Video: Helping to Create 21st Century Schools

my del.icio.us

Digital Chalkies

An article that I found on the internet about what is web2.0 http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html  

Web 1.0		Web 2.0
DoubleClick	–>	Google AdSense
Ofoto	–>	Flickr
Akamai	–>	BitTorrent
mp3.com	–>	Napster
Britannica Online	–>	Wikipedia
personal websites	–>	blogging
evite	–>	upcoming.org and EVDB
domain name speculation	–>	search engine optimization
page views	–>	cost per click
screen scraping	–>	web services
publishing	–>	participation
content management systems	–>	wikis
directories (taxonomy)	–>	tagging (”folksonomy”)
stickiness	–>	syndication

Here is table showing the difference between web1.0 and web2.0. Another article I found is ‘using wiki in the classroom’ http://www.digitalchalkie.com/category/emerging-technology/ It has become evident that many teachers are starting to show interest in using some sort of web2.0 in their classroom. Using wiki in the classroom may be hard for some to master. This site has video tutorials on how to use wiki and you can go through it at your own pace. Teachers in the classroom could assign homework for their students to go onto the site and learn how to use a wiki at their own pace. The article also mentions then fact that many educators are questioning if the industrial age institutions we work in are ready for the kids of the digital communication revolution.

Back to the School with the Classes 2.0

With the start of the new school year, many teachers and students are seeking new products and technologies to help them through their upcoming academics. With the increase of teachers using blogs and wikis, and students networking and utilizing online tools, the demand for easier and more efficient ways of learning is on the rise. To me, the growing interest for web-based learning is amazing, which brought me to thinking; what if I were to consolodate some of the helpful online products and services that can help students, teachers and administrators alike? Well, I convinced myself. The following is a compilation of Web 2.0 products that I’ve personally researched and tested. These services are grouped into two main categories: “Tools”; and “Office Applications”. Some more specific services include: organizers, gradebooks, research tools, document managers, diagrams, and more.

There are going to be three parts to the “Back to School with the Class of Web 2.0″ series: part one covering tools; part two covering office applications; and in part three, real cases of Web 2.0 used in classrooms around the world.

Different tools students can use:

• Stu.dicio.us: Student organizer and social notetaking tool where students can create a schedule, track their grades, manage a to do list, store files for classes, and write public notes in an outline-like format. Stu.dicio.us also allows students to connect with friends and soon will include Facebook integration. More on Stu.dicio.us.
• Gradefix: Best described by Gradefix, “Gradefix intelligently organizes and prioritizes all of your homework so you are always on top of it.” Students that use Gradefix create a study schedule used to best spreadout and prioritize homework throughout the week in hopes to decrease stress and improve grades.
• Chalksite (Teachers): Chalksite is a system built for teachers, students, and parents providing teachers with an easy to use central point where they can communicate with students and parents, post assignments and grades, send messages, and manage a website for their courses. More on Chalksite.
• Engrade (Teachers): Similar to Chalksite, Engrade allows teachers to create an account and have direct communication with students and their parents. Teachers can manage student grades, track attendance, schedule upcoming homework, and provide students and parents progress reports.

 Comments

Basically the article looks at the new reality of the world wide web and how we can implement this into our teaching and learning enviroments.  As the article states that the ‘demand for teaching and learning is on the rise’ the implmentation of web 2.0 has assisted a new learning journey.

The demand for new learning arenas has pushed the erge for this new technologly and has consequently enabled teaching to be more efficent and effective.

Web 2.0 administrates students to interact and enage as a networked. Foe example sites such as stu.dicio.us enable students to use simple and reliable note-taking, share your notes, find your notes and create and organise documents. This allows students to respond to collaborative learning and contruct thier own constructive critism in the classroom.

How can ‘facebook’ be used as a teaching and learning tool?

 

As we approach a new technological area, educators must be aware of the implications technology will have on both teaching and learning. One can say, gone are the days of textbooks and pen. While the interest has previously been used as a tool to ‘obtain’ and ‘gather’ information, further innovations have lead to a extraordinary break through of WEB 2.0. Web 2.0 has allowed people to ‘network’ and place themselves in the heart and construction of the web.

Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet. Owing to the numerous abilities of this revolutionary web 2.0 educators can use this in their teaching and learning environment.

Facebook is made of many networks. Teachers can very well establish their own classroom network, and join the entire class together. The educator is also able to monitor all student progress and determine the capabilities of students.  Through this tool everyone can stay in touch contribute to the learning environment and social feature. Students can share both ideas and photos in a virtue world whereby everyone is granted the opportunity to contribute. For example, if the network is set up for a History class currently studying “The Vietnam War”, students can post images from their excursions or even multi-media videos they have found through searching the web. Student can set up a “wall” of their own choosing, and this can be used as the learning wall for example, where everyone adds comments, images, and multimedia or post- it-notes of a topic of their own choosing.  

For instance if the teacher set up a ‘fun wall’ on the Responses to the Vietnam War, the following could be posted up: Video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30zjpTEtE3Q [this looks at the Anti-War Movement of 60’s and 70’s] 

Photo: 

From such images and videos, students can also add comments and critique the multimedia. If students are not sure about a comment or constructive criticism they wish to give, they are able to ‘send a message’ in private whilst at the same time giving some form of contribution. As we approach a new reality, teachers must understand this new reality and ensure it is successfully incorporated in their teaching and learning environment.

