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votivecandleholder · 9 months

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Birthday Party Decorations For A Perfect Pokemon Wonderland

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Birthday Party Decorations For A Perfect Pokemon Wonderland

If you’re planning a birthday party for a Pokemon-obsessed little one, you’re in luck. Pokemon birthday decorations have skyrocketed in popularity, giving parents endless options to create a memorable and engaging experience for their child’s big day. Not only do these Pokemon decorations add to the atmosphere of the party, but they also provide great photo opportunities for the birthday boy or girl and their friends. Plus, with the continued popularity of the Pokemon franchise, it’s no surprise that these decorations are in high demand.

Best Pokemon Birthday Party Ideas

By incorporating Pokemon party supplies and decorations, you can transform any space into a Pokemon paradise, filled with joy, excitement, and the spirit of friendship.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Round Arches With Pokemon Spandex Covers And Pokemon Themed Cylinder Riser Covers

Get ready because this article will be your ultimate guide to creating the best Pokemon party ever!

Selecting the Perfect Pokemon Theme for an Epic Birthday Party

Choosing the best Pokemon birthday decorations for your child can be a fun and exciting task. With so many Pokemon characters and generations to choose from, it can be overwhelming to decide on a specific theme. When selecting Pokemon decorations, it’s important to consider the child’s preferences or popular choices. The child’s favorite Pokemon can provide a great starting point for choosing the theme.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Desserts And Cake Table With Pokemon Cut Outs Standee

To involve the child in the decision-making process, it can be helpful to show them pictures and videos of various options and ask for their input. Additionally, incorporating details such as Pokemon stuff or Pokemon party supplies can enhance the overall party experience. By involving them in the decision-making process and incorporating their favorite Pokemon decorations, you’ll create an unforgettable celebration!

Spectacular Pokemon Decorations and Party Setup

To create an immersive atmosphere, consider a range of ideas. Start with Pokemon party supplies like balloons, banners, and tablecloths to set the scene. DIY pokeball centerpieces or Pokemon backdrops can add a personal touch and showcase creativity. Incorporating Pokemon characters through posters or cut-outs is another fantastic idea. Just place them strategically throughout the party area to create an engaging and interactive environment.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Pokemon Minimalist Themed Decors Cakes And Desserts On Table

To take it a step further, wrap presents in Pokemon wrapping paper to add an extra element of excitement. This small detail can make a big impact on the overall aesthetic of the party.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Pokemon Characters Cutouts On Green Grass Backdrop

Remember, the key to successful Pokemon birthday decor is to embrace the colorful, fun-filled world of Pokemon. With Pokemon decorations and a little imagination, you can transform any space into a Pokemon paradise that will leave everyone in awe.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Dessert And Cake Tables And Pedestals

Interactive Pokemon Party Activities and Games

To keep the children entertained, it’s important to incorporate interactive and age-appropriate activities. One popular choice is a Pokemon scavenger hunt, where children search for hidden Pokemon stuff or clues, fostering teamwork and excitement. Another entertaining option is “Pin the Tail on Pikachu,” a twist on the classic party game. Blindfolded participants attempt to pin Pikachu’s tail in the correct spot, creating laughter and amusement.

Pokemon Birthday Party Game Cards

For a mentally stimulating activity, consider a Pokemon trivia or quiz session, testing the party-goers’ knowledge of Pokemon characters and abilities. Offering small Pokemon party prizes for correct answers enhances the excitement. With these imaginative Pokemon party ideas, you’ll create an unforgettable experience, allowing young trainers to immerse themselves in the enchanting world of Pokemon.

Pokemon Birthday Party Favors

Creating a personalized and unique Pokemon party can be a fun and exciting experience for both children and adults alike.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Desserts And Cake Outdoor Table With Balloon Arches

DIY Pokemon Birthday Party

Don’t let the lack of Pokemon birthday decorations discourage you from throwing a party that will be remembered for years to come.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Desserts And Cake On Cylinder Risers Cute Pokemon Theme

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Round Arches With Pokemon Themed Spandex Covers

Diy Pokemon Birthday Decorations Number Light Box And Pikachu Balloon

Unleash your creativity and explore DIY options to create decorations that are tailor-made to suit your child’s interests. From Pikachu-themed balloons to Pokemon-themed banners and personalized cake toppers, there is no shortage of ideas to make your party stand out.

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Pikachu Ballon Centerpiece

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Desserts And Snacks On Red Wood Table

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Pokemon Characters Ballon And Mylar Foil Number Balloon

Pokemon Birthday Decorations Pokemon Themed Favor Gift Bags And Pokemon Paper Plates

Finally

Whether you are a seasoned party planner or someone who is just getting started, a Pokemon-themed party will be sure to bring joy and excitement to all who attend. So why not give it a shot and create a memorable event that your child will cherish for years to come?

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sugar-petals · 3 years

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Hey Caro ☺️ I just took your super m quiz - thanks for making such a fun quiz, I feel like it helped me get into super m! I know nothing about them yet but I thought it fit soo well that I got Kai bc I’m a full time dancer - now you have me super curious about him 👀👀

KAI :: INTRODUCTION MASTERPOST (dance focus)

so you wanna know about the god of k-pop choreo? oh yeah, i’ll talk to you about fucking kai! if you dance, this guy is the #1 must-know. once you see him move, there’s no going back. i don’t exaggerate: kai is the gold standard. brace yourselves, i’ll show you why.

kim kai aka kim jongin (27) is a solo artist and super m’s plus exo’s main dancer — est 2019 and 2012 respectively — heading either group with a passionate, hyper-physical style that roots in his early practice of of jazz dance and ballet. the influence definitely shows.

learning choreography, he’s become the gorgeous fusion of emotional grace and explosive power that unites both tension and extreme accuracy. while at the same time: never sacrificing his interpretation. and HOW MUCH HE BLEEDS FOR HIS CRAFT. he enjoys it so much.

and he’s communicating it 100%, jongin’s dance is so interactive and raw, luring. i swear to god, put the seatbelts on for this one. it’s never just him, it’s you as well. you’ve never seen this before. he’s like “yes, i meant you, i’m looking at you”:

he’s even gonna modify the choreography to point right at you to underline that very thought. he’s so good, he can learn it, ace it, epitomize it, and do his own thing anyway. even the person in the last row will get whatever point kai wants to make. this is dance that belongs on the biggest stages.

even when he films without a crowd, it’s like you’re literally standing opposite to him. he focuses on two people: his moves, and the viewer. he has it look like you made him smile and self-aware, or you made him determined. INCREDIBLE. he shows his charisma, BUT he also shows your own (!) impact on him. it’s a duet. he wants you to join him on the dancefloor. this is from exo’s call me baby mv where kai does his famous come-hither:

he flirts and he encourages. he values the audience and wants them to be confident as well. i think it’s the reason why he’s so outstanding and addictive, kai thinks beyond himself. it’s a tango he involves you in with his eyes and how he opens his body, interprets a lyric.

it’s not about imposing himself going one way. instead: he plays the back and forth ALL. THE. TIME. in any context. whether it be frivolous, or fun, or gloomy, or sweet. even with a simple little smiley wink it’s happening. and he acts like you had a reaction to it. there’s literally just a camera.

this guy’s physique, strength, elegance, feeling for the beat, character portrayal (!), and control is unbelievable. he’s destroyed it in every fancam out there. he can’t switch it off even if he tried. your eyes would go toward him in the largest group formation still. put him in the center, that’s his spot, he showcases it.

because he doesn’t just show learned moves, he makes it radiate something dynamic and animalistic (he embodies superm’s ‘tiger inside’ all the way).

jongin’s dance says: i love this, you love this, let’s do this, the feeling is right. he makes bodies and unrestrained touch the opposite of wrong, he pronounces it a source of having fun and being instinctual. and he never breaks the tie with you throughout, and uses his shoulders and lips to put the oomph into it.

he uses innuendo and a ‘we both know’ sentiment perfectly as an invitation rather than just going through his routine. that’s how he can make each move fascinating. you can tell kai knows exactly how to make everyone scream their lungs out. i bet somebody held their breath just reading this post already.

exo’s most famous choreo is ‘monster’ (kai focus linked) with good reason: jongin can turn himself into nothing short of a roaring beast. it’s one sharp, complex move after the other. kai can bend any gravitational law he wants to show any feeling and pose he wants. a glimpse:

now, how to spot him in general if you’re new to him? here are some pointers. kai’s execution is clean, fast, and powerful. those are two decades (!) of experience showing. kai is an all or nothing dancer, he plays no games. he treats every group and solo stage like his best and last. his work ethic is beyond words. yeah, he’s a capricorn. his style is direct as can be, working every axis.

as you can see, jongin is hard to overlook anyway: he’s a 182cm giant made of steel. he strives to acutely visualize impact in his style and it is always successful. in fact, it’s his signature. it’s like he creates invisible objects and pushes through them. boom, he just burst another bubble.

when the song gets to his part, i guarantee you won’t miss him and all the boldness and expression he brings to enrich the performance. hell... he carries it. jongin can handle the center, i’m telling you. (look how fast he rotates here)

talking features — this is what to look for when he dances in a group setting: you can recognize kai’s face by how wide, bluntly structured and sensual it is. jongin is a sight. he has such an aura, serious, sultry, and smiling alike.

with a very recognizable silhouette (like... holy hell!):

he’s very cute as well ♡ the fandom and kai himself have an adorable analogy going on. jongin calls himself a teddy/nini bear and we joined in on it. (i made a thread about it here, it talks more about his offstage life) — hence kai’s fans are called eri-gom, eris as in exo’s fanbase and gom meaning bear.

and i mean. look at him. what an attractive guy. he’s that handsome. strong brows, teddy eyes, square jaw, swept hair, glorious lips, tan skin.

now yes, something important concerning his appearance and a serious topic: i don’t want to list you the endless instances of colorism that kai has to endure but it has to be mentioned. jongin has been called every name in the book and people agonize him over his skin incessantly. it goes on and on and on. every day a new terrible comment about him emerges because some pitiful person thought it was funny and would elevate them.

he’s had to deflect, ignore, reframe, defend, remotivate, assert, harden, prove, denounce, and push himself, protect his confidence, decline skin bleaching constantly, laugh along, dance and practice thrice as hard to get the respect, and still see his dignity torn to pieces all day. i’ll just give it to you straight, that’s all fucked up. kai’s skin is perfect, he’s amazing and wonderful.

in his own words:

— exactly right. say it even louder.

having him at the bottom of every joke is weird and messed up. this man is an utter beauty and nothing has to be fixed. it is up to him to define himself rather than get called ugly for his skin’s appearance by default, and get whitewashed at every opportunity. it’s been going on for 27 years, he scrunitizes himself all the time and doesn’t look at himself fondly because he hears these beatdowns daily.

it’s heartbreaking that this happens literally with no end in sight (’kai is just a stripper!’... ‘he has bad vibes’... ‘darkest guy jongin!’). for his skin, and how he decides to show it, too. jesus christ his skin looks fantastic, end of debate. they just can’t handle him, kai couldn’t be any more immaculate.

