Adobe InDesign Certification begins. Assigned 2/25, due TBA - MULTIPLE GRADES

Today's instructions are to help you get into the correct application to take a practice test. GMetrix has TWO practice tests, and those two practice tests had a TRAINING mode and a TESTING mode. All of you will take ONE practice test in TRAINING mode and then take the corresponding TESTING mode test. If you can get an 80 on the TRAINING mode and then get an 80 on the TESTING mode, you will be ready for the actually Certification Test which we will start taking after Thanksgiving break.

Each testing mode takes approximately 1 class period. So you will need one class for TRAINING, and one class for the TESTING. You will need to pass BOTH TRAINING and TESTING mode with an 80 before you can certify. If you fail a TESTING MODE, there is a second version of the practice test with a TRAINING and TESTING mode. You can take both of them. Once you show me a TESTING mode score of 80 or higher, you can take the actual CERTIFICATION test. Those will be available beginning Friday, Dec. 6. There will be 4 IN-CLASS days to take certification tests AND the 2 hour final exam day to get this done. All of you MUST be done with Learnkey training and have completed all 5 Domains by Friday, Dec. 6.

The first thing we need to do is make sure you have access to Adobe InDesign. Please use the Launchpad to search for the application. It looks like this:

If you DO NOT HAVE Adobe InDesign 2026, please go to here in LAUNCHPAD:

Find this application:

Open this application and locate Adobe InDesign:

Find the correct button and Install InDesign. You could get a pop-up that verifies you want to install InDesign - click INSTALL INDESIGN. This could take 5-8 minutes to install. When you get InDesign installed, make sure that it is NOT OPEN on your computer. We need to let GMetrix open the program. If it does open, make sure to CLOSE the program. You cannot do this by simply clicking the red button in the top left corner, you MUST go to your DOCK and right-click and CLOSE Illustrator.

Once you have InDesign 2026 installed, DO NOT OPEN THE PROGRAM. If you do so accidentally, please go to your dock and make sure you QUIT InDesign before you do anything else.

Please do the next step:

Go to the following website, 

https://www.gmetrix.net/GetGMetrixSMS.aspx

You should see the following:

Click on the Download SMSe for Mac

 

It will create what is called a .dmg file, and it should go into your download folder. Once it is downloaded, please DOUBLE CLICK on the .dmg file. It should look like this:

When you DOUBLE CLICK on that icon, it will ask you for an admin user name and password. Please let me know and I will come around and type in my information so you can get the program. Eventually, this program will show up on your desktop and it will look like this:

Open the application by clicking on it and then clicking on the icon inside the folder with the same look.

Now we need to set up your account. 

First, make sure you have logged into your AISD PORTAL

Second, click on your GOOGLE DRIVE, this will create a connection between you and your Google Account.

Now on this screen, you can SIGN IN WITH AN EXISTING PROVIDER:

Make sure you click this button:

Once you are logged in, find the REDEEM CODE on the pop-up box that comes up:

It looks like this:

Click this button and put in the following code:

3rd period: 01443-ReeDM326-41545

4th period: 55471-ReeDM426-65212

Click Redeem Code.

The main screen will come back up. Scroll down to this section:

Locate the InDesign icon, it looks like this - Mine looks dark because I went into DARK MODE, but it should look exactly the same except with a white background for you:

Click this button. 

This should open another pop-up box where you can find the following:

Click on the START button for the 2023-24 Practice Exam 1.

You should see the following:

In the MODE section, please change it from TESTING to TRAINING. It should look like this:

From here you can start the TRAINING MODE. This is a timed 50 minute test with 30 questions. The baseline expectation is 70/100 or 700/1000. But you must get an 80 for me.

Take a screenshot of your completed TRAINING MODE test when you are done. If you have an 80 or higher, next class you will take the TESTING mode and take an actual practice test.

In TRAINING MODE the program will provide advice on how to do each question. It takes a little practice to get used to the help it offers. There are places where you can ask for assistance. It should be pretty intuitive. 

When you first launch the TRAINING TEST, it may ask for an ADMIN login. Call me over and I will put that information in.