Essential Features for online learning (week three tutorial)

-Whatever you do online must be:

1. Creative

2. Collaborative

3. A spark of defence: esentially used through the incoperation of multimedia

4. The need to be able to have trust and express confidence

5. It must be highly organised and clear

6. You have to set up your site to enable people to multi-task

Del.icio.us

What is del.icio.us?

del.icio.us is a collection of favorites – yours and everyone else’s. You can use del.icio.us to:-Keep links to your favorite articles, blogs, music, reviews, recipes, and more, and access them from any computer on the web. -Share favorites with friends, family, coworkers, and the del.icio.us community. -Discover new things. Everything on del.icio.us is someone’s favorite — they’ve already done the work of finding it. So del.icio.us is full of bookmarks about technology, entertainment, useful information, and more. Explore and enjoy. del.icio.us is a social bookmarking website — the primary use of del.icio.us is to store your bookmarks online, which allows you to access the same bookmarks from any computer and add bookmarks from anywhere, too. On del.icio.us, you can use tags to organize and remember your bookmarks, which is a much more flexible system than folders.You can also use del.icio.us to see the interesting links that your friends and other people bookmark, and share links with them in return. You can even browse and search del.icio.us to discover the cool and useful bookmarks that everyone else has saved — which is made easy with tags.                         

 Reflections

I have been a members of del.icio.us for over two months now and find it to be one of the most useful and helpful websites. Whilst undergoing a practical experience in the teaching profession, we were encouraged to sign up for del.icio.us. This website was an extremely relevant site for teachers, and it helped network a strong yet reliable use of resources for everyone to use.Rather then simply adding useful internet resources to ones “favorites”, del.icio.us allows users to tag certain websites. When adding other users, who may also be in a similar profession to themselves, they can form joint alliance whereby everyone has access to the useful tools. Furthermore the site also allows one to arrange websites into certain categories allowing the search of information to be a lot easier and simple.  

 

Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia

What is Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a multilingual, web-based, free content encyclopedia project. Wikipedia is written collaboratively by volunteers from all around the world. With rare exceptions, its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the Internet, simply by clicking the edit this page link. The name Wikipedia is a portmanteau of the words wiki (a type of collaborative website) and encyclopedia. Since its creation in 2001, Wikipedia has grown rapidly into one of the largest reference Web sites.In every article, links will guide the user to associated articles, often with additional information. Anyone is welcome to add information, cross-references or citations, as long as they do so within Wikipedia’s editing policies and to an appropriate standard. One need not fear accidentally damaging Wikipedia when adding or improving information, as other editors are always around to advise or correct obvious errors, and Wikipedia’s software, known as MediaWiki, is carefully designed to allow easy reversal of editorial mistakes.

 Reflections on Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a very up-to-date information based website. However, whilst the site allows anyone to obtain quick and relevant information, one must weigh up both the negatives and positives where examining ‘networking’.Initially, wikipedia seems like a simple site in which one can receive fast summaries of a certain issue, however, due to the nature of the site we must also be careful of the reliability of the site.The information placed on the website is placed up by any individual who wishes to contribite. This prime factor erges one to re-consider the accuracy of the information. Furthermore, as it is editied regurarly careful consideration in reference to the monitiroing of the website is essential. This site should simply only be used as a ‘reference’ and no one should take anything from wikipedia as the absolute fact.

Has “MYSPACE” become the new socialising mechanism?

 

According to society the five fundamental socializing agents include:

1. people
2. community
3. place
4. time
5. environment

 Traditionally all cultures and societies have based human interaction and relationship on the above five terms. However, as we enter into an era where technology has overcome many of the socialisation process we should ask ourselves: are we lacking our ability to socialize or has innovations such as myspace improved out socializing techniques? I will begin by giving a brief description of the capabilities of myspace itself:

• myspace allows one to create their own ‘webpage’ as such in which one can put up information, photos, personal detail, videos, polls, surveys etc; to inform other networked users about themselves
• myspace allow networked users, or according to myspace terminology ‘friends’ to comment on images and videos in which have been posted by the user themselves
• myspace works as an ‘email’ as such as one is granted the opportunity to ‘privately message’ any user, even if they have not requested their friendship
• myspace allows one to comment on another pages, in which everyone has view of the comment
• myspace permits users to join organizations (such as school groups or university groups) in which you can networked with many acquaintances which you have come into contact with on previous occasions.

 Now ill shall beg the question, while these features are the keys to critical human interaction (ie. Personal information, images and real life videos of oneself, commenting and forming group relationships) are they essential taking over tradition human socializing capabilities. Initially, while many may argue that myspace is essentially a well formed pass time, it has however formed a new generation whereby people solely rely on their computers for forming relationship and the key base of communication.If you can easily communicate as a group, sitting at home in front of a computer, why would one go out to meet new people, this only requires effort.Furthermore, communication via myspace, while it incorporates the aspects of: people, communication and time, I believe it lacks a place and environment. One may deem that myspace itself is an environment, essentially it is artificial and interaction is minimal. I consider the essential components of communication to be lacking: place and environment, and with out these we are not really communicating. The most important determination of communication is: non-verbal communication, and without this, how are we really networking???

Web 2.0: Different Programs

Please see image below for the various programs avaliable in the web 2.0: