a kaleidoscopic world

Another Look at Blogs and Blogging for Professional Development

2008-04-14T13:30:00.000-07:00

Blogs & PD & RSS

Blogs and blogging for my professional development in this course has been thought-provoking, educational and a phenomenal experience for me! The opportunity to learn through collaboration by sharing information, thoughts, ideas and asking questions on blogs positively supports my learning. I can now relate and clearly understand that, “Sharing thoughts through self publishing and harnessing the collective intelligence of all users to generate information and solve problems, creates huge changes in how educators (me) and students (myself and those I teach), receive and respond to information. (Next Wave Now: Web 2.0-2007) Accessing various educational blogs and the actual process of blogging for professional development is how I keep and will continue to keep informed of the latest trends and developments in education and teacher librarianship. Blogging enables me to share and reach out to my colleagues with questions and innovative ideas.

Stephen Abram in Teacher Librarians: Sharing and Taking Care of Themselves (Sept/Oct2007) - mentions that he follows about 600 blogs a day, to try and get a sense of what is happening in all types of libraries. I look at a few blogs everyday and that is enough for me at this point in time. He has an extensive list of favourite blogs related to teacher librarianship, school libraries and learning technologies which I have 9 of, so I think it is a pretty good start. By having created my own blog and commenting on our classmates’ blogs and other educational blogs I am able to get ideas out into the world at an amazing speed which benefits me and others.

In the blog, Library Garden(2006) one of the contributors, Robert Lackie blogs about librarians and educators using Web 2.0 technologies which include blogging to communicate, interact, share, create and publish information online. This is exactly what we have been doing in EDES 545! Accessing Library Garden has influenced me to assess how effectively I connect with those who currently access the library at my school and those who will in the near future.

He also suggests that we try setting up a library blog and that we start receiving library or other related topics using RSS feeds via Bloglines. Jennifer had also suggested we do this at the beginning of our course, which I did although at the time I did not realize how beneficial it would be.

As our course progressed, I was amazed at all the information on other blogs online about education, teacher librarianship, technology and so many other related topics. I realized I wanted to be able to access them with ease and remain current. That is when I started to pay attention to what RSS was all about. Browser based Real Simple Syndication aggregator was indeed the solution as readers like me can subscribe to content on blogs and at many other sites. The feeds, also known as RSS feeds, XML feeds, syndicated content or webfeeds, contain frequently updated content published by a website. They are also used for distributing other types of digital content like pictures, audio or video.

When you first view a website, if feeds are available, the Feeds button will change color. You simply click the Feeds button and then click the feed you want to see. You can subscribe to a Feed to get content automatically which I have done and have experienced reading up to date material many times now. You can view your feeds by going to the tab in the Favorite Centre and clicking the star button then click the Feeds button. So easy and so amazing that current material can be accessed with speed and efficiency with just a click of a special button!

Blogging & Professional Development

Teacher librarians, who are isolated from others in their field, benefit from blogging in order to keep up with the latest research, share information and receive support from others in the profession. The article Ending Isolation ( Sept.2006) gives an example of this. However, it also reminds me of our own class. We are scattered all over Canada, but through blogging we can connect, learn, share and support one another in our professional development.

According to Laurel Clyde, author of Weblogs & Libraries not only do blogs bring current trends and issues to our attention, but they also allow us to keep up to date by reading and participating on library and information weblogs. I personally want to know what are the latest developments, how are other educators using Web 2.0 tools in their schools, what issues do they have to address and how do they effectively address them.
Subscribing to educational blogs and utilizing the RSS feeds keeps me current and answers questions I might have. I have learned that there is a lot of support that we can access.

One of the benefits of blogging for professional development is the opportunity to build my own professional network with my colleagues in this class. I can comment on their thoughts and links and they do the same for me. I feel much more confident about the possibility of going on the ‘gurus’site to leave comments and ask questions too. The following quotation is so applicable to our situation in this class. “Learning with others makes the difference, since learning is a social process…and has now gone online with blogs. Learning with others means you take control of the flood of information and data coming into your life.” (Miguel Guhlin – Blogs: Webs of Connected Learning – 2006)
Teacher librarians and educators like us, need to start leaving comments and linking those back to our own blogs for our own professional development, to learn more and to share knowledge. I will most definitely continue to do this even after this course is completed!

Examples of Blogs for Professional Development

As Dr. David Tobin notes in Building Your Personal Learning Network, blogs give us access to a variety of information sources and to people of whom we can ask questions, who can provide us with coaching and mentoring and who can challenge or extend our thinking and our professional development. There are a large number of blogs maintained by librarians and information specialists that provide valuable information. Deciding on which blogs to discuss in this section was a challenge as there are a number that I find very beneficial. One way to decide is by accessing well known bloggers sites such as Will Richardson and explores which weblogs they subscribe to. I must admit that when Jennifer asked us to subscribe to five educational blogs, at the beginning of the course, I depended on the list by Will. However, when I decided to update my blog, give it a fresh look and add more links, I took a more critical look at my original blogroll. I agreed with some of my choices but then added several more. I finally felt confident in knowing which blogs and bloggers truly influence and support my professional development and who I wanted to share with others. I look forward to accessing my classmates’ blogs to learn about some additional quality blogs and bloggers and to include some additional education blogs to my currently extensive blogroll!

Here are a select few blogs that I find very informative.

Anne Davis, EduBlogInsights covers many topics of interest to me such as collaboration, conferences, evaluation, literacy, professional development, social networking, teaching, Web 2.0, writing and many more. She is well known and well respected and her name appears in numerous articles. I like the fact that she has a lot of experience and knowledge to share.

David Warklick’s 2CentsWorth is a familiar blog to many of us. I appreciate Warklick’s open mindedness, his knowledge and his ability to share. According to David with regards to his blog, “It is a conversation. I blog to learn. I do not promise answers here. I will ask far more questions.” I would like mention that this is my philosophy on blogging too. I also blog to learn, and ask lots of questions and need to ask even more for my learning!

Doug Johnson speaks from the viewpoint of librarian and educational technology leader in his The Blue Skunk Blog. His blogs are quite amusing, full of witty comments, while encouraging his readers to think about libraries and technology in a different way. I have found that after reading his blog I do exactly that! Do I always agree with him? Not necessarily, but he does give us some inspirational ideas to consider and often in a humorous fashion!

Jenny Levine, the blogger behind The Shifted Librarian is well known for her knowledge of technology gadgets. She often posts information about ‘cool tools’, along with comments about how librarians could use them in their daily work. After reading her blogs, I am inspired to discuss cool tools in a blog that could be accessed by the teachers at my school. Sharing technology and getting their comments and feedback would be beneficial to my learning, support their learning and benefit the library. Jenny Levine is very good at explaining our profession and the role of technology in it. As she keeps telling librarians, the time to shift is now, hence the name, The Shifted Librarian!

Joyce Valenza’s Neverending Search is well known and one that I often check for updates on my RSS. I find that she frequently blogs and her topics are current and very practical, so I have to keep checking for updates which can be overwhelming at times. I don’t think that I will ever be able to keep up with her. Now that this course is winding down, it is amazing what a better understanding that I have of Joyce Valenza’s 21st Century School Librarian. We are truly living it!

I really enjoy the site of Hey Jude, created by Judy O’Connell from Australia. She has a lot of practical ideas on her well organized blog. I particularly like to access the section on her blog about Judy’s Web 2.0 tools. She has selected ones that she feels are beneficial to students and educators. Judy very deservingly was awarded Best Librarian blog at the 2006 EduBlog awards. (See her comment that she left on my blog in response to SNS security issues and concerns from last week’s blog assignment.)

Will Richardson, Weblogg-ed is another popular blogger that I return to. His site is dedicated to discussions and reflections on the use of various Web 2.0 tools. Will discusses the use of blogs, wikis, RSS, podcasts, social bookmarking and other read-and-write technologies. His site is one that I would utilize with staff to support their learning of various web tools and how to successfully apply them in the classroom. I am hoping to purchase his book for our Professional Library at my school.

Closing Thoughts on Blogs/Blogging for Professional Development

The blog tracking and searching site Technorati published the following statistics in April 2007,

- 70 million weblog
- about 120,000 new weblogs each day, or 1.4 new blogs every second
- 1.5 million posts per day, or 17 posts per second
- growth from 35 million to 75 million blogs in 320 days

I personally had no idea of the popularity of blogging. The statistics are incredible and impressive! More and more educators are becoming active in blogging including myself!

Michael Stephens, the author of the article Tools from Web 2.0 & Libraries: Best Practices for Social Software Revisited (2007) discusses that, librarians join the blogosphere to participate in a community, share expertise and gain recognition within the field. According to Stephen’s, today, the library blog has become its own platform and I would have to agree with him. We know that almost anything can be embedded in a blog now from Flickr, to audio (podcasts, voicethreads, avatar), to video (YouTube). I have explored these tools in this course and hope to introduce some to our staff and students when blogging.
Eventually, if not already, school boards will look for administrators with experience blogging and using other technologies. I am planning on applying to administrative positions with our school board and will add a technology strand to my vitae upon completion of this course!

Mary Ghikas, The Green Kangaroo Blog discusses her amazement at the vitality and generosity of the professional exchange that takes place on blogs. Like her, I too have shamelessly grabbed references to other blogs and web sites, as well as to interesting papers and new books to read. She is also struck by the reflectiveness of many posts, the thoughtful consideration of context, of related issues and concerns of evaluation. Last of all, she is amazed by the personal voice within the blogs which reveal frustrations, happiness, anger and optimism. I have read and felt these emotions in my colleagues blogs and am learning to develop my own personal voice and feelings when blogging.

I have discovered that I find blogging quite gratifying! I look forward to viewing my colleagues’ posts and how they approached the various Web 2.0 tools that we have explored in this course. I find myself reading and checking out their links which connects to other interesting sites which leads me deeper into my learning. It is like a domino effect! I am beginning to feel more confident in my abilities to effectively blog. I look forward to continuing blogging and accessing blogs for my professional development. Learning from others and sharing with my fellow educational bloggers has and will continue to be a part of my ever evolving teaching profession.

I would like to leave you with this closing thought on blogs and blogging for professional development…

"You have great ideas. You’ve done great work. Keeping your innovations and learning to yourself, won’t let your light spread. Everyone can find 15 minutes a week to blog about something they learned or did that week; comment on an idea in Ning, on a wiki or on a blog or start an article preferably with a partner. Share. Your ideas will spread, and learning and libraries will improve. To paraphrase the old saw, in times of extreme change the spoils go to the learners-not the learned.”." (Stephen Abram- Teacher Librarians: Sharing and Taking Care of Themselves)

Final Thoughts and Reflections of EDES 545

2008-04-13T22:49:00.000-07:00

When the opportunity came to sign up for this course, I was quite eager to do so as I was aware of the need to become more technologically literate. However, there was a lot of anxiety that came with this need as I did not feel overly confident in being able to understand the technology of the 21st century learner. Admittedly, I am ‘digital immigrant’ but I really, really wanted to be a ‘digital native’!! So, I took and deep breath and jumped in!

I can honestly say that when I went through the course outline I had heart palpitations! Lots of readings really didn’t intimidate me, rather they are a tool that I welcome, to support my learning and understanding. Blogging and blog topics with Web 2.0 tools… yikes! I quickly learned to read and read and read more to find out about these tools. I liked the fact that Jennifer used the term ‘explore’ and that is exactly what I did! This process was ‘hands-on’ learning which for myself was very effective. One can read all they want but unless they actually try the tool, only partial learning will occur.

Connecting these tools to our teaching and learning really makes one critically examine how they teach. Throughout this course I would often reflect back on a quote that I came across; ‘There is a major shift that is critical to our classrooms, not only in what we teach our students, but also how we teach our students.’ (David Warlick) This course encouraged me to critically analyze my teaching strategy and philosophy and gave me the courage to implement change to positively affect student learning.

My cup overfloweth comes to mind when reflecting on all the readings and discussions that we had on our blackboard. Reading the topics for discussion and having to make a decision as to which one to focus on and respond to was a challenge at times. Truly I wanted to read them all but realistically I couldn’t. If you were a random abstract learner before, you had to make adjustments and become a concrete sequential learner or you would not accomplish very much. I mentioned the domino effect in one of my blogs when it comes to accessing information in this course. A reading would have references that you would check out which would have references to other writers or topics and so on. A classmate would share an article read that connected to another article and so on. There were days that I wanted to curl up with my computer and immerse myself in reading and responding to it all but alas my wiki was waiting!

The opportunity to work with a partner on creating a wiki and supporting a discussion was very worthwhile. Not only did I learn about wikis but I was able to develop some skills using the SNS of Facebook for educational purposes. Katie and I corresponded and planned on Facebook and continue to do so. I learned what an effective tool wikis are for sharing of information, thoughts and ideas. I can see so many possibilities for using them professionally with the staff and as a learning and sharing tool with students. I felt that the format used in learning about wikis was an excellent way to learn about the versatility of this tool with a partner and through the opinions and shared information from others.

Deciding which Web 2.0 tool to use to share with my staff as a professional development opportunity was not too difficult as blogs support writing and that is a focus for our school. What made this assignment somewhat challenging was limiting what to include in the paper. I wanted to share details on how I would present this tool to my staff with links to all the great information that I have accessed in this course from articles, other seasoned bloggers and from information my classmates have accessed throughout this course. I am looking forward to reading about the PD choices my classmates have made and perhaps incorporating them into future professional development days at my school.

Reading, discussing, sharing, partnering, exploring, creating, and participating are all effective learning strategies that enabled this course to be so successful for me.
I will admit that there were times that I felt overwhelmed and learning to plan and balance the workload became critical at times. The flexibility that Jennifer showed when making adjustments to our final assignments was very intuitive on her part and greatly appreciated. I can be my own worst enemy as I have high expectations of myself. I found that I spent a great deal of time on my assignments and readings and I began to loose my personal voice in my blogging. It was Jennifer who pointed this out to me and made me realize that academically I had a good understanding of the material but I needed to remember my role in the equation. I will not forget this and plan to continue blogging with a more personal voice on educational matters, issues and challenges.

An overall message that I am taking away from this course is that students today learn differently and I will need to change the way I look at teaching and how I teach in order to reach them and be an effective educator. Perhaps I am a ‘digital immigrant’ but after taking this course I feel that I am closing the gap and coming closer to understanding and developing my technology skills to those of a ‘digital native’.

“Todays education system faces irrelevance unless we bridge the gap between how students live and how they learn.” (21st Century Learning)

Web 2.0 Tool of Choice

2008-04-13T21:47:00.000-07:00

Blogging is my tool of choice for sharing on a professional development day because it positively affects student learning in numerous ways. Will Richardson on his blog Weblogg-ed, discusses the positive impact of blogging; it enhances student writing, helps students find a voice, creates enthusiasm for writing, engages students in conversations, provides an opportunity to learn about responsible journalism and empowers students.

Some background and history of our school provides the connection as to why Blogs and Blogging is a good tool of choice for our staff to explore during a professional development day to utilize in their teaching. Currently our school is very much involved in a writing focus. One of our School Development Plan goals is to develop and support student writing skills. Our school is involved with the AISI project of Assessment for and of Learning and has initiated meaningful assessment of student writing skills through the use of rubrics and self assessment. Teachers have received various training sessions related to writing, including Six Write Traits in order to support student writing.

Although some teachers may be aware of blogs, there will be some that will need more of an explanation. Introducing this topic would be accomplished by sharing the video, What is a Blog? found on YouTube. (Arrangements would be needed to have the site unblocked at my school) The commentary on this video clearly explains blogs with the use of a ‘Wine Blog’ site as an example. There will be teachers who question the benefits of blogs and blogging. Without going too deeply into my own experience in this course and all the amazing readings and my own learning, I would share with them The 8 Ways Blogging Makes Me a Better Teacher.

