Learning, Teaching & Technology

Where has the time gone this week? I’ve learned many new things and the adventure toward more draws me forward. What are some new learnings?

Active use of Twitter by adding more people to follow, writing and checking it; Widgets on the sidebars of my blog; Connecting my web pages, blogs & wikis in one space; Exploring and viewing video podcasts from NECC, National Geographic, etc.; Adding slideshows of photos to my school index page; Avatars from Lego blocks; entering Second Life; Connect2.0 ning; WebCasting Academy; Slideshare; MindMeister; the networking aspects of del.icio.us and on & on…

Whenever I finish a class I always have a bag full of readings and reflections I want to get back to and connect to the real work of school. Unfortunately they usually stay in the bag and I have every expectation that this blog will stay present and alive.

Thanks to all participants and most of all to Alice for all the preparation and enthusiasm that made for an outstanding week!!

Note, fellow EDC500 class members, I didn’t get to this until late today so if you commented on my “Project Update” I’m sure that Alice will count that as a comment on my Project. CW

Why do this project?

I undertook this project in an attempt to compile the web pages, wikis and blogs that I have created or may need to create. In the past I have had web pages hosted at a variety of addresses that even I couldn’t find, let alone someone else who might have common interest. This blog (http://yestech.edublogs.org) is designed to host my links to school sites, courses I teach as well as my professional portfolio. I needed to spend this week focusing on blogs as a tool for me before I knew enough to follow up on my ideas about ways teachers and students at school could use blogs. My work this week has confirmed what I have read in several blogs about having to write and create a blog for my own purposes before I could offer any guidance to others who might want to try this form of learning reflection for themselves and/or their students.

What is my project?

My project is essentially this blog- Learning & Teaching Using Technology: How can our students share what they have learned? I still have much to learn about fine-tuning this blog to make it the web presence I want it to be.

How have I done this project and what will I continue to do?

I have spent most of the week on this blog and the sites that connect to it. The blog will grow and change as I continue to work on it. In the next few days I will be connecting this blog to other work I have at other Internet addresses and and playing with how the design works and feels. The blog site itself has much more complexity that I haven’t yet fully utilized (e.g. In what areas would images help a reader understand? What about posting videos would be most powerful? Podcasts?) I am not a “journaller” or person given to frequent written reflection so the dates on the last posts of this blog may serve to push me to keep it current. We’ll see!

What will it change in my practice?

I love the idea of having my resources connected to one place that is interactive. I’ve been intimidated to make things so ‘public’, but I’m getting more comfortable and look forward to the feedback it will allow. I hope that several teachers at school will want to develop classroom blogs and we collaborations across classes and schools in various settings.

How is it collaborative?

This project is a big step for me in moving to new ways of collaboration and connecting with other educators. The comments posted have been great and I hope that during the school year the content will be interesting enough to engage teachers at school in online conversations. I see this as a chance to open my work up to parents and students in a new way as perhaps they too will comment and react. If I can interest teachers in blogs for their classrooms that will give me a new connection to what students are learning and writing.

As I look at my project goal of course it is ludicrous in scope. Somehow I thought I could learn new ways of connecting and develop all the things I wanted to have ready for teachers and kids all in one week.

So now I’ve revised my expectations a bit. I have spent time looking at the blogs and wikis I have started in the past and I think I’m pulling it together. I love this new (as in its infancy) blog. The additions to edublogs in the past year are amazing. James Farmer’s videos on the support site helped me learn to use all the tabs across the top of each Dashboard tab. This morning I came in and worked with several others on the idea of setting up Pages as static content so that the we can have those all well as posts.

Mike showed me the embed text for placing slide shows of photos on my school web pages so now I know how to do that. I have been learning and trying so many new things. Now I need to settle down and focus on what I will share with others and take away tomorrow. I know it will be far from “finished” and I think it will be focused on this blog as my site for connecting and collaborating with K-4 teachers.

I heard Will Richardson at NECC07 and have been reading his blog this summer. It has been interesting to read his continuing thoughts about the importance of the quality and purpose of blogs, not just blogging for blogging sake. Also, he has been questioning the format of “expert” presentations at NECC, BLC, etc. and writing about trying to build conversations and connections as part of working with teachers in groups.

I was one of many who responded to a July 17 blog entry about the difficulty of getting educators to focus on their own learning and not just the students. That was my first comment on a blog other than a class or contained group. So far, no return comments…

I could read this blog every day and have 6 new things to try!! Today he wrote about a virtual presentation he did for teachers using Skype and iSight following up with SlideShare a podcast and posting to a wiki–wow! I can almost follow how to do that, but it is a bit mindblowing.

Mike Arsenault mentioned that slideshare.net is adding podcasting to slideshows and indeed theyn now have “slidecasts” which allow to upload each one and the soundtrack will accompany the slides. I love this for kids who are using digital cameras and iPods with recorders to be able to post their work online.