♡

jongin has vigorously protected fans from discrimination, bullies, and shaming himself whenever it came up. in a very straightforward and deadpan manner because he knows exactly how it damages you. (”J” in the subtitles = jongin, he’s wearing the plain white top at the very back)

we need to protect and praise him that way right back. it’s important.

so, needless to say. all in for jongin getting the center stage he deserves. because he has the wow factor in every regard. kai usually opens an MV because there’s no better way to get people’s attention with that level of presence. with kai, you can’t go wrong. if you get the center in a an all star group like superm, you are the king.

being part of that presence, kai’s stage alter ego has reached levels of infamity you can’t even imagine. it’s great to see him being sovereign without apology.

and it doesn’t stop there. he shows time and again that acting, props, and commanding the audience has to be mastered to be an exceptional dancer. kai owns his sex appeal. sometimes, he even dances a portion of choreo with his eyes closed because he’s feeling it so much.

he is a pro in using his surroundings as well, superm’s stages are a glorious opportunity for kai to show how he comfortably ‘lives in’ the 3D space around him.

which makes the viewer do the same: watching kai makes you feel amazing, energized, but also serene and enjoying the moment.

there’s always balance. it’s the magic of it. e.g. he comes along with so much impetus and decisiveness but eventually, he halts to offer himself. here i am — take me. i’m yours. closed arms, open arms. walking, kneeling. looking down, looking up.

kai goes every extra mile there ever was and makes each eye contact count. involving the audience, one grin at a time. it works. it’s about establishing contact. he connects to the onlooker with so much nuance.

kai’s smirk is notorious and you can see why it’s so raw and real: he makes it linger. it’s such a duality since his dancing says i’ll come over, while his message is come and get me, i know what’s on your mind.

with a hilarious twist – kai expertly uses humor. you don’t get that in many dancer repertoires. i love it. all those quick expression changes. his smile! 😊 what a man.

so — what makes him so good and known: yes, his style doesn’t deny that dancing and eroticism are one in his business. that takes courage. kai has it. iconic performances have been his reward. point dance/killing part: exo’s love shot choreo.

that suit has swept the nation. what’s more: kai shows you it’s more than just good hip movement that a good dancer needs. he does everything at once, he puts the pleasure on his face, all his limbs are following the template he chooses.

the thing is. kai couldn’t be any shyer, but when the music starts he becomes a oscar-winning madman. he emotes constantly (!) and stays in character. this is gold.

jongin always plays it up. he knows how to use that face and does a lot of power posing. this is how visceral looks like. he’s interpreted exo’s aggressive concepts to a T.

and he has so. much. fun. it propels him. on every beat.

past every hurt, heartbreak and injury, man. if you know about his genre you knew this was coming, kai does all of that with 4 herniated discs. since debut days, never recovered. every gif in this thread, he dances with a battered spine. wheelchairs, stage collapses, relapse-recovery-schedule tales, the dilemma of injuries being inevitable, limping, kai falling into depression during breaks, constant pain killers, countless tears on stage, we’ve seen it all, the extreme end of it.

kai works out like hell to literally keep his body from falling apart. but it doesn’t help the nerves in his back that are impacted. doing choreo you can sometimes literally see the pain kicking in and he pulls himself through with force for the last minute. once you know how strained his back is, you can see it.

at the end his expression goes fuck now it’s coming when the adrenaline fades. he takes every second-pause he gets to rest but still finishes each move. even when he holds back, he keeps it together and executes each turn. sometimes, he has to restrict himself and soften his movements to protect his health (especially in hard choreographies such as lucky one which is universally disliked by exo — still jongin makes the very best of it smiling bright and dancing so hard his sleeves come off).

he frequently states he ‘dances in any case unless his legs are affected by something’. all torso injuries are fair game, this guy is hardcore. and people claim he’s just pretending. chen (a fellow exo member) says not a single part of jongin’s body is intact. he has paid every price to get this far to follow his love. he’ll step on stage with crutches. he works SO HARD.

that being said: exo being called the official nation’s group, i say kai is the nation’s dancer. period. he has had his great moment at the korean olympics flawlessly dancing in a hanbok with traditional instruments and fulfilling his dream.

i love the tension and drama he can bring. he can also thrill with slow, vulnerable movements alike.

kai’s is called a legend, he’s all that and even more. the facial expressions alone are feared by any kai stan because they hit home.

this guy is a sex icon and goes off like a gun, messing around was never kai’s incentive.

while at the same time being incredibly nuanced and so, so descriptive with his movements.

point dance: baby don’t cry. yep, kai has danced in water. must-watch.

this man loves what he is doing. he said he wouldn’t regret to die on stage because dancing is his destiny. boy, it shows. this guy has found his purpose. he can tell any story he wants. he’s a complete artist.

he’s perfectly portraying his incentive and he couldn’t look any more like a god on earth.

long story short, kai is dance and motivation goals. if you dance professionally, you can easily look toward him for the right words.

if you want to further your study and knowledge: he released a self-titled solo album recently. highly recommended. he worked forever on it, and he’s really dishing it on there. you get to hear his soft voice plus sizzling footwork. and he isn’t even getting started yet. you’ll hear from kai, i promise. he constantly achieves new levels of artistic perfection.

a last remark. jongin is amazing for a myriad of reasons that go beyond what i show you here given the post focuses on his work on stage. but the point stands, while other people have tried to break him, he broke through every barricade instead and stood up for himself. we can be extremely happy to have him and witnessing his unreal dance is an exceptional pleasure. here’s to jongin continuing his passion and confidence, healing, and getting the sweeping respect and acknowledgement that is his.

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ketakidesai · 3 years

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6 reasons why Digital Marketers should NOT ignore Gamification

For the uninitiated, gamification is most commonly defined as “…an informal umbrella term for the use of video game elements in non-gaming systems to improve user experience (UX) and user engagement…”. (1)

Brian Burke, Research Vice President at Gartner, in a podcast defines gamification further as “The use of game mechanics and experience design to digitally engage and motivate people to achieve their goals…it’s the use of game mechanics… and uses things like points and badges and leader boards… It is used in a digital engagement model” (2)

Let’s take a look at the 6 reasons why marketers must consider gamification in their digital strategy. (It's a long read but I promise it will be fun!)

Reason 1: Let’s accept it – gamification is not ‘just a fad’

The last decade has seen interest in gamification rise substantially. Growth in digital technologies has further propelled this interest across sectors like Healthcare, Real-estate, Education, and other sectors. Today, mobile technology is using game mechanics combined with UX design to enhance user engagement, aid employee learning, help students with problem-solving, and even help sales personnel reach their targets.

Reason 2: Gamification is everywhere, literally!

The earliest, less refined, version of gamification in marketing was recorded in 1896 (3) when retailers rewarded loyal customers with stamps received from marketers. By 2020, one can comfortably say that gamification in marketing has come a long way.

“It (Gamification) can be applied on many products, services, or any stage of the customer journey and it’s easily adjusted to any budget” (4)

Today, Gamification is seamlessly incorporated in our favorite digital platforms like Google Pay, Fitbit, and even Linkedin. It is common to see a mobile app use badges, points, or virtual currency to drive user engagement. While there are popular applications that have gamification at their core like Duolingo and Nike Run Club, there are apps like Zomato which have incorporated gamification into their product to keep app users coming back for more.

In 2019, Zomato launched Zomato Premier League during the IPL season. Users could predict a winner of the IPL cricket match of the day and gain 30% cashback if they predicted the winner correctly. Zomato released a scorecard of the activity that showed 224 cities and 14 Million predictions achieved during the IPL season. (5)

(On a separate note, Google decided to ruin the game and sent a notice to Zomato citing Play store policy violation – Zomato had to take off this feature in September 2020) (6)

Reason 3: Your digital audience wants to have fun

“Many brands don’t need brand awareness anymore, they already have it. So they’re looking at what’s next, they want to engage the audience, the influencers.” (7)

Digital marketers need not limit themselves to using gamification only in an app – digital engagement can be successfully created wherever the audience is including social media! Micro-gamification moments have been popular on social media platforms for some time now. One example of the micro-gamification moment is Stories Ordering by Burger King.

Burger King Spain used Instagram stories and had some fun with gamification. With “Stories Ordering” followers could pick ingredients and customize their Whoppers by simply clicking on the Instagram Poll Feature. This generated a unique coupon that participants could use to redeem their Whopper for free. A simple creative idea with zero media investment led to 270000 brand interactions.

Similarly, Star Movies launched Play @ 7 (8) to gamify the TV watching experience. Viewers were required to watch the movies played on the channel daily and play 7 games by tweeting the correct answers to the games. Star Movies created a leader-board on Twitter in real-time where participants could track their progress daily and weekly.

Reason 4: Personalise to Gamify and Gamify to personalize

“While the job of gamification is easing the daily tasks in different fields, the users’ interests and likes must be considered to create intrinsic incentives and a moral environment for them.” (9)

For a truly effective retention strategy, a brand must enhance the product experience for the user. For this ethically collecting relevant data along the user journey to personalize content and keep users engaged becomes important. Duolingo emails a weekly report to its users reminding them of their progress in comparison to the previous week. Similarly, Starbucks sends rewards points as a birthday treat to its users.

As the collected data gets richer in quality, marketers can then create loyalty programs, feedback mechanisms, gamified content, and much more, to personalize the user’s experience further.

Reason 5: Gamified marketing survived COVID-19

Locked up at home due to COVID-19, people were increasingly active online, consuming a variety of content, and playing games when not working. Between March 2020 and April 2020, comScore noted a 62% increase in the time spent on playing games online in India. Another report states that the US and UK saw a ‘40% surge in the time spent on online games’.

During this time, Burberry launched its summer collection through a gamified campaign. The luxury brand created a multiplayer game “that lets players dress up their characters in the brand's outfits before grabbing a surfboard and challenging friends to a race around a track”. The game rewards participants with daily prizes and AR-based digital rewards. (10)

ABC Entertainment decided to have fun promoting its classic TV game show “Supermarket Sweep”. To announce the return of the show, the broadcaster launched a Twitter game “Supermoji Sweep”. The audience on Twitter was required to “reply to its @SuperSweepABC account with combinations of nine emoji for grocery items including cheese, bread, steak, turkey and cherries”. Every emoji had a secret dollar value attached to it and the audience was required to guess the combination of items that would cost exactly $20. And the reward for the correct guess? A Special video message from comedian Leslie Jones, who is also the host of the show.

Reason 6: Gamification is about to get better

The overall Gamification market globally is expected to be worth $76298.9 Mn by 2030 (11) and for marketers, the opportunities are endless. Game mechanics are combined with AR/VR in education, tourism, healthcare, and entertainment industries.

In 2019, Ally Bank used AR and Gamification to create an online learning experience for consumers. “The augmented reality game brings Monopoly to life in six USA cities… Ally aims to improve consumers’ financial literacy through gamification while giving them the chance to increase their savings and win prizes."

PetSmart used Snapchat’s AR feature to create a “gamified quiz based around educational reptile facts”. Using this feature users could use the filter to turn themselves into a reptile, answer questions related to reptiles, and win a 40% discount coupon that can be redeemed at a PetSmart store. As a result, PetSmart “has seen a 50% increase in reptile sales, as well as a boost in general pet sales as owners stocked up on food and supplies in preparation for lockdown..”

Digital marketers can leverage these technologies to present immersive and gamified experiences to consumers and expand the scope of digital marketing. Similarly, brands can work towards gathering relevant user data and utilize it to create a better user experience and consumer engagement through personalized in-app gamified experiences.

Parting Thoughts

From engagement to retention, gamification can support most of the marketing objectives. This is a great approach ONLY if the marketer is clear about what objective the brand is trying to achieve when adopting the approach. To elevate a user’s experience through gamification, marketers must weave storytelling or personalization.

But remember, creating a gamified experience is not easy. Experts have researched why gamification fails and these reasons range from lack of understanding of the target audience to not being able to create a compelling story. Brian Burke mentions that gamification fails when it is used to manipulate the user’s experience to meet the organization’s goal, instead of the goal of the customer (2). As a result, marketers must create an experience that helps the consumer achieve their objectives. And this means going beyond mere reward points.

I will leave you with two popular frameworks Elemental Game Tetrad Model by Schell and Octalysis Framework by Yu-kai Chou. Both these should help you start off with planning and designing an outstanding gamification experience for your audiences/customers/users!

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FIN!

Thank you for reading this article. I would love to hear your views on gamification and how digital marketers can leverage game mechanics to improve user engagement.

If you found this article interesting or if you have any feedback for me, do share the same in the comments below!

All references and cited articles can be viewed here.

#digital marketing #Gamification #zomato #burgerking #petsmart #personalization #KD writes

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firewoodfigs · 4 years

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morning toasts and thunderstorms

read on ao3 | for @royaiweek day 4, crackle - thank you mods for all the hard work so far 💕

Summary: Mister Mustang has a gift or two for Miss Hawkeye.

[a/n: (i) whatever Roy is reading is taken directly from Issac Hollandus’ Complete Alchemical Writings, Part 1. (ii) this was supposed to be a future chapter of a slow unravelling, but I have terrible project management skills xD (iii) for @havocsss - more young!royai for you! <3]

~x~

“Man should not use the Art except for the salvation of his soul… Only then can he be given the secret signs of the philosophers of sages…” Roy Mustang chanted under his breath while pacing around the room.

He never thought he would live to see the day where he would actually find alchemy boring. Learning would have been easier if he had someone to quiz him on the content, but in the short span of his apprenticeship he had already come to understand that Miss Hawkeye was - well, to put it nicely, a hermit.