By having each teacher create their own blog, I anticipate support of their own personal learning and understanding of student writing. Through accessing various educational blogs that discuss writing and to learn first hand about the challenges and successes of writing through blogging, their own writing skills will develop.

Time would be taken to share some blogs including my own. Although I am not as experienced as some bloggers such as Joyce Valenza and Will Richardson, the staff relates more to me and I would be able to convince them that if I can blog so can they! Taking them on a tour of my own blog would enable me to point out some special features of blogging such as the various Web 2.0 tools explored, the sidebars with various lists of bloggers and blogs that can be accessed and comments made by my colleagues and outside bloggers.
Some other blogs that I would share with them consist of ones that I personally find very informative, user friendly, current, and support the development of Web 2.0 technologies and libraries:

Hey Jude (very user friendly and informative)
Blue Skunk (this would appeal to our Grd 5/6 Teacher, who provides Tech support and has a great sense of humour including sarcasm)
Library Garden (may appeal to some of my colleagues who are intimidated by independently blogging on a regular basis as it is a group effort)
The Fisch Bowl (great for support of technology in the classroom)
Weblogged (Will Richardson, he is so knowledgeable and covers a lot of information)
Neverending Search ( Joyce Valenza – a guru!)
Cool Cat (introduces a number of technology tools)

The teachers would then be encouraged to discuss with their students about writing and have the students create their own individual blogs. Blog Basics for Classrooms is an excellent site for teachers to access to learn about blogging with students as it is user friendly and very visually appealing. In order to encourage students to initially write, the focus for writing on their blogs would include topics of interest specific to them. Student blogs would give them personal responsibility of their own learning. They would be able to express how they personally feel about something and let their opinions be heard. We want them to write, however we would also need to discuss what an appropriate topic choice is and why. At this time, it would be important to discuss security issues related to blogging and share this link as it is a list of tips for staying safe online for tweens and teens.

The importance and benefits of leaving comments on blogs needs to be discussed with the staff. Sharing an informative link on guidelines (10 tips for a better weblog) for good blogging would be useful. Encouraging all staff to comment on student blogs and students to comment on one another’s blogs is important as it will make their learning more relevant and meaningful. Students will learn from one another and so will the teachers learn from their students and in turn learn from one another. As we have experienced in this course, receiving comments is so motivating and inspirational!

Just as we have participated in reflecting in this course, we need to encourage our staff and students to do the same on their blog. As Anne Davis discusses on her blog, EduBlog Insights, we need to let our students write their way into their own understandings and discover answers to the questions they need to ask. We need to let them be creative, off the wall, and branch out with their own thoughts. Through reflecting on their blogs, staff can discuss and share their thoughts about writing and issues in education.
By now the staff and students should be well on their way to blogging for professional and personal development.

Where do we go from here?
The importance of continuing to blog needs to be emphasized to both staff and students. I would encourage them to ask questions on their blogs as other teachers and students may have an answer or an opinion that they could share by leaving a comment. I would encourage them to create a separate blog entry on a particular subject of interest. I would remind them to access other educators’ blogs as someone ‘out there’ with similar interests may have something significant and relevant to say that will support their learning or understanding. Sharing thoughts on their blogs with regards to writing as an adult, student writing and addressing challenges and assessment issues will be effective for their professional development. I would remind the staff and students to subscribe to their classmates blogs as well as other educational blog sites to experience many different perspectives.

On additional PD days the focus would be sharing some ‘cool tools’ that could be embedded on staff blogs, like podcasting, VoiceThread, and Flickr.
Once the staff is more confident and more knowledgeable regarding the use of these Web 2.0 tools, we can introduce them and teach our students to do the same. This particular professional development topic would be very collaborative as now the teachers would be experienced bloggers and could contribute to the planning and focus of a ‘Cool Tool’ professional development day.

Blogs and blogging is a very practical and effective Web 2.0 tool to introduce to my staff on a Professional Development day. Blogs support the development of our own writing skills, and student writing skills, provides access to quality educational blogs which deepens our understanding of writing and enables us to express our opinions, concerns and ask questions relating to writing.

“Blogging makes us better as professionals but it also makes our classroom better.”
(Vicki Davis, Cool Cat Teacher Blog)

Closing Thoughts on Blogs/Blogging for Professional Development

2008-04-06T12:16:00.000-07:00

The blog tracking and searching site Technorati published the following statistics in April 2007,

- 70 million weblogs
- about 120,000 new weblogs each day, or 1.4 new blogs every second
- 1.5 million posts per day, or 17 posts per second
- growth from 35 million to 75 million blogs in 320 days

The statistics are incredible and impressive. More and more educators are becoming active in blogging including ourselves!

Blogs and blogging can and do enable professional development. On EduBlog Insights a teacher named Anne writes about how a librarian's blog—The Shifted Librarian—allows her to learn about a conference she could not attend. She writes, “Those learnings led me to even more learning on the blogs of those who had presented. Talk about professional development.”

Michael Stephens, the author of the article Tools from Web 2.0 & Libraries: Best Practices for Social Software Revisited(2007) discusses that, librarians join the biblioblogosphere to share their voices. The reasons for doing so is to participate in a community, share expertise and gain recognition within the field. According to Stephens, today, the library blog has become its own platform. Almost anything can be embedded in a blog now: pictures from Flickr, audio, video (YouTube), chat(Meebo), presentations (SlideShare), bookmarks (del.icio.us), and more(our stuff, VoiceThread, Podcast, avatar). Sounds like our course!
Librarians are finding ways to add value to their online presence through use of a blog.
Eventually, if not already, school boards will look for administrators with experience blogging and using other technologies. I feel that we can definitely add a technology strand to our resume when applying for administrative positions upon completion of this course!

Mary Ghikas, The Green Kangaroo Blog, succinctly states that when exploring the ‘biblioblogosphere’, she is amazed by the vitality and generosity of the professional exchange taking place on blogs. Like her I too have shamelessly grabbed references to other blogs and web sites, to interesting papers and new books to read. She is also struck by the reflectiveness of many posts, the thoughtful consideration of context, of related issues and concerns of evaluation. I have seen a number of these in the educational blogs that I have accessed. Last of all, she is amazed by the personal voice within the blogs, revealing frustrations, happiness, anger and optimism.

In this time of Web 2.0, we look to each other for news, recommendations, and advice. We want to be involved and we need to write our own story. Blogs can be opinionated, and personal, but they still serve as a valuable research resource for professional development.
"You have great ideas. You’ve done great work. Keeping your innovations and learning to yourself, won’t let your light spread. Everyone can find 15 minutes a week to blog about something they learned or did that week; comment on an idea in Ning, on a wiki or on a blog or start an article preferably with a partner. Share. Your ideas will spread, and learning and libraries will improve. To paraphrase the old saw, in times of extreme change the spoils go to the learners-not the learned." (Stephen Abram- Teacher Librarians: Sharing and Taking Care of Themselves)

Examples of Blogs for Professional Development

2008-04-05T22:51:00.000-07:00

As Dr. David Tobin notes in Building Your Personal Learning Network, blogs give us access to a variety of information sources and to people of whom we can ask questions, who can provide us with coaching and mentoring and who can challenge or extend our thinking and our professional development. There are a large number of blogs maintained by librarians and information specialists that provide valuable information. Where can we find such blogs? There are many to choose from and one way is to access the blogs of will known bloggers such as Will Richardson. On his blog, you can find links to an extensive list of quality blogs to access.

Deciding on which blogs to discuss in this section was a challenge, as there are a number that I find very beneficial. I look forward to accessing my classmates blogs to learn about some additional quality blogs and bloggers and to include, some additional education blogs to my currently fairly extensive blogroll!

Here are a select few blogs that I find very informative.

1. Anne Davis, EduBlogInsights, works at Georgia State University in the Instructional Technology Center in the College of Education as an Information Systems Training Specialist. She works with faculty, staff and students in the area of instructional technology. She has over 20 years experience as an elementary classroom teacher, an instructional lead teacher, a reading specialist, and an instructional technology specialist. Under the title of her blog she has written, 'Comments, reflections and occasional brainstorms' which does reflect what a blog should be about. Anne has covered many topics of interest on her blog, such as collaboration, conferences, evaluation, literacy, professional development, social networking, teaching, Web 2.0, writing and many more. We can access her numerous blogs, leave comments and learn from her, as "Edublog is a place to reflect, discuss, and explore possibilities for the use of weblogs in education." (Anne Davis)

2. David Warlick's, 2CentsWorth is a familiar blog to many of us. He is a well known blogger and speaker who has a wealth of information to share, ranging from assessment to conferences, to evaluation, to the digital divide and many more. I appreciate Warlick's open mindedness, his knowledge and his ability to share. When reading on his blog 'About this Blog', I was impressed by his focus for his blog, that he writes to have his ideas criticized, deconstructed, recombined, added to, and when possible, to be used. According to David with regards to his blog, "It is a conversation. I blog to learn. I do not promise answers here. I will ask far more questions." I have and will continue to learn a great deal from David Warlick!

3. Doug Johnson speaks from the viewpoint of librarian and educational technology leader in his The Blue Skunk Blog . He is an author and speaker in the school library world. His blogs are quite amusing, full of witty comments while encouraging his readers to think about libraries and technology in a different way. According to Johnson, he created this blog so that is a convenient way for people to respond to his writing or presentations, a sounding board for ideas he is currently thinking or writing about. Why Blue Skunk? Check out his blog to find the answer! A very valuable and informative blog for librarians.

4. Jenny Levine, The Shifted Librarian, focuses on changes to the role libraries play as information becomes more portable and technology becomes more prevalent. She is on top of new developments, and travels widely so is able to provide on-the-spot conference reports. Levine’s goal according to Library Journal 2003 is to help librarians become technologically adept so that they can deliver services when and where they wish to use them in their preferred medium and platform. She often posts information about ‘cool tools,’ along with comments about how librarians could use them in their daily work. Some history behind Levine is that when the world wide web came along, she was one of the first librarians out there, finding the good information and material and sharing it with her colleagues in training sessions. In 1995 she created the Librarians’Site du Jour web site where she reviewed a reference web site in detail every day to convince librarians that the web was extremely useful for everyday reference and to give them a reason to make visiting the web a daily habit. She is known for her knowledge of technology gadgets. Her web log convinces many librarians to consider how new technologies might extend services beyond the normal boundaries of location and time. She is very good at explaining our profession and the role of technology in it. As Jenny Levine keeps telling librarians, the time to shift is now, hence the name, The Shifted Librarian!

5. Joyce Valenza's Neverending Search This site is a well known and favorite listed site for librarians. Take a look at it to see why if you haven't already and go to her other sites as well. Librarians and educators are encouraged to join any discussion about emerging technologies, searching and information fluency. Her blogs are frequently focused on a discussion of information fluency, teaching and learning in the 21st century.

6. Judy O’Connell, Hey Jude blog comes out of Australia by a very 'forward thinking' Librarian. She discusses education-related items in general, provoking her readers to take a more criticial look at education and technology. I like what she has to say on her well organized blog. The HeyJude blog she has a section called Judy's Web 2.0 Notes where you can access information about blogging, and various Web 2.0 tools that she feels are beneficial to students and educators. She includes a video clip from YouTube about Will Richardson speaking to blogging and a list of her favorite edu-bloggers. Judy was awarded Best Librarian blog at the 2006 EduBlog awards. (see her comment that she left on my blog in response to SNS security issues and concerns from last week's blog assignment)

7. If you are not sure that you want to blog independently, then you could try getting some of your colleagues at school or fellow librarians to work together on a blog. Library Garden is an example of a blogger-born site where there are a number of contributing members. It was started by Peter Bromberg at South Jersery Regional Library Cooperative, with Janie Herman at Princeton Public Library. Library Garden began after the three teacher librarians introduced some Web 2.0 tools to the Central Jersey Regional Library Cooperative's executive board. According to one member, Robert Lackie, “it has become a just-right mixture of a librarian groupgenerated blog, creating an ongoing conversation among librarians with differing perspectives (public, academic, school, consortial, youth), but with one shared goal: ensuring the health and relevance of libraries."

8. Will Richardson, Weblogg-ed is another very popular blogger. His blog is one of the oldest edublogs on the internet. Richardson blogs about teaching technolgy and literacy in schools. He actually has an entry that is about blogs on bloggers who blog on his wiki. Will provides ongoing inspiration for educators. His site is dedicated to discussions and reflections on the use of various Web 2.0 tools. He focuses on Weblogs, wikis, RSS, audiocasts and other Read/Write Web related technologies in the K-12 realm, technologies that are transforming our classrooms.

Blogs & Blogging for Professional Development

2008-04-05T20:57:00.000-07:00

According to David Warlick, a blog is a Web-publishing concept that enables anyone to publish information on the Internet. Blogs or blogging have become a journalistic tool, a way to publish news, ideas, rants, announcements, and ponderings very quickly, and without technical, editorial and time constraints. We can access blogs for professional development and we can all blog ourselves for professional development.

TLs can express their ideas and direction of the librarianship profession through blogging. Stephen Abram in Teacher Librarians: Sharing and Taking Care of Themselves(Sept/Oct 2007) follows about 600 blogs a day, to try and get a sense of what is happening in all types of libraries-academic, college, school, public and special libraies. He says that he sees great new ideas being implemented throughout libraryland but worries that these ideas don’t diffuse quickly enough through our world. He wonders if there are ways to improve communication between practicing TLs. He has a list of favorite blogs related to teacher librarianship, school libraries and learning technologies. ( I have 9 on his list) Through creating our own blogs and commenting on blogs, it is possible to get our ideas out into the world and to do this faster.

To ensure the health and relevance of libraries, teacher librarians are encouraged to get involved with blogging. In the blog Library Garden(2006) one of the contributors, Robert Lackie blogs about librarians and educators using Web 2.0 technologies which include blogging to communicate, interact, share, create and publish information online. Lackie goes on to say that by using technologies like blogs in practical and worthwhile applications, we are able to connect with those we are already serving with those we wish to serve in the near future. He states, ‘We all know that we need to continue to reach out to our students and patrons and get them interested in what amazing things we can do for them.’ He suggests that we try setting up a library blog, or start receiving library or special topic related RSS feeds via Bloglines.

Many libraries are using blogs to make their web existence as inviting and interactive as the buildings in which libraries are housed. Libraries are benefiting too as well-written, up to date blogs help librarians relate to their patrons, generate support for new building initiatives and market programs, collections and services. Internally, staff blogs help to strengthen staff communication and solidarity. Tasha Saecker the director of Menasha Public Library, values blogs as an important tool for librarians. She is the creator of two longest-running blogs, Kidslit and Sites and Soundbytes. For Saecker, they provide a venue to stay informed about her own professional passions. According to Saecker, blogging has connected her with a wider library community, where she can gather ideas, know that she is facing the same issues as other librarians and learn from other people’s experiences. She states, “It is a vital part of my professional development as a library director, because, through blogging, I can lead the library to implement new ideas and new technologies. (Why We Blog - Nov.2007)

Teachers librarians who are located in more isolated areas benefit from blogging in order to keep up with the latest research, share information and receive support from others in the profession. The article Ending Isolation(Sept.2006) gives the example of a seasoned social studies teacher who is using a blog to ask her fellow teachers for information, as she is in a training program for schoolwide literacy coaches and her location is isolated. They communicate through blogs as they learn and experience the role of literacy coach in their respective schools. She and her fellow teachers are separated from universities and other educational organizations because of their rural locations and limited resources impede participation in professional development opportunities. The teachers who participated in the initiative needed a way to remain connected to one another. The Supported Literacy staff developed a section of the Literacy Matters web site specifically for the teachers. This site was tailored to fit their assignments, lessons, and reflections and also housed a series of blogs that the teachers could use to share classroom experiences, ask questions, and turn to one another for support. Blogs function as an instant Web publishing system and provided tools for posting comments and linking to information on other web sites. In their blogs they shared experiences using Supported Literacy in the classroom. They received feedback and support from the staff of the program. The blog entries varied from requesting support and assistance to success stories about using the literacy program in their classes. Using blogging to support teachers when they undertake new instructional practices is effective in overcoming time, distance and lack of resources for those who are isolated.

Blogs and blogging for professional development enable teacher librarians to keep up with the latest research on teaching, libraries, technology and learning. According to Laurel Clyde author of Weblogs & Libraries, not only do blogs bring current trends and issues to the attention of libraries and information scientists, but they can also help practitioners to keep up to date by reading and participating in library and information weblogs. They provide valuable resources and information for Library Media Specialists, looking for ideas and professional connections. For For example, Doug Johnson’s The Blue Skunk Blog and Joyce Valenza’s Neverending Search are using their blogs as a tool for professional communications.

In Blogs and Blogging, Part I(2006) Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson explain how library media specialists are using blogs within professional development activities. A TL created a blogger project as part of a sustained professional development activity. She involved teachers with discussions about blogging in schools, young adult literature and blog integration for credits in the course. Larry Johnson integrated blogging into a Web-based course for library media specialists. They shared their expertise in areas such as grant writing, budgeting, promoting the library, technology and leadership.

Teacher librarians can also get up to date information on the exploration of the application of Web 2.0 technologies, links to wikis, podcasts and discussion forums on teacher librarianship when blogging or reading other blogs. Steve Hargardon launched a social network for educators(A Little Help from my Friends -2007)which attracts educators who are exploring Web 2.0 technologies. Participants interact online to ask questions, provide answers, debate and trade information about various web tools including blogging.

One of the benefits of blogging for professional development is the opportunity to build your own professional development network. You can find people from whom you can learn, ask questions of them, comment on their thoughts and links and they do they same for you. “Learning with others makes the difference, since learning is a social process…and has now gone online with blogs. Learning with others means you take control of the flood of information and data coming into your life.”(Miguel Guhlin - Blogs: Webs of Connected Learning - 2006)

Michael Stephens’ doctoral research focused on why librarians blog. The reasons included participating in a learning/teaching community, sharing expertise and gaining recognition within the field of teacher librarianship.

Blogs and blogging enable the educator to reflect, discuss and explore possibilities for the use of blogs in education. An excellent blog to explore is Anne Davis’ EducBlogInsights with numerous examples of blogs in education. However it is not enough to just read blogs, you also need to write. David Warlick, at a TechForum explained that he first began to read a few education-related blogs and then he started exploring more. Teacher librarians and educators need to start leaving comments and linking them back to their own blogs for their own professional development, to learn more and to share knowledge. “Blogs enable me to learn from strangers.”-Miguel Guhlin and so can we!

Blogs for PD & Web 2.0

2008-04-04T00:05:00.000-07:00

Blogs and blogging for professional development can be engaging, thought-provoking and educational. A Blog is one of the Web 2.0 tools that focuses on building information from the bottom up. Sharing thoughts through self publishing and harnessing the collective intelligence of all users to generate information and solve problems, creates huge changes in how educators and students receive and respond to information. (The Next Wave Now: Web2.0 – 2007)

Brian Kenney in You 2.0 (2007) discusses the web and its influence on school libraries saying that,"The new Web is a very different thing," writes Lev Grossman in Time . It's a tool for bringing together the small contributions of millions of people and making them matter. It is a revolution, and one that challenges librarians more than nearly any other profession. It's a revolution that we've been documenting in our pages and podcasts, calling it "School Library 2.0" to underscore the connection between this social and informational shift and the school library program.

He goes on to list the various Web 2.0 tools that we can access such as blogs and wikis. Flickr and YouTube. RSS feeds. Social bookmarking. LibraryThing. MySpace and Facebook. Blogger and del.icio.us. and Digg and Technorati. Kenney then discusses,why this revolution is a challenge to librarians, because today, it's through these tools that information is published, shared, and evaluated. This is where information seeking takes place. It's on the Web, in the interaction between "established" media and "user-created" media, that our culture's conversations are taking place.

According to Kenney, now it's all changed. We still need to read our professional publications (in some format or other) and keep current with our users' lives. But we also need to be active participants in the new Web, specifically blogging with its opportunities for community and collaboration. (School Library Journal - Jan.2007)

Accessing various educational blogs and the actual process of blogging for professional development is how we will keep informed of the latest trends and developments in teacher librarianship. Blogging also enables us to share and reach out to our colleagues with innovative ideas and questions.

Educational Benefits of SNS

2008-03-31T00:01:00.000-07:00

"Using social networks in the classroom is a bit complicated but one thing is clear, social networks give educators a unique opportunity for just-in-time, peer-to-peer professional learning. No longer do we wait for course offerings or workshops delivered by "experts". We ARE the experts and social networks allow us to teach and learn from each other."
(Social Networks and Education from reinventing project- based learning blog by Jane Krauss - Oct. 2007)

There are a number of Social Networking Sites that are student friendly and enable educators and students to benefit from accessing them. The sidebar of the article If you can't beat 'em, Join 'em (Aug. 2007) from ProQuest lists four of these sites.

1. Imbee (www.imbee.com)
Content A web-based site developed for the tweener set Features a spot for teachers to have their own class pages and even includes lesson plans. The animated look draws kids in, and the site has all the social networking gadgets of the larger sites, but the teacher areas are open only to whomever the teacher allows in-other teachers, students, and parents. This site gets contributed content from its corporate sponsors, which include PBS and Disney.
Cost: Free

2. TIGed (www.tiged.org)
Content An offshoot of the global-awareness social networking site TakinglTGIobal (www.tig.org), where teachers can get their students involved in issues that affect the environment, and other contemporary topics. The site features an activities database, discussion boards, thematic classrooms, and other tools, and teachers control the environment. It's currently being used in more than 700 classrooms in 39 countries. Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard Canada are corporate sponsors, and more than 10 educational foundations also support the site.
Cost: Free

3. Tnink.com (www.think.com)
Content: A web-based online learning community sponsored by the Oracle Education Foundation (www.oraclefoundation.org) as a safe space for students to collaborate and share knowledge. It features tools to enable students to publish their own websites and to collaborate on projects with other participating students anywhere in the world.Think.com is also used by students participating in the yearly ThinkQuest (www.thinkquest.com) competition, in which students work together to create an innovative website on any topic within a broad range of educational categories.
Cost: Free

4. Haiku Learning Management System (www.haikuls.com)
Content: More than just a social networking site, Haiku LMS is a learning management system that features numerous tools for teachers, including calendars, assignments, and class rosters. Teachers can build their own secure websites and offer collaboration tools such as blogs, forums, and wikis.The site recognizes when a user has multiple accounts for different teachers and can link all the user's class pages. Cost: Free up to 1MB of storage space. Beyond that, from $4.95 per month for 50MB of storage space up to $50 per month for 1GB.

Social Networking Sites have many educational benefits and can be used for a variety of educational purposes;

lessons can be presented using blog and chat applications
students can correspond with the teacher through private messaging on SNS
peer editing and feedback can occur on blogs
create multimedia projects
create daily newscasts
podcasts can be uploaded onto SNS
write essays from prompts on the blog tool
write blogs
post stories
improve reading skills
improve writing skills through creating a profile, posts, comments and collaborating and communicating with peers online
work on collaborative projects
book reviews/clubs
share music and write reviews
creativity through art
utilize various fun application with an educational focus
develop surveys

Karen Greenwood Henke, chair of the Emerging Technologies Committee at the Consortium for School Networking (www.cosn.org) states that a social networking site is only effective as an instructional tool if a school has a plan for using it. She goes on to say that any successful social networking site has a reason to exist and that reason shouldn't be because students are going to use it. With a plan in place and curriculum objectives in mind, I firmly believe that the Web 2.0 tool of Social Networking Sites will benefit both educators and students.

Libraries Get Social!!

2008-03-30T14:04:00.000-07:00

Libraries can play a positive role in supporting and protecting students on Social Networking Sites. Should libraries make their presence known on SNS? Seeing how librarians use SNS, students are given a role model and libraries can be promoted and more accessible through a Social Networking Site. However there are problems and concerns with library involvement on SNS that need to be considered and addressed.

"Schools and libraries are working to integrate positive uses of social networking into their
classrooms, programs, and services. By integrating social networking technologies into
educational environments, teens have the opportunity to learn from adults how to be safe and
smart when participating in online social networks. They also learn a valuable life skill, as these
social networking technologies are tools for communication that are widely used in colleges and
in the workplace."(Social Networking Toolkit - yalsa)

This article goes on to give some excellent examples of the positive aspects of SNS in the library;

- create a MySpace site as a way to connect with teens in the community, including quick and easy access to the library catalog and other research tools
- include information on programs and services at the library
- enables teens who are not traditionally library users an opportunity to learn about and use the library, teens can make the library one of their friends and then are reminded of the library whenever they log onto their space
- post on a SNS about what the library is doing to ensure that students are safe online, include information about Internet filters and any Internet Acceptable use Policies the library has
- create an online discussion forum about SNS
- set up a blog application where adults and students can read about the library's activities and can add comments
- post an information sheet about the positive aspects of SNS and include annotated lists of resources
- give teens the opportunity to connect with favorite authors, artists, and musicians on SNS and then they can leave messages which will develop their social and cultural abilities
- empower students to build a library space on a SNS, have students plan the space, what it should look like and what it should include, who can access it and have links to online safety and library resources including your catalog search

There are actually a few public libraries that use MySpace check them out!

Bethpage Public Library
www.myspace.com/bethpagepubliclibrary
Hennepin County Library
www.myspace.com/hennepincountylibrary
Lansing Library
www.myspace.com/lansingpubliclibrary
Library Loft
www.myspace.com/libraryloft

I wonder if this could ever be possible in the school system where there are alot of filters and blocking of certain sites. It would be an amazing project to take on! But and this is a big but... here are some questions and thoughts to consider before making a decision on this topic. These questions and comments come from School Library Media Activities Monthly, where on March 26, 2008 they linked a transcript of a chat with a High school principal and a popular culture professor discussing social networking, and the educator's role. The questions that we need to ask ourselves based on this article before involving our libraries on a Social Networking Site are:

Should a school library 'reach out' to kids in their digital world?
If we consider it inappropriate to call a student our 'friend' fact to face, is it appropriate to be 'friended' by a student on Facebook?
How will we respond when inappropriate content on a SNS affects the school environment or students? Who is responsible?

The professor who was facilitating the chat felt that kids don't want us in their social spaces, that they are not there to learn but there to be social. I wonder how others feel about this?

On the Library Garden blog, Karen K made the decision to create a MySpace account for her library and was very pleased with the results. As she said, she knows all the kids are there anyway so maybe it would make her library seem cooler and help to reach out to them. Within a week she had asked some to be her 'friends' and more have requested the library to be their 'friend'. She posted info about events and invited their input. She felt that their behavior had improved and their attitude toward the library too, perhaps because the library is now a 'cool' place because they are on MySpace.

On the Information Wants to Be Free blog created by Meredith Farkas, a librarian, writer and tech geek she makes it quite clear that although she thinks it is a good idea to build a presence on a SNS, she feels that most libraries do it really badly. She feels that if the reason is to be cool it is not acceptable. There needs to be a useful purpose, such as getting feedback from students, and to create a library portal. Asking what books and videos they'd like the library to order, asking about services, library hours and collections, getting their opinions, she says is giving them a voice in the future of the library. Farkas goes on to say that libraries that make their SNS an extension of the library Web site with links to the catalog, chat reference pages, research guides, calendar of events, research tools, ask-a-librarian, and links to books, movies, and booklists is much more effective. This was quite an extensive blog with many links and I would recommend that you access it! She has alot of good suggestions that one could utilize when building a presence for their library on a Social Networking Site.

A ProQuest article Librarians on Facebook authored by Kathy Ishizuka in School Library Journal in October 2007, discusses a university librarian's experience with SNS. The librarian, co-founded Librarians and Facebook. Laurie Charnigo says that it has evolved into a valid method of communication but she's has not had much success with students accessing it for educational purposes. I joined Librarians and Facebook today and look forward to accessing this application. It looks like TLs will most likely access it and not students.

In the article, Checking Out Facebook.com: The Impact of a Digital Trend on Academic Libraries,(Mar. 2007) Laurie Charnigo and Paula Barnett-Ellis discuss the results of a survey of 126 academic librarians concerning their view of Facebook. It was found that those who are most enthusiastic about its potential, suggested ideas for using Facebook to promote library services and events. While some librarians were excited about the possibilities of Facebook, they felt that it was beyond the role of professional librarianship.
A valid point was made when they stated that as librarians struggle to develop innovative ways to reach users beyond library walls, it seems logical to consider using SNS which appeal to students. Being made aware of students' cultural and social interests through Facebook may help librarians better connect with their students. The article goes on to say that professors who teach online courses(that would be Jennifer!) make themselves seem more human or approachable by establishing Facebook profiles. We are now 'friends' on Facebook! Charnigo/Barnett stated that some libraries that are on Facebook, say that they create a profile to interact with the students in their natural environment.
One of the main goals of the study was to obtain a snapshot of the perspectives and attitudes of librarians toward social networking sites. Most were neither enthusiastic nor dismissive of Facebook. The highest percentage of respondents indicated that librarians need to keep up with Internet trends, including Facebook. When asked if Facebook serves any academic purpose, 54% indicated that it does not, while 34% were not sure. Some academic uses that were suggested, consisted of Facebook being used as a communication tool for student collaboration in classes, using it as an online study hall, using it for conducting online discussion forums, and using it for building rapport with students through a communication medium that many students are comfortable with. Some librarians in the study suggested that libraries use SNS to promote their services, advertising events, creating online library study groups, and book clubs.
The authors made the observation that there is a fine line between what constitutes academic activity and recreational activity in the library and sites like Facebook seem to blur this line further.
The article states that by exploring popular new types of internet services like Facebook, instead of dismissing them as irrelevant to librarianship, we might learn new ways to reach out and communicate better with a larger group of our student users.

In a power point presentation by Mary Madden of Pew Internet & American Life Project, entitled When Libraries Get Social (Feb. 2007) she discusses the role of the library as being connected nodes of information and community exchange that we use to communicate, collaborate, share resources and preserve knowledge. She shared the stats where teens go online, and 75% of the students go on at school. She goes on to say that social computing is where teens and library meet to connect to people and information. I particularly liked her slide of what a library is,
the Library of the future is...
Web-enabled and participatory
Valued as a physical space
Made of people!

Security Issues of SNS!

2008-03-30T11:09:00.000-07:00

Although many young people believe that the information they post on Social Networking Sites are private they are not! Students do not seem to realize that these web sites are public places and that posting a user profile goes out to the public in general with sometimes too much private information about themselves.

According to the article, Social-Networking Web Sites Pose Growing Challenge for Educators(Feb. 2006), these sites have given rise to issues that leach into schools in ways that can be worrisome. The author, Andrew Trotter goes on to say that concern is running high that students are posting information that exposes them to invasions of privacy and safety threats. School bullies can turn to social-networking pages as a way to torment their victims. He states that on occasion, students have anonymously created pages-often with humorous intent-that purport to be those of prinicpals or teachers.

Issues like these often result in schools filtering or blocking social networking sites in Calgary. However, students still have access when they are at home or can sometimes get around filters says Trotter through different web sites like www.letmeby.com and www.unblocmysite.com.

Schools are encouraged to include lessons on safety and security of SNS and most do. The Federal Trade Commission under Consumer Protection gives a short and useful list of reminders for staying safe on Social Networking Sites. The FTC suggests these tips for socializing safely online for tweens and teens. The list would be beneficial for teachers to use when talking with their students.

