Where to now?

I guess now that I have finished Web 2.0, the inevitable question remains, where to from here? Will I be one of those people that started a blog and it is never added to again, or will this be the beginning of something new.

I read an interesting view earlier today on the development of blogs on

Confabulation:

Just having a blog is not enough. You need a plan so it is not pointless. You need a focus and strategy to really nurture a blog into an indispensable communication tool. Rambling or “incessant barking” (see cartoon above) is of no value. Blogging takes work and dedication.

So I guess I have some decisions to make ...

Course Reflection

Web 2.0 has really confirmed one basic thing - time is my rarest commodity in life. I can only use it once. I cannot make up for lost time. I can easily waste time that I will regret later.

There are so many new tools and applications that I have discovered as part of my learning in this course. It seems to be that there are several options to do the same or a similar thing. Many of these applications I can see highly valuable uses for as a teacher working with other teachers, such as Youtube, Scootle, RSS feeds, Google Reader, Google docs . Some of these applications I can see some use for as a teacher working with students, such as blogs, wikis, podcasts and vodcasts. Some applications I see limited or no use for as a teacher - such as Facebook and Twitter.

Ultimately that is one of the greatest things I will take way from this Web 2.0 course - there are so many options, there are so many tools. So it is a case of choosing what works for you and which tools are most suited to what you are endeavouring to achieve. I have added another couple of things to the list of what I am trying to get done in my limited time. I guess I have to really sit down and look at the options before me and choose those which are best suited for the purposes I am trying to achieve.

The ilearn model reveals that the same key words continue to arise : share, communicate, reflect, engage, collaborate. These are what I perceive to be the key elements of elearning and the challenge to incorporate it into the contemporary classroom. My priority has to continue to be providing quality educational learning opportunities for the students. These tools are just another vehicle that will enable me to reach this goal.

Blooms digital taxonomy gave me a new insight to the traditional taxonomy that I have worked with. This is a clear reflection that the world of the classroom is evolving and will continue to evolve. My part in this is not to throw out everything I have done before and start over but rather to take the aspects that are most beneficial (from both traditional teaching and the digitally enhanced version) and blend them into a workable and cohesive solution. It’s important to see that teaching is not driven by technology but rather enhanced and supported by the use of appropriate technology and digital resources.

At the end of the day, students still need to learn to be literate and numerate. But they also need to be independent and creative learners with a world view. This is the world of these students. It is my role to work alongside them, to assist them by providing the most appropriate resources to support them in their learning.

The ilearn model clearly outlines the generating of a community of learners. I think the next step forward in building this community is to take a personal initiative to continue to engage with other learners to further our application of our newly acquired Web 2.0 skills. We have gained so much insight from the incredible things others are already doing in the Web world. We now need to continue to contribute as learners to this growing online community, sharing our learning so that others too may benefit in their learning.

I commented on Mark Newbury's blog in Module 9 at http://newbsweb2.blogspot.com/2010/06/module-9.html

I commented on Christopher Ingrati's blog in Module 5 at http://chrislearns20.blogspot.com/2009/10/module-5.html

Module 10 : I'm thinking Nings

http://www.storyplace.org/storyplace.asp

I loved this little discovery through the Bookleads wiki.

The world of the wiki and the ning provides so many valuable opportunities for teachers to communicate - sharing best practice, valued ideas and resources. These discussions are surely taking place in staffrooms, corridors and classrooms in school state, nation and worldwide. I love the way that this tool is able to put me into those conversations, to bring them to me. This module highlighted more than ever that teachers far and wide are facing the same struggles and joys that we are in my school. The beauty is that through the use of wikis and nings we are able to bring the reality of finding a solution to our problems a bit closer.

I'm looking a little more closely into the nings (because to be completely honest, I had never heard of a ning prior to this module) and one thought immediately springs to mind - It's Facebook for teachers!!!

The one highly appealing feature of this tool is that it provides a valuable forum for teachers to communicate on the same topic - educating the future. If I was to use this tool, I would definitely seek out specific nings that target specific curriculum areas rather than a general discussion. Scrolling through a large number of posts that are not specific to my particular interests would not be a sensible use of time.

My scrolling through Classroom 2.0 led me to this one :

http://penningtonpublishing.com/blog/

It had some great ideas for developing reading and spelling strategies in particular.

I am so glad I took this journey into the world of the ning:)

Can you believe it ? Me ... a growing fountain of knowledge :)

The best thing about undertaking this course has to be that my husband who spends all day in the IT world is asking me for advice ... what is it? how does it work? can you show me? This is learning in action :)

Module 9 : The thing to do...

Randy has done it again!!

