Teachers Discovering Web 2.0 Tools - Recently Updated Pages

Notes from HSNF (2008)

TGray — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 14:38:11 CDT

Ken Kay Keynote (7-15-2008)

Our national preoccupation for the past 5 years has been in asking: "Where are the underperforming kids and the underperforming schools?" A valid question to ask but in doing so we forget to ask "Is every student ready for the 21st century? Are they ready to participate in a new global economy?"

Three questions to frame the keynote:
1. Why are 21st century skills so important?
2. What is the Framework for 21st Century Skills?
3. What should districts do?

What is the shelf life of our learning?
In the 1950s - we learned about the solar system and planets. Shelf life = 50 years.
In the 1990s - we learned about the solar system and planets. Shelf life = 10 years.
Last year - students learned about the solar system and planets - two weeks later, we had one less planet.

The amount of technical information in the world currently doubles every 24 months. In the year 2020 (when our current kindergarteners graduate), information will double every 72 days.

We need students to not memorize and regurgitate facts, but

find

verify

synthesize

communicate

problem-solve

leverage

collaborate

with information. Ask yourself: Are we doing this for our students?

Currently, 60% of our jobs are in the service economy. By 2014, 80% of our jobs will be. What does this mean?

"We have a real crisis in self direction" - if we don't get ourselves motivated to recognize global competition, our kids will fall behind.

Partnership for 21st Century Skills

Learning and Innovation Skills:
- critical thinking and problem-solving
- creativity and innovation
- communication and collaboration
* Core of survival skills in 21st century and biggest shift we will have to make!

Life and Career Skills
- flexibility and adaptability
- initiative and self-directions
- social and cross-cultural skills
- productivity and accountability
- leadership and responsibility

Connecting 21st Century Learners (7-15-2008)

Sheryl's Blog and our sandbox

Cisco Network commercial - "More powerful together than we could ever be apart"
- "Imagine a world where people subscribe to people - not magazines"

Worst thing you can do in education today is embrace the status quo!
Can't begin with the end in mind if we don't know what the end is - need to think about shifts that are happening around us: Ten Trends : Educating Children for Tomorrow's World by Gary Marx

Focus needs to be on the passion of the students - not the tools. SmartBoards are great and incredible motivators, but how many of our students will be using them in their workplace? What is our legacy?

Slow School Movement

"If you could be replaced by a computer - then you should be."

Wikis To Watch

TGray — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 11:31:46 CST

Wiki Collaboration Across Geograpy

Flat Classroom Project: An assessment project between a school in Georgia and one in Bangladesh. You can read more about the project on the blog of the Georgia teacher, Cool Cat Teacher aka Vicki Davis.

International Teen Life Project: A global exchange of what life is like for teenagers, in its early stages!!

One Thousand and One Flat World Tales Project: An online collaborative writer’s workshop with participants from Australia, Malaysia, Korea, Serbia, Canada, the Dominican Republic and the United States. And it’s not too late to join!! Be sure to also read the blog of the participating teachers.

The Alatoba Proportion Project: A collaborative math venture between students in Manitoba, Canada and Decatur, Alabama. My favorite part - the video about how much snow it takes to close a school in Alabama!!

MemoryArchive: A fabulous new site for people to record their memories surrounding an event or an individual. After submitting your memory, it is reviewed and then "locked" so that it cannot be changed by others. This collective memory tool is a wonderful history resource!

Wiki Collaboration in the Classroom

Sophomore English WikiSpace (Punahou School, Hawaii)

Westwood Schools Wiki: Classroom wiki for Cool Cat Teacher. Be sure to check out the student projects and the Wiki Hall of Fame!

Holocaust Wiki ProjectThe teacher, Dan McDowell, has done presentations on his wiki projects and has posted several handouts and links on this page.

George Hall Elementary: Shares student exploration of Mobile, Alabama sites including narrated photostories and a podcast about making the wiki!!