Parents need to also be educated the on ways of talking to their child about the internet and what signs to look for if there may be issues. A sidebar on the article, The MySpace Culture (Dec. 2007) discusses the warning signs for parents to be aware of from the Attorney General in the United States;

- spending large amounts of time online, especially late at night

-turning off the computer quickly when adults come into the room

-becoming upset when asked to see what they are doing online

-receiving phone calls, mail or gifts from unknown adults

-making long distance calls using an online account belonging to someone else

From the Heyjude blog of librarian Judy O'Connell, she directs the reader to an article posted in The Guardian (March 25, 2008) warning parents that children are being raised online and concerns about the content they can access and their lack of awareness of parents of what their children are doing on the internet. The Guardian (March 3, 2008) also reported on the results of a survey about the effect of SNS and homework. Apparently, British students are spending less time doing homework then they use to as a result of their use of Social Networking Sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Bebo. It would be interesting if a similar survey could be done here in Canada and what the results might be!

"Social networking presents challenges for us in schools that we have not seen with any of the previous waves of technology." (Social Networking: A New Tech Tool and a New Security Concern for Teens and Schools - May/Jun 2006) SNS are having a huge impact on schools because of the ways in which some students have used them. This article discusses that when students post information on these sites for the world to see, it makes it available to predators. The author, Joanne Barrett mentions the disappearance and subsequent murder of a young girl who had kept a blog on MySpace. As Barrett says it give one pause to think that her thoughts and feelings were recorded for the whole world, including her future killer, to see on MySpace. Barrett goes on to say that another concern is online harassement. Incidences and reports of cyber bullying are on the rise and the ability to use SNS for bullying has intensified.

There have been cases where students have been suspended and expelled from schools due to information posted on their SNS. Even when applying for a job, employers have been known to check SNS for information on potential candidates. Having an inappropriate picture or posting content that is inappropriate may cost you a potential job or the current job you have.

In my opinion Barrett does an excellent job of summing up on how I feel about the security issues of Social Networking Sites. She says the educators have long held the belief that technology is here to stay and the educating our students to the wise use of technology makes the most sense. The successful adults of the future will be those who know how to incorporate the use of technology into all areas of their lives. While we have gained the ability to have instant information and sharing at our fingertips, we still need to educate students on how to use these tools wisely.

The Many Spaces and Faces of SNS!

2008-03-28T19:20:00.000-07:00

Like the majority of people who know a bit about Social Networking Sites, I am most familiar with Facebook and to a lesser degree with MySpace, Friendster and Nexopia. However, when exploring SNS, I was totally unprepared for the vast numbers of Social Networking Sites!

Wikipedia lists over 100 social networking sites! When I went through them there were some that were definitely social in nature as they focused on a specific social-type feature such as blogging, photosharing, travel, hobbies, books, business, sports, music, video sharing, and games. I took a more critical stance and decided to explore only those sites that would be considered to be a conventional social networking site that included some if not all the previously mentioned features on their site and that appeared to allow only 13 year olds and older to access them. I managed to reduce the numbers to slightly less than a dozen sites. I noticed that there were a number of SNS related to education that were not mentioned on Wikipedia. I will be discussing them in a separate blog entry.

A number of the SNS are international sites, some out of Europe like Badoo and Bahu. Badoo has 13 million registrants and invites people who are aged 18+ to join their site. An interesting feature is developing 'reportages' of their lives. It is a free site but you can pay to promote your profile. Their slogan is 'The whole world can use Badoo!'

Bahu is not nearly as large and just a year old. It is very popular in France, Belgium and Europe. Bahu invites people from the age of 13 and older to join... 'Hey! Here you can express yourself and meet tons of new friends!'

Orkut is a multilingual site, similar to Facebook, Friendstrs and MySpace. It has 59 million followers and is popular in India and Brazil. Because it is affiliated with Google, when I went to the site, it welcomed me back and asked for more information before starting. I did not bother as I already have a Facebook account and that is enough for me at this point in time. Orkut can be accessed at http://www.orkut.com/.

The SNS of hi5 is popular in Cyprus, Romania, as well as in Latin America and has many Asian teens who register on their site. 'hi5 - Who's In?'... as of 2007, 98 million users!

Faceparty ...'the biggest party on earth!', is a popular SNS out of the United Kingdom with registrations around 35 million. Initially it was popular with teenagers but now people in their thirties and forties access it, utilizing their chat room. I was not impressed when I went to their site as the home page had a scantily clad girl on it and some inappropriate terms on the page. You are supposed to be 16 years and older to register but I question whether 16 is too young and whether even younger kids are accessing this site.

Habbo, created in Finland is popular worldwide. Users create an avatar, there is a virtual hotel, chat rooms and discussion forums. As of January of this year there are 86 million users and 75,000 avatars created weekly. The home page lists a number of activities that a registrant can do on this site and alot of them were games. A list of discussion forums was at the bottom of the home page and some looked quite interesting.

Out of the States, is myYearbook that has 6 million users with 90% being American. This site was created by two high school students based on the concept of a yearbook. The purpose was to keep records of students and to keep in touch with high school friends upon graduation. It continues to grow in popularity as there are alot of friends out there...'myYearbook, You've got Friends!'. A very colorful and activity filled home page which would be quite appealing to the teenage crowd.

The Social Networking Sites that are more well known to us are; MySpace, Friendster, Nexopia and Facebook.

According to Dana L Fleming in the article, Youthful Indiscretions (2008, ProQuest) MySpace is routinely ranked among the top three most popular websites in America. The site was founded in 2003 by Tom Anderson, a graduate student at UCLA. It was initially created to enable musicians to show case their music. Two years later, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. purchased MySpace for $327 million. She goes on to say that MySpace boasts an international audience with more users than any other networking site in the world.

MySpace is very popular with the older teenagers but younger ones have been known to access it too. Teenagers use it to communicate with each other about their favorite music, online videos, pictures and more. While artists and musicians use it to promote their work and network with other artists around the world.

My connection to MySpace is through our 'undaughter' the best friend of my oldest daughter, who spends a great deal of time with our family. When I asked her if she had an account and why, she responded that she has one for the music and music videos. She has attended several 'shows' which feature various bands around Calgary and where she has taken many photographs. One of the bands 'The Hollywood Gods' has asked her to take photos for them after seeing her photographs on MySpace. She took me into her account to see the photos that are posted for that band with her name below acknowledging her as the photographer. They were pretty awesome looking black and whites!

Friendster was one of the first sites to get noticed by the online community when it opened to the public in March 2003. Friendster was founded in California and is privately owned. According to Wikipedia, there are over 50 million users who are mostly in Asia. and is a multilingual site. It has a video page to add to your profile through YouTube, Crackle and Shankle.

Joanne Barrett briefly refers to Friendster when discussing Social Networking Sites in the ProQuest article, Social Networking: A New Tech Tool and a New Security Concern for Teens and Schools (May/Jun 2006). She states that the most notable aspect of Friendster was its unprecedented access to the coveted 25 to 35 year old demographic. She goes on to say that wanting access to marketing dollars targeting this important group, a number of big Web players started up social networking sites. While Friendster enjoyed an intial membership explosion, many of the users from the initial demographic seemed to get bored with the technology and moved on to other things. Friendster was considered to be a top online SNS until 2004 when it was overtaken in terms of page views by MySpace. It also receives competition from Facebook.

Nexopia is a made in Alberta product! This social networking site originated in Edmonton and was created by Timo Ewals, a 18 year old 'programming wizard and rebellious renegade' (from About Nexopia). Today there are over 1.2 million registered members.

The 'About Nexopia' page goes on to say that it was initially designed as a way to fight back against his high school for banning floppy discs (that's a flash from our past!). Ewals wanted to connect his friends online. Nexopia prides itself on the fact that its members are outspoken and opinionated about their culture. This culture commentary goes on to say that by supporting, promoting and developing music, art and cultural events they managed to foster an authentic engagement with their members and have made Nexopia oh so much more than just another faceless internet utility. Nexopia creators state that whether they are arguing ideas in their forums, handing out bandanas in a Warped Tour mosh pit, or partnering with the world's leading media companies to put on high profile cultural events, Nexopia is the social network that's become a lifestyle.

I can understand why this SNS appeals to a younger user. My 14 year old who is in grade 9 has an account with them. He also has a Facebook account but says all his friends are on 'Nex' so he wants to be too. His older sisters brought to my attention that junior high students use Nexopia and senior high students use Facebook! Which now brings me to my own use of Social Networking Sites, I have a Facebook account.

I chose Facebook because it was the only SNS that I knew something about as my own children have accounts. They guided me through setting up an account at Facebook and then I have taken it from there.

Facebook was created in New England by a Harvard sophomore, Mark Zuckerberg. Originally it was meant for undergraduates with a .edu email account but has now opened up to include a wider audience. According to Mark Sullivan of PC World in his article Is Facebook the New MySpace?(July 2007), Facebook has reinvented itself to retain its core members as they move on from college life. The site allows you to search for new friends at companies not just at schools. The useful(??) little applications are apparently turning the site into a networking home page. Sullivan goes on to say that these new features and Facebook's clean design are beginning to attract an older audience of high-tech professionals (the class of EDES 545).

Facebook's home page indicates that it is a free social utility that connects you with the people around you. It lists how to use Facebook; to keep up with friends and family, share photos and videos, control privacy online, reconnect with old classmates, discuss interests and hobbies and plan parties and events.This is not a flashy home page and would appeal to a more mature membership.

Once I got in, the fun began! Visually, it actually became quite busy with advertisements, and appeals to sign up for various applications. I wanted to try out all sorts of applications but then quickly realized how time consuming they are and for me personally they had no productive purpose. I still chose a few so that I could experience them. My youngest son quite frequently sends me requests to try various applications such as Which Marvel Super Hero Are You?... apparently I am like Gambit from marvel comics, whoever he is!

I have 3 scrabble games going. One with Katie from our class, with Simon Rose an Albertan author and with three teenagers one being my 18 year old daughter. I must admit I don't spend much time on them. If I have not come up with a word in a few minutes, I move onto something else.

I have used 'The Wall' to leave messages and my kids leave messages there for me too. When I initially used my account, my son left me a message on my wall saying ...'YOU GOT FACEBOOOKK!! does this mean I don't acutually need to talk to you at home or should all our conversations be on Facebook?' ...ha ha funny 12 year old!!

Once I read a message on my son's wall which I felt should have been posted in the private message area so I sent him a private message explaining why he needs to be more discreet about what he puts on his wall as everyone can read it. He understood and is now more careful. The privacy issue definitely is a concern on SNS and will be discussed more in a separate entry.

Katie and I communicated on Facebook during the creation and discussion of our wiki. We have continued to do this and also play scrabble. It has been a great way to get to know a classmate in our distant learning classroom. I can tell Katie seems much more familiar with Facebook than I as she has alot more happening on her site. I like Jennifer's display of favorite books and current books being read. So far, I have used Facebook more for the 'social' aspect and when I have more time, I would like to develop more educational uses for my Facebook account.

Social Networking Sites are numerous and cater to a wide range of ages and interests. Some people have more than one SNS where they keep in touch with friends and meet a variety of new people with similiar tastes and interests. An interesting video which looks at Facebook, MySpace and YouTube takes a positive spin on social networking and is worth viewing.

SNS...What is It??

2008-03-27T23:14:00.000-07:00

SNS or Social Networking Site according to Andrew Trotter in the article, Social-Networking Web Sites Pose Growing Challenge for Educators (2006) are websites that offer a free, easy way to create personal Web pages and fill them with content: text diaries, digital snapshots, favorite songs, and short video clips. Trotter goes on to say that social networks are formed as members link their Web pages to those of their friends and search through the vast sites to find new friends who share common interests.

Membership into these sites are free and anyone can become a member by setting up an account. SNS can be open to all other members of the site or they can be accessed by invitation only if the user so desires.

Social Networking in Plain English on the Commoncraft show, clearly explains the basics of SNS and why they are so popular. View this video clip here.

A January 2007 survey by the Pew Charitable Trust found 55% of all online youths ages 12-17 have profiles on Social Networking Sites, with 48% visiting them at least once a day. A recent survey by Grunwald Associates found 71% of tweens and teens between the ages of 9 and 17 visit SNS weekly. In the Pew survey, 91% of all social networking teens say they use the sites to stay in touch with friends they see frequently and 82% say they use the sites to stay in touch with friends they rarely see in person. While 70% of older girls have used SNS compared with 54% of older boys, the boys 60% are more likely than girls 46% to use the sites to make new friends. Interesting statistics coming out of the U.S. and I wonder if the statistics in Canada would be similar.

The younger generation are not the only ones accessing Social Networking Sites. Some of these sites are attracting an older audience like ourselves. (I mean that in the most delicate way, ie 'mature' audience!) Keeping in contact with colleagues, friends, and business associates and searching for former high school or university friends are some of the reasons that we are on social networking sites.

According to Kristina Woolsey (Nailing Digital Jelly to a Virtual Tree, Learning & Leading with Technology Dec/Jan 2007-08 36(4)) found in our course readings:

Social networking Websites have taken society by storm and created

quite a stir, a good stir, a negative stir, and a questioning stir. The

important things currently are the implementing of Internet safety,

the distribution of awareness, the differentiation between the benefits

and drawbacks, and the harnessing of its potential in all areas of life.

It is hoped that this blog will address many of this issues and concerns of Social Networking Sites and provide a clearer understanding of this Web 2.0 tool.

Final Thoughts on VoiceThread

2008-03-25T11:08:00.000-07:00

VoiceThread is very user-friendly multimedia Web 2.0 and has so much potential for the classroom in a variety of subject areas. Not only is it an excellent tool for independent work, it allows for collaboration. The flexibility of this Web 2.0 tool enables creativity, information sharing, writing and speaking skills to occur. As educators, we need to meet the learning needs of our students. VoiceThread is a multimedia tool which enables educators to differentiate instruction to ensure that learning will occur for all students. Gardner's theory of mulitple intelligences supporting the linguistic learner, the musical learner, the personal learner, the naturalist learner and the logical and spatial learner can be utilized through using VoiceThread.
VoiceThread has really opened my eyes to a number of possibilities in my personal life, in my classroom and in my professional development.

Teaching and Learning with VoiceThread

2008-03-25T09:30:00.000-07:00

‘Participation is not optional’
A VoiceThread allows every child in a class to record audio commentary
about the ideas and experiences that are important to them. Whether it’s an
event, a project, or a milestone, children can tell their story in their own voice,
and then share it with the world. For teachers, a VoiceThread offers a single
vessel to capture and then share all the diverse personalities of an entire
class. A VoiceThread can be managed with little effort, creating an heirloom
that can be shared by students, parents, and educators alike. You can hear the
pride and excitement in their voices as the students “publish” and archive
their work. (from VoiceThreads in the Classroom website)

I think that VoiceThreads is a great multimedia tool that has so much potential in the classroom and in the educational setting. There are many ways to use VoiceThread which I will list for you. I will also direct you to Collette Casinelli's wiki where she is gathering examples to share of how educators are using VoiceThread in their classrooms and in their professional development. Collette is a high school computer teacher who actively blogs and was very proactive in developing this wiki to share VoiceThread uses. (reminds me of Jessie in our class starting a wiki for us!)

VoiceThreads in Schools:

studying various countries, geography, cultures, animals, foods etc.
solving math problems
exploring art forms, reviewing and critiquing
creating digital stories (I am very excited about this possibility to support challenged students)
research projects in science and social studies, doing a final presentation using VT
demonstrating/practicing oral reading skills to be assessed by the teacher (another area of interest to me as I teach guided reading)
a creative way to do a book report both visually and orally
discussion of favorite books that could be on the schools newsletter website under the Library heading (I contribute monthly to the newsletter and provide recommended reads, VT would provide a new innovative approach to this)
through the sharing of photos on a VT, students could develop their creative writing skills(this is an skill that our school is focussing on, to develop student writing)
professional educational articles could be commented on and shared
support ESL learners in connecting words orally to pictures
listen to music and respond critically
use as an online discussion tool on current events
allow students to share their learning as individuals or collaboratively
enabling teachers to interact and support student learning(upload materials to reinforce topics taught in the classroom, explain concepts in more detail)

VoiceThreads allows educators and students to collaboratively share their thoughts and learnings through an audio component or text component while viewing pictures, videos, and slideshows with others online.