He'd tried, tried his valiant best to talk to her - about anything, really. School, her hobbies, her likes and dislikes… At some point he’d gotten so desperate for human interaction, he even tried to talk to her about the weather. The weather, for goodness sake!

Even thinking about it made him feel pathetic. Miss Hawkeye had simply stared at him blankly before returning to her room, door tightly shut and locked to ward off any potential evil like…

He was probably a menace in her eyes, so he supposed it would be him.

For the most part, therefore, Roy wisely refrained from disturbing her peaceful solitude. She was content to be left alone to her own devices, and he was inclined to think that his time could have been spent a lot more productively instead of embarrassing himself further in front of his master’s daughter.

But on lonely, chilly nights like these where the crackling of the fireplace was his only companion, Roy found himself missing his sisters and aunt terribly. Though they were a rambunctious, rowdy bunch - the living antithesis to Miss Hawkeye - they at least made for good company.

Roy sighed before flipping the dusty tome open once again. “Sulphur indicates fire… it is the earth and beginning of all metals. It is the female who brings forth the fruit. For no seed can grow unless it be first thrown into fertile soil, then beautiful fruit will come from it.”

Did fruits have any correlation to alchemy? Surely Master Hawkeye must have known better than to ask him to get through a pile of impertinent information…

“And when a pure is joined to a pure... it brings forth pure fruit. Thus, they are man and woman, fire and water... ” To his hormonal thirteen-year-old brain the underlying implication was as clear as day. Heat began to rush to his cheeks as he read it out loud -

- which, of course, was the precise moment Miss Hawkeye chose to walk in.

Roy jumped, startled by the sudden intrusion before quickly snapping the book shut. “Good evening, Miss Hawkeye…” his voice trailed off, unsure if he was encroaching on her personal space.

Miss Hawkeye didn’t respond. Instead, she continued to turn on the spot, head darting from side to side as she paced around frantically. From her distress it seemed like she had misplaced something important. Normally, her footsteps were so quiet that he would miss her whenever she came down to pour herself a glass of water, but this time he could definitely hear them over the fire’s crackle.

Ignoring the possible humiliation that might ensue, Roy tried again, stepping closer towards her this time. “Are you okay, Miss Hawkeye? Did you lose something?” As tense as she usually was, he’d never seen her so anxious, and he was beginning to worry for the younger girl.

Miss Hawkeye finally turned to acknowledge his presence. Well, look - we’re making some progress here!

“My…” she stuttered, as if hesitant to divulge any information to him. He waited encouragingly. “My necklace. It’s gone.”

Roy’s palms were open in earnest, in an attempt to convince her that he meant no harm. “I can help. What does it look like?”

“It’s a little medallion on a silver chain,” she answered vaguely. He nodded before inching closer to her, following her around quietly as she continued her search while keeping an eye out for anything that glimmered in the dark.

“Do you know where you might have dropped it?” Roy asked.

“I… I’m not sure. I’ve been searching all over the house since before dinnertime, but I haven’t seen it anywhere,” she answered.

“Maybe you left it in school?”

“I might have,” she mumbled. Miss Hawkeye was very upset, he realised, upon examining her face now well-illuminated by the small fire burning in the hearth.

Briefly, he wondered if she was going to cry.

“If so, then we’ll look for it tomorrow,” he said, offering her a reassuring smile.

“No, I have to find it now,” she countered, pitch rising subtly in irritation. Roy blinked at her in confusion, wondering if she was going to rush into her school compound at this ungodly hour alone to search for it.

The stubborn glint in her eyes told him that she had every intention of doing so. Under other circumstances he might have applauded her bravery, but in all honesty it was rather absurd for a girl her age to do such a thing. Why - Aunt Chris would have skinned him alive if he let Vanessa even so much as roam the streets of Central alone at midnight!

Unfortunately, Miss Hawkeye’s desire to do so was interrupted by the loud, ominous crackle of thunder that signalled the onslaught of an impending storm. She jumped slightly at the sound, before swallowing hard at the realisation that she couldn’t return to school now to look for it.

“We’ll look for it tomorrow, alright? You’ll get it back, I promise.” Roy raised two fingers up like he was making a vow and looked at her solemnly, hoping to convince her to put a little faith in him.

She stared into his obsidian eyes, as if searching for any hint of a lie, and nodded begrudgingly when she was finally convinced that there were none. Miss Hawkeye was willing to believe him - for now, at least - and muttered a soft thanks before turning on her heels to return back to her room.

Roy, on the other hand, sank back into the couch, determined to at least scrape through the endless material that he’d been given, although her forlorn expression never quite left his mind.

He shook his head, burying himself again in his books if only to pass the time.

It turned out to be a massive downpour, but two hours later the skies finally calmed down and the rain subsided. Roy let out a satisfied smile at his progress, having completed a chapter before the rain stopped. Rubbing his eyes to rid them of any fatigue, he stood up and began to tiptoe quietly towards the door after getting his coat and a lantern that would be his guide in his hunt for Miss Hawkeye’s necklace.

~x~

Roy was beginning to wonder if he was cursed with a penchant for bad ideas. The walk to Miss Hawkeye’s school had left his shoes completely soaked with damp, muddy soil and broken twigs, and every step he took was accompanied by a disconcerting squelch that left him terribly uncomfortable. The darkness that settled also painted the school in a particularly eerie light.

But of course, he wasn’t afraid. Scientists like him didn’t believe in the existence of supernatural beings like ghosts. After all, ghosts were but villains in children’s fairy tales designed to scare them…

… Right?

(If Roy was being completely honest with himself, he would have admitted that the weather-beaten compound bore an uncanny resemblance to a haunted mansion.)

He gulped. Nonetheless, he was adamant that ghosts were but silly, non-existent and utterly unscientific objects. Whatever the naked eye can’t see doesn’t exist!

The memory of Miss Hawkeye’s melancholic expression chose to resurface at that point, and it was all the motivation he needed to continue trudging on. This was a chance for him to earn her trust and prove that he really just wanted to be her friend, not some weird freak obsessed with alchemy without any capacity for normalcy.

Roy might have been an idiot in many senses of the word, but he wasn’t that foolish to pass up on an opportunity like that.

With that in mind, he climbed up the iron gate with renewed conviction. His slippery soles made this task considerably difficult, but he was indisposed to give up on something that he had already set his mind on. Resting a foot conveniently on a ledge, he let his weight settle there for a bit before hauling himself up with all the strength his scrawny body possessed and jumped across.

Roy grinned triumphantly as he landed safely in one piece before commencing his search. He started with surveying the classrooms, overturning the numerous old boxes and other junk stacked up against the walls; every nook and cranny for a chain to have fallen into and gotten lost, the very epitome of a persistent boy who refused to give up. He was unfazed even as he crawled underneath the tables to search for the tiniest sparkle, the familiar glimmer of jewelry…

And finally, his quest for Miss Hawkeye’s necklace bore fruit.

“Aha!” he cried out to himself when he chanced upon a broken chain with a shiny medallion in the centre. Quite a pretty necklace, actually. He could make out her initials carved onto the front, though the inscription on the back was far too small for his eyes to make out in the dark.

His joy, however, was cut short when another crackle sounded off in the distance.

“Oh dear, I sure hope it doesn’t start pouring again,” Roy muttered under his breath, before tucking the necklace securely into his pocket and dashing out of the classroom. This time, it was a lot easier to climb over the gate, but by the time he landed on the other side it had begun to drizzle, and so he lifted his coat over his head before making a run for it.

In the end, the protection his coat offered was but inconsequential. By the time he was midway through his journey back another downpour had begun, and he could only hope that his feet would be fast enough to escape any lightning that might strike him dead and leave Miss Hawkeye without her beloved necklace.

When Roy finally arrived back at the mansion he was thoroughly soaked from head to toe, but he was at the very least grateful that he managed to evade death by electrocution. Stepping in and closing the door quietly so as to not wake any of the Hawkeyes, he made his way to the bathroom in quick, long strides, hoping to take a warm shower to quell the shivers now wracking through his weedy frame.

~x~

It didn’t take a genius to figure out why the chain had broken off. From the looks of it, it was way too long for someone of her stature, and the added stress on it as she paced around the house daliy to complete her chores fastidiously certainly contributed to its fragility as well.

Roy found himself suddenly feeling very grateful for his sisters. For while they could be utter nuisances who never failed to ridicule his love for alchemy on a daily basis, they’d always badgered him with silly requests to transmute accessories for them from random bits of metals and ores.

He thought it was one of the most useless purposes of alchemy, but now he was glad. It turned out to be very useful as he drew an alchemical array on his desk and placed the broken necklace on top with practiced ease, adjusting the chain a little so that it was shorter and more comfortable for Miss Hawkeye.

He let out a muffled sneeze into his arm before clapping his hands together. With a familiar crackle, an almost-magical blue light the necklace was restored back to its original state soon enough - perhaps even better than before, he thought to himself with a little bit of pride as he admired the gleaming silver under the candle’s comforting light.

With the shortened chain, though, there had been a bit of extra metal left behind, and he was in a bit of a dilemma as to what to do with it. Vanessa would probably know best, but she wasn’t around, and calling her at one in the morning to ask for help over something as trivial, as asinine as this would only guarantee him a slow, painful death.

Roy stared at the remnants of Miss Hawkeye’s necklace contemplatively for a long, hard moment before a brilliant idea dawned upon him.

Earrings.

Trinkets like necklaces and bracelets were prone to being lost and forgotten, if the many necklaces and bracelets lying around his Aunt’s tavern after an exhausting day of work was any indication. Earrings, on the other hand, were a lot less susceptible to such incidents since they would remain firmly embedded in a person’s earlobes. Like the ones Aunt Chris wore.

With that in mind he set out to make a pair of matching earrings that would hopefully bring a smile to her sullen countenance. The transmutation circle crackled again, and - voila! Roy mentally applauded himself for his ingenuity as he admired the silver studs in front of him.

It was simple, nothing extravagant, but he thought the simplicity suited Miss Hawkeye since she didn’t seem to incline towards anything particularly ostentatious. For starters, she seemed to be in the habit of recycling her clothes, and they were generally plain and practical (something that would have probably left Vanessa aghast at the mere thought of it).

It would be a fitting match for her, no doubt.

Roy allowed himself one last grin of approval at his handiwork before finally drifting off into a satisfied slumber.

~x~

“You look… tired,” Riza remarked casually the next morning over breakfast as she took note of the lethargic manner in which he bit into his toast. Initially, she thought it might have been because she did a bad job at preparing breakfast, but her toast was fine. Impeccable, even. One of her better accomplishments in the kitchen.

Roy sipped at his tea drearily. “Wha-what? No, I’m fine,” he mumbled, before attempting to shove the toast into his mouth with greater gusto. It was a poor mimicry of how he normally devoured his food, but it seemed to placate Miss Hawkeye a little, at least.

Casting a quick glance at her, he realised that she still looked rather jittery. Miss Hawkeye couldn’t stop jiggling her knees while frowning at her toast like it’d committed a heinous crime, and Roy wondered if she was still worrying about her missing necklace.

“Thank you for the lovely breakfast, Miss Hawkeye,” he said sincerely, hoping to distract her a little while stuffing the final bit of toast into his mouth. He leaned back into the chair to stretch his arms, preparing himself for the day ahead and to give her his gift.

Truthfully, the latter was quite the daunting task because he didn’t know what to expect. Would she punch him, thank him, or bury him six feet under for even daring to search for her necklace of his own accord?

She merely nodded at him before rising to clear the plates, though he rose immediately to halt her actions. “I can do it, Miss Hawkeye. It’s no problem at all,” he sputtered before positioning himself in front of her.

It was now or never.

“Um, I have a present for you,” he stammered, reaching into his pocket to show her the reason behind his dark circles and intermittent sniffles.

Roy hoped desperately that he wasn’t coming down with a cold. He still had plenty of work to catch up on, and he doubted that Miss Hawkeye would take to him sneezing in her face kindly.

She let out a muted gasp upon noticing the familiar silver gleam. “You… how did you get it?”

The accusatory edge in her voice wasn’t lost on Roy. He wanted to sigh in exasperation, frustration - here he was, doing something nice for a girl who glowered at him on a daily basis, treated him like he was a curse to humanity…

Nonetheless, he reined in those feelings quickly. It was probably more urgent to correct any misconceptions that Miss Hawkeye might have first, lest she thought he stole it from her or something. “I… uh, I found it in your school yesterday,” he mumbled under his breath.