The Husky Pawper: A seventh grade wiki newspaper!!

Sixth Grade Wiki- Paragraph of the Week (PAW): Student paragraphs hosted on a wiki to reflect learnings in history class each week. Be sure to check out the teacher comments and how these are used to develop writing!

Meyers Island: The wiki of a fifth grade classroom as they work to become a Web 2.0 classroom. Includes student projects and student blog links.

Science is a Verb! Wiki for secondary science includes student portfolios/labs and more!

Welker's Wikinomics: Shanghai American School creating an AP review text.

Cyber-Bullying

TGray — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 09:49:02 CDT

This video by Brad Paisely is a humorous look at how people transform themselves online, however, the situation can take very serious turns.

According to the STOP Cyber-Bullying website, "Cyberbullying" is when "a child, preteen or teen is tormented, threatened, harassed, humiliated, embarrassed or otherwise targeted by another child, preteen or teen using the Internet, interactive and digital technologies or mobile phones. It has to have a minor on both sides, or at least have been instigated by a minor against another minor. Once adults become involved, it is plain and simple cyber-harassment or cyberstalking. Adult cyber-harassment or cyberstalking is NEVER called cyberbullying."

"She Used to be Pretty: Schoolyard Harassment Goes Online" is a great article from Edutopia that shows the impact of cyber-bullying on students, and in particular on girls.

Some important links to learning more about cyber-bullying and what you can do to prevent it:

Internet Superheroes: Delivering smart, safe and responsible surfing messages to
children, teens, schools and parents, online and offline.

STOP Cyberbullying: What cyberbullying is, how it works and how to understand and deal with cyberbullies.

National Crime Prevention Council: If you' re like most teenagers, you spend a lot of time on a cell phone or instant messenger . . .

Additional Tech Tips

TGray — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 07:58:22 CDT

Evaluation of websites is a critical skill for students to learn in this age of digital and information literacy. Just because it is on the Internet doesn't make it true (see all the Wikipedia discussions at that tab on this website.) If we want to have our IT folks work with us to "unblock" sites - we need to be sure that we are taking the time to teach this critical skill.

The Cornell University Library has developed five criteria for evaluating websites which are helpful for students to remember. For additional guidance on helping students critically evaluate websites - visit this site by Kathy Schrock for tips and handouts appropriate at every grade level.

If you would like a demo site to teach students about what makes a quality site, start with this one on the "Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus".

In addition to understanding the power of the Internet, everyone needs to under this power is often abused by Cyber-Bullies. This page has additional information on cyber-bullies.

Finally, it seems that we should know all those e-mail "don'ts" but somehow - they still appear in my in-box!! A funny video with Stephen Colbert hits all the highlights!

Home

TGray — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 11:39:53 CDT

Keep on Learning!!

We've all been teaching but the world is changing around us - so we need to keep on learning about how to engage our students and use the tools that have become second nature to them! That is the goal of this wiki and the companion blog and our work together!!

One significant way that learning has been changing is the use of technology and in particular, the Internet. Opened to wide use in 1995, the number of Internet users increases everyday. Beginning as a simple place to find information, the Internet has now transformed into a place to locate and share information, to collaborate and build networks, to create!! While the Internet is not new, how we are using it is - thanks in large part to "Web 2.0" tools fo wikis, blogs, social networking sites and the like.

This Business Week graphic summarizing on-line users in the United States and what they are doing gives you an idea of what our students are doing on-line (click on the page to go to the larger view):

Why is learning to use this technology so important? Take a few minutes and watch one (or all!) of these videos to get an answer:

"Did You Know" by Karl Fisch of Arapahoe High School in Colorado.

Pay Attention by Darren Draper at the Jordan School District in Utah.

When I Grow Up by Matthew Johnson from Loyalsock Township Middle School.

Let's start by defining some Web 2.0 tools that we'll be using.

