AND WE ARE ENTERING A POETRY CONTEST ABOUT VIOLENCE AND THE WINNER GETS $10,000 worth a scholarship.

Whatz up?!?!?!? 4/8/08*****

Today duribg tech club all of us students just talked about what role we wanted to take for the Chicago Voices Against Violence 2008 Campaign. There was also two fun new cool member who just joined Tech Club their names are Tashara Thomas and Steve. He creates video games!!!

tech club!!!!!!!!!!!!! April 1st

Today in tech club we (Ashaunti, Jon'nita, Melissa,and Kristin) started a book club. And the book(s) we are reading are Blueford high series, Brothers in Arms!!!!!!!! Plus it seems like a very good book and everyone is very interested!*!*!*! Deral is designing a logo saying "BOSS" and it looks really great!*!*!*!*!*!* Good job Deral!!!!!!

Tables in web page design

It's an exciting time for us as our Technology Club membership grows. Two new students, Deral Willis, Jr. and Antonio Hillard
have joined our ever growing group of young technologists.


In the coming weeks each student will learn the basics of web design and web page layout. These intermediary steps will assist them as they begin to learn to work with more technologically advanced web tools.

This Tuesday we will begin working with "Tables" in webpages as a way of formatting a page to give a specific layout. "Using tables for layout is probably one of the most controversial subjects in web design. There are many people who believe that fixing the layout the way a table does shouldn't be done. I, on the other hand, love the ability it gives a designer to control where things will appear on a page."

New members and Masking effects

We have ongoing efforts to encourage the CC students to join Tech Club, in that regard we are poised to teach the youth and the volunteers how to create Webpages using Frontpage or Dreamweaver, manipulate graphics using Photoshop and Fireworks and how to create animated graphics using Flash.

I created an example Flash movie using the mask effect to show how to remove unwanted background images from a picture. In the Flash movie I used images of our newest Tech Club members, Melissa, Jon' Nita and Ashaunti.


When creating a mask you have to place a graphic of any shape over an image, when you set up the mask it reveals only the portoion of the back image that is beneath the graphic. As you can see in the above example I used the Pen Tool to create a graphic in the shape of the students outline. I once again encourage any student or volunteer who wants to expand their computer skills and learn graphic and webpage manipulation to join us on Tuesdays between 6:00-7:00pm for Tech Club.

The do-it-yourself mentality is one of the things that built this country, and it is most certainly still deeply embedded into the fabric of American sensibilities. FedEx was dreamed up by a college kid. Apple Computer started out as a pet project of Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs that they birthed in Jobs’ garage, and Google was founded in a dorm room by a couple of grad students from Stanford University. The list of spunky and successful startups goes on and on. Do-it-yourself projects (DIY for short) have been brewing in garages, basements, and college dorm rooms for years. It was inevitable that these ideas found their way onto Web sites dedicated to DIY projects of all types, and the sites feed the growing legions of people searching the Internet for answers on how to do everything from knitting to building a computer to home remodeling. There is even a man whose DIY project is being considered the first cure for cancer.
There is a bevy of interesting, wildly entertaining, and even mischievous Web sites out there that offer articles, instructions, and video of DIY projects. Have you ever wondered how to make your own solar-powered bicycle? Or wanted some creative ideas for entertaining kids at a party? Or tried to figure out how to fix your car without sending it to a repair shop? The answers are out there. Here are a few I've come across...
http://www.instructables.com/
http://www.wikihow.com/Main-Page
http://www.makezine.com/
http://www.diyhappy.com/

The Tech Club in 2008

As we begin the new year our challenge is to continue to movitate our youth to access and utilize the Internet and it's various technologies to enrich their lives, education and communication. We are interested in growing our Technology Club membership by March to about 8 students. As mentioned in my previous post we interested in students who want to learn web design, graphic design and/or Flash Animation amongst other projects. We've currently have two exchanges students from Korea, Jaekyu Lee and Geunjae Lee working with Cabrini Connections who want to get involved with the youth and show them some of the Flash and graphic design skills... We will have links to some of there work up soon! They are currently working on a Webquest that will allow students to explore interesting information about Korea.