When the test opens, you will not see much, it will probably look like this:

You will need to load the test properly. Go to Window>Extensions>GMetrix

and it should open the exam. It looks like this:

You will need to do the following things:

Take Practice Test 1 in PRACTICE MODE - USE THE HELP TOOLS - you MUST PROVIDE A SCREEN SHOT of your score - this will be a MINOR grade in the grade book.

Take Practice Test 1 in EXAM mode - pass with at least an 80 - you MUST PROVIDE A SCREEN SHOT of your score - this will be a MINOR grade in the grade book.

Take Practice Test 2 in PRACTICE MODE - USE THE HELP TOOLS - you MUST PROVIDE A SCREEN SHOT of your score - this will be a MINOR grade in the grade book.

Take Practice Test 2 in EXAM mode - pass with at least an 80 - you MUST PROVIDE A SCREEN SHOT of your score - this will be a MINOR grade in the grade book.

TAKE The CERTIFICATION EXAM - Pass it - This will be worth TWO MAJOR grades in the grade book. If you pass = 100. 

If you take the test and fail, you MUST COMPLETE a study guide I will provide. Study Guide = MINOR grade in the grade book - 100 if you do it, 0 if you do not.

Retake the CERTIFICATION EXAM - Pass it = 100 on the 2 MAJOR grades

If you fail it, but you did the Study Guide grade = 70

If you fail it, but you did not complete the study guide = 50

You can complete a practice test or an exam each class period, which means all of you should be able to complete TWO Practice Tests and TWO Exams before Spring Break. When we return from Spring Break, we will do some review and then everyone will start the certification process. I hope to have this all done by the end of the month of March so we can move on to other things. My goal is that at least 25 of the 38 of you will be certified. I know you can do this, but it requires concentration and dedication. Now is the time to step up!!

WRKxFMLY celebration & catch-up day. Posted 2/13 - no grade assigned

 Mr. Winter will be here to celebrate today so we are going to basically have a free day. I will say that if you are behind in my class, I am still working on grades and will submit them before the end of the day. This is your last chance to turn in work if you want to avoid a progress report. I will be visiting a few of you.

WRKxFMLY Wrap-up

Link to the classes: https://education.workingassumptions.org/login

Africa and Abandoned Theme Parks. Assigned 2/18, due 2/23 - Minor

 Africa

Visit the following website. IF THIS WEBSITE DOESN't WORK PLEASE DO A GOOGLE SEARCH FOR NICK BRANDT AND SEE HOW MANY QUESTIONS ABOUT HIM YOU CAN ANSWER!

http://www.photographyoffice.com/blog/2014/5/on-this-earth-a-shadow-falls-across-the-ravaged-land-by-nick-brandt-photography

1. On your Google Site make a new subpage called Africa and post your reactions to what you read and what you saw. How about 3-4 sentences.

2. Do a google image search for Nick Brandt, find your favorite photo and post it on your blog.

3. Describe it and tell me why its your favorite.

4. What rules of photography are evident in the photos you selected, be sure to explain the rule to me?

Do a google/wikipedia search for Nick Brandt

5. What kind of camera and lens does he use and why is this important?

6. What is his reason for taking these photos?

7. What is his hope by taking these type of photos?

8. Find something he has to say about Africa, and post the quote on your blog. 

Now go to the following website:

https://create.adobe.com/2018/6/8/opening_eyes_nick_br.html

Answer the following questions:

9. What is Brandt's newest focus with his photography?

10. What was the process he did to create these new images?

11. What effect do you think his work might have?

12. How did these new images make you feel? Describe the emotions you felt as you scrolled through them.

Abandoned Theme Parks

Open a browser and go to Google and do a Google image search for the following locations:

Prypiat Amusement Park, Pyrpiat, Ukraine

Holy Land, Waterbury, Connecticut, USA

Gulliver’s Kingdom, Japan

Six Flags, New Orleans, USA

Land Of Oz, Beech Mountain, North Carolina, USA

Spreepark, Berlin, Germany

Kpo Land, Okpo City, Geoje Island South Korea

Dunaújváros Vidám Park, Dunaújváros, Hungary

Joyland, Wichita, Kansas, USA

Akakanonuma Greenland, Hobara, Japan

and

http://www.latimes.com/travel/themeparks/la-trb-21-creepiest-abandoned-amusement-parks-20140225-htmlstory.html

Make a new page on your Google Site called Abandoned Theme Parks and please complete the following:

1. Tell me which amusement park that you learned about today that you would like to visit and take your camera along and what about that park made you want to go there. Write at least a paragraph.