“You… went to my school?” She stared at him incredulously.

Roy nodded. He could feel the embarrassment springing in his chest, making its unwelcome appearance on his pale features. “I managed to fix it - I think you might’ve dropped it because the chain broke,” he held it up, as if to demonstrate his craftsmanship. The chain was shiny and pristine and brand new under the welcoming, fulgent rays of the morning sunlight creeping in through the lilac portieres.

All in a day’s work!

“Here you go.” Roy inched forward to put it on for her, reaching over her shoulders to clasp the necklace securely in place. It nestled in the hollows of her neck peacefully. Upon observing that the modified length was better fitted for her petite size, as he’d predicted, Roy couldn’t resist the urge to let out a pleased smile.

She said nothing. He raised his arms slightly in defense as he stepped back, but she made no move to hit or strangle him. Instead, Miss Hawkeye only fingered the medallion reverently with bright eyes - oh God, please don’t cry - as if to reassure herself that it was indeed real.

Taking this as a sign to continue, he dug out the earrings he’d made the night before, allowing them to rest on his outstretched, sweaty palms.

Roy inhaled before launching into a senseless rant. “I, well. I shortened your chain a little because it looked like it was too long for you, and there was some leftover metal, so I made you a pair of earrings. I don’t know if you have piercings, but I thought they would match your necklace well, and also they’re less prone to being lost or misplaced or stolen…”

Miss Hawkeye interrupted his nervous rambling with an extended hand of her own, reaching out to pick up the pair of studs. “Thank you,” she murmured indistinctly, before making a move to leave for school, bag slung over her shoulder as the slightest hint of a blush began to grace her cheeks.

“You’re welcome,” Roy replied, suddenly feeling very awkward himself. Did she like his present, or did she think he’d crossed some invisible boundary by taking the liberty to make a pair of earrings with the remainders of her chain?

Roy stared into his reflection in his cup of tea, wondering if all that effort had been for naught. With a despondent sigh, he began to clear the plates, snivelling and rubbing his nose with his sleeve as he scrubbed at the crockery idly.

Little did he know that Miss Hawkeye had fastened the studs securely onto her earlobes as soon as she was out of the door, and from that day forward she wore them every single day without fail.

#royaiweek20 #royai fic #young royai #royai #HAPPY ROYAI DAY #read till the end for a surprise :')

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letterboxd · 4 years

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Kid Detectives, Adult Problems.

As The Kid Detective becomes “a surprising darling” of a hit with our members, Jack Moulton talks to its Canadian writer-director Evan Morgan about broken projectors, the pressure of proving yourself, and what happens when precocious kids grow up.

“The premise felt immediately funny but it also felt immediately sad and painful.” —Evan Morgan

A growing number of indie films over the past decade recognize that ‘coming-of-age’ is not a teen-exclusive life event—indeed, that it often takes decades to work out who we are, versus who people perceive us to be. The Kid Detective takes that premise and steals off into the night with it, blending noir with indie slacker in an offbeat, genre-flipping tale of a washed-up, thirty-something private eye who was once a star solver of local mysteries.

Adam Brody (Ready or Not) stars as Abe Applebaum, the detective in question, who seizes a chance to step back into the small-town limelight when a young woman (Sophie Nélisse) asks him to help find her boyfriend’s murderer. Veep’s Sarah Sutherland also stars as Abe’s secretary, taking calls about lost cats and other inane mysteries.

Reviews on Letterboxd praise the “delicious premise” that explores “the darkness lurking beneath the surface of small-town America”. They also appreciate Brody’s “phenomenally pathetic” performance, and the unexpected swerve in the final twenty, noting that “sometimes movies don’t recover from a shift in tone in the third act… but here it all [falls] into place”.

The Kid Detective is the directing debut of Toronto filmmaker (and Letterboxd member) Evan Morgan, who first received attention for The Dirties (2013), an alternately funny and upsetting micro-budget dark comedy in found-footage style, which he produced, co-wrote and co-edited. Morgan’s work is drenched in pop culture: Abe’s talent for deduction is demonstrated by how he digests movie narratives; The Dirties, too, has endless movie references. So we were chuffed to quiz Morgan about the films that have played an important role in his life.

What was premiering The Kid Detective at the 2020 Toronto Film Festival like for you, under the current conditions? Evan Morgan: We were in quite a rush to get the film finished for the online platform that they had made—I signed off on the final cut on Thursday and then I was reading a review of the movie by Saturday. I was still in that mode of trying to scrutinize everything and implement my final notes, and then all of a sudden the movie was done and I could never touch it again. It certainly was a surreal transition to make that quickly.

It was also extremely gratifying to see people respond to it for the first time. We knew that we weren’t making a movie that was for all tastes but when you’re reading the first response from the first person who’s ever reviewed it and they’re picking up on stuff you intended, you start to let your spine unclench a little bit. You can sort of finally say goodbye to the process of making something and enjoy the process of people interacting with it.

Have you been reading the Letterboxd reviews? Obsessively. I’ve been refreshing Letterboxd all the time. I’ve been joking with my editor and composer a lot about how people posting their reviews on Letterboxd, on their YouTube channel, or other little outlets would never expect the filmmakers to be instantly reading their reviews.

You’re also a member! How do you use Letterboxd? I’ve always been a big film nerd. Ever since I was a teenager I was making lists at the end of the year and obsessing over an order that would always change. A friend of mine, Matthew Miller, who produced The Dirties, recommended that I hop on Letterboxd and instantly I was going through the library rating and organizing everything, and it became a real slippery slope. I remember spending hours on it in the first week.

Now, after actually having made a movie that’s on a larger scale, I’ve found that my sensitivity has changed a lot in the last year. I’m less inclined to give a star rating. I’m happy just to catalog the film so I can reflect on it and just use the ‘like’ button. That’s been an interesting shift in my relationship with how I see movies after having finally completed this project.

I know this idea had been gestating a while for you, what was the seed of the story? I’d written a short film in film school, which I never shot, that was about a child detective who was still a child and was solving grisly murders. I was obsessed with the first season of The OC and I thought Adam Brody was so funny. I was impressed with how he broke out of the formula of that show. I knew he was someone I really wanted to work with and we happened to cross paths at Sundance because The Dirties was premiering at Slamdance. It was clear to us that we shared a similar sense of humor and taste.

I was looking back on my old ideas and I saw an opportunity to re-conceive this one for him because I immediately identified with the protagonist. I’ve always known I wanted to be a filmmaker and thus had that sense of expectation where people would joke: “he’ll grow up to be the next Spielberg!” It’s incredible encouragement when you’re young but it also creates this unfortunate sense of pressure where you’re beholden to a future that you actually haven’t achieved or lived.

When I graduated film school, I was suddenly left in the space of my own apartment where now it was up to me to actually make this happen, to write and direct a feature film. The process acquires this unfortunate pressure because it’s not just about watching ideas unfold in front of me, I also have something to prove. I was at a point in my life where I was doing a lot of writing and not having great success in terms of actually finishing a script so this premise resonated with me and I saw an opportunity for people to connect to this character in their own way.

I revisited The Dirties after watching The Kid Detective and I finally understood why there were those huge The OC posters in Matt and Owen’s edit suite. I assume that was your idea? Yeah, it was. We were all big fans of that show. The cultural references they made were things that were important to us at that particular moment and we loved Seth Cohen [Brody’s character]. When I ran into Adam at Sundance, I shared a link to The Dirties, forgetting that his face was in the background of about twenty minutes of our movie. We were back in our hotel that night and it suddenly just occurred to us—“wait a minute, shit. We should probably warn him that his face is a big character!”

How did you conduct your research into detective work? What excited me about this premise was the character and not so much the genre. I think the genre is alluring in a sense that it’s so hallowed. The set pieces are so familiar in terms of the PI office, the receptionist and the glass of scotch. That stuff was all super cool and enticing, but I was never a big mystery person. I was intimidated by the process of writing because it felt very much outside of my wheelhouse.

The first thing I did was buy a bunch of Raymond Chandler books from the Philip Marlowe series. I read those super quickly and thought they were super funny. I also read a bunch of Encyclopedia Brown books. So, the world of The Kid Detective exists between these two realms. I started watching bad TV procedurals where the detectives try and find the victim within the span of 42-minutes just to absorb as much as I possibly could.

Here you have a whimsical directorial approach while the film reflects upon a cynical, changing world. In comparison, The Dirties also deals with young adult trauma but couldn’t be further from this in style. Can you talk about your use of juxtaposition this time around? There was no more fun experience than shooting The Dirties. It really was a film made by four best friends having an endless sleepover in their parents’ basement. That’s where the energy, the life, and the humor of the film comes from. We were always relying on the darker component of the dramatic payoff to provide us with a structure so that we could goof around as much as we wanted knowing that it wasn’t all for nothing. Those dramatic stakes would provide it with a different kind of technical legitimacy. We didn’t have any money to make it but it didn’t have to look like a big Hollywood film because it was made by the characters.

It wasn’t a conscious decision to recreate the same dynamic with The Kid Detective in terms of dealing with dramatic issues in a very light way. The premise felt immediately funny but it also felt immediately sad and painful. I wanted to find a way to wrap them together without forfeiting the humor or the reality of the characters. It’s interesting how a lot of people are responding to the way the movie reveals itself to be dark because, for me, this was always inevitable. If you’re going to tell a story about a stunted adult, like a kid detective who never really grows up, the only way for the character to grow up is to confront something that is so sinister that it would break them from their selfishness.

Which detective movies most influenced The Kid Detective? The biggest films that were in my head when I was writing this movie—and also in terms of our aesthetic—were Chinatown and Blue Velvet. Chinatown was a movie that I had more of a relationship with as a teenager than I did the older Humphrey Bogart movies like The Big Sleep and The Maltese Falcon. Blue Velvet also has a suburban setting that reveals this darker underbelly—two characters driving around in a convertible, interviewing people, and putting themselves in greater and greater risk. Those were the movies that we wanted you to be able to put the film on the shelf with.

Jim Carrey in ‘Ace Ventura: Pet Detective’ (1994).

Which film made you want to become a filmmaker? This is an easy one for me. I was a very big fan of Jim Carrey when I was eleven and I remember seeing Ace Ventura: Pet Detective for the first time and having my mind blown. I didn’t even know what some of those jokes were referring to, but I was so delighted by his energy and the absurdity of that movie. It invited this ferocious interest in acting and consequentially, the world of film. I got really excited when I heard he was working on his first dramatic feature and that it was going to be directed by Peter Weir since I was already a fan of Dead Poets Society.

I remember going to see The Truman Show with my family on the first night that it played and the projector broke about an hour into the movie. I was broken—I knew that was I watching my favorite movie that I’d ever seen. I was absolutely blown away by the world and the story. After about 30 minutes, the theater staff came out and started offering vouchers to see it again but I wouldn’t let my parents leave—I said “no, we have to stay and finish it!”—and then I was rewarded with what remains my favorite movie ending ever.

That was the point when my interest shifted from wanting to be in front of the camera and the center of attention. I was kind of the class clown as a child. If you’d asked at the time, I’d say I wanted to be a comedian. This was the moment where I decided I wanted to tell stories and start writing scripts.

Which coming-of-age protagonist did you relate to the most as a teenager? Not super original, but I was obsessed with The Catcher in the Rye as a teenager. I don’t know if I necessarily saw my experience reflected in a movie—I’m sure it’s out there. Rushmore was another film that Adam and I used as a reference when we were pitching this movie, in how The Kid Detective exists between that and Chinatown. It’s also about a character dealing with his own expectations of himself and ultimately having to evolve out of his selfishness.

I think that there’s something about the coming-of-age genre that is very special to me and I continue to really appreciate and recognize it. I really enjoyed Adventureland, which came out about eleven years ago and it’s sort of underrated. I guess in its own way, Blue Velvet is a coming-of-age story too. Those are the ones that are the top of my list.

What are your favorite Canadian films that really could not be made anywhere else but Canada? It seems I should have an immediate answer to that question. It just proves how bad Canadians are at celebrating themselves. There was a movie called Monsieur Lazhar that stars Sophie Nélisse, who’s the leading actress in our film. It was her first film role at eleven and it’s an incredibly sensitive and quiet movie that was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars that year. That’s a really amazing example of Canadian filmmaking at its best.

