Adobe Spark

 Adobe Spark

 Basic Information

Adobe Spark is a web and mobile platform that makes it fast and easy to create social graphics, web pages, and video stories anywhere.

Primary Use:

• [General] Create social media graphics, web pages, or videos—from anywhere.
• [Faculty] Documents, Web Pages, Presentation
• [Students] Projects, Presentation, Video Stories

Key Features:

• Provides ready-made templates for simplified website creation.
• Allows users to drag and drop items and content to customize their site’s look.
• Permits HTML-savvy administrators to input code to uniquely customize their website.
• Provides insight into words that would increase search engine optimization.
• Provides an email for users to field communication within their website builder too.
• Manages content such as blogs, marketing tools, newsletters, etc.
• Allows administrators to create role or password-based permissions to ensure users see only what they should see.
• Gives users insight into unique pageviews, subscribers, location of viewers, etc.
• Offers customers the option to purchase a unique domain name.

 
Meet Adobe Spark 

Category: Interactive Tool

Keywords: Creating Media, Video Presentation, Interactive

 Detailed Information

Full Description:

Adobe Spark is a design and media-creation platform that’s best used on the web but is also available on iOS and in beta for Android. The platform features three project types: Post (social graphics), Page (web stories), and Video (animated videos). Each of these features used to exist as a separate app — Adobe Post, Adobe Slate, and Adobe Voice — but now they all exist within Spark. Work is automatically synced across the web and iOS apps; published Page and Video projects are hosted on Adobe servers. If your school has an Adobe Enterprise ID, students can use that to access Spark. Otherwise, they’ll each need to create an account and — because of the social sharing function — enter their birth dates to verify they’re at least 13. You can start a Post or Video by choosing a template or starting from scratch. There’s a selection of school-specific templates for Post projects such as flyer, explainer/how-to, and report; several Video templates also are great for the classroom. Page templates aren’t built in to the creation flow (but you can find examples in the gallery). Pop-up prompts are used strategically to guide users through the features — for example, suggesting that you apply a design filter, use the microphone button to record your voice, or try adding a “Glideshow.” A how-to tutorial pops up automatically before a user begins a Video project. While creating, you can upload photos, add Creative Commons images, or sync your Creative Cloud, Dropbox, or Google Photos accounts. Videos can be uploaded or embedded from YouTube, Vimeo, or Spark Video. All projects are automatically collected in the Projects gallery for easy access. Published creations can be shared via social media, email, or shareable link. Post and Video projects can be downloaded, while Pages and Videos have the option to embed.

Tool Access

To access the tool online or for a related download link (if available) please see sources below:

• Free with limited features
• Subscribe with Plans

Advantage/ Disadvantage:

Lots of inspiring examples with ongoing updates, plus it’s easy to select and cite Creative Commons-licensed images. However, If your school doesn’t have an Adobe Enterprise ID, then terms of use specify age 13 and up. Teachers should be aware of sharing settings. This free, one-stop shop for creating sleek graphics, web stories, and animated videos is incredibly easy to use and challenges students to think critically about visual presentation.

Good for Teaching:

An amazing creation suite for both teachers and students, Adobe Spark is easy to use and offers plenty of inspiring templates to get started. You can browse the Education section of the Inspiration gallery and filter by project type (Pages, Posts, Videos) to get ideas. The Post tool is great for creating flyers or posters, which can be printed and displayed in your classroom. Students can create collages and graphic images to accompany lessons on any subject. Use the Page tool to design a scrolling, interactive lesson plan or have students create web stories to present their research or bring a narrative to life. The third creation tool, Video, allows teachers and students to select music and record their voices over slides that tell a story, argue a position, or describe a research project. For students, the key is figuring out how to organize and visualize their ideas. These tools offer rich opportunities to demonstrate learning while getting creative with design elements. The search integration for Creative Commons-licensed photos is a great opportunity for teachers to explain best practices around copyright and fair use. Check out Adobe’s webpage for using Adobe Spark in the classroom to get more ideas from teachers using the tool.

Good for Learning:

Adobe Spark projects can be highly personalized and empowering: Students can choose photos from their own collections, upload their own videos and music, and record their voices over slide presentations. Across the three project types, there’s plenty of choice to keep students engaged. The design interface is intuitive and easy to use — it’s the creative choices and finished project satisfaction that’ll continue to engross students project after project. Many will be pleasantly surprised by how polished their creations turn out to be. The numerous choices for best displaying information drive learning in Spark: Students exercise creative, critical, and strategic thinking in concert as they decide how a thesis statement, research report, or story should unfold. The Video templates in particular provide helpful guidance for structuring information across the slides. Sharing published work is another draw for students, but teachers should protect students’ privacy. Students can choose not to display their name and not to allow their published links to be discoverable on search engines. There’s a social aspect, too: Classmates can “appreciate” each other’s published projects and share each other’s work on social media. Accessibility is an issue, since support is offered only in English, but Adobe acknowledges this and hopes to add more languages in future updates. Advanced design students likely will need more functionality, but this platform isn’t really designed for them — they’ll want to check out the Adobe Creative Suite, Autodesk Sketchbook, or Procreate.

  Reviews [For Future Use]

Public and Internal reviews on the quality of the tool and ease of use to learn/ implement.

 Learning Expectation [For Future Use]

General guidelines of how long it typically takes to learn and be comfortable (basic, advanced, expert levels) with the tool as well as what capabilities users have at each level.

• Level of difficulty to learn/ use for each level:
  • Basic  Use/ substitution: 2-4 hours of use
    • General familiarity with the tool
    • Ability to import documents in from MS Word or Powerpoint
    • Ability to create a simple document and share
  • Advanced Use/ augmentation: 20- 30 hours of use
    • General comfort with the tool
    • Ability to make a presentation from scratch including text, graphics, video, and with basic thoughts on style.
  • Expert use/ transformative (modification / redefinition): 40+ hours of use
    • Complete comfort with the tool
    • Ability to offer advice and guidance to others on the tool
    • Ability to use the tool for various design purposes: presentation, booklet, ePortofolio…
    • Understanding of layout, style (font, colors, themes) to meet end users needs

 Examples

Additional Examples:

• Art Examples
• Photography Examples
• See Lessons for more education examples

 Tutorial Guides

 Templates

 Lesson

 Crowdsource  [For Future Use]

To learn from other faculty or to share your thoughts or resources (e.g. templates) please see below:

• Comments (either blog style or discussion based)
• Upload their examples/ samples (ability to post information in form)
  • Form components: (For future form)
    • Name
  • • Submission type ( Examples, Guides, Lessons, Templates, Reference Link)
  • • Title
  • • Purposes/ Uses
  • • Description (optional)
    • Attachment – Upload or Link
  • Date and Time Uploaded
  • Contact Information (hidden)
  • Download Stats
  • Rating Stats

 Reference

The key resources used to make this resource page. Most all information is public except for specific TCS generated resources. For more examples and resources (e.g. guides, templates, etc) see below:

• Common Sense Media
• G2
• Capterra