2. Post one photo from that park. You may use the photos from the link, or you can google an entirely new photo. I would prefer to see a photo of the park in disrepair and not a photo of it when it was still operating.

3. Think of at least FIVE other unusual places you think would be of interest to photographers. List them. For example: A cemetery

4. Use google or another search engine to research ONE of the five places you came up with and see if anyone has already started documenting that place. If you find that someone has already started - post at least one photo of their work. For example: do a Google Image search for cemetery photos and see if anyone has specialized in cemetery photography. I found this guy 

Cemetery Photographer

Here is a photo of his I liked:

5. Write a paragraph about why you think that it would be fun to document that location. Tell me what interests you about that place and what kind of photos you could expect to take there.

6. Tell me what it would take for you to go and take photos at your location. What would you need as far as equipment goes, travel plans, expenses you might encounter and what laws you would have to take into consideration to take photos at your spot.

Caption writing and questions. Assigned 2/11, due 2/13 - Minor

Choice Sheets

Reminder here: Remember if you signed up to take Newspaper/Graphic Design and Illustration, I need an application from you. This is really to help me make sure you show up on my choice sheets if you want to be in the program. I am always happy to talk to you about this if you have questions.

Now to today's assignment:

SLO Practice

Soon you will be taking an SLO test about caption and headline writing and I wanted to review the items you will need to know for this test. All of these things have been covered in the past few months, so it's just a reminder. When you have finished this task for today, please make sure you are caught up on everything else. 

First: The reasons we would cover an event in the newspaper, there are seven of them, you just need to remember these as best you can:

Timeliness - the newness of the facts. 
Proximity – the nearness of a given event to your place of publication. 
Prominence – the “newsworthiness” of an individual, organization or place
Impact – the effect or consequence of an event on the audience. 
Conflict – the meeting of two or more opposing forces. These forces can be physical, emotional or philosophical.  
Human Interest – the drama the surrounds people involved in an emotional struggle.
Novelty – the attraction people have to unusual things and events. 

Second: Captions - there are some questions about these ideas AND you will need to actually write a caption.

Remember captions are always two sentences.

The first sentence is written to explain the action happening in the photo. It is written in present tense as though the action was going on in front of you. Use strong action verbs where possible.  The first sentence should try to answer the 5 Ws and 1 H (who, what, where, when, why and how).

The second sentence is written to provide background information not available or understood by simply looking at the photo. It is written in past tense because the information is typically based on events that happened in the past.

Present tense action verbs describe the moment captured in the image as if it is happening now, is more engaging for the audience to read, and it helps the reader to understand the action in the image.

Captions should identify by name when there are three or fewer people identifiable in the photo.

Do not use words like "pictured here", "in this photo", or "here you see" as these are assumed. Start with a name, a grade, or an identification method.

Third: Headlines, these are just questions, you will not have to write a headline

Headlines are written in a similar fashion as a complete sentence and have both a subject and a verb.

Headlines do NOT include ending punctuation like a period, an exclamation point or question mark.

Avoid using "to be" verbs like is and are, was and were. These are removed because the tend to make longer headlines which are difficult because of space requirements.

Use full names if possible in headlines and do not use pronouns like he or she.

Here are some practice examples in each of the three categories. We will go over the answers together before you take the actual test. Please create a new Google Site Subpage called SLO practice and answer these questions.

1. In the following, which news value is most clearly represented in the caption below?

Caption: Courtney Suel (left) and Lesia Bridges navigate a flooded Aquarena Springs Drive in San Marcos on Tuesday. One gauge in the city recorded nearly seven inches of rain.