If you’ve had time to watch any films this year, what is your favorite film of 2020 so far? This is another tough one for me because I was honestly so immersed in trying to complete The Kid Detective—we were editing intensely from the very beginning of the year and throughout the lockdown. I was so exhausted by that process that I lost track of what was happening in terms of new releases, so I watched quite a few old movies and there were a few movies I revisited.

The movie that probably had the biggest impact on me was Midsommar, from last year. I couldn’t believe the precision and how unshakable it was in terms of those images. It got me excited again in the way that sometimes you feel when you have to see a movie more than once in order to truly see it, because the first time you’re dispensing your expectations. Maybe you wanted to like it or maybe you didn’t want to like it, but the second time you don’t have the same anticipation, and as a result you notice things that you didn’t notice previously.

Related content

Melissa’s list of films about Detectives, Private Eyes, Mysteries, Film Noir, Neo Noir, Thrillers, Erotic Thrillers, Cat and Mouse, Chasing, Crush, Obsession, Stalking, Escaping

Phillip Marlowe, Private Eye: RetroHound’s ranked list of films featuring Raymond Chandler’s famous detective

MovieMaestro’s Teenage Wasteland list of coming-of-age movies

Follow Jack on Letterboxd

‘The Kid Detective’ is in select US theaters now.

#evan morgan #adam brody #the oc #film noir #noir #kid detective #the kid detective #sony #crime thriller #murder mystery #sarah sutherland #letterboxd

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marniq7 · 3 years

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Hitting Targets with a One-Two Marketing Punch

Omnichannel Campaigns + Interactive Content

While reading has its benefits, I’m sure we can all admit that it’s easy to get bored and distracted when you’re just passively skimming something. And sure, “content is king”, but everyone is publishing content these days, so how exactly can you stand out in a sea of blogs titled “The Best Blah Blah Blah” and keep readers engaged? Interactive content!

If you’re unfamiliar with the concept, interactive content is exactly what it sounds like – it’s any form of content that can be interacted with by a website visitor or user. Think quizzes, calculators, and infographics – they’re all types of interactive content. And, creating these unique experiences can give you the opportunity to convey your value to your audience and encourage more engagement.

A Rundown on Interactive Content

Since we all seem to have the attention span of a squirrel these days, interactive content is the superhero here to save the day. What makes the concept even better, is that you can take any approach you want with it. The options are truly endless, but to put a picture to the face, here’s a rundown:

Quizzes offer a unique opportunity to both educate and engage your audience while giving you valuable data in return. Whether you do a career quiz, personality quiz, or a brain health assessment quiz, your audience will be much more intrigued and you’ll be able to grab info without even asking for it.

No matter if your audience is looking to buy, save, or reach a goal, calculators offer a helping hand and ensure trust when it comes to a final decision that needs to be made.

Infographics give you the ability to provide key data and stats in a digestible, meaningful way. At the end of the day, who wants to read a whitepaper when you can look at a pretty picture.

Finding the Time & Place

While there are numerous benefits that come with interactive content, it’s important to not overkill your platforms with it. There’s a time and place for it and finding that happy medium will benefit you more in the long run. Here are a few tips and tricks to consider when incorporating interactive content into your strategy.

Figure out what your interactive content goal is. Do you want higher engagement rates, looking to capture more relevant data, or increase brand loyalty?

Narrow down which style of interactive content will give the best results and help you reach your goals.

Decide where your content will be distributed. Will you get the most engagement from emails, landing pages, digital ads, etc.?

Execute your interactive content strategy and modify it as you see fit.

Duo of The Year

Aside from all the points made earlier, there’s still one key component of interactive content that will maximize ROI and user experience in the long run – omnichannel marketing. To put it simply, an omnichannel marketing campaign has one goal in mind — constant contact and engagement with your targets and reaching customers in ways they want to be engaged. Now tie the concept of interactive content and omnichannel marketing together, and you have the perfect combo! Imagine all the opportunities that can come along with these two very customizable concepts.

Looking into The Future

With things like VR, AR, and many other futuristic concepts progressing rapidly, one can only imagine where we’ll be in the next 5 to 10 years when we interact with our audience from afar. Already, 70% of marketers are creating more interactive content today compared to a year ago and 90% of consumers agreed they wanted to see more interactive content in their communications. It’s exciting to see how much it’s already evolved and we can’t wait to see where it will go.

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quizsite4-blog · 4 years

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On-line Quizzes - A Great Understanding Opportunity

Online quizzes can be quite a great learning opportunity for pupils. There are websites that offer instructors or parents the ability to produce a quiz to test students in any subject matter. This can help to make studying for a test a lot more enjoyable process, and help trainees to better retain the information. You can also get sites where students can produce their own quizzes for each additional to study and test them selves with. Using online quizzes in this manner can make learning a lot more entertaining helping to make preparing for a huge test less stressful. Given that we all do better on lab tests when we are relaxed, this can help for taking unneeded pressure off as well as improve test scores. Offering students an advantage like that may be invaluable on current and also future test scores. quizsite.com

Quizzes can also be used to sharpen expertise for trivia players. Using a wide variety of subjects available for on the web quizzes, these can be used as being a practice before a big trivia night. This gives quiz takers an advantage since they are keeping their particular skills sharp and type in the trivia tournament ready along with focused. It is also fun to utilize these quizzes to learn with regards to a new topic. Learning in this fashion is more enjoyable than just looking at and memorizing information. While information is learned in a very fun environment it is quicker retained. Using online quizzes anyone can learn a massive amount of new information within a relaxed and entertaining approach. This can even be used in an effort to study new office in addition to policy procedures for a career.

There are so many types of quizzes about the it is difficult to know where to start. Start with deciding what the goal in the quiz is, to have exciting or to study. Then hunt for quizzes in the subject necessary and narrow down to the web site you want to use. Finding the right to figure out website for you can be done simply by reading site reviews on the internet and gaining insight from other consumers. Some sites are targeted more towards experts inside a field of study, and several are more general pop lifestyle based quizzes. Either way, using a little research, anyone will see a vast amount of quizzes that they'll enjoy, and if not they could create as many of their own quizzes as they like. This generates endless ways to enjoy on the net quizzes and keep the pleasure every time.

Are you a fan of taking quizzes for fun and entertainment? If this is the case, then it's important that you visit a fun and free site like QuizSite.com. The site is loaded with tons of fun quizzes and games that can be accessed online and easily shared with friends through social media. The site also allows users to submit their own quiz info for other visitors to complete and share with friends as well. No matter if you are looking for trivia quizzes, a personalized quiz or even online games, you will find that this site likely has just what you are looking for.

References Quiz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiz

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heckyeahitsnick · 4 years

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thank you @in-madhouses for tagging Magnolia from my fic Her Soul is Like Magnolia. This was super fun and I appreciate you thinking of me and my character!

1. If you weren’t doing what you’re doing now, what would you be doing instead?

I’ve always known I was gonna be a STEM girl and be a chemist, ever since Professor X from the Powerpuff Girls was my very first crush ever. But, if I truly had to choose a second-option, I’d probably become a lawyer so I can be the kick-ass brown Elle Woods and go around flexing the line, “What? Like it’s hard?” to any question ever.

2. If you could change one thing you did or didn’t say in the past, what would it be?

Despite the fact that I literally NEVER think before i speak and i’m always sticking my foot in my mouth, I still don’t think I’d regret anything in particular? Maybe change something vague in my past, like I'd say something kinder in place of something rude I’ve said or replied with a more well-thought out response instead of just speaking the first thought in my mind. But overall, no regrets. No wait, scratch that; no ragrets!

3. What’s one personal secret you haven’t told a soul?

One time I ate one kibble of Pumpkin’s cat food. I just wanted to try it, in the name of science, and she always eats it with so much gusto it had to be good. It was not.

4. If your mum texted you right now, how would that make you feel?

Shook. My sweet, innocent immigrant mother only technologically communicates with whatsapp and ill-informed facebook posts. If she were to ever text me, it’d definitely be an imposter.

5. Have you pictured your future? If so, what does it look like?

I wildly swing from both ends of the spectrum: I have like a vague, general idea about what I’d like in store for my future but I also have a very, detailed 5 year plan of future accomplishments. Short answer is I picture being content, owning a house if I can stop wasting my money on avocado toasts, working as an environmental chemist. Harry, Pumpkin, Niall, and Marisol are featured in my future too, but this MY story so they’re not that important. I’m kidding. Kinda.

6. What is your Zodiac sign and do you agree with it?

Uhh. First, let me clear the air. I don’t hate on people who believe in horoscopes and astrology. More power to them, but I personally don’t believe in astrology and know next to nothing about zodiac signs. I don’t know what the sign’s characteristics are, but I do know I’m a Leo because Niall made Harry and I take a horoscope compatibility quiz the other day.

7. Do you use social media? If so, what kinds of things do you post? If not, why not?

Instagram, because selfies, and Facebook because I’m here to advocate they are not for boomers. I’m refraining from making a twitter account. I'm trying to protect the world from my random thoughts, despite Harry’s futile attempts to make me my own account.

8. Who’s the most important person to you?

Cop out answer that’s actually true: there isn’t just one singular person. Me, Niall, Mari, Harry, my sister, my mom, the opportunities for important people are endless.

9. What are your interests and hobbies?

Love chemistry and all things related (except Harry’s awful chemistry puns). I love reading, especially sci-fi books. IDK if it counts as an interest but my faith? That’s super important to me.

Oh, and Horror movies - the Scream movies are undefeated and I’m currently trying to get my coworker, Liam, who’s a film major, to cast me as the lead in his horror short for his class project, despite my lack of acting skills. It's not going well, but I’m a huge advocate to make horror films more diverse. I can be the dumb brunette with big boobs who runs into the locked basement with no exits instead of running out the door. That could be me!!

10. Have you ever been in love? Why/Why not?

Yes, I’m in love with so many people right now. I love all my friends, I love my family, I love my life. But i’m sure this question meant romantically, and all i’m gonna say is Harry and I are definitely getting there (though he’d argue, we’re already here. Wherever here is. I think i messed up my metaphor - ugh this is why I hate English majors!)

#1daaw #1dfics

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hozeletters-blog · 5 years

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Secrets of Media

Media is not as straightforward as people have simplified it to be. Just like a generic-sized country or a wide city or an over populated town, media is a wide space overloaded with ideas, a platform with its own fair share of nooks and crannies. It is good that it provides a wide stage for the people’s voice, but having a wide surface can create space for more mistakes. The more you dive into the water of media’s deep ocean, the clearer its holes become. Soon, you will realize that not everything written down is true and not everything you read is factual. Even news can be a bluff and words can easily be filtered.

There has been numerous cases when things on the media were proven incorrect. The erroneous updates or “Fake news” as the people call it often get many people fooled and have them believing such outrageous pieces of information. One of these cases was the feud between the world’s most popular YouTuber Felix Kjelberg who goes by the name PewDiePie and a news outlet called the Wall Street Journal. Back in year 2017, there has been numerous instances when the writers of WSJ (Wall Street Journal) have misinterpreted the jokes of the famous YouTube Star, calling him a supporter of Hitler and part of the Nazi. This was because of a certain joke Kjelberg made in a video posted on his channel. Kjelberg claimed the statements of WJS to be not only false, but plain wrong. Along the end of 2018, pro-hacker fans of PewDiePie hacked WSJ to post a fake public apology to PewDiePie pretending to be the owner of the page. They temporarily closing the website, they are now conducting a full investigation. Cases like this are proof of just how easily things on the media can be tampered with, and even a measly fan can hack a giant corporation’s company.

Our generation have been so accustomed to technology that it is already part of day-to-day lives. We have always connected to other people through it, most particularly social media. Social media have been a significant component of our lives in our modern society. We are able to not only share information but most importantly, also gain it. It has structured our lifestyles throughout time. Teenagers are one of the main users of social media, spending 8 hours on average online daily.

While there have been well-known cases on the negative consequences of using social media, there are numerous benefits that it can give when used properly. It is a medium to promote positivity and produce ideas for change. The numerous benefits of social media make it one of the most irreplaceable tools of the society.

1. Opportunity

YouTube is one of the social media platforms that people use to state their stands and express their opinions on a given topic. This results to the attraction of millions of viewers making the video a hit becoming trending. This also lets other people to take interest in it and they may also sponsor such people or channels.