Blog (short for Weblog):According to WikiPedia, a blog is a user generated website where entries are made journal style and displayed in reverse chronological order. Now that we have the official definition out of the way - let's get one thing straight!! While blogs can be used as "online diaries" they don't have to be!! Teachers have been using blogs with their classrooms to have them respond to texts or deeper question, to reflect upon their learning in a course, or to serve as "notes" through use of student scribes. Be sure to check out the link to Blogging Tools and Resources on the left to see what teachers are doing!!

Wiki: A wiki is a collaborative web page that allows users to edit, change, or add content to a site. The Wikipedia entry mentioned above is one example of a very popular (and sometimes controversial!) wiki. This WetPain site is another example. The term wiki comes from the Hawaiian term wiki-wiki, which means "fast." These are very easy websites to create which can have a powerful impact on your classroom - teachers have been using them for their students to work together as well as to work with classrooms across the county or the continent!!

Podcast: A podcast is a digital media file (usually mp3) that is shared over the web via a syndication site. Teachers have been doing remarkable things which podcasts - not surprising given that so many students have and are comfortable using mp3 players!! From recording classes for those who are absent to having students read their poetry and writing aloud - there is no end to what podcasts can do in a classroom!!

Wiki Tools and Resources

TGray — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 07:03:53 CDT

A community is like a ship: everyone ought to be prepared to take the helm.

—Henrik Ibsen

Why wiki?
Of all the Web 2.0 tools, wikis seem to be the most controversial. Community editing of pieces in places like Wikipedia have made some suspect of what is on the Internet. While this may be true, teaching students to question the authenticity of websites should go hand in hand with using Web 2.0 tools. A July 1, 2007 New York Times article (attached at the bottom of this page) helps to go "behind the scenes" at Wikipedia and show the measures that have been put into place to preserve the integrity of information on the Internet.

Off my soapbox, one of the most engaging and thought-provoking pieces I read in learning about wikis came from Brian Lamb's article: Wide Open Spaces: Wikis, Ready or Not.

If you've got some time and prefer a visual approach, librarian John Hubbard does a nice job with video snippets of his wiki presentation. It gives a nice back ground on wikis and Wikipedia, the pitfalls of Wikipedia, and how to use wikis. Another user-friendly video on why wikis work come from Lee LeFever at CommonCraft. This one is a great resource to explain the power of wikis!

Finally, a posting from Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach at 21st Century Collaborative captures the essence of using wikis to build learning communities, particularly the visual from Stanford University.

Wiki Tools

pbwiki : As easy as making a peanut butter sandwich, seriously!! And not only is it free, but educational sites are now ad free!! A relatively bland site background wise but it gets the job done!!

We will practice editing and using pbwiki from the site Visioning Change.

wikispaces: Simple and easy to use - and they are giving away 100,000 educator spaces for free!! (Which means ad free!)

wetpaint: You are here! Easy to use and nice templates to make your page exciting looking!!

NEW!! A "report card" on the three wiki providers above from School Library Journal (5/1/2007) and WikiMatrix to help you decide the perfect fit for you!

Wikis To Watch
An annotated list of wikis in education. Updated regularly!!

If after reading through the amazing work of these educators you are concerned about introducing wikis in your classroom, read this blog post from Cool Cat Teacher to get some ideas of where to start.

Del.icio.us Bookmarks

TGray — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 09:08:50 CDT

"Social Bookmarking" is simply saving bookmarks to a public website (such as del.icio.us) and "tagging" them with keywords, much like a file system. Unlike saving web sites to your "Favorites" - with social bookmarking, you can view your websites from any computer. More importantly - you can share them with others! Common Craft has created a great overview video to understand the value of social networking.

Aside from keeping your websites organized and accessible from virtually everywhere - social bookmarking can have some powerful educational uses.
For additional information on using del.icio.us, be sure to read this Chris Neal article on the use of social bookmarking.

Quick and easy YouTube video on setting up and using a del.icio.us account - in case you forgot what you learned in the workshop or want to share with others!!

