Book Reflection: Chapter 6: The Social Web: Learning Together

The magic word for Will Richardson in chapter 6 is "tag" as it relates to two forms of social networking: Twitter and social bookmarking. He describes Twitter as a "microblogging" tool that has become what some describe as "a 'sixth sense' in terms of the network(s)" that the Internet provides. (Richardson, 2010) This social networking system revolves around a web of people who are either following, being followed, or both as they micro-blog about a variety of topics in 140 characters or less. As a result, an impressive vocabulary has emerged to describe the various actions taking place in the Twitterverse. If you're like me, you wish there was a Twitter dictionary of sorts to help define them all…oh wait, there is: Twittonary.

Within the Twitter community there are two tags to take note of:

• Use the "@" sign in combination with a person's Twitter name to denote your response to one of their tweets. This helps to make connections with others and build up your list of contacts.
• Use the "#" sign (also known as a "hash" tag) before key words to mark your tweets so that they will show up in a search using that particular tag.

I was introduced to Twitter a few years ago at a technology education conference, ACTEM. I created the account but didn't see much value or use in it (it didn't help that my school district was blocking Twitter either). However, as time progressed and I started following other teachers, tech. integrators and just really smart and savvy people it has transformed into something more. It is now a tool for sharing cool websites, asking for suggestions and ideas for an activity, and cries for help when technology doesn't go the way you want it to (I use it for this A LOT).

The other half of chapter 6 focuses on the concept of social bookmarking, with the two largest players in this arena being Delicious and Diigo. Social bookmarking is simply the act of taking the bookmarks you have stored in your web browser on your computer and moving them to a spot on the Internet. In this configuration, you can access your bookmarks from any computer with Internet access. I had a teacher come to me just this week in a panic because he had somehow lost all of his bookmarks in Firefox. I strongly suggested that we setup a time to meet so that I could show him how to setup a social bookmarking account so that this wouldn't happen to him again. This feature alone in my opinion solidifies social bookmarking as a valuable web tool.

Now, I know what your thinking, "Where does the word 'tag' fit in with social bookmarking?" When you bookmark sites using D-&-D (Delicious-&-Diigo) you have the option to add tags to the entry which can be used in future searches. Think about it, how many sites do you have whose content is applicable across multiple educational disciplines? I used to go so frustrated when trying to organize websites for teachers because I was never sure under what category to list the site…now I don't have to - YEA! Better yet, how many times have you wanted to find a site you bookmarked but can't remember the site's name? If you use tags, then you them to search for the site because you remember that it had something to do with history, videos, a quiz and Napoleon.

The "social" in social bookmarking comes into play once you start adding sites to your library. D-&-D both allow you to see who else has also bookmarked a site or are using similar tag identifiers. This  allows you to search for other users who are bookmarking sites that you both share an interest in. And, do you remember my blog post about RSS feeds…yup, you guessed it. You can setup RSS feeds based on tags so that when someone applies that tag to a newly bookmarked site your aggregator will notify you. At this point in the game we realize that we have come full circle, where "RSS lets us read and connect with what others write; now we can read and connect with what others read as well." (Richardson, 2010)


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WebQuest: Historical Facebook

<Historical Facebook>

For my WebQuest assignment I designed an activity around having students use Facebook without actually going to Facebook. Thanks to Derrick Waddell who created the original template, the WebQuest asks students to create a standard Facebook profile. However, instead of making one for themselves they create one on behalf of a historical figure. Students must research their historical person in order to provide accurate biographical information for the profile fields. While some information is factual there are places such as the friends they would follow, the groups they would join, and their recent wall posts where students are encouraged to be creative while remaining in character. When complete students must provide references for the information they entered and justify the posts they added on behalf of their historical figure.


There are many ways that this WebQuest can be modified to fit broader or more specific activities. For example, check out the Facebook assignment entitled “Pirates need Social Networks too!” by Tara, which is designed to go along with the reading of the novel Treasure Island.

HistoryTeachers Channel

Created by two history teachers from Honolulu, Hawaii, HistoryTeachers has over 50 music videos that cover such topics as Napoleon, The French Revolution, Shakespeare, Pompeii, Vikings and more. Their YouTube channel has been going strong for almost 3 years now with new videos being uploaded about once a month. Below is their video about William the Conqueror and the Battle of Hastings. I will never forget the year 1066 again!

Thanks to ktenkely for sharing this find!

I Spy (ECOMP6008)

Web Apps. Assignment: VoiceThread In-Depth

VoiceThread is a Webapp. that allows users to upload multiple types of media and then invite others to add comments via multiple media forms. Audiences can comment on a voice thread via:

• phone
• webcam
• microphone
• text
• file upload

 Your VoiceThread can be embedded into most webpages and access can be set to public or private with groups or individual members that you specify. Once audiences have started using the VoiceThread, the site will email the author of the project with a "Daily Digest" summarizing the comments added, the type of comment each one takes the form of, and links to easily listen to each individual comment.


EXAMPLES

• "I Spy…" with ECOMP 6008 cohort group
• "I Spy…" with Mr. Warren's 6th grade
• What's the best kind of pet to have?
• When you hear the phrase "East Asia", what comes to mind?