2. A Voice

People have been using social media as a platform to open-up and speak for the people who cannot. Facebook and Twitter are great examples of these social media site that have been often used as a voice for the “voiceless”. An example is that people are speaking out for the disabled people and stating that even if a person is disabled, he/she can still live a full life and do what he/she can. The groups or individuals are mostly started and comprised by the youth who see the significance of equality making use of social media as a place to send a message to everyone.

3. Innovation and Creativity

Because social media sites depend on the sharing of content by active accounts, people have thought of numerous ways to spice up their posts. They thought outside the box to come up with unique and new ideas for their content. Not only is their posts unique, but there are always news applications and sites that are developed introducing new techniques in expressing oneself.

4. Skill Development

Interaction have become more free and easy online. The different social media sites have opened up social environments online for people to interact. Endless exposure to social media and being online have resulted to numerous benefits like engaging to their potential employers. Being online have benefitted young people in acquiring skills that helps them in evaluating and interpreting different situations. This preparation helps people to be prepared to face different kinds of situation mentally. YouTube contains numerous educational videos that aids in sharpening and improving one’s skills.

5. Confidence and Independence

Being online through social media is considered to be an adventured for some people. It is comparable to exploration where there is a need for numerous skills sets. People are able to mold themselves to become more independent in order to survive the social media race. They are also able to become more confident in hopes of having a positive online presence and be heard. Eventually, these becomes part of their life.

Media has also numerous Positive Impacts. These are the following to name a few.

1. Social Media Is a Way to Enhance our Connectivity

It’s an effortless manner to connect with other people but we have an amazingly wide variety of such sites to choose from. No matter how far they are or what region they could be in, how different our beliefs are, social networks are beneficial in reviving and retaining relationships with other people.

2. Social Media Has a Lot of Benefits for Students and Teachers

It’s been a habit for people to use social media to search important details that couldn’t be seen in encyclopedias and other books. But with the use of these social media, it has given numerous opportunities for us to expand our knowledge. For example. We use to convey our projects easily especially for research.

3. Social Media Can Benefit Mental Health

Our emotions and health affect our mood being a part of the social media users community have been effective and helpful allowing us to relieve our social isolation and other depressing problems. It also allows people to share their thoughts without revealing their identity. It also develops our self-esteem making us more confident. It is a platform that helps people express themselves with less, if not without any, fear.

4. Help Develop Social Skills

Some people are anti-socials. Media offers them the chance to develop their own social skills. It also gives them the chance to expand their social circle and make new friends. They need to build their selves to develop their social confidence, heighten literacy in the media, and other social support to improve their social skills as a person in real life. It can also help them to communicate with others, most especially if you’re a teacher or a businessman, you need to develop these skills in order to be successful in life.

Media have been an essential part of not only our lives, but also of the society. In today’s generation, media has been an important part of the lives of the people. However, it is two-sided which means that it has its positive side and the negative side. We are certain that nothing is perfect, not even social media. Though imperfect with its disadvantages, social media, when properly used, has its good side.

Advantages of Media

1. Media helps in educating the people. Through the television, radio programs and the internet, people get to know and learn on the things such as health matters, recent news and much more.

2. People get the recent news in just a short period of time. People get news daily through the use of media and this keeps them updated on what is happening on their environment.

3. Media lets the people showcase their talents such as singing, dancing and acting and post it online.

4. Children can easily learn from media because it increases their knowledge. They can learn from quiz programs, animal programs and etc.

5. Radio is very convenient for the people who loves to get updated to news and such, with their mobile devices they can easily listen to it.

6. Media is also a great way in terms of advertising and promoting. This can make the sales of such products to increase rapidly.

7. Media serves as a good source of entertainment. People get entertained through music and television programs.

8. Media leads to the diffusion of different cultures. By showcasing these cultures, the people will be able to learn and appreciate the different cultures that we have.

9. Television allows electronic duplication of information. This reduces the production cost making mass education possible.

10. Media helps people all over the world to understand and embrace each other’s differences.

Disadvantages of Media

1. It leads to individualism. By spending too much time on the internet and watching television, the people will often forget their lives outside of their mobile phones.

2. Some of the contents of media are not suitable for the children. Limiting children’s access to these can be hard.

3. Newspaper is geographically selective.

4. Increase in advertisements in television and radio is making them less attractive.

5. Internet as a form of media opens up possibilities of identity theft, phishing, fraud, hacking and etc.

6. People get too addicted to media which decreases their productivity.

7. By staying too long in front of their screens, this may lead to eyesight problems. Also, using earphones might lead to hearing defects.

8. It idealizes alcohol and drugs. Some of the programs make this kind of things appear to be cool.

9. It can lead to personal injury. Some people likes to copy what they have watched online even though they are not professional in this field.

10. It can ruin a reputation of a person. Hacking is one of the tool in spreading rumors about a person.

No matter how credible the internet presents itself to be, we find that more unreliable sources could be found in it. The easiest way for people to speak up is through their social media accounts; it is also the easiest way to fake figures. Most of the legal issues of media could be found through this branch of media. Phishing, Plagiarism, Hacking, etc. One could say that it is the most dangerous form of media, since almost everyone has access to it. But if you were leaned at the wonders of the internet, you would know that true danger is found inside something that less people have access towards.

There are three known layers of World Wide Web: the surface, the deep and the dark web. Some of which you might be familiar to.

The “surface” is what you usually see when you open up your Safari, Google Chrome, Firefox or any web browsers. The surface has been part of the web since the first ever engine developed by Sir Tim Berners-Lee. It is absolutely anything you could access whenever you go to Google, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, etc.

The deep web also called the invisible web or hidden web. Just as the name is trying to suggest, it is below the surface, but not completely at the bottom. It is still part of the web, but unlike the surface web, this contains things that a normal web browser could not access or see. It is where one’s personal information is located. From the content of personal email accounts, banking information, medical records to legal documents. It is considered a safe place to the right people. Nevertheless, if all those information goes to the wrong hands, people’s lives could easily be mangled and reconstructed. It is accessible to the public, but protected by complicated encryptions that only professional Hackers could get through. The encryptions serve as security measures to keep it from being searched by anyone outside the system.

Diving deeper into the sea of the internet and swimming past the deep web, you would hit something called the dark web. People often mix the dark web and the deep web, but the dark web is a completely different story from the deep web. The deep web beside the dark web would look like a safe haven. The dark web is not really buried too deep that not a lot of people know about it. It also did not help that news about it have appeared in daily papers and stories about it have been reported on TV. The dark web got its name because not many people have access to it. The dark web is a place of criminal activity. It hosts contents from harmless book clubs to dangerous and disturbing items and services and stolen information. It is the dark market of the internet. You could buy just about anything in there, even the things you could not even think one would sell, let alone buy. The encryption for this layer of the web is much more complicated than the others. This layer and its users are anonymous and cannot be tracked easily.

Media is one of the best avenues to connect with others, let us not ruin the experience. With all the negative consequences that a person may face when he/she use media without thought or considerations, there are numerous tips on how we can responsibly use social media. Social media is mostly free, let us not make it scary due to our irresponsibility.

1. Be mindful of your emotions

As of the moment, teenagers are not being aware of what are they posting in social media, you should think first before you post anything. Don’t let a though-of-the-moment be the cause of something you do not like to happen in the future

2. Don’t Be Glued to Your Smartphone

As great as the virtual connections are, there’s a whole world out there that can’t be seen through your smartphone.

3. Learn to Let it Go

You don’t need to respond to every tweet, or comment- sometimes it’s good to get a bit of time to your own thoughts.

4. Don’t Post Personal Info

There are people online who’d like to take advantage of your trust- don’t give them the opportunity! Don’t post your all information.

5. Enjoy Social Media

Use your intuition when dealing with people online, and have fun sharing your experiences with the people you care about.

6. Never ever threaten anyone

People often take threats seriously even if it is only a joke, most especially the authorities. When you have a problem with a person, go to someone you trust and confide with them. Let others help you instead of making things worse by threatening someone.

7. Be you

You are a very unique and amazing person. Copying and impersonating someone else will only hide you beauty within. Be yourself and make friends. It is better to be not liked being yourself than loved as a fake.

8. Do not ruin your image

Refrain from sharing and posting funny yet indecent or vulgar posts and contents. Even if you would gain a lot of likes now, remember that in the future, someone will come across that and might judge you even f you regret posting it. Humor is fleeting and never permanent but the internet will surely be there for a very long period of time. Do your best to avoid such drama.

References:

https://www.momjunction.com/articles/positive-and-negative-influences-of-media-on-teenagers_00107975/#gref

https://curatti.com/social-media-positive-effects/

https://sdvirtualschools.com/how-to-use-social-media-responsibly/

https://www.importantindia.com/22940/media-advantages-disadvantages/

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myhelrav · 5 years

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In Search of Wellbeing

Tales of Transition #3

As I started assembling my words and pictures for this post, it was 6 months to the day since Rod and I left Wellington, one of us heading north to to start the hard work of turning this beautiful renovation into a home, the other detouring to the South Island. That felt like quite a milestone. It was wild and wet here in the Bay of Plenty. It felt wonderfully appropriate for an anniversary of leaving windy Welly.

While I was contemplating this particular post, the words of the Navajo Prayer, In Beauty May I Walk, played through my mind over and over. Reminding me that I have indeed walked in beauty since I left my beloved city. Telling me how much the everyday beauty of our new home has helped ease transition.

A while back I read a piece suggesting a difference between happiness and wellbeing. A lightbulb came on! It’s no secret that I struggled for happiness as Rod and I adapted to the many changes of the previous 6 months. Yet in the midst of bouts of unhappiness, I was experiencing moments of what I have come to identify as wellbeing. Almost always outdoors, it might be feeling the mild northern winter air, soft on my skin. Revelling in the novelty of rain falling vertically (!), often so gentle it could barely be heard. Feasting my eyes on treats such as sparkling blue waters, our garden glowing golden against a dark sky to the east as the sun dropped in the west, yet another treasure discovered in that garden as the seasons started to unfold... Breathing in the heavenly aroma of our own citrus fruit. For however long that moment lasted, I felt at ease.

Those moments all felt like gifts, as did the notion that wellbeing and happiness could be separated. Letting go of happiness as a goal was liberating. It was a remarkably helpful strategy in helping me begin to deal better with the emotional conflict that, somehow, didn’t magically disappear after the excitement and turmoil of arriving in Eleventh Ave. And if you know me well, you know that I like my strategies! Here are some of my other strategies for this phase of Project Tauranga:

To create a sense of peace and order so as to counteract the many ways in which lack of peace was frustrating me

To attempt to forgive myself for the ways I was not coping and to concentrate instead on the ways I was contributing

To focus on gratitude

To seek out beauty

Peace and Order

Box city is not a peaceful place in which to live. No surprise there, but what did surprise was how long it continued to be a struggle to adapt.

Initially nothing had a place so nothing looked out of place. Locating phones, keys, or any other random thing put down “for now” was the first challenge. The pace at which we could create order out of chaos was limited. How fast could Rod could build shelves? How many chests of drawers - an item of furniture we’d had no need for in Karepa Street - did we need to find?

My heart was aching for the sons and friends I’d left behind, my resilience was undermined by week after week of very poor sleep, my body was wearied by prolonged hay fever - the legacy of dusty downsizing, cleaning product overload and far too many flowers in far too many rooms while Karepa Street was on the market... The energy and team work that brought us this far took a big hit. Rod, although faring better than me, was also exhausted. It took far longer than either of us anticipated to find our mojo as a team again.

We had also both anticipated that we would quickly adapt to the background traffic. “You’ll get used to it” everyone said. Except some don’t get used to it. Yup, it seems I’m one of those. The noise intruded on my thoughts, affected my moods and, even through earplugs, disturbed my sleep. 2 miserable months passed before I managed a decent night’s sleep. It was even longer before the noise stopped feeling like a malignant foe. In the wee hours I’d find myself staring down at the trucks that drive through the night, angry and hating them, wanting to scream back at the road, just shut up!

It probably sounds overly dramatic and I did feel as if I was becoming unhinged. Strategies were desperately needed! And so we set to work. To help turn my ears away from the traffic we put gently ticking clocks in the rooms I spend most time in to listen to instead. After months of investigating and pricing our options, I’m thrilled to report that work on double-glazing our windows will start in the next few days. Changes are also happening within. Rod and I started doing yoga and our lovely classes have helped calm my mind. I am learning to listen to my breath rather than the noise when it wakes me at night. My foe is shrinking...