We'll be using del.icio.us for our training purposes, but there are other social bookmarking sites available!! One in particular you may want to consider is Diigo. Additional resources for that site can be found on this wiki by selecting the appropriate page at left.

Classroom Blogs to Watch 2

TGray — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 08:58:17 CDT

These classroom blogs to watch are organized by subject area. To view blogs organized by grade level - click on Classroom Blogs to Watch.

Mathematics
Mathematical Paintings and Sculptures

Math Playground

Science

Teaching People to be Amazing

The Junk Edublog

Science After School

Social Studies

The Journal of Harriet Tubman: Journal entries created by students about the life of Harriet Tubman - as well as links to additional resources.

World War II Blog : Student created stories about life in World War II from multiple perspectives.

Civil War Blog: Fictional blog of people living during the time of the American Civil War created by fourth grade students.

Diigo : Social Annotation

TGray — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 21:35:55 CDT

Diigo is a great, FREE tool to use when doing research. Most importantly - it is a great way to teach kids to "read" Internet pages (a highly important skills).

Diigo allows you to bookmark and view your pages from any computer, create "sticky notes" with questions, vocab, notes, etc., share the information you read with others. The possibilities for student use are endless!!

Watch this video to see Diigo in action.

Blogging Tools and Resources

TGray — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 18:32:05 CDT

Why Blog?
There has been much debate about whether blogging is a tranformational technology tool in the classroom or just another piece of technology that doesn't change instructional practice. This webcast with Will Richardson and Alan November gives some interesting perspectives on the use of blogging in the classroom.

You can also see some teachers and students discussing how they have used blogging in their classrooms, courtesy of The Fischbowl blog. It is important to note that the teachers and students that are featured have only been using blogs for about one year!! There is a long (16 minutes) and a short version (about 8 minutes) of the video presentation.

How to start? Some of the best advice that I have been given (and that you heard Will say on the podcast above) is to start by reading the blogs of others. Check out the use of blogs in the classroom below but also read these blogs by teachers about teaching. And dip your toes into the water by posting a comment or two along the way. (P.S. If you really get hooked - you'll want to set up an aggregator so that all your blogs will link to one place. Click here to get started!!)

Student Blogging as Independent Writing: Blog article by Eric MacKnight, a middle school teacher experimenting with blogs in his classroom.
Hear Our Voices : A blog by a middle school team attempting to create a learning community. My only complaint - they don't post often enough!!
Learning is Messy: A fourth grade teacher in Nevada and his reflections on using technology tools in the classroom.
G-Town Talks: A local administrator blogs about her work, her district, and her passion - KIDS!! New to blogging - she is going through the same experiences as you will!! (Bias alert! I like this administrator and am privileged to work with her on occasion).

When you think you are ready to write - read this list of Ten Habits of Bloggers That Win from Vicki Davis (aka Cool Cat Teacher). Then select a blog tool and let's begin!!

Blog Tools

All of the tools listed below provide free blog spaces. Some will require an email address in order to verify the account.

Blogger : This is a fairly easy blogging tool to use and allows you to add many extras to your blog posts. You can set up the blog to moderate comments, a useful tool when using blogs in the classroom. While free, you will need to have an email address to confirm your registration.

Edublogs : Designed for education, this tool is a bit more complicated than Blogger but has nicer templates and a different visual style. Moderation of posts is an option - although I have found it slightly less workable than Blogger. Again, you will need to have a valid email address to confirm registration.

ClassBlogmeister : Designed specifically for classroom use, students can be easily added to an account without individual email addresses. In all fairness - I have not played with creating this as you need a school pass code from the creator, David Warlick. But I will say that this is the first blog home that comes with great directions should you chose to create one here!

Classroom Blogs to Watch
An annotated list of educational blogs, divided by grade level.

Keeping Track of Your Favorite Blogs - Using RSS Feeds
Information page on setting up RSS feeds to make reading your blogs easier.