A. Conflict
B. Human Interest
C. Impact
D. Proximity

2. In the following, which news value is most clearly represented in the caption below?

Caption: Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday in Nogales, Ariz: "This is a new era. This is the Trump era. The lawlessness, the abdication of the duty to enforce our immigration laws....are over."

A. Prominence
B. Human Interest
C. Impact
D.Proximity

3. Which of the following is an example of a present tense action verb?

A. painted
B. gets painted
C. paints
D. getting paint

4. What is the most wrong with the following headline?

Headline: Big win

A. The date and the place
B. The background information
C. The lack of a verb
D. The lack of a subject

5. What information is missing from the first sentence of this caption:

Caption: On Wednesday, March 13 senior Sarah Smith captures the flag.

A. The date
B. The location
C. The name of the subject
D. A present tense verb

6. What information is missing from the second sentence of this caption:

Caption: On Wednesday, March 13 senior Sarah Smith captures the flag in the annual senior games event held at Bowie High School. Smith lives at 10405 Johnston St. in Austin.

A. The date of the event
B. A present tense verb
C. Background information about the senior games
D. The name of the subject

Caption Writing:

Please write a correct 2 sentence caption for the following photo - remember that you get to make up all the information, but you still need to follow the correct format as described above:

Photograph: Chris Wattie/Reuters

News Values. Assigned 2/9, due 2/11 - Minor

 We are going to begin our exploration of journalistic writing and style  by examining the reasons a publication might choose to cover an event. Some experts have come up with a variety of reasons for this and from my experience, based on those experts research, I have come up with seven solid reasons to cover a story. Today we are going to learn about those seven, and to completely understand them, I want you to be able to pick out some stories to prove to me that you understand each reason.

Here are the reasons:

1. Timeliness - - the newness of the facts

2. Proximity - - the nearness of a given event to your place of publication

3. Prominence - - the "newsworthiness" of an individual, organization, or place.

4. Impact - - the effect of consequence of an event on the audience, or readers

5. Conflict - - the meeting of two or more opposing forces. These forces can be physical, emotional, or philosophical

6. Human Interest - - the drama that surrounds people involved in an emotional struggle

7. Novelty - - the attraction people have to unusual things and events

Now here is your assignment:

Find seven stories that you believe are driven primarily by one of the news values listed above. You will need to copy and paste links to the stories in your Google Site. Follow the five steps listed below.

Title this Google Site subpage: News Values

1. Pick out a story you think meets one of the news values.
2. On your new subpage - type the name of that news value
3. Write a complete sentence or two explaining why you think the article is driven by that news value.
4. Type the headline of the article
5. Include a clickable link to the article's URL. To insert a clickable link on your Google Site, in the Insert pane, you will find the EMBED function, click that and paste the link. It will automatically create a text box with the link for me to see.

I will be going over these with you later in the period to make sure we are all on the same page. 

Here are some places you can start looking for stories. You are welcome to use other sources as well if you wish.

http://www.nytimes.com/pages/world/index.html

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/

https://www.reuters.com/

Wall Street Journal

https://news.google.com/topstories?hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en

The above link will have "Local" stories. You can also use Google News, or search for your favorite local news organization to find stories.

I recommend:

The Austin Monitor

The Austin Chronicle

The Austin-American Statesman

Any reputable news source is fine. 

When you have completed the work above, please write CORRECT two sentence captions for the following photos. 

Remember - you MUST ID with a title, first name and last name everyone in the photo if there is less than 4 people in the image. 

First sentence = what is happening in the photo. Present tense.

Second sentence = background information you cannot get from looking at the photo. Past tense.

Don't forget to write a little kicker headline of less than five words. Spell out all words under 10, use numerals for numbers over 10.

Newspaper Design #2 Turn-in Instructions. Posted 2/4 - MAJOR

When you are done:

When you have your newspaper design done, please follow the instructions listed below to turn your projects in. FOLLOW THEM SPECIFICALLY AND EXACTLY. It may look complex and it isn't simple, but if you follow them carefully you will need no help from me.