Box city shrank too, but gradually, wearyingly, and not completely. In the garage, wardrobes and upstairs rooms, it still lurks in wait... As it retreated, we were able to create ever larger pools of calm beginning with my favourite corner chair, where I look out into the garden on two sides and back at the beauty that surrounds me indoors.

We may not have peace and quiet but we do have spaces that look peaceful and calm. I am working to keep them that way - in this new life of ours I am reinventing myself as a much tidier person!

Contribution

Forgiving myself is such a hard one. Luckily I have an ally in making this strategy work. Rod is thriving on the freedom to beaver away at his enormous list of home handy work but sees our physical environment as just one piece of the home-making puzzle. For him, making connections with new people and places is of equal value and he is very generous in treating the time that I spend seeking these as important work. Who knew that my addiction to Facebook and love of cafés would be seen as useful?

And so I ferret out new things for us to do. From watching live music in tiny venues to watching ride-on mower racing at a huge school gala - with a variety of weekend markets in between - Rod has cheered my efforts and said yes to most of my suggestions as we try to get used to life in this very different town.

We were incredibly lucky that I stumbled across an active women’s social networking group on Facebook early on. Thanks to this group we learned about the yoga class, joined a pub quiz team, hosted a book club, helped cater for a fundraiser, found friends to join me and my mother on a garden jaunt to the Waikato, found someone new for Rod to go biking with…

I am, of course, getting to know Tauranga one café at a time. All with Rod’s blessing and support. Go Team Tauranga!

Gratitude

I am grateful that Rod shares the need to go back to Wellington often. To drink in the comfort of familiar places and to wrap ourselves in the aroha of beloved family and friends. To lay aside the task of reinventing our lives and just be ourselves for a little while in the company of those who know us well.

We both feel very fortunate that we had time and means to say yes to nearly every opportunity that came our way to catch up with old friends, not only back in Wellington but in other parts of the country too. We are especially grateful to those who took the trouble to come and add to the new chapter being written in Eleventh Ave. Each visit replenishes our kete and feels like a blessing on this house.

Oh, how much I miss my “posse” of friends, to quote one of my new friends. I am so grateful for the women I have met here who help ease that ache. Who don’t expect that we can possibly take the place of old friends overnight but who are here for each other in very meaningful ways in the meantime. Who might just feature in a blog post all their own one day…

I feel very blessed by how much easier adapting to change has been for my partners in this venture. To be able to focus so much on putting myself first with Rod’s help is an enormous luxury that I have seized with both hands. Seeing how happily my mother potters around her “Little Nest” has given me and Rod profound joy every single day since she arrived.

And we are all grateful for our bountiful avocado tree. It has been delivering a big dollop of wellbeing every lunch time for weeks and weeks now. How lucky is that!

Beauty

The natural beauty of the Bay of Plenty is one of the things that drew me and Rod here in the first place. Has it ever delivered! Being so spoiled in the choice of beautiful things to see and do has helped immeasurably whenever I’ve tried to focus on the positive and give less energy to the negative.

We thought we’d miss our dramatic Wellington view but very soon discovered that our Tauranga view is equally mesmerising in a different way. Mauao, the iconic volcanic cone at Mt Maunganui, is a constant presence, drawing our eye and grounding us. We’re intrigued by unfamiliar patterns of clouds above us (we truly are living under a different sky.) We love to watch the ever shifting patterns of light and tide in the estuary that’s close enough to escape to for a very nice bike ride or walk.

Walking on the beaches at the Mount is also an easily accessible treat. Closer to home, trees and flowers provide endless inspiration to reach for my camera. The photos with which I bombard my friends on Facebook are but a tiny fraction of the ones I have taken, feeding my soul even while my spirits sagged. The variety of species that thrive here means there is garden colour to be enjoyed everywhere we walk or drive, no matter the season. We are beginning to learn the pattern of the seasons and are looking forward to next year’s arrival of feijoas and mandarins, magnolias and cherry blossom.

And the tiny first steps we have taken in growing vegetables fill us with hope that our dreams of a garden to nourish body and soul will come true.

To quote another of my new friends, “being out of your comfort zone is not comfortable!” For what seemed like the longest time, I felt lost and broken. Now that I find myself able to look back and write about those bleak times, I cherish the fact I am feeling more whole and more at peace.

This new sense of peace feels fragile. Bad days still strike without warning. Knowing that they’re not guaranteed, I am all the more grateful for the good days. For the beauty that cushions us through good days and bad.

In beauty may we continue to walk as Project Tauranga moves into a new year.

Arohanui

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g9mediaagency · 3 years

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Essential Real Estate Digital Marketing Strategies for SEO agency Kitchener

The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has had a severe impact on different sectors of the global economy and the real estate market is not an exception.

Restrictive measures to combat the virus spread has led to a halt in house viewings, even as uncertainty due to the pandemic has caused property owners to take their property off the market and homebuyers to press pause on their purchase decisions.

The various key players in the industry from real estate brokers, to agents, and property owners are all taking several steps to remain in business prompt sales, and minimize losses from the current slowdown in the real estate market.

Some of these steps include shifting their operations online and also providing virtual house viewings to would-be buyers, with the hope of closing deals over the Internet. Digital marketing, therefore, has an important role to play more than ever during this time.

For a successful online marketing effort that results in growth, real estate digital marketing experts have to develop, fine-tune and modify any marketing tactic they adopt to ensure that it fits the prevailing mood and desires of their target audience.

Here are five essential real estate digital marketing strategies for a SEO agency Kitchener

1. Focus on video content

Videos are fast gaining popularity as an essential marketing tool for many marketers. Not only is it a direct way to deliver a message, but it is also more attention-grabbing, engaging, and convenient and has a long-lasting impact on the viewer.

These are just some of the reasons why the use of video content is becoming very popular among marketers.

According to 2019 survey, 92% of marketers believe videos to be an important marketing tool, 83% indicate that video has helped them to generate leads, 80% say video has directly helped to increase sales while 89% say video delivers a good return on their investment.

All of these key statistics tell us one thing and it is that the use of video content for your real estate business should be amongst your top priorities right now.

This is most especially important in this current situation when individuals who might have an interest in buying a new home or property may not be open to the idea of open house viewings.

The use of videos is a suitable alternative to in-person house viewings. By creating a high-quality and informative video of the properties up for sale, you are giving potential buyers an opportunity to still view available properties albeit virtually from the comfort of their own homes.

Additionally, the number of devices, software, and applications that are readily available makes the creation of video much easier.

It is also important to note that the type of videos you create to convey your message is critical.

Right now, there are two popular video content marketing technique you should consider and they include:

– Branded Videos

Branded videos usually involve the consistent use of elements such as thumbnails, video titles, and signature aesthetics to create an appealing video of your showcasing available properties on the market.

Branded videos seek to inform the viewer through narration, which makes it engaging and allows you to deliver more information than text.

As a realtor, you can use this type of video to present an interesting “How to” or “Behind the scenes” of what you do that viewers will be sure to remember you for.

– Live Videos

Live videos are increasingly becoming very popular among businesses, influencers, and organizations. This in part is because of how easy it is to set up plus the different number of platforms from Facebook to Youtube, Instagram, and LinkedIn that support the feature.

As a realtor, you will find live streaming to be extremely beneficial as it allows you to showcase raw, authentic, and unedited footage of properties for sale to potential buyers.

Another superb benefit of using video content as part of your marketing strategy is that you can use it for a different purpose and platform.

For instance, you can repurpose your narrative video content as audio for a podcast, a short trailer for your Instagram, include it on your website, or turn it into a blog post.

There are endless opportunities using video content to promote your real estate business and you should definitely hop on it at this instant.

2. Facebook Messenger Marketing

With over 1 .3 billion active users of Facebook messenger, marketing on this platform is an incredible way for you to target and reach people who might have an interest in buying a home or property.

As the world’s most popular mobile chat application, this marketing program gives you direct access to your potential customers right where they are. Not to forget the scalable marketing solution that enables you to create audience segments, tailor and distribute your messaging, create marketing campaigns, and much more.

What makes it even more appealing is its average open rate with statistics showing that messenger on an average has a 70-80% open rate and 20% click-through rates.

Using Facebook Messenger marketing you can leverage all the platform’s incredible features that allow you to automate your business activity & lead generation process, build trust, etc.

Since Facebook Messenger marketing is not really popular yet as only 1% of businesses engage with their customers via automated chatbot messaging, It is a smart idea to capitalize on it now that it is less saturated most possibly by others in your industry – real estate.

3. Digital Audio Advertising

Visual advertisements are one of the most widely used and popular types of advertisements in the marketing space, but it is not really enough in this present situation particularly for an industry like real estate.

This is why you should consider adopting and using audio advertising as part of your marketing strategy to spread the word and generate exposure.

Audio advertising also referred to as programmatic audio is the act of serving advertisements to people listening to audio files on digital audio platforms like digital radio, podcast, or music streaming service.

So this simply means that your advertisement is incorporated into digital audio files and played to a listener for example; as a pre-roll or midroll in a podcast, during advertisement breaks on digital audio and within songs in a playlist.

According to a Statista report, there is an audio audience of 145.6 million listeners split between 141.34m for music streaming services and 81.64m podcast listeners in the United States.

This figure is a solid indication that the digital audio advertising market is huge and provides you with an incredible opportunity to reach and engage potential buyers.

Audio advertising is effective for marketing because it reaches people in certain moments, visual ads cannot for instance when they are running, taking a stroll, walking their dog, cleaning, and so on.

The different digital audio platforms also have distinct features and functionalities that make them unique in conveying your messaging to a specific audience segment.

A typical example is Spotify’s Ad Studio, a self-serve audio Ad platform that medium-sized organizations can use to promote their brand, product, and service in the non-music-related category.

Spotify Ad Studio’s targeting features allows you to select an audience based on age, gender, location, activity, and even listening preferences.

Using this self-service Ad platform, you can expand the exposure of your real estate agency and drive action from your target audience.

With Digital audio platforms you can define your Ad parameters, choose an audio format that better suits your marketing goals, and serve personalized audio Ads to your preferred audience based on their listening preference.

4. Interactive Content

Every effective and successful marketing campaign has one thing in common, the use of original content that educates, solves a problem, or entertains.

There is no denying the fact that content is king, and with the increasing popularity of interactive content, its role is becoming ever more important.

Conventional content mainly serves to inform, educate, and entertain an audience and may not result in an immediate response. It is a process whereby the reader consumes the content without necessarily interacting with it.

To make your efforts more impactful, you need your audience to do more than just consume content, you need them to get involved and interact with it.

This is where interactive content comes in and it is simply a type of content that informs an audience, and also prompts them to interact with it. The interaction could either be by answering a quiz, taking a poll, or participating in a multi-day challenge of some kind.

Interactive Content

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Interactive content has the ability to personalize the experience of your audience, even as they share their opinions or express their feelings about a particular subject.

Interactive content can be delivered through Email messaging, on social media feeds, blog posts, and so on.

If used correctly, interactive content can increase engagement, generate more views, and increase brand awareness which ultimately translates into more customers.

5. Snapchat Ads

Snapchat Ads is another online marketing option you should consider adding to your digital marketing arsenal.

This is most especially important for you as a realtor for three basic reasons– the platform’s low Ad pricing, targeting options, and user demographics.

Snapchat is a popular social media platform, with 53% of internet users in the United States aged 15–25 years who use the photo-sharing mobile application.

Millennials will be buying a huge portion of real estate in the United States, even as their share of the primary housing market continues to rise even in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The user demographics of Snapchat, its low Ad pricing, and target flexibility make it an appealing online marketing option for you to increase brand awareness and potentially receive significant returns on every Ad dollar you spend.

#seo agency Kitchener #SEO Agency in Kitchener

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eliteprepsat · 3 years

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With 2020 in the rearview and the hopes of a better year in sight, resolutions have no doubt been on many minds. New Year’s resolutions can be a great way to reset at the start of the calendar. They allow one to check in with themselves and to assess what deserves greater personal focus into the future.

Whether making a resolution (or two, or three) is new to you or a common practice, here is a list of resolutions specific to high school students that you might consider undertaking in 2021.

1. Improve your grades

Whether it’s resolving to score higher on your weekly reading quizzes or to go from a B to an A in math, try taking actionable steps to reach your goal. What is necessary to better succeed on those reading quizzes? Taking better notes? Going over assigned chapters twice? And what do you need to achieve that A? Staying after class to ask your teacher about the problems you missed? Visiting your school’s tutoring center? Improved grades don’t magically happen to us. Instead, we need to take the initiative to make them happen. So, go the extra step, and see how your grades improve.