I like scootle as a resource tool. It has some great resources that are easily accessible. Being able to locate them in one well organized place is a positive for all teachers. It’s necessary to do a little bit of sifting to find the right resource – but isn’t that the case with all resources that we access? It is a whole lot quicker than sifting through the resources on the shelf!!

Being able to access Australian resources is also much more appealing. Particularly when it comes to literacy resources, the use of appropriate content is important. Relevance of resources is always an issue. This tool enables some well educated and resourced decisions to be made.

Social networking has definitely become the thing to do.

I’m already a Facebook user. My favourite aspect of this application is that it enables me to keep in touch with friends and family overseas and far away. We share photos, have chats and keep up to date with what’s going on in our busy lives. I’m losing interest in being inundated with updates of the lives of people I see daily or weekly. If I really wanted to know or considered them “friends” I would make a genuine effort to make sure we were in contact already. As for the need to maintain your facebook through your phone throughout the day – come on, I have more interesting and important things to do with my time. I’ve tightened my privacy controls to limit how much people can and can’t have access. I’m a bit skeptical of the term “friend” and the desire of people you don’t even know to become your friend. User discretion is definitely required with this one.

Twitter doesn’t appeal to me at all. This is Facebook on an even more regular “reporting scale”. Who really wants to know what someone did every 5 minutes of the day. I have a phone, I can text a message to a friend if I need to. “Follow me on twitter” = I am a big noter, I want people to stop and notice me as I draw as much attention to myself as I can. No thanks. I’m not a user and can’t see myself being one.

The conclusion I have come to with social networking sites is that they have the ability to become an incredible drain on one’s time.

Comment made on http://newbsweb2.blogspot.com/2010/06/module-9.html

Module 8 : RSS Feed = Updates as you want them.

What a fantastic tool.

I currently receive a lot of updates from websites that I am a subscriber to. These come in the form of emails. But it's not quite as simple as open an email and read the update. It's often a "several click process". Being able to receive feeds from sites of interest that I am able to peruse at my own interest is fantastic. This is the equivalent of having someone else read the daily paper and highlight the relevant articles for you.

I can definitely see this becoming a real favourite tool of mine. It will be great to be able to subscribe to sites that update me with new information as it goes online. I'm all for tools that make my daily life more time efficient and less overwhelming.

Module 7 : Del.icio.us

Not related at all to cooking or the fruits of a masterchef :-)

It's actually a social bookmarking tool!!

I have to be honest, I had never heard of delicious prior to beginning this module. I'm going to be honest and say that I am actually going to sit on the fence on this one. I'm not so sure whether I am a fan or not of this tool.

On the plus side, I like the ability to be able to bookmark favourite sites that I am able to access from any computer I am working on. Some sites I am able to remember because they are often used or have easy names to remember. Others I google based on a partial recall and scroll through the results with mixed success. Now there is delicious - this is a real energy saver - not needing to have them recorded or logged elsewhere. I can really see the benefit of being able to organise my favourite sites/links in one location - rather than on my home mac, my macbook and my computer at work.

As I sit on the fence, I'm thinking the wheel is round ... why reinvent the wheel. If I am able to access high quality resources that are tried and tested by other teachers this is a real plus. To be a reliable and responsible user, I have to tag quality resources that I have tried and tested myself. Further, the tag needs to be explicit so someone else can find it easily. Those that I think are just worth a second look should probably be bookmarked using my previous approach - reserved for a later look rather than tagging straight away. If I am able to share my own resources with other teachers then this has to be a plus too.

I'm thinking this would be a great resource to take on board as a staff. I can really see the benefits that a tool like this would have within our school learning community, particularly when teachers move between grades.

On the down side, using Delicious means that it is another site I have to log into rather than heading straight to my bookmarks menu (which is a really great feature I love about my mac). It would mean that I could access these from other locations (so a plus). I'm not so sure that using bookmarks of others would be something I would really get into in a big way. What is good for me, may not be good for a colleague and vice versa.

This is a tool that I think I have to give a bit more energy to exploring.

Is this where the next module is leading me?

For someone who is a fan of cooking who isn't really a fan of eating, I like the sound of the next module ...

http://www.masterchef.com.au/home.htm

Delicious!!!

I'm thinking it's got to be linked to cooking, because it's the first word that always springs to mind when the kitchen fires up, the apron goes on and the book of the day opens up to a new delight ...

Module 6 : Glogster

This has just got to be the coolest thing yet. It's like scrapbooking grownup style. It's also like the creative unit title page in a digital form. My fingers can hardly type i am just so excited by this application.

I'm not so sure that I can see a practical use for it in my teaching at this point in time, given the role that I currently undertake. Nevertheless it was an extreme amount of fun to play with. I can see definite benefits for this application if you were working with older students.