Examples of VoiceThread

2008-03-25T07:00:00.000-07:00

There are many outstanding examples of VoiceThread for educators and others to access. I would like to share a few here that may be of interest.

I watched Pat Muth's VoiceThread about her family passport picture. She is the mother of one of the founders of VoiceThread, Steve Muth. I must apologize, but I had to giggle as she was too funny when she commented about some of her children looking like they have anxiety issues. She didn't understand, after all..."she was their mother and so they should be happy!" I thought of my own children and wondered how many pictures do we have that I have made them sit through which would have give a similar message to the viewers. Her VoiceThread was priceless and 'a keeper'! This made me realize the importance of family history behind photos and how VT can so effectively contribute by providing additional valuable information and details to a photo. I am so enthused about this prospect that when I go home to Ontario for a visit this summer, I would like to pull out some old family albums and assist my 85 year old Mother in creating a VoiceThread to preserve our family history and share it with others! All thanks to Pat Muth's delightful family VoiceThread!

VoiceThread is used very effectively on K-12 Mathcasts 500 project which is entirely VoiceThread based. Students are able to view a written problem and then with using the Doodling tool they can draw the solution to the problem for others to see. Audio and text comments assist others as well as enables the teacher to view and listen to their understanding of the math problem. Adults as well as students are able to collaborate on solving math problems. A variety of strategies are shared on MathCast which is so effective student learning!

Both adults and students can share their knowledge and pleasure when studying or travelling to various places around the world through VoiceThread. Arlene's VoiceThread about her travel to La Paz, Bolivia gave the viewer a wonderful tour of the city with beautiful pictures and commentary. Sharing what the picture was about, provided details that still photos are unable to do. Students in a class on the Langwitches site studied the Galapagos Island and using VoiceThread, they were able to share their knowledge. As a collaborative project, each student was given the opportunity to speak about what they had learned rather than write. For some students, this would be a good medium to showcase their learning of the Galapagos Island. The opportunity to share student learning about various areas in Canada, various Canadian cultures and the history of Canada could be met through the use of the VoiceThread tool.

These are just a few examples of the use of VoiceThread. There are so many examples that you can access on the VoiceThread site as well as even Google some ideas that you might have. You will be amazed at the number of voicethreads that have been created on a number of topics!

Creating a VoiceThread

2008-03-24T22:11:00.000-07:00

I chose to create a VoiceThread about our cabin! I hope you enjoy the tour!

The process of creating a VoiceThread was relatively straight forward. I was able to watch various tutorials which helped to explain and clarify the process of what is a VoiceThread, how to use Video Doodling, the Microphone Set Up for Windows XP and even a 1 Minute VoiceThread was provided to name a few. I appreciated the opportunity to view them several times when necessary. There is even additional support under the Help Tab through Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), a Forum where additional support is provided through discussions on new features, some general questions and answers are shared and ideas for managing VTs in the classroom, also a variety of Tutorial topics can also be found here to assist your learning about VoiceThread.

The VoiceThread site allows you to create only 3 VoiceThreads for free. Should you decide you want to do more, you would have to pay to create more VoiceThreads. If so, as a teacher, you may want to register and pay to create a VoiceThread on the Ed.VoiceThread as this is a site for K-12 educators, students and administrators. I chose to make a VoiceThread for free and I have two free opportunities still available to create additional VoiceThreads.

To begin my VoiceThread, I clicked on the 'Create' tab and followed the steps of Uploading my pictures, Commenting on my pictures and then Sharing my VoiceThread.

First, I took several pictures around the cabin and downloaded them to my laptop. I selected a few photos and imported them to my VoiceThread website. I had initially attempted to upload them all at once but when I realized that it was taking too long, I made the decision to do one at a time, which was more efficient and effective. Once they were uploaded on VoiceThread, I rearranged them into the order that I wanted by simply clicking and dragging them to their new position. I was pleased and impressed when I was able to rotate a photo by clicking on the arrow in the corner of the picture! More pictures were taken and added to the site while others were deleted until I was satisfied with my selection. I liked the ease of using this tool to achieve the best layout.

Next, I made the decision to add commentary to my presentation. I had the option of adding text but chose audio as I felt it was more personal and effective for this type of VoiceThread which is a tour. I already had a suitable headphone/microphone set from creating the Podcast blog so I was familiar with how the equipment functioned. By clicking on the 'Comment' tab, I was able to record a brief comment for each picture. This went quite smoothly except for one problem. Previously recorded comments that I had deleted were still there for some of the pictures. I went to the 'Help' button where I was able to find a solution to my problem which involved using the trash can icon and clicking delete when necessary. I appreciated the fact that I could listen to my recording, delete and start again as many times as necessary until I liked what I heard and then would click 'save' before moving on to the next picture.

Finally, it was time to share my newly created VoiceThread. I chose to make my VoiceThread about the cabin, Public but I also selected not to allow comments from outside. Next, I needed to link it to my blog which was easy to do and you can access it by clicking on the word 'cabin' in the first line of this blog entry.

Considering that this particular web tool was quite unfamiliar to me, I am glad that I embraced the opportunity to learn about it and am delighted with the results! VoiceThread is user-friendly and easy to navigate. I can see so much potential for using it personally and in educational settings.

My Introduction to VoiceThread

2008-03-21T20:58:00.000-07:00

VoiceThread, a multimedia sharing tool was the first Web 2.0 tool that I had very limited knowledge about. I actually asked several people, teenagers, my colleagues at school, and an IT specialist what they knew about VoiceThread. Some had heard of the term but no one could share anything about it. The students at my own school, when I explained that VoiceThread was a multimedia sharing tool, could talk to me about iMovies but were unfamiliar with VoiceThread.

I became more curious about VoiceThread after reading an article in the journal Learning & Leading with Technology entitled Storytelling in the Web 2.0 Era. Alan Levine who is well known nationally and internationally for his expertise in the application of new technologies to educational environments is mentioned in this article. He used VoiceThread as one of the 50 different Web 2.0 storytelling tools used when producing the same digital story about his dog Dominoe. (Now wouldn't that be an interesting way for our students to share their learning of various Web 2.0 tools!) Levine refers to VoiceThread under a special category called 'Mixer Tools' as it combines a variety of media to tell non-linear stories allowing others to comment and annotate the stories too. Glen Bull, author of the article further explains, that VoiceThread supports the creation of online media albums and allows others to contribute shared text or audio comments.

To further develop my understanding of this tool, I went to the VoiceThread website where it explains that VoiceThread is a web 2.0 multimedia sharing tool which enables people to collect and share images and then allows them to comment in five different ways. VoiceThread allows group conversations to be collected and shared in one place.

Joyce Valenza, in School Library Journal, (January 29, 2008) describes VoiceThread as a web-based, multimedia collaborative network. Her enthusiasm and description as to the ease of accessing this tool reassured me that even a newbie like myself could effectively utilize VoiceThread.

The Wiki Prayer

2008-03-08T23:25:00.000-08:00

Please grant me the serenity to accept the pages I cannot edit,
The courage to edit the pages I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.

(from Brian Lamb's Wide Open Spaces, Wikis Ready or Not, 2004)

Wiki Wonderlands!

2008-03-08T21:45:00.000-08:00

There are an amazing number of wiki sites for our class to explore and participate in. I will share some of the wikis that I feel are noteworthy. Just click on the wiki title to access them.

Wikipedia

begun by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger in 2001
best known example
created as a free encyclopedia
anyone can register and become a contributor
over 9 million articles in 250 languages

Flat Classroom Project

analyzed 10 societal trends from book The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
winner of the 2006 International Edublog Award for best wiki in education
develop a deeper understanding of the effect of information technology on the world
using a joint wiki, students paired with a global partner
explained trend, gave their viewpoints and created a video

Miss Cassidy's Grade 1/2 Dinosaur Wiki

Wesmount School in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan
learning about dinosaurs
student art work with explanations of each type of dinosaur
very simplistic with lots of potential

Teacher Librarian Wiki

created by Joyce Valenza
invited to share wisdom and best instruction
information on books, information literacy and models
links to blogs and other library wikis

Library Success

a wiki that has great ideas and information for all types of librarians
share ideas with one another
replicate the successes of other libraries
17 categories ranging from conferences, leadership, reference services, resource sharing to many more topics
a place to get information about technology in the library

Ways of the Wiki in Education!

2008-03-08T19:34:00.000-08:00

The wiki is fast becoming a popular tool for increasing the amount of collaborative work done by students and teachers. Students might use a wiki to collaborate on a group report, compile data or share the results of their research, while teachers might use a wiki to collaborate on the structure of a professional day or the curriculum design of a course.

Students need to be aware that because anyone can participate in the building of a wiki, not all the information is of equal quality and reliable. Wiki participants should cite their work and provide supporting evidence. According to my twelve year old apparently astute son, wiki users should cross-reference their information using a variety of credible sources. Apparently his teachers have emphasized the need for evaluating information on wikis!

The following is a list of potential projects that students could generate on a wiki:

a wiki reference guide
a wiki directory of helpful websites
a letter or statement on behalf of the class
build a guide to correct punctuation
debate issues
outline options, make suggestions
collaborative research
edit a book, guide or manual
organize information for a book club or study group
collect and organize resources for an electronic portfolio
organize links to websites, and blogs
create a collaborative study guide
share resources as part of a virtual conference
create and share book reviews
library home page
integrate research into curriculum
summarize current events and discuss with others
virtual tour of a field trip site
discuss environmental issues
journal daily on a posted question
share and discuss original music

According to High Tech Learning, wikis are becoming a popular tool in learning because they involve high-level thinking and information skills. They allow students to participate in a project larger than themselves. Participants are able to learn from each other and expand their thinking about a topic by working as a team. The author goes on to say that wikis involve learners in asking more sophisticated questions related to their topic. Learners begin to assimilate new information and draw inferences. This ultimately leads to reflection and additional questions, more indepth analysis and understandings. These abstract connections are made more concrete through the building of a wiki. Information organization is also examined in this article. It is stated that wikis encourage learners to think about how information can be organized to maximize understanding. Organization might take the form of outlines, visual maps, questions, problems,or organizing material alphabetically, chronologically, hierarchically, and geographically.

Wikis are a flexible tool that utilize hyperlinks, categories, hierarchies, and organizational structure. They encourage collaboration and allow users to edit, add and modify information. They can be used in a variety of ways and are a welcomed technology tool in supporting the education of our students!

Wiki Worries!

2008-03-08T17:58:00.000-08:00

Because users can modify, edit, and delete the content of a wiki there are concerns or 'worries' about this web based collaborative tool. A wiki needs to be monitored for inappropriate language, incorrect information and inappropriate content. This can be time consuming and someone has to be willing to be responsible for ensuring that the wiki is scrutinized on a regular basis. When a change is made to a wiki the author is notified that a change has been made via e-mail. This actually happened to me when my partner uploaded our article summary on our wiki. I was impressed that this notification happened so quickly! You can revisit the page and check things out and make any necessary changes. The old version is saved and stored where it can be accessed and redoing the page again is possible. Structuring the content so that it is accessible can be a challenge and must be done carefully and early on so that users and contributors can navigate the site quickly and easily.

When using wikis with K-12 students, a website with ads can be distracting and may sometimes link to inappropriate sites. Choosing a website without advertising would eliminate this concern.
Another issue related to advertising is spam. Wikis are open environments and marketers and vandals can flood a wiki with spam. Having a security protection program may help to alleviate this problem.

Matt Barton's blog on Embrace the Wiki Way! on May 21, 2004 discusses wikis and comments on their vulnerability. He makes a very valid point when he says,

'Wikis are protected not by code, or by law, but rather by the participation of an active wiki community. If you are proud of your entry, you will feel compelled to see what's up if you receive a notification that the entry has been changed and roll it back if it's obvious the page was vandalized or rendered less intelligent.'

An interesting issue was raised in 7 things you should know about Wikis. It discussed how a wiki represents the collective perspective of a group and that over time, the values, perspectives, and opinions of its users can become embedded in the wiki. It is felt that although a wiki is well suited to reflecting current thoughts, perhaps it is not effective in gaining an unbiased perspective on rapidly evolving topics. I am sure some of my colleagues will have formed a very informed opinion about this issue after completing this course.

Peanut...Peanut Butter...Yeah!

2008-03-08T16:41:00.000-08:00

I love peanut butter, you love peanut butter....Peanut....Peanut Butter...Yeah!!!

I am singing the praises of the wiki website where I chose to upload Assignment 2! I chose pbwiki...peanutbutter wiki as my website.

Creating the wiki and defining its password was a quick 3 step process. There is alot of support on this website and I was able to watch a 'tour' of the pbwiki website. It has other features that made it appealing such as widgets or plug ins for photos, chats and video. It has a built in connection to YouTube. You can download a pdf or a slideshow. It has easy text editing and visitors can edit. Anyone can make a new wiki any time.

Another feature that appealed to me was the information page for Educators. They discussed ten different questions that an educator might ask before they would sign their class up. Questions such as; Is it safe?, How will this help my students?, Can I control access?, How much does it cost? and more. On this page you could access wiki examples and case studies. Overall I felt it was user friendly and the best choice.

My partner Katie and I will be inviting our class to join us on our wiki on pbwiki.com in a few days to collaborate on digital game playing. I hope you enjoy using this site as much as I did when creating our wiki.

The Wonders of Wikis!

2008-03-08T15:50:00.000-08:00

A successful and effective wiki will have a number of characteristics unique to this social and collaborative technology as discussed in High Tech Learning: Learning Spaces: Collaborative web and wikis, 2006.

Good organization - makes good use of hyperlinks to connect information and ideas

Flexibility and structure - although structure is important, there must be opportunity to expand and look deeper into a concept or the content

Collaboration - people working together toward a common goal will have bigger and better results than when people work in isolation or independently, a virtual team

Passion and enthusiasm - need to maintain a high energy level through quality questioning

Evolving - in a constant state of change and neverending

Open editing - anyone can add or edit anything at any time, although some wikis require contributors to register

Unique content - identify and create something that isn't available

As wikis' use increases in popularity, what constitutes a true wiki will be up for debate. The previous list of fundamental characteristics can be a guide when creating a successful and effective wiki.

Wiki Appeal!

2008-03-08T14:28:00.000-08:00

Wikis have been described as a composition system, a discussion medium, a repository, a mail system, and a tool for collaboration that allows users to both author and edit. (7 things you should know about ...Wikis, Educause, July 2005) Their varied uses make them appealing to those wanting to collaborate on a variety of projects. People can use wiki pages to find out more information on a subject or communicate with others who are interested in the same topic.

Wikis are useful because you can share and collaborate on documents without any kind of special software or without having to have special training. Because wikis are web pages, they can easily link to references. Anyone can add, edit or delete material with nothing more specialized than a web browser. Wikis are user friendly with no HTML or special programming to learn. A wiki provides instant gratification as a click of the 'save' button posts changes and updates immediately. A wiki can be open to everyone, there are no restrictions. Anyone can read and respond to information by adding and modifying the wiki themselves.

According to Brian Lamb, UBC, what's unique about wikis is that users can define for themselves how their processes and groups will develop, usually by developing things as they go along. He goes on to discuss that the purposes of a wiki are varied and it only takes a couple of seconds to set up a new page based on whatever purpose be it simple or complex that a person has.

In Lamb's article, in Educause, September/October 2004, he shares with the reader that wiki users decide for themselves how the wiki would fulfil their objectives. He states that technical support and training is minimal and that even 'confirmed technophobes' have grasped and mastered the wiki system quickly. According to Lamb, users do not have to adapt their practice to the dictates of a system but can allow their practice to define the structure of their wiki.

What is a Wiki?

2008-03-08T11:59:00.000-08:00

A wiki is a free open-ended Web page that can be viewed and modified by anyone who has access to the internet.