Be Careful!! After investigating blogging - you may find that it is addicitve! If your friends and family get concerned, take this quiz on Mingle to determine the level of your blogging problem!!

Wiki How

TGray — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 13:26:32 CDT

This page is designed to give information on creating and using wikis.

Understanding Edits: This video from University of South Florida describes the way that revisions work with wikis and is intended to calm any fears you may have about opening up your wiki for collaboration.

Blogging Safety

TGray — Sat, 30 Jun 2007 19:20:02 CDT

One of the many problems I have encountered in doing workshops on Web 2.0 tools this year has been the problem of Internet filtering. I know why websites are filtered - although at times it can be frustrating.

Because students are "out there" on the web when blogging - it is important to take some precautions. While you should always check with your own district policies, consider these tips from teacher bloggers:

Blogging policy and guidelines from Mathematical Musings.

Discovery Blogging Rules : A wiki that compiles the input from several teacher blogs and most importantly, was decided upon by students.

Bud the Teacher's awesome wiki with sample blogging policies, parent letters, acceptable use policies and much, much, much more.

Classroom Blogs to Watch

TGray — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 20:00:21 CDT

These blogs to watch are organized by grade level - just to show that all levels are capable of creating/contributing to blogs. For a listing by subject area - Click on Classroom Blogs to Watch 2!!

High School

“The Daily D”

AP Calculus Blog

Middle Level

Freak the Mighty: A seventh grade class in Alberta, Canada engages in extension activities around this book. Be sure to check out how the very clever teacher worked around having individual student blogs!

Excellence and Imagination: This link is to a posting that connects to student blogs used in a social studies unit on colonization.

Elementary Grades

Room 12 (Third graders from Seattle, Washington): Gives classroom updates, but more importantly check out the student blogs on the right hand side.

Civil War Blog: Fictional stories of life during the American Civil War created by fourth graders.

Primary Grades

Mrs. Cassidy’s Classroom Blog (First graders from Canada) : Be sure to check out the 1000 Names wiki link!

Marin County Day School's Trout Blog: A school documents their learnings with a local fish project - including some great work by the primary school set!! This is the same school who worked on the award winning Duck Diaries last year!!

One to watch for!! Readers Make Leaders is a new set of blogs that will focus on the books of an author, who will assist the students by podcasting how she writes books and providing background information, while also asking prompts for the students to respond to. Starts March 26th

Reading Made Simple with an Aggregator

TGray — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 10:11:37 CDT

A free RSS reader or aggregator allows you to scan quickly through new articles posted on your favorite sites that include an RSS feed. RSS simple means "Really Simple Syndication" so it sound scary but is really......well, simple!!

For a simple article explaining RSS and how we educators can use it, be sure to visit this Infinite Thinking Machine blog post! Visual learners - be sure to watch this video from CommonCraft!!

Once you have your RSS aggregator set up - most will allow you to customize them by category or customize what the updates looklike (headlines or full article). But the beautiful part of an aggregator is that you no longer have to search out your favorite sites to read - they find you!! This allows you to take reading breaks much faster!!

One site that allows quick RSS aggregation is Bloglines (and knock-on-wood it is not yet blocked from most schools to read, you may need to set it up at home!).

Bloglines is free and quite easy to set up. Once you have registered with Bloglines and replied to the confirmation email, click on the My Feeds tab at the top of the screen. Then, click on the Edit link. At the bottom of the left panel will be a link to import subscriptions.

When you want to subscribe to a site, look for the symbol that indicates an RSS feed is available. They often look like this:

If for some reason you are blocked from Bloglines, another alternative is PageFlakes. This is another free site that allows you to define your own webpage (which can be shared with others) that includes blogs, weather updates, sports (Go Sabres!!), and more. Again - very easy to set up and a nice visual for those of you who need that!! Visit my PageFlake and you can see that I have created separate pages for the types of blogs that I like to visit.