On a personal note, this application makes the idea of a school project or in-class presentation a lot more exciting. I thought Jack and I had been adventurous creating a notebook presentation and a photo presentation for kinder news this year. Now we can really have some fun !!

Module 6 : Bubbling with ideas

bubbl.us ... what a great idea.

Mindmapping without the need for rubbing out and changing your mind and starting over. A simple online application that really makes the organisation of ideas easy to do. On the Smartboard, on the laptop, or even at home. I particularly like the idea of being able to create a mindmap, share it and collaborate with others to develop it. Save it online, export it, blog it. The more I explore the world of web 2.0 the more cool aplications I discover that really make life just so much simpler.

I'm not so sure of how I would use this with the students I teach. I can see uses for my classroom teaching colleagues, especially working with younger users. It would be possible to set up a skeleton mindmap and have students add ideas to given categories. For older students, it's definitely an application that they would be able to run with independently, following an introduction like the Youtube video.

Have you heard about Flickr yet??

How long will it take to get to the end of school?
Originally uploaded by littlemisssunshine75

It's amazing the things that you will do while you are waiting for the bus to school on a rainy day.

One of my favourite photos of the year ... I've just uploaded it to my new Flickr account, along with a heap of other Jack favourites. It's so funny to look at the things that we see that are marking the passing of Jack's first year of school :)

My Digital World

I thought that I would have a little bit of fun exploring with bubbl.us before I condensed my ideas about Web 2.0 and the implications for my digital life. Life at the moment, in every aspect, has a digital implication. It often seems that I am managing so many different accounts, checking here and there for updates, mail and messages. There simply has to be an easier way :|

Module 5 : Time for a story

Way before I became a savvy mac user I was introduced to Itunes with the purchase of my first ipod. It was an eye-opening experience. It was so different to any program I had ever used on a PC. But I soon realized it was more than just a way of loading my songs onto my Ipod. There were other options such as downloading music (legally!) not to mention “rereuns” of my favourite radio programs. It has to be my all time favourite program on my mac.

As a parent of a kindy child this year, I'm always on the search for ideas to help us through the journey of being a parent rather than a teacher. I always vowed I wouldn't be one of those teachers who teaches their child relentlessly rather than a parent who enjoys the journey. I found this on my latest surfing journey.

www.dubuque.k12.ia.us/ parents/index.htm

This cartoon really reflects my changed view on the value of storytelling and the endless possibilities for podcasting and vodcasting. As authors, we create a vast range of stories that so often only have an audience of one – the person who is reading our work to assess it and give it a grade. Why not broaden the scope of the audience by using digital storytelling through podcast or vodcast to expand the audience? The world of the old listening post is changing. I can access stories to present to students, wait … I can create my own digital stories for student to listen to and watch.

I’ve always worried about those students who have limited opportunities for storytelling at home albeit due to family structure, time constraints of parents or language background. Can I provide my very own proficient reading model to listen to or watch at home? Who would have thought that we would ever be able to move into a world where I can access favourite stories “retold and performed” on Youtube?

Inspiring students to engage in their learning in meaningful ways that are tangible and relevant learning experiences becomes increasingly possible through this medium. I will take the time to explore using proficient models, and not just adult ones, that are able to engage less competent readers through being able to listen to and view stories in new ways, rather than just the traditional sitting and listening as the teacher or parent reads the story.

The world of Podcasting and Vodcasting has really opened my eyes to new teaching and learning possibilities. I don’t have a class in my current role, but work daily with individual students on the Reading Recovery Program. After completing this module I have learnt new ways to include both Podcasts and Vodcasts into my teaching and learning practice, maybe not so much my daily lessons but to support the students in their class programs and to support them in theor continued reading at home. Looking forward I would like to start to create my own Podcasts for my students to use. I dream a selection of home readers with accompanying reading to listen to!! I would also like to explore ways of students creating their own Podcasts or Vodcasts to engage in digital storytelling. Is it possible that students could recreate the bigbooks and popular picture books we share in early learning classrooms? Or even their own versions of well-known stories?

Module 4 : Flickr it

Privacy is a real serious concern for me, being able to control who has access to my cyberspace galleries and communications. One of the most appealing features of Flickr is that I am able to issue a guest pass to those of my family, friends, colleagues and students who don’t have a flicker account. Even further, I am able to restrict the images that they are able to gain access to.

When I entered the world of Facebook, it wasn’t so much the appeal of the social networking but the ability to view my friend’s photos who was living overseas at the time. She had posted photos to her Facebook account and due to her privacy settings, I was only able to view them if I too had an account.

Gone is the need to join multiple social networking sites simply to view some photos. Welcome to Flickr!!