The term was invented by Ward Cunningham in 1995. He used the term 'wiki' after riding on quick buses or 'wiki wiki' at the Honolulu Airport. The word wiki (WikiWikiWeb) comes from the Hawaiian word for quickly. According to High Tech Learning, a wiki can be created when a virtual collaborative team quickly constructs an interactive website.

An interesting explanation of a wiki can be found on YouTube, Common Craft, Wikis in Plain English.

Implications for Teaching and Learning

2008-03-02T23:36:00.000-08:00

According to Joyce Valenza, librarians are needed more than ever to support student research and to prepare students for a lifetime of efficient and effective information use. She goes on to say the with students expecting to find most of their information on the Internet, it is logical that the 21st century school library website will play a big role. Today's school library will be expected to achieve its mission for learners both physically and virtually , expanding and reinterpreting reference and instructional services, meeting young users' information needs where they live and play and work...on the Web!

Kuhlthau (1997) stresses the importance of virtual libraries helping students internalize the process of learning from information. She feels that 'librarians play a critical role in creating environments that foster meaningful and lasting learning in digital libraries'. Kuhlthau encourages librarians to design virtual libraries where they can accomodate, guide, coach and overall support our students' learning.

Clyde (1997) sees the virtual library's prime purpose as being a means of delivering information skills which is essential.

According to Carol Grantham , Coordinator of Information Services at St Aloysius College in Adelaide, Australia, for the school library to be seen as relevant by students, the teacher librarian must embrace new technologies and offer students access to quality online resources that support the school curriculum. She states that this can best be achieved by a virtual library that meets the learning needs of students and teaches valuable information literacy skills which will enable them to become independent learners.

'If students are going to be effective seekers and users of information, they need two types of guidance: information skills critical for the 21st century; and customised, appropriate and well-designed online learning environments. Virtual libraries do the jobs on both fronts.'Joyce Valenza

Exploring Virtual Libraries

2008-03-02T21:44:00.000-08:00

Before building a virtual library, it is advantageous to examine some exemplary virtual libraries. Here are only a few examples and a brief description of some virtual school libraries that I would recommend you explore. Just click on the school name and be taken to their virtual library.

Elementary Sites

Latimer Road Elementary

-built by a colleague in a previous class while taking EDES 545 last term-side bar with information on how to research, small picture icons can be clicked on a takes you to catalogues, books and other links

Grandview Elementary

-attractive, good animation, lots of ideas and items to explore, tree analogy and blogs on a line were interesting

McLurg Elementary

-lots of valuable information in sidebar, has a virtual tour, plenty of pictures

High School Sites

Springfield Township High School

-built by Joyce Valenza, visually appealing, links for students and teachers, click on items and words on home page, has NoodleTools(a new item for me which looks fascinating)

Chico High School

-well organized, using icons it has a list of databases and resources, sidebar has web information on student research topics, easy to navigate

The Greece Athena Media Center - Middle and High School

- this site was chosen as 'School Library Web Page of the Month' in May 2001 by the International Association of School Libraries
-navigation icons can be found on pages, explained what each represents

Another valuable virtual library that is near and dear to my heart is the Calgary Board of Education site.

Calgary Board of Education Virtual Library

This site was built in 2003 and is maintained by a variety of teachers and teacher librarians. There are 3 websites set up, Elementary, Junior High and High School. They are visually appealing and user friendly. The elementary and junior high have several icons, and words that one can click on to find various information. The high school lists the relevant information at the top of the picture. Each page allows you to 'Ask a librarian' and they get back to you as soon as they can. There are two additional tabs on the main page entitled Educators and Parents. When they are clicked on, they take you to your own page with numerous links. The CBE Virtual Library is easy to navigate and I would recommend that you take some time to explore it!

Advantages & Disadvantages of Virtual Libraries

2008-03-02T14:53:00.000-08:00

When deciding whether or not to build a virtual library, the numerous advantages and disadvantages need to be taken into consideration. There are several articles that examine these various factors.

ADVANTAGES

1. Immediate access to resources.

virtual libraries are available anytime
facilitate just-in-time learning

2. Information updated immediately.

TL able to respond to immediate needs of teachers
provide resources at short notice
contains up-to-date information

3. No physical boundaries.

people from all over the world can access information
as long as there is an Internet connection

4. Support different learning styles.

access material in a variety of formats
tailored to characteristics of the learner or community of learners
range of resources to meet the information needs of different users
can be customized for particular schools, grades and subjects

5. Accessible for the disabled.

offers an alternative for those who have physical difficulty accessing resources in a regular library
through use of audio and video, resources are made available to the visually and hearing impaired
integrate voice, video, and text for users involved in distance education in remote locations

6. Present student work.

share and showcase student work
student-created art, photography, oral histories to support local curriculum and compensate for lack of local resources on the Internet

7. Information retrieval.

provides user-friendly interfaces, giving clickable access to resources
use any search term such as word, phrase, title, name, subject to search entire collection

8. Teaching tool for information literacy.

enables students to find their way more easily around the various search choices
as an instructional tool, students learn the skills of selecting and using appropriate search engines, reading URLs and how to use an online database when needed
can be taught information ethics ie. plagiarism, reference sources, copyright issues

9. Storage of information.

potential to store much more information that traditional library
requires very little physical space to contain information

10. Networking capabilities.

one digital library can provide a link to any other resources of other digital libraries
a seamlessly integrated resource sharing can occur

11. Directs students to relevant resources.

students spend more time thinking about information rather than participating in time consuming searching
that complement the library's print resources
customized to meet the needs of a particular school community
resources selected to match research topics, age and reading levels of students

There are some disadvantages or concerns that need attention and consideration when creating a virtual library.

1. Restricted by copyright law.

works cannot be shared over different periods of time like a traditional library
content is public domain or self generated
if copyright exists, permission should be requested

2. Requires connectivity.

instability of Internet sites requires regular checks should be carried out to ensure that web links are still active
if there is not Internet connection, the VL is inaccessible
many people do not have Internet access - the Digital Divide may apply
may have access to the Internet but lack skill to utilize the available information

3. Skilled professionals are required.

to organize, maintain and help students
guide students in their selection, evaluation and use of electronic choices
need the knowledge of Boolean searching and advanced searching skills

4. Increased number of resources challenges student selection.

purchase of online materials are not tailored for a particular community of learners
increased need for instruction in use and evaluation of resources
students face difficulty in selecting quality material from the increased assortment of resources

The building of a virtual library requires consideration of both the advantages and disadvantages in order to create an effective library. With careful design and the support of skilled information professionals, virtual libraries can provide a powerful environment for student learning. (Gunn, 2002)

References:

Digital Library. (2008). Wikipedia. Retrieved February 29, 2008, from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_library

Grantham, C. (2007). Virtual library: e-ssential. ACCESS. 21 (3) 5-8.

Gunn, H. (2002). Virtual Libraries Supporting Student Learning. Retrieved March1, 2008 from

http://www.accesswave.ca/~hgunn/special/papers/virlib/print.html

Elements of an Ideal Virtual Library

2008-03-02T11:35:00.000-08:00

Valenza(2005) and Clyde(1999) have both suggested that there are some common elements that are shared by well designed virtual libraries:

- navigation that is simple and instinctive
- search tools and electronic databases pages are available
- there is a school library catalogue link
- access to bibliographic and citation guides
- access to research guides such as organisers, rubrics, hand-outs, subject gateways and web quests
- reference services are available such as an e-mail link for students to as a librarian for suggestions on how to research a topic or located information
- access to reading lists, book reviews and promotions
- access to pathfinders, which link students to physical and online resources for a specific assignment

Teacher librarians need to embrace and support student enthusiasm for learning with technology by providing online resources, and teaching information literacy skills.
Building a website might seem an enormous task but it is achievable according to Grantham(2007), if the following steps are taken:

- explore other school library websites
- select the best ideas for design, content and navigation
- set realistic goals
- start small and build up over time
- develop a comprehensive selection policy for online resources
- consult journals with reviews of Internet resources
- select from the Edna theme pages as a source of authoritative web links
- encourage teacher involvement in sending relevant web sites to add to subject links
- promote the use of the school's virtual library to teachers and students
- incorporate its use in resource-based learning lessons
- allocate time to work on the web pages

Developing a well designed virtual library will enable teachers and students to effectively search for relevant information and effectively utilize this knowledge.

Virtues of Valenza!

2008-03-02T09:25:00.000-08:00

The 21st century student utilizes the internet as a major information source. In Carol Grantham's article Virtual library: e-ssential (2007) she states that the internet has opened the door to an abundance of online resources and the school library can either respond to the needs of students by embracing these new technologies or be seen by students as irrelevant. She goes on to say that many students choose the Internet as their preferred information source but most have a limited understanding of how to search effectively and efficiently.

Joyce Valenza, librarian at Springfield Township High School, observed that students need more instruction as well as the assistance of improved system design if they are to become effective seekers and users of information. Virtual libraries can address these needs. According to Valenza, through virtual school libraries, teacher librarians can 'guide and serve learners where they live, play and work'(The Influence of School Virtual Libraries on the Information-Seeking Behaviors of High School Students,2004)

Valenza in her information on workshops that she offers on School Library Websites: State of the Art Information Landscapes for 21st Century Learners states, 'Our libraries should now have two front doors, and one of them should be virtual. The effective virtual library pulls together, in one unified interface, all of a library's resources..print and electronic. It can be a vibrant, media-rich knowledge management tool for the entire learning community.'

This concept is developed further in her wiki page, A WebQuest About School Library Websites (2007). She discusses the fact that an effective library web page is available 24-7, and provides immediate support and intervention. Valenza makes a very valuable and valid point when she explains that the school's virtual library projects the image of the librarian as a 21st century teacher and information professional. According to Valenza, the library website represents the library program as it offers guidance and instruction while it fosters independent learning, it supports reading, learning and the building of knowledge.

One of the gurus of virtual libraries, Joyce Valenza has shared many valuable thoughts and ideas on this topic.

What is a Virtual Library?

2008-03-01T11:11:00.000-08:00

A virtual library is an organized collection of resources stored in digital format which are accessible by computers. A virtual library exists in cyberspace only. There are no buildings or shelves. According to Gunn in Virtual Libraries Supporting Student Learning, 2000 the emphasis in virtual libraries is on organization and access, not on physical collections. The design determines the type of learning, for a particular community of users that the virtual library supports.

A virtual library, also known as a digital or electronic library may be defined as a system that is accessible from anywhere via the internet, to deliver knowledge directly to their users, without being confined to the contents of a physical library nor by being caught in a web of unorganized, unmanaged information. Information from any online source can be managed and shared by librarians with their users, making more knowledge available to users than ever before; the goal of an e-library is to perform online all the functions of the traditional library, plus many more available in today's digital world.(Deb,Kar, Setting Up an Electronic Library:the case of TERI,2005)

The Digital Library Federation(DLF)defines digital libraries as
"organizations that provide the resources, including the specialized staff, to select, structure, offer intellectual access to, interpret, distribute, preserve the integrity of, and ensure the persistence over time of collections of digital works so that they are readily and economically available for use by a defined community or set of communities."

There are numerous definitions of what is a virtual library. In research literature, the terms digital, electronic, e-libraries and virtual libraries are frequently interchangeable.

Voila!

2008-02-25T06:02:00.000-08:00

I do believe 'the public' can now access my podcast! I am keeping my fingers crossed. Go to the following website at Podcast People, and my 'Figgy Duff' recipe should be there.

http://listentome.podcastpeople.com

Now I just need to upload it onto my blog!
I do believe that it works now. I went to a tutorial at Blogger and listened to a video clip and adapted the directions to my podcast people site. I hope you enjoy it!

Figgy Duff

Let Me Count the Way(s of Podcasting)!

2008-02-25T01:30:00.000-08:00

A list of ways of using Podcasts:

-sharing student work with the community
-narration of characters in literature
-vocabulary practice
-oral book report
-archiving historical events
-peer tutoring
-use on a field trip
-provide notes for absent students
-provide day plans for substitutes
-improve fluency of reading, speaking and communicating
-assessment tool
-enlist peer support for social issues
-bring experts and knowledge to students
-develop interviewing technique
-preview and or review of course material
-celebrate learning at the end of a unit

There are numerous Podcasts that we as teachers would benefit from accessing.
Here is a list of a only a few that may be of interest:

-Connect Learning Podcast (David Warlicks)
-ESL Teacher Talk
-Tech Teacher Podcast
-Music Appreciation Podcasts

In conclusion, podcasting is a very powerful tool that benfits both the learner and teacher. Students and teachers actively participate in creating and listening to info-rich podcasts.

'Podcasts are versatile, reusable, interesting and stimulating to the new generation of technology-savvy student(and teachers).'(Podcasting for Your Class,Mikat,Martinez,Jorstad, Journal of Physical Education, Recreation & Dance, May/Jun 2007.)

Long my your big jib draw! and when I am finally able to upload my podcast, you will know what the previous phrase means.

Podcasts in the Library!

2008-02-25T00:35:00.000-08:00

In the article entitled, Podcasting 101 for K-12 Librarians (Computers in Libraries, April 2006)the author makes a very interesting and valid statement when discussing the reasons to use podcasts in the library. The author, Esther Eash cautions us to consider the reasons for podcasting. She goes on to say that it isn't reason enough to use it just because it is a new form of technology. According to Eash, we need to consider if podcasting is the best format for the task, whether it supports our curriculum goals and if it enhances student learning. These are all valid concerns that teachers and TLs need to address whenever they encounter new technology or new curriculum developments.

There are several legitimate reasons for using podcasts in school libraries.
Teacher librarians access podcasts to supplement research, or to get updated news and information. School library programming can be promoted through creating a podcast.You can use podcasts for book reviews, reading programs and for assessing student achievement. Student podcasts in the library that include interviews, creative writing and readings, demonstrate skills and observations about the learning process. Podcasts can be used to share library news, advertising library events like book fairs and student library club activities. Podcasts in the library can provide professional development. Professional development podcasts could include how to write a book review, copyright issues, book group discussions and bring in other professionals.

Teacher Librarians are in a unique position to be proactive in developing the use of podcasting with students and teachers to support their teaching and learning.

A Place for Podcasts in Education!

2008-02-24T21:57:00.000-08:00

Podcasts can be utilized and integrated in a variety of ways as a teaching and learning tool. By creating and recording podcasts, students sharpen their research, writing and speaking skills The Podcast Heard Around the World (Jacqueline Heinze, Scholastic Administr@tor, June 2006). According to this article, students deepen their understanding of content,and teachers can hear that students know what they are talking about through their podcasts.

In Podcasting: Just the Basics (Kelly Gatewood, Kappa Delta Pi Record,Winter 2008)four educational purposes of podcasts are discussed. These include curriculum augmentation, professional development, material presentation by both teachers and students, and effective communication with the community and parents.

First,with regards to curriculum augmentation,Podcasts supply a variety of content in audio form. According to Howard Gardner and his theory of multiple intelligences, we all have different learning styles and strengths. This technology enables teachers to utilize another instructional tool that allows effective communication with students who positively respond to audio learning. In the classroom, podcasts can be used to introduce new material, support current lessons and review material already covered in classrooms.According to Sound Off! The Possibilities of Podcasting (Gordon, Book Links, September 2007), some teachers have begun to record themselves teaching important concepts which then creates an archive of information online for students to access when they're stuck on a homework assignment.

Second,Podcasts for professional development can be very effective. Podcasts provide conveniency to teachers as they can select what, when and where they learn. If there is a particular professional topic, they can search for relevant podcasts and listen to any applicable ones.They can listen to them at their own convenience, at their desk,or even on the drive home using an iPod. This recent technology tool is now available anytime or anywhere for teachers to use in support of their professional development. Another area of professional development that is of personal interest is utilizing podcasts as an assessment tool. Our school's AISI(Alberta Initiative for School Improvement) focus is on assessment. Teachers could listen to students read passages at various times of the year to assess changes and improvements.