EDUCATIONAL BENEFITS

• Can engage all students
• Gives students choice in how they contribute to the conversation
• An interactive way for students to demonstrate knowledge and comprehension
• Because VoiceThread is publishable to the web, students will take greater ownership of the quality of their comments

APPLICATION POSSIBILITIES

• Presentation of student poetry by peers and teacher and invite constructive criticism
• Pronunciation and cultural presentations in world language class
• Math problems or homework could be responded to by class
• Historical events presented and questions posed to students
• Participation by students who cannot be physically present in class
• Q&A session where students answer in the foreign language they’re studying
• Use as a bridge to connect with students from other cultures

Book Reflection: Chapter 5: RSS: The New Killer App for Educators

Okay, let me just say that this chapter was by far the coolest one yet in Richardson's book. Chapter 5 did not earn this because it is only twelve pages long and it only had one picture so that's not it either. No, the reason RSS has earned such a high coolness factor is because of its ability to help you manage both your time and the relevant content on the Internet. This is big for me, and in reading the blog posts of my cohort colleagues I think it's the same for a lot of people.

RSS stands for Really Simple Sindication, although I like Richardson's twist on the definition as well: "Reading Skill: Synthesizing." (Richardson, 2010) Using a form of HTML code (the mechanism behind the workings of all web sites) called XML, sites that employ this allow web tools called aggregators to collect newly added content and display it for you in one place. With this system in place, "the content comes to you instead of you going to get it." (Richardson, 2010) This is very cool stuff.

Because RSS is really that simple, Richardson spends the rest of the chapter talking about techniques for selecting the most important feeds that you will want to follow. To keep your RSS feeds organized, Richardson suggests using several of Google's apps including Reader, News and Groups. If you use Google Reader, note that even within this app. you can use additional tools to organize and manage the content that is "feeding" into your account by way of tags (for searching later) and stars (so that you can read the content, just not right now). And, if you want access to your Google Reader content even when you are disconnected from the Internet, there's Google Gears.

If we as educators are having a hard time trying to pick out what's important and what's not from the Internet, just imagine how it must be for our students. Educating students on what RSS feeds are and how to setup their own aggregators has some real benefits and payoffs.

• Use aggregators with students to as a "personal information filter" so that students are receiving only relevant content and cut down on the bologna that's out there. (Richardson, 2010)
• Use RSS feeds to easily inform parents when students publish new content on their blogs and/or wikis.
• Inform yourself when your students upload content to their blogs, then use the links provided to quickly add your assessment of their work as a comment.
• You can even use RSS and web tools like Pageflakes.com and Netvibes.com to create actual web pages that display specific content that you want students to interact with.

Google Reader Gadget in iGoogle

After reading this chapter, I have to admit that I went hog-wild trying to make the online content I interact with on a daily basis a little more manageable. After setting up Google Reader, I wondered: could I get feeds setup to all the blogs from my Lesley cohort group…OH YES! Now, whenever one of my colleagues posts to their blog, my Google Reader gadget lets me know and provides both a quick link to the entry and a link to the full blog entry.

RSS in Mac Mail

I did some more experimenting and found that other applications have RSS integration components as well. Do you spend a lot of time within your email client? Then you can integrate RSS feeds into most clients like Mac Mail and Mozilla Thunderbird so that new feed posts come in just like email.

RSS in Firefox

Is your web browser your main mechanism for managing content? Then you're in luck! Almost every browser including Firefox, Safari, Google Chrome and Internet Explorer allow you to create RSS tabs with links to your feed content. New posts should appear at the top of the list and act like bookmarks to the content.

RSS is a great tool because not only is IT simple, but its primary job is to make it simpler for you to find the content online that is of interest to you. More and more information is being created, posted and distributed everyday on the Internet but unfortunately the amount of time we have to ingest thsi information has stayed the same. All we can do is try to be more efficient with our time and RSS is a tool that will help us do just that.


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Book Reflection: Chapter 4: Wikis: Easy Collaboration for All

In chapter 4, Will Richardson turns away from the world of Weblogs and dives into the world of wikis. Starting with the first wiki in 1995 by Ward Cunningham, the idea behind a wiki is to give everyone full access to the site content; anyone can change anything at anytime. Richardson spends some time talking about the most famous player in the wikis game, Wikipedia, and looks at the pros and cons of this site as an information source for the classroom.

The issue of the reliability of the information on Wikipedia is constantly debated in my school district. With every and anyone being able to change the content of any Wikipedia entry, how can students be sure that the information is reliable enough to include in their research projects? Richardson asks us to have faith in the community of "watchdogs" who are not only working to add new content but who are on the lookout for potential misuse and misinformation. He believes in the strength of the collective good of many over that of a single individual, "Each entry is the group's best effort, not any one person's." (Richardson, 2010)

In my school we are not quite ready to make the full jump into Wikipedia. In the past, the rule of thumb has been that students cannot use Wikipedia as a primary source for their research. This year however, some teachers have begun to relax on this rule with the stipulation that if students do use Wikipedia they need to verify the information from another primary source. So, perhaps we too will reach Richardson's level of faith in Wikipedia as a good source for student research, we just need a little time to get there.

As more and more classrooms look to a wiki instead of a blog as a potential web 2.0 tool to integrate, Richardson is quick to point out that some services have attempted to meet them halfway with wikis that require a login and password. If I were to integrate a wiki into my curriculum then I would start out with one of these services because as Richardson states, "…it would only take one parent to open the wiki and find something inappropriate to derail the project." (Richardson, 2010) However, I wonder how it would work if parents were also invited to participate and contribute to the project wiki? Maybe the wiki would start out with just the teacher and students working inside the realm, and then invite parents to come in later to mix things up a bit. Something to think about.

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