Flickr has very cleverly created a way to maintain tighter control over privacy and access issues by being able to give individual users varying degrees of access. Uploading of photos is easy and manageable. I couldn’t get over just how easy it was to do. If I had just one criticism of Flickr ... I had 10 photos that I chose to upload in the initial gallery. It did take a while longer than I would have expected. The photos were not overly large by any stretch of the imagination. I'm not sure whether it was the speed of the program, the speed of my ADSL connection, the busyness of the site or a design fault. Nevertheless, it's not a big enough complaint to keep me away. Flickr has definite usability. The real positive is that it can be done almost anywhere : mobile, email, desktop application or browser. It really can’t get much easier than this :)

Module 3 : Method to the madness

Google docs where have you been???

For so long life has been a mess of documents, draft after draft. I like to keep the originals so that I can see the changes I have made, to refer back to where I have been before - to go over what I was thinking and to look back at what I had created previously. Revisions of timetables, class programs, reports, individual learning plans, assignments, budgets, to do lists, and on it goes. The constant renaming, the attaching to emails (or the erasing and the forgetting to attach to emails). Then there is the document that comes back with the same name that I accidentally delete or the document that doesn't come back at all.

At last, here comes my saviour, Google docs. My online filing cabinet that always keeps the current file at the top of the pile. But the best part is, I can decide who has a key to my filing cabinet, they can access the files whenever they choose and wherever they choose, saving the changes before they go. This application is truly going to revolutionise my life. It makes me realise that I haven't been leaving a digital footprint. Up until now I have been leaving an avalanche of footprints, documents all over the place. So many copies, with everyone making their own amendments. It's like a whirlwind that is out of control. But finally there is a button on the remote that can slow it down to a slight breeze. Google docs you are truly going to change my digital life!!

Thought for the day :)

Wandering around in cyberspace, I stumbled across a cartoon by Randy Glasbergen, one of America’s most published cartoonists. He reminds me a little of Dilbert. There is nothing better than a little bit of humour to help you through your day.

Module 2 : The World of the Blog!

iblog ...

One of the greatest challenges as a teacher is finding the right resources to support the delivery of the planned learning resources. Trial and error isn’t always a strategy that works when you are faced with tight financial limitations. Pouring through catalogues, resource guides and online sites isn’t always the best use of time either. Given the expansion of the technological classroom, the search has become harder rather than easier as the range of available sources soars.

We’ve all been faced with the scenario of finding the perfect resource after the need for it has passed. If only there was an easier way to keep track of the good ones as we find them.

I loved the blog Boys blogging books. The concept of using the blog to not just review books but to promote reading to a specific audience was a great idea. I've done this oldschool as a ratings wall, where we voted for favourite books. Nothing beats the power of a child recommending a book to another child - I'll read it because my friend said it was good, rather than I'll read it because I have to. The appeal of your name in print for others to see .. I'm not only a student, a reader but now I'm also a reviewer that my peers look to for advice on what's a good read.

Flip the coin and my mind is racing to a review of resources for teachers – the thought of a way to find the perfect resources :)

Introduction and Learnings from Module 1.

isurf ... ifacebook ... iemail ... igoogle ... ichat ... iyahoo ...iphoto ... itunes ... now ilearn.

Currently I work as a Reading Recovery Teacher at St Thomas More's Primary School in Brighton Le Sands. I have recently commenced the Web 2.0 online course for CEO teachers. I registered for the Web 2.0 course as I realise the world of the classroom is changing before my very eyes.

In the non-teaching world, I email family, I catch up with friends on Facebook, I use skype to keep in touch with friends far and wide, I even shop online. I use my beloved mac to keep track of our photos, run the home network, manage finances and desktop publish. I access my son's school newsletters, view his reports and keep up to date with current events through the parent portal. I study online, engaging in learning circles and posting to class noticeboards.

Walking through the school gate, the world is considerably different. I access school routines, timetables and routines, I track students and their progress through the database, my classes keeps me up to date with the important things I need to know. I hear the expressions 21st century learning environment, information and communication technologies, digital classroom. Smartboards grace the walls of our classrooms. the chalkboards and whiteboards are becoming a thing of the past as students choose appropriate technological devices to enhance their learning.

I realise the great importance of integrating technology into the curriculum. I don't consider myself to be an web novice but there are definitely some grey areas. I'd like to work towards broadening my skills so that I'm not outrun by my six year old in the learning race.

Module 1 has really opened my eyes to a world of possibilities. Creating my igoogle webpage was a lot of fun, being able to add gadgets. It reminded me a bit of my mac dashboard. It's interesting that a lot of the gadgets I added to my igoogle homepage are the widgets I have on my dashboard. The added benefit is that I can also check my mailbox from gmail at the same time without having to open my internet browser. I've been introduced to many new ideas that were just web tools other people used. My biggest challenge is going to be finding tangible ways to incorporate what I am learning in Web 2.0 into the classroom.