A third educational use for podcasts is information sharing. Teachers can record lectures, lab directions, project overviews and review material and make it available for students to access. Students can then create podcasts to demonstrate their learning and understanding of the content. Podcasts give the opportunity for some students to effectively explain something outloud rather than write it down. The writing process is supported through podcasting. Students write a script, edit it,practice reading it and perform. Students take on a more responsible role in their personal learning through the use of podcasts, either listening or creating with podcasts.

A fourth use for podcasts is to effectively communicate with parents and the school community. Podcasts can provide information about current happenings at the school, homework, announcing special events, and give sport reports. Podcasts provide an effective way of keeping families and the community informed.

These are just a few educational benefits of podcasting. More specific ones will be listed later as well as how to use podcasts in the library.

Planning and Producing a Podcast!

2008-02-23T23:55:00.000-08:00

As we know, the best way to learn about a web tool is to use it! Being a beginner, I decided to use the KISS approach. First I listened to several different podcasts, on YouTube, and at various podcast sites (Podcast Alley, PodcastPickle, Podcasting News). I also explored websites recommended by Jennifer at poducateme.com and Arlene's site.

I then gathered all the required equipment. I have a PC and I purchased a set of headphones with a built in adjustable microphone(on sale for $20 at The Source). I chose the recording software application, Audacity because it is reasonably easy to use and is free! It is available to download from the internet at the website: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/.

When the file is opened, it initiates the installation process and you follow the self explanatory steps to install it on your computer. Once it is fully installed, an icon will appear on the computer for you to open it. I also downloaded the free 'lame' file which enables one to convert the podcast into an mp3 format so that it is more accessible.

Before beginning a podcast it is recommended that you make a plan. An informative article which discusses how to create a podcast can be found at Proquest - Podcasting in the school library, part2:creating powerful Podcasts with your students(Annette Lamb,Larry Johnson, Teacher-Librarian, April 2007).The article examines how one teacher decided that instead of confiscating MP3 players from students, he would integrate them into the curriculum by having students create a podcast. The article goes on to explain the steps of creating a successful podcast. Who will be your audience? What will your topic be? What will be in your script? How long will it be? Have you checked for copyright issues? Have you got a quiet place to record? Will there be more than one person doing the podcast? Will you be incorporating music or sound effects? How often will you rehearse? Does it need editing and how will you do this? How will your podcast be shared? These are all important questions to address in order for your podcast to be successful.

The first podcast I created was a reading of one of my own children's favorite picture book that we have at our cabin. I practiced numerous times and even included a sound effect of a tinkling bell! It was very impressive! However, it was fairly lengthy and copyright was an issue. Because it would be out there in the world wide web, I realized that I could not publish it. Back to the drawing board!

I then decided on sharing a recipe. I planned the script, adding some background information of where it originated from, what some of the terms meant and the actual recipe itself. I practiced several times to ensure a fluent reading. To begin the recording, I accessed Audacity and recorded, checking the wavelength and listening for controlled expression. I kept it short and simple which had good results.

Next came the most challenging part and that was uploading the MP3 file to a webserver so that it can be accessed by others. This is where I have stalled! Uploading to my blog has also not been successful to date. I have spent an incredible amount of time trying to do this. I have accessed tutorials at Audacity, Googled it, talked to an IT guy at our board, talked to my 'pod person' and still no luck. I can access it on my desktop and I successfully sent it to my 'pod person' who said it sounded great! I have not completely given up but definitely need to take a break from it. I now find that I am becoming very confused. I will return to it at a later time and hopefully I will have gained some insight to enable this very important step to happen!

Podcasting...a Powerful Tool!

2008-02-23T22:29:00.000-08:00

'Podcasting is yet another way for students to be creating and contributing ideas to a larger conversation, and it's a way of archiving that contribution for future audiences to use.' -Will Richardson, Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts & Other Powerful Web Tools for the Classroom.

According to Charles Doe in The Podcasting Phenomenon (MultiMedia & Internet@Schools, Nov/Dec 2007) a podcast is a digital media file distributed over the Internet using syndication feeds for playback on computers, portable media players such as iPods and MP3 players.The term is somewhat confusing because it does not actually require an iPod to listen to it.
The word podcasting is a combination of two words, iPod and broadcast. The New Oxford American Dictionary chose 'podcast' as the Word of the Year for 2005, and defined it is as "a digital recording of a radio broadcast or similar program, made available on the Internet for downloading to a personal audio player." Podcasting, according to an article by Milat, Martinez and Jorstad entitled, Podcasting for Your Class(Journal of Physical Education Recreation and Dance, May/June 2007) is a form of personal broadcasting over the internet.

Podcasting has quickly become a powerful Web 2.0 tool. From the digital library of David F. Warlick,(EPN the Education Podcast Network)people equate podcasting to 'radio on demand'. However, it goes on to explain that podcasting has more options with respect to content and programming than radio has. Also, those that listen to podcasts may do so at their convenience and can choose what they want to listen to.

Podcasts have the capability to reach a wide audience both inside and outside the regular school day. The whole world can become potential listeners and can subscribe to a podcast through an RSS feed. Podcasting is indeed a powerful tool!

'The speed at which podcasting is spreading is phenomenal! This versatile technology is entering the educational arena almost as fast as it entered the technology mainstream a while ago.'- Charles Doe, The Podcasting Phenomenon
(Multimedia & Internet@Schools, Nov/Dec 2007)

Cindy meets a Pod Person!

2008-02-18T20:40:00.000-08:00

I had heard of the phenomenon 'podcasting' but really didn't have a clue until I went to a Technology Fair a couple of months ago. A couple of 'techies' were giving a mini podcasting demonstration so I decided to check it out. I quickly discovered that they were inexperienced and unsure of how things worked. I questioned whether I could actually do one myself, as they were involved in an AISI project - The 21st Century Learner and using all kinds of technology and yet here they were struggling.

Then I met a 'Pod Person'! She was cool, enthusiastic and knowledgeable! By then my head was spinning but she managed to explain things more clearly and I could see the potential in podcasting. Some words of advise that she gave me were to check some podcasts out, create one myself and then work with students on creating their own podcasts. Although it is two months later, here I am following her advise.

Because it had been awhile, I felt I needed to be reintroduced to podcasting. I went to YouTube and listened to NIU- What is a Podcast? which you too can listen to now with a click of your mouse!

I would recommend listening to this clip and using it as a brief introduction to podcasting. It was very informative and reviewed and clarified some key elements of creating a podcast.

Final Thoughts on Social Bookmarking

2008-02-10T23:15:00.000-08:00

With this Web 2.0 tool comes some concerns and issues that as educators we need to address. When users tag/categorize their information, they are doing what in the past 'expert catalogers' would have done and some people may question their ability and the accuracy of the tags. According to Laura Gordon-Mumane in, Social Bookmarking, Folksonomies, and Web 2.0 Tools (2006)Folksonomies are current and capture the rapid changes in the popular world while traditional classification schemes take longer to adapt to changing trends, languages, fads, and daily news. She goes on to discuss folksonomies as being self-moderating and inclusive. In contrast, there are those who feel that the use of controlled vocabularies is important. Without controlled vocabulary, it is argued in Mumane's article that folksonomies and tagging are imprecise, ambiguous, overly personal, and inexact.
Mumane concludes with the argument that we should utilize the knowledge created by expert catalogers and information professionals and make better, more formal, more accessible tools that make it easier to find new materials, help us locate older materials and build new data collections and online tools.

In the Library Journal article, by Rethlefsen Tags Help Make Libraries Del.icio.us (2007)Social bookmarking and tagging tools help librarians bridge the gap between the library's need to offer authoritative, well-organized information and their patron's web experience. Social bookmarking sites like del.icio.us according to Rethlefsen lets users bookmark suitable web pages for themselves and others, check out what others bookmark and organize bookmarks in one place. Web 2.0 tool of social bookmarking meets and effectively interfaces with the library!

As teachers, we look for tools to support and help us with our teaching. One such tool is Social Bookmarking. It helps us organize, store, retrieve and manage all kinds of information. Social Bookmarking empowers searching and locating of new and old resources.

'Web 2.0 tools harness the collective intelligence of the Web and, by tapping into that intelligence, make the services better and more powerful'.(L.Mumane 2007)
Social Bookmarking is one such tool!

Let's All Learn to 'Share'!

2008-02-10T22:15:00.000-08:00

The educational benefits and classroom applications are numerous for social bookmarking. The Web2tutorial at
http://web2tutorial.wikispaces.com/social_bookmarks?responseT listed a number of possibilities;
- teachers could network with other educators around the globe who share their interests.
- as TLs we could create social bookmark accounts for our school's academic departments. Teachers within the department could all contribute to the growing database of web resources.
- school staff could contact other people for professional networking, based on their social bookmarks.
- classrooms could collaborate on projects with other schools, sharing bookmarks
- the TL or classroom teacher could choose specific sites and bookmark them. Their students could go directly to a bookmark that supports a concept or research project instead of the student 'Googling' and trying to wade through all the irrelevant information.

Will Richardson in Taming the Beast(2007) discussed having collaborative groups, classrooms or districts decide on a unique tag that everyone can use when they bookmark something of interest. He gave the fascinating example of a AP(Advanced Placement) calculus class in Winnipeg who when students found an interesting and useful site about calculus, they would bookmark it at del.icio.us with the tag 'apcalc06'. He goes on to say that not only are they collecting sites for themselves, they are collaboratively building a classroom resource.

I am quite interested and curious to know more about social bookmarking for books. Richardson briefly discusses this idea using Library Thing or Shelfari bookmarks. You first start a free account that allows you to create an online catalog of all of the books in your school library, and then add notes, descriptions and tags that describe what they are about. You then get connected to everyone else who has tagged that book and you would be able to view their comments, see the other books in their library and get ideas for what to read next. I think it has possibilities... has anyone heard of this before or done this?

Through collaboration and sharing teachers and students do benefit from utilizing social bookmarking tools.

del.icio.us is delightful

2008-02-10T20:42:00.000-08:00

There are many social bookmarking tools out there such as Furl, Diigo, Blinklist, Ma.gnolia and Raw Sugar to name a few. Ronda shared a website in her blog that evaluated the top 10 social bookmarking tools. The author, Alex Iskol indicated that del.icio.us dominated the social bookmarking market.

As you may have guessed, I chose del.icio.us as my social bookmarking site as it is one of the most popular and well known book marking sites. Joshua Schachter is the creator of this tool that was launched in 2003. Laura Gordon-Mumane in her article entitled Social Bookmarking, Folksonomies and Web 2.0 Tools -Searcher, June 2006 (Proquest Education Journals)explains that Schachter needed a more sophisticated bookmarking tool to handle his large and growing collection of links. (Sound familiar?) He needed a better tool which would enable him to retrieve both his favorite and most frequently used links, as well as information less frequently used, but still important to him when he needed it. Hence, del.icio.us was introduced as the social bookmarking tool to use.

del.icio.us was user friendly and quick to set up. After I signed up, I went to the next step of uploading two buttons to my browser, a 'tag' button and a 'shortcut to del.icio.us' button. Next,I went to my 'Favorites' in my browser to bookmark a few articles. The process was straight forward, with a few tags assigned and a brief note about the article, I was successful at bookmarking. A few hours later when I checked back there were others that had bookmarked some of my articles for themselves (the 'social' part of bookmarking). When I clicked on their names under users I could view all of their bookmarks. I must admit, I was totally amazed and enthralled! With just a click the web opens up to you and I can locate related information that has been tagged by other users.
del.icio.us is indeed delightful!!

Tagging and Folksonomies

2008-02-10T14:08:00.000-08:00

Tagging and folksonomy are terms that are affiliated with social bookmarking.I feel that they require some clarification in order to better understand how and why social bookmarking functions so effectively.
Will Richardson in his article Taming the Beast in School Library Journal(March 2007)retrieved from ProQuest, stated that the operating principle behind social bookmarking, tagging and folksonomies is if you find something interesting enough to save, odds are good that others will too and together using these tools we can build resource lists much more effectively than just working alone. I equate it to having your own personal support group. He went on to explain how tags work, that they are keywords that help you identify what a site is about. He gave a simple example of bookmarking Romeo and Juliet and adding tags such as 'Shakespeare', 'theatre', 'Romeo_and_Juliet' which would be used to retrieve the information. With tagging, there comes controversy as to the appropriatness of some tags, which I will discuss in another section of my blog.
Now, according to Richardson comes the really cool part!
The social bookmarking site where you have saved those tags becomes connected to similarly tagged content by other users. It's a 'homegrown taxonomy' for the Web, a 'folksonomy'. Folksonomy is a term created by the information architect Thomas VanderWal and combines the people or 'folks-y' approach to building a taxonomy. A user tags a video, image, bookmark or text in order to remember it later and then that information is added to the global tag cloud and helps to build a folksonomy.
I can definitely see that tagging, folksonomy and social bookmarking are interrelated. Using deli.cio.us to tag a favorite '7 Things you should know about Social Bookmarking' has resulted in 495 other people who share my interest in this topic which is now a folksonomy! Amazing and fascinating!!

The Mystic of Social Bookmarking!

2008-02-10T12:34:00.000-08:00

What is social bookmarking? Why would I access a social bookmarking site? How do I access it? How can social bookmarking help me with my learning and teaching? These were questions that I pondered as I began my exploration of the Web 2.0 tool of social bookmarking.

First I went to Wikipedia (I have never used it and was curious as to how they would explain social bookmarking and how accurate it was), the free encyclopedia to get an explanation of what social bookmarking is and found that; ‘social bookmarking is a method for Internet users to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages on the Internet with the help of metadata. In a social bookmarking system, users save links to web pages that they want to remember and/or share. These bookmarks are usually public, and can be saved privately, shared only with specified people or groups, shared only inside certain networks, or another combination of public and private domains. The allowed people can usually view these bookmarks chronologically, by category or tags, or via a search engine. Most social bookmark services encourage users to organize their bookmarks with informal tags instead of the traditional browser-based system of folders, although some services feature categories/folders or a combination of folders and tags. They also enable viewing bookmarks associated with a chosen tag, and include information about the number of users who have bookmarked them. Some social bookmarking services also draw inferences from the relationship of tags to create clusters of tags or bookmarks. Many social bookmarking services provide web feeds for their lists of bookmarks, including lists organized by tags. This allows subscribers to become aware of new bookmarks as they are saved, shared, and tagged by other users.’ In summary, social bookmarking is a tool used to manage and share information on the web.I decided to continue my research to varify what Wikipedia had stated.

I then accessed ‘Social Bookmarking in Plain English’ on YouTube. This provided a brief overview of social bookmarking and helped to make sense of how it works. The video clip was fun to watch, well organized and gave an effective explanation of social bookmarking.I now knew the necessary steps to take sign up for my own account and how to effectively use a social bookmarking site. This will be discussed later in my blog.

According to Social Bookmarking 101 – What is Social Bookmarking and How Can it Help Me? (http://webtrends.about.com/od/socialbookmarking101/p/aboutsocialtags.htm) if you have ever e-mailed a friend or family member and sent them a link to a website that they might find interesting, you are participating in social bookmarking. It is comparable to taking a book mark in your Favourites and sending it out to the web. This article goes on to say that not only can you save your favourite websites and send them to your friends and colleagues, you can also look at what other people have found and tagged because they felt they would be of interest to others. Social bookmarking allows you to target the internet for only what you are interested in seeing, as it narrows down specific items for you. Social bookmarking enables you to stay current and only view relevant information. With social bookmarking you do not need to type in a subject to a search engine and then flip through copious results. Instead, you go to a social bookmarking site, choose a category or a tag and then you will be able to find the most popular websites. You can take this a step further with social bookmarking and add bookmarks, saved by others, to your own collection as well as subscribe to the list of others. Now I clearly understood the simplicity and implications of social bookmarking. The mystic of social bookmarking has disappated!

Let's Get Serious Now!