You must have your page open in InDesign (NOT photoshop)

>File>Adobe PDF presets>Smallest File Size

>Rename your magazine cover as follows: Last name_first name_Newspaper Design 2_period #

Make sure to save it in your folder ON THE DESKTOP.

>Click export (if any messages come up about outside the clipping area or anything else like that during the .pdf creation process, click okay)

After you create a .PDF at the smallest file size put that file into your Google Drive and make sure it is share so BOWIE HIGH SCHOOL can VIEW it. Then get the link, and put it on your Google Site on a new subpage called Newspaper Design #2 using the embed function. Once you complete that, open your PDF in Photoshop and make it into a PNG by SAVING AS and converting it into a .PNG. Then put that PNG file on your Google Site on the same subpage called Newspaper Design #2. Hit PUBLISH!!!

ALSO  -  I want to post this on your Google Site. To do this you have to convert the .pdf into a .PNG file. This is 25% of your grade.

1. Open Photoshop
2. Open the .pdf of your newspaper design 2 (NOT the .indd, it won't work)
3. When the .pdf converter pop-up box appears, click okay
4. >File>Save as

5. Click - ON YOUR COMPUTER
6. Change the format into .PNG - this is located near the bottom of the pop-up box
7. Click save

8. It should default to large file size, if not change it and click OK
9. If you get any other pop-up boxes, click okay 
10. Post it on your Google Site on a new subpage called Newspaper Design #2

REFLECTION

Please take the time to look closely at your Newspaper Design #2 and complete the following reflection. On your Google Site, please make a new subpage called Newspaper Design #2 Reflection and answer the following questions there:

1. How many headlines are on your page and is there one for each story?

2. How many captions are on your page and is there one for each photo?

3. Are there any big white spaces on your page, especially ones that are "trapped" between objects and not planned white space that would be along the outsides of the page?

4. Did you include a byline for every story, photo and graphic?

5. Did you put a story stop on each story?

6. Did you view your page in Preview mode? You should and take a look at what you are actually turning in.

7. Tell me two frustrations you had while trying to complete this task?

8. Tell me two things you enjoyed about completing this task?

9. Rate your page on a scale of 1-10. Compare your page to a real Dispatch page as you rate yourself. Do you think your page compares to what current page editors have created this year?

10. Rate this assignments difficulty versus other practical applications we have done i.e. magazine covers, King Pica, etc. Was this easier or harder? Explain your answers.

For those people who are moving onto Newspaper next year and will be in Dispatch staff, please write a paragraph explaining what you thought about this process and tell me if this is something you might be interested in learning more about.

Newspaper Design #2 Checklist. Posted 2/2 - No grade assigned

 Do you have the following:

1. A headline for every story
2. A caption for every photo
3. Are there any big white spaces?
4. Have you written all the headlines? Do they fill the entire space required? If not you will have to write more - make the headline fit the ENTIRE space allocated.
5. Have you used FILL TEXT to completely fill all white spaces in text boxes where stories go?
6. Do all captions have a photo by?
7. Do all stories have a byline?
8. If you used art (any .jpeg without a caption that I wrote for it), does it have an art by?
9. Are the entire stories there? Please read the story and make sure it doesn't cut off somewhere weird.
10. Did you put a story stop into place at the end of every story?
11. Did you view your page in Preview mode? You should and take a look at what you are actually turning in.

Some of the things I saw last class that I wanted to point out to you to fix/work on today:

Make sure that every headline is written fully so that it fills the entire space. Make sure those headline boxes in InDesign are made big enough to cover the entire space required.

Make sure you use FILL text to completely fill all text boxes/blocks.

Make sure you have story stops (the little colored boxes) at the end of every story.

Look and see that you can draw a box around all elements that go with the same coverage, i.e. headline, story, photo/art, caption. You should be able to draw a box around it.

Make sure that you have NOT gone outside the pink/purple lines, but also make sure that all of your objects are touching pink/purple lines.