2. Become a better student

The best students aren’t simply those with the best GPA. Beyond improving your grades, you can also resolve to become a better overall student this year. Participating more in class, asking teachers about extra credit opportunities, assisting classmates who could use extra help in a strong subject of yours. These are just a few ways that you can become a better student. What other ways come to mind?

Becoming a better student has many benefits. For example, voicing your thoughts by participating more in class can aid in developing your critical thinking skills. It also displays to teachers your interest in their course and your ability to lead. This likely won’t be forgotten when teachers calculate your final course grades, and it will also come in handy when you hope to receive a favorable letter of recommendation from them for college.

3. Focus on actual learning

Grades are important. Even more important, though, is actual learning. This means not just memorizing a vocabulary list for a quiz only to instantly forget it. It means internalizing lessons for greater purpose.

How do you go about this? Build a course schedule that will assist in a career you could imagine yourself pursuing. This might mean taking classes at your local trade school or taking AP classes so that you can test out of required courses in college to focus more on your major. Regardless, in all of your classes, always consider how the material can help you in practical, real-world applications.

4. Expand your mind

Don’t forget that there is also so much to learn beyond the subjects offered in high school. What new things would you like to try to learn or do this year? Learn how to code? How to tap dance? Or throw a pot on a ceramics wheel? The possibilities are literally endless, and so are the resources available to you. Research what kinds of classes are offered to high schoolers at your local community college. Perhaps your own school even offers enriching clubs you don’t yet know about. And, of course, there is no shortage of books, documentaries, and podcasts out there (many of them often free) to assist you in expanding your knowledge, too.

5. Expand your sphere

In addition to expanding your mind, you may also wish to expand your sphere in the new year. “Networking” can be very important for success—in school and beyond. So, whenever you can, reach out to teachers, counselors, tutors, and even friends to build up your network. You never know when you might need to call upon those you know for help.

6. Focus on your school-life balance

Education is extremely important, especially as a young person hoping to succeed in high school, college, and into the working world. But it is also extremely important to experience fulfillment outside of school. For more on improving your school-life balance, see our previous articles “4 Tips For Finding Balance: How to Study and Still Have a Life” and “A Guide to Achieving a Healthier School-Life Balance”.

7. Focus on self-care

After 2020, we could all stand to focus more on our personal self-care. Self-care involves nourishing all facets of one’s mental and physical health. What requires tending to in your self-care routine? Getting more fresh air or exercise throughout the day? Drinking more water or sticking to a regular sleep schedule? Stretching, meditating, or even just committing to flossing every day are all good goals that will add to your mental and physical wellbeing.

8. “Unplug”

While social media keeps us connected, helps us learn, and supports our creativity, it also has damaging effects. Studies have shown that too much scrolling on our phones increases feelings of isolation, inadequacy, depression, and anxiety. This likely isn’t news to you. But how do you break the cycle? If you think that you may spend too much time on social media, resolve to limit your use in the new year. A few tips include disabling notifications, leaving your phone behind when you go to bed for the night, and even removing one or more social media apps from your phone altogether. You can also redirect your attentions from social media to your offline friends and interests.

9. Break a bad habit

Excessive social media use can be quite a bad habit. What other bad habits might you benefit from axing in the new year? Biting your nails? Eating too many sweets? What about gossiping or even cursing? Write your intention on a piece of paper or share it with a family member or friend who can support you in your quitting efforts. And feel free to reward yourself when you’ve made strides toward achieving your goal.

10. Kick procrastination to the curb

But what if your bad habit is putting things off? Kick procrastination to the curb this year by trying to identify the cause of your procrastination. Are you easily distracted? Do your best to eliminate distractions at the outset of tasks. Are you simply overwhelmed by the task at hand? Break it down into more manageable parts on a to-do list. And again, don’t forget to reward yourself—both as you cross steps off of your to-do list and when you finally complete an entire task.

11. Get organized

Can you never seem to find your favorite pen? Your comfiest sweater? Does it take you ten minutes just to locate that history report on your laptop because your home screen is loaded with so many files? Perhaps your New Year’s resolution could be to focus on your organizational skills. Work to declutter your desk, your closet, your computer, or any other area in your life that always seems to be in the most disarray. Clear your space, and you will also clear your mind.

12. Become a better citizen

Once you’ve decluttered your closet, why not donate your unwanted clothes to a local shelter or thrift store? This is just one way that you can resolve to be a better citizen, giving back to your community in the new year. Other ways to help make the world a better place include assisting with food drives, collecting blankets and other necessities for animal shelters, and becoming a reading buddy for young learners. There should be no shortage of volunteer opportunities in your area. And with a simple Google search, you can discover them all.

13. Reach out to old friends and/or family

Miss your best pal from seventh grade? Only talk to your favorite cousin on holidays? Give them a call or shoot them an email to initiate a closer relationship this year. Don’t be afraid to take the first step. It’s amazing how quickly and seamlessly true friends and/or family can pick up where they left off when they reconnect.

14. Make a new friend

Alternately, you can always add to your roster of exiting friends. No number of friends is too many—especially when the friends are quality. Is there someone you know as more of an acquaintance who seems like a potential pal? Ask to sit with them in class or at lunch. Invite them to an event. Though it may be awkward at first, you’ll find that most people appreciate being reached out to as a friend. After all, don’t you?

15. Be a better friend

Although it’s true that no number of friends is too many, it’s also true that—as the dictum holds—quality is more important than quantity when it comes to relationships. So, how can you be a better friend? Practicing being a better listener is a great place to start. These articles from The New York Times and Psychology Today provide great tips on how to be a better listener.

16. Practice gratitude

This can take many forms. For example, you can practice gratitude by more regularly writing “thank you” cards to loved ones. Or you can begin each day by naming out loud three things that make you happy. You could also keep a gratitude journal, board or jar (on/in which you regularly write down things for which you’re thankful). Practicing gratitude can help to make you feel more outwardly compassionate and more inwardly positive and satisfied. According to a Harvard medical study, it can even improve your physical health. So, try one or a few of these practices in the new year, and see how it makes you feel.

A few final thoughts and recommendations

Remember that your resolutions can be as small or as big as you like. Often, setting smaller, more manageable goals is best, since you can more readily and frequently see your progress along the way. But don’t be afraid to set “shoot for the moon” goals, as well. Indeed, the old adage is true that you can accomplish just about anything you set your mind to. But also remember the wise words of Ralph Waldo Emerson, who said that the greatest accomplishment is “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you into something else.” So, whatever your resolutions for 2021, just be sure that they are right for you.

Serious about keeping your New Year’s resolutions? Check out Day by Day, Habitify, or Habitica—just three of many apps that allow you to keep visual track of your goals and your progress in achieving them. Such apps can help you to stay better focused and motivated on resolutions, and each is unique—from the more analytics-driven Habitify to the RPG-style Habitica.

And if you would prefer an app that is more tailored to a specific resolution, check out this list from PCMag, which includes apps for working on better eating, exercising, budgeting, and more.

Stacy G. is a writer and teacher who has taught composition, literature, and creative writing courses at a number of public and private universities across the U.S. She has also taught SAT, AP English, and Literature SAT Subject Test courses at Elite Prep. She likes poetry, dogs, and poetry about dogs.

#high school #studyblr #student life #study tips #New Year's Resolutions #goals #college prep

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harbingersystems · 3 years

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How AI-Powered Teaching Assistance in EdTech is Making a Difference

The year 2020 showed us endless possibilities of how things can be looked at anew especially in imparting education. The entire education system revamp got accelerated through technology innovation. For the learners, shifting to a remote, online medium has meant absorbing more multi-media content. As for the educators, to make up for the lack of in-person interaction, I believe the new system demands creating engaging sessions that are content-rich to eventually ensure effective course outcomes.

This positive disruption in education has thrown open many opportunities for innovation, predominantly in technology. And while this is a welcome shift, it needs to provide teachers easy-to-use tools that help them enhance the teaching-learning process. Rather, teachers will be able to focus on their core task using technology tools as enablers.

Enter Artificial Intelligence

Videos are an extremely effective medium to impart education. However, there is a dire need to streamline the vast content. Many of the education videos available (for example, Open Education Resource) are too long and unstructured. These need to be clipped/snipped appropriately to retain only the most relevant learning content visible. Further, there is a need to logically structure these into micro-learning bites for easy information retention. In fact, this holds true for almost every learning content. Additionally, interactivity and gamification could provide better student engagement and outcomes.

I feel technology will play a crucial role in assisting the education sector for these needs. The one that is particularly making waves is Artificial Intelligence (AI). What can intelligence that is artificial do for us? Well, it has proved to be a resource worth investing in, especially to make technology an enabling function.

For instance, examples of AI usage are surfacing rapidly, be it for student selection, course recommendation, interactive and intuitive content modules, nudge learning, adaptive assessments, reinforced learning, and more. The often-quoted Georgia State University is a good case in point for having used AI effectively in making a difference in the overall student learning at the university.

In this blog, we will talk about two specific AI-powered tools that can help teachers make learning more effective: Quillionz and Skimthru.

Quillionz – Leverage the Power of Questions

In the age of information overload, I find that the key to a successful learning experience lies in asking the right questions. Powered by AI and Machine Learning (ML) algorithms, Quillionz is a platform that lets you build a host of quality quizzes and assessments – within seconds.

Quillionz creates a variety of questions from any given content, including multiple-choice questions, recall questions, and short descriptive questions. Once the questions are ready, Quillionz can curate and enhance them. It lets you generate questions and also allows exporting questions into multiple formats, thus enabling you to directly upload questions on Learning Management System (LMS) or print the assessments.

Self-assessments are important and can be fun too for both students and teachers. Students can examine their own level of understanding without any judgment. Using QuilliQuiz, teachers can quickly reinforce key concepts whenever required. Basically, you can take a self-assessment, check your knowledge, identify areas of improvement, and also have fun sharing it with your peers. Creating editable notes is also very easy with Quillionz. It offers a concise and objective view of the original information so you can highlight important parts, summarize main points, and reinforce key concepts.

Additionally, Quillionz offer APIs for easy integration for product companies. It supports REST API and offers custom integration options with systems that use questions, such as EdTech platforms, assessments and quiz platforms, LMS, digital publishing platforms, and more. With multiple integration options designed to handle various OEM business needs, advanced tools and utilities, and custom input/output formats, Quillionz API can be tailored to suit your unique business needs.

Skimthru – AI-powered Video Navigator

This unique tool is equipped with an interactive video browsing feature making use of a patent-pending concept to create a set of Theme Clouds. Words used in a specific text are clubbed together to emphasize either their frequency or importance or even both. This as a Theme Cloud which helps focus on the core topic in a given video.

As an educator, say if you wish to use a particular YouTube video on a subject, then all you need to do is to ensure that the video comes with a transcript and enter the URL on Skimthru. With the help of AI, the Theme Clouds will get generated automatically based on the key words. As learners go through the video by moving along its timeline, Skimthru highlights relevant parts of the video and vice-versa. It is literally like skimming through the video. Such multiple Theme Clouds make up a Skimthru. This enables a better learning process as learners get precise relevant content that is easier to absorb and retain.

What the Future Holds

Artificial Intelligence, which was once just a dream, is now a reality – chatbots, recommendation engines, personalized tutoring, adaptive assessments, smart virtual assistants, and more, are already here. Educators agree that AI is essential for the future of learning and how it can empower both teachers and students and reshape the way we approach education.

We know that teachers have to handle varied tasks such as organizing educational material, evaluating assignments, grading exams, managing paperwork, communicating with the management, students, parents, etc. The good news is that AI can help teachers with all these administrative tasks in addition to providing all the teaching-learning aids.

I was recently a part of a Point of View session on 'AI-Powered Teaching Assistance in EdTech' where together with my colleagues, we have explained how EdTech stands to benefit from AI. Unfortunately, there is a notion that with the rise of AI technologies in education teachers may become obsolete. In reality, this is highly unlikely to happen as AI will instead become a reliable assistant for the teachers, helping them fulfil their responsibilities with higher efficiency. After all, while AI can be of great help, students will still need a teacher to connect with personally, and more importantly, to guide and inspire them in a way that no machine ever will.

#edtech #artficialintelligence #skilling #reskilling #upskilling

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