2008-02-04T01:30:00.000-08:00

YouTube is open to a wide range of users. Some are eager to share their own personal lives and viewpoints. Others want to meet new people and interact online through watching and sharing videos.
I was somewhat dismayed at the subject matter of some of the clips. Security and appropriateness of material became a concern of mine. Do young people have access to the questionable material? The short answer is yes, due to the fact that you can sign in and lie about your age when setting up an account. What are the implications for schools? I know that in Calgary, the public high schools can access YouTube and close monitoring is not always occurring. The filter levels at the Elementary level and Junior High level prevent students from accessing YouTube in the school setting. A teacher can override the security level for a student for educational purposes but that rarely occurs.
The implications for teaching and learning are varied and valuable. On the Educase Learning Initiative website,(www.educause.edu/eli) an article written in September 2006 examined the role of YouTube at the school level. According to this article,and I would believe the majority would agree, YouTube enhances students' visual literacy through viewing videos and through discussions. The article goes on to say that the application itself enourages experimentation with new media which develops a deeper understanding of the subject and the tools used to create the content. Students are exposed to new insights and skills which link them to a variety of online communities. As well, it discusses the fact that YouTube as a social network is replacing passive learning with active participation, where everyone has a voice, anyone can contribute and a network of learners form around content and support one another in learning. The potential to use YouTube as a teaching/learning tool is great but there needs to be a plan in place to ensure that students are able to critically analyze material for appropriateness and know how to effectively utilize it and apply it to their learning and education.

Another video-sharing service was discussed in a few other blogs called TeacherTube. According to their website, the goal of Teacher Tube is to provide an online community for sharing instructional videos. Their aim is to provide an educationally focused, safe venue for teachers, schools, and home learners. It is a site to provide professional development with teachers teaching teachers. As well, it is a site where teachers can post videos designed for students to view in order to learn a concept or skill.
I had heard of it and decided to take a look at what it had to offer. I found it easy to navigate and decided that for the elementary level it had alot of potential. So much so that I set up an account with them too. I decided to take a look at some science topics and chose one on machines called 'Screws are Amazing Machines'.Grade Two students would be highly entertained and develop a better understanding of screws by time this musical video was done! Researching applicable topics to the curriculum would be more straightforward and age appropriate when using TeacherTube.
The possibilities are endless and I intend to go to school tommorrow, check to see that I can access TeacherTube and start some students exploring for applicable video clips on time, and the calendar.

Video sharing is a part of the world of our 21st Century learners and we need to take advantage of this tool to access information and support student learning.

Sign Me Up!

2008-02-04T00:45:00.000-08:00

Myself and millions of my 'very close' friends have signed up for YouTube. It was easy to get an account, free and now I can rate other videos, upload videos and leave comments. Other 'fun' things I can do: upload and share my own videos worldwide, browse millions of original videos uploaded by my 'very close' friends, seek out and create video groups who have similar tastes, customize my experience with playlists and subscriptions and integrate YT with my website using videos embeds.
I am into it already. I have started listing some favorites on my own 'aCuriousCat' YouTube account, uploaded a video clip for information purposes on this blog and I left a comment about a video clip that I previewed on YouTube. I first saw this clip of Rick Mercer and Prime Minister Harper on T.V. and it made it to YouTube. I chuckle everytime I see it.

I must admit, I have spent countless hours looking at YouTube and having way too much fun!! I can understand now how students become addicted to it.

YouTube Enters my Life!

2008-02-03T23:51:00.000-08:00

I began my exploration of video-sharing sites by initially focusing on YouTube, because it is the most popular video-sharing service. According to an article in Time Magazine, YouTube became so popular in 2006 because it was both easy and edgy, a rare combination! I chose to get my own account so that I would have access to more videos and be able to post my own video if I was feeling really wild and crazy.

I was curious as to how YouTube began so I searched for a bit of history and came across the following video clip. I hope you enjoy it...

Because my exposure to YouTube is limited as I am in an Elementary school where YouTube is blocked, I decided to discuss with a group of teenagers their involvement with YouTube. The informal survey in an earlier blog was very enlightening! Young people use it for varying reasons but mainly to watch video clips and music clips. I observed them in my home going on YouTube individually and also sharing a particular video for fun or for entertainment. Using YouTube for educational purposes was very limited and will be discussed further on into my blog.

You Tube Survey!

2008-01-30T23:35:00.000-08:00

Before I explore You Tube I decided to do an informal survey of users. After all why not go to the source!
I interviewed nine young people ranging in age from 12 to 21. Five males and four females participated in the survey.

A summary of the results are as follows:

- main reason for going to You Tube is to watch music videos and movie/video clip
- one person likes to watch parodies on You Tube
- a couple of them like to watch highlights of sports (14 and 21 year old males)
- some of the students (age 12, 16 and 17) access YT at school for educational purposes
- two students in Junior high said their access is blocked at school
- a student in High school said that their access at school is not closely monitored
- one student sometimes accesses YT at school for entertainment
- five of the participants in the survey actually have an account, one initially thought in order to access You Tube you had to have one so signed up
- those who did not have an account, sometimes use a sibling or friend’s account so they can see more movie clips
- most were aware that YT blocks inappropriate material
- a few were aware that you can post videos
- five participants were aware that an account is free
- how frequently they accessed You Tube varied from everyday to once per week.

The above responses were based on questions that were asked of all survey participants

Additional Comments:
- feels that their school restricts access as it would be a distracter
- has a high entertainment value
- shows the number of hits a clip has
- most popular with 10-30 year old age bracket
- likes that it is free
- having own account allows you to comment on videos
- need to have an account to upload a video
- hears about something funny and can look for it
- can find older, less popular videos
- comes in multiple languages
- at one time you could watch a show in its entirety but not now due to copyright
- forbids adult material, has a Family Filter
- got started by a friend sending them the link
- can be very distracting in a good way
- plans underway to do a hand puppet show and upload it weekly
- attempts to allow only 18 years of age and up to preview movies is ineffective as anyone can click the age ID button indicating that they are supposedly old enough

We are Family!

2008-01-29T21:49:00.001-08:00

Exploring Photo Sharing

2008-01-27T14:48:00.000-08:00

Computer technology is more prevalent in classrooms, according to L. Dias and S. Atkinson in Technology Integration: Best Practices-Where Do Teachers Stand? (http://www.ucalgary.ca/~iejll/volume5/dias.html) and it is becoming less a decision of whether or not to adopt it, and more of a dilemma of how to implement it effectively into instruction. Greater value is being placed on integrating computer technology into the curriculum so as to create meaningful learning experiences and increase technology literacy.

It has been found that teachers who use technology effectively do not limit integration to a restricted number of technology tools, but rather, they choose a variety of tools in relation to their teaching needs and focus. (Dias/Atkinson) One of these tools, would be the utilization of photo sharing sites to organize, store, display and distribute a schools’ photo collection. With the growth of digital photography and the simplicity of uploading and accessing pictures online, the use of photographs for educational purposes has definitely increased.

I found that there are a number of advantages to using photo sharing sites, such as; no film to develop, the pictures do not fade over time, any imperfections can be corrected with editing programs, it is easy to take and erase a number of pictures to get the perfect shot and there are a great variety of free and inexpensive sites to choose from.
I was amazed at the number of photo sharing sites that can be accessed, much more than fifteen that I had mentioned in an earlier blog.

The photo sharing site that a school chooses will depend on their program needs, services offered, costs, and ease of accessibility. Some of the popular sites include Flickr, Picasa, Photo Bucket, Smug Mug, dotPhoto, Webshots, Shutterfly, Kodak Easy Share Gallery, and Snapfish. There are photo sharing review websites that one can access in order to assist in making a decision as to which site to use. The evaluation criteria consists of features they offer to help upload, post, share, print, network, browsing capabilities of photo galleries by keyword or date, accessibility or user friendliness, adequate help and support through tutorials, FAQ, customer service contact and if they offer editing tools, lots of storage space, and password protected access. Two of these review sites that I accessed can be found at Rate It All (http://www.rateitall.com) and at Top Ten Review (http://photo-sharing-services-review.toptenreviews.com/).

Ensuring that a photo sharing site is secure is a topic that will need to be addressed in the school setting. Student names and personal information should never be included. Some schools may block sites because of objectionable content. Some sites may have images that are not appropriate for students due to mature content. Clear policies and appropriate supervision is important and similar to those relating to internet usage.
The use of filters can be controversial and restricts ones freedom and rights to access information. As one Grade 3 teacher remarked in the article Photo Sharing Web Sites (Odvard Esil Dyrl)…‘How can teachers integrate online technology into the curriculum when those tools are prohibited and blocked from access in our schools?’

I chose two photo sharing sites to explore, Picasa (http://picasa.google.com) and Photo Bucket (http://photobucket.com) for varied reasons. Picasa because it is a more popular site and I wanted to know what it had to offer and Photo Bucket because it was recommended by a high school student. Like Elizabeth and Arlene, I was anxious to explore the two photo sharing sites and actually upload pictures to my blog. I successfully accomplished this to my surprise and delight!

Picasa can be downloaded for free and I was able to do this very easily and quickly. It is run by the well known and popular Google which I found reassuring and appealing. The program automatically scans your hard drive for every digital photograph you’ve taken and collects them all on Google’s Picasa library. I liked the fact that it can create albums, write captions and manage a variety of photo projects with ease. You can make albums public so anyone with an invitation can browse them but switching albums to private viewing is easy. I thought that the layout was attractive and functional. You can edit your photos and I played around with the red eye reduction tool and the cropping tool. My cat Tenzing was my subject for Picasa. He cooperated quite nicely and was honored to have his picture uploaded on my blog.

Although Picasa had a slide show tool, unlike Ronda who successfully uploaded a Picasas slide show, I could not get it uploaded onto my blog. I could have used the tutorial they offered but a tech savvy high school student suggested I try Photo Bucket to do it. I made a decision to use Photo Bucket and this enabled me to explore yet another photo sharing site.

Photo Bucket can also be downloaded for free like Picasa which is appealing to schools with limited budgets. Photos can also be organized into albums and sub albums where you can share, organize and publish images or photos on the web. It allows you to upload single photos or several photos at a time. You can actually print a photo book, posters, mini photo books and postcards through Photo Bucket which I would like to try doing. When creating a slideshow it was easy to upload my images from my photo file to Photo Bucket and then upload them to my blog in the form of a slideshow at a touch of the Blogger button. A quick look at a tutorial they offered provided me with simple instructions on how to upload a slideshow to my blog. You can also copy and paste the link of the photos to your blog but I had some challenges with this feature. Another appealing feature of Photo Bucket is they do not allow pornography, nudity or offensive pictures on their site which is so important in an elementary or any school setting. The slide show of my family turned out just the way that I had envisioned it and so I was very pleased with the outcome. I would definitely create other themed slide show using Photo Bucket.

Exploring these two photo sharing sites was a great learning experience through navigating their sites and trying the various editing tools. Both sites were user friendly and as long as I stayed focussed and calm, everything went smoothly. There are more features on both sites that I would like to explore like adding captions, music and using pictures from the web. The teaching and learning possibilities are numerous with using photo sharing tools and will be discussed next.

Using photo sharing sites as a technology learning tool would be beneficial to students’ learning in several different areas. The possibilities are endless and I have chosen to list just a few that my school could become involved, as follows:
Ø Our school goes on numerous field trips and using a digital camera and then using a photo sharing site, students could create an album of pictures for each trip
Ø We do a monthly newsletter and pictures could be imported of field trips and classroom activities to the school newsletter or on the school website
Ø Using a digital camera, students could record class history throughout year and put it up on a class website
Ø Students could use a variety of images as writing prompts during creative/story writing
Ø Create simple storybook with Div I students using images and having students add captions and print
Ø Create a slideshow with music for a special concert (Christmas/Spring)
Ø Create a year end slideshow presentation with the Grade 6 graduating class of their years in elementary school, using archived images and adding captions/ music/commentary
Ø Use photos to promote school events ie sports day, hats day, literacy day etc.
Ø Use photos to promote the school within the surrounding community to entice families to enrol students in our school and post on school web site
Ø Allow students to create a blog and enhance it using photo sharing tools
Ø Through accessing photo galleries, have students create a social studies project that depicts various regions they are studying in Alberta or Canada
Ø Import a map and upload applicable photos of a land use/physical geography
Ø Create a photo web for a novel study or a research project
Ø On Valentines/Christmas and other holidays make cards using photos and email to classmates
Ø In a Grade Two math class, use photos that have various geometric traits and create a geometry book to be shared with class members

Photo sharing is just one technology tool that teachers and students can integrate into the curriculum to support student learning. I would strongly agree with Dias and Atkinson in Technology Integration: Walking the Talk, when they discuss that being purposeful is an important aspect of teaching with technology. Not only is it important for teachers to decide when and if to use technology but also where. Photo sharing has a place in supporting curriculum objectives and designing lessons as part of integrating technology for student learning.

Photo sharing

2008-01-26T14:31:00.000-08:00

You may have noticed a picture of a cat on my blog. His name is Tenzing the brother of Hillary. Yes, they were named after the Mt. Everest climbing team of Sir Edmund Hilary and his sherpa guide Tenzing Norgay. I used Picasa to upload this picture.
The slide show was created in Photobucket and consists of family members. Four of the six kids belong to us, also included is our 'undaughter' and our 'Chinese son' and two are not human but are still family!
What a blast to successfully upload them and I will comment later on the process.

Tenzing

2008-01-26T13:23:00.000-08:00

Smile you're on candid camera!

2008-01-21T22:26:00.000-08:00

How times have changed, the flexibility, the versatility! Photo-sharing is so much more than I thought it would be! I am just beginning to explore all the possibilities out there and I think I may have narrowed it down to 15...i think...

Here I go with my intro!!

2008-01-20T19:54:00.000-08:00

I must admit that I was feeling somewhat intimidated with the thought of creating my own blog. Being who I am, I first did alot of reading about blogging and looked at many blogs. I needed to explore how blogging would benefit my learning and my students' learning before building my own.

The Horizon Report 2007 stated, 'some blogging scholars say that the forum for airing ideas and receiving comments from their colleagues helps them to hone their thinking and explore
avenues they might otherwise have overlooked.' A very good argument for blogging in this course.
According to Serim and Schroek in Nailing Digital Jelly to a Virtual Tree-Tracking Emerging Technologies for Learning, in schools, blogs, wikis, videos and podcasts have made learning more interactive. They positively support teaching and sharing of information which positively effects student learning. Another good argument for blogging!

An excellent article about blogging that I would encourage others to read is from the periodical, Learning and Leading with Technology called, Blogging and the Media Specialist by Frances Jacobson Harris(2006). She compared student and adults use of blogs. How they set up their blog and who they are communicating too may be different but their overall reasons for blogging are similar. According to Harris these are the reasons for blogging in a nutshell:
Blogs...
- provide a natural environment for active learning
- provide the opportunity to connect students to the media centre
- can transmit a sense of voice
- are a vehicle of self expression
- are a vehicle of communication
- are a vehicle of information

Now I was convinced that blogging would be beneficial to myself and students but I wanted to examine other blogs and their purposes. Like many of you, I went to W. Richardson's blog list.Talk about getting side tracked! There are alot of blogs out there and I liked the fact that he organizes them into different groupings. Hey, I thought... I can actually do this too! They really looked great and I was eager to jump on the band wagon!

My decision to choose Blogger came from examining a few free blog publishing tools and talking with my teens. I went to the blog site and took a tour. It explained what a blog was and how to navigate the site. I felt it was user friendly and opted to sign up with them.

Choosing a name took a bit of time but I settled on 'A Kaleidoscopic World' as it is indicative of the multifaceted, varied, complex, intricate technological world that I will be living in during this course and infusing into my working and personal life now.

I truly look forward to learning through blogging. Already I have surprised myself with learning how to post, edit, and upload on this site and I still want to do and learn more. Everyone's blog is creative and different which adds to my journey in technology.

As we work together...we learn together!

Cindy