DARK TO BRIGHT

The Big Think Question: Treasure Mountain Table Question

2010-06-03T15:14:00.000-07:00

TREASURE MOUNTAIN CANADA: A RESEARCH RETREAT IN SCHOOL LIBRARIES!

Collaboration : the heart and soul of a Learning Commons, yet we need to build our professional collaboration with each other and our adminisrators.

Teacher librarians need to create and seize opportunities to network, collaborate, mentor, model, and support one another. Why? To create a sustainable vision of a 21st Century Learning Commons as the heart of teaching and learning practices in schools today. Action needs to happen to build these communities at school, district and provincial levels.

Web 2.0 Tools as Be-All or End-All?

2010-06-03T01:23:00.001-07:00

Treasure Mountain began with a bang. Dr. Ross Todd spoke about the Learning Commons and I've come home with 300 pages of reading for tomorrow!

How energizing to be part of this historic research retreat in Edmonton with some of the finest minds in Canadian School Libraries. I have lots of thought on this event to blog about, but tonight I want to reflect on Todd's comment, that it is time to stop teaching kids how to find 'stuff' and move to how to kids use 'stuff'.

As well, he spoke about the error of believing that technology is the be-all and end-all. It is a tool.
This combination of commentary from one of the North American Leaders in School Libraries led me to reflect on the serious engagement my students are having using their choices of technological tools. These tools engage them but are we moving beyond finding stuff to using stuff? Is it the tool that is engaging or the creation? I know that the products are outstanding, and the attitudes shown are beyond that, but is it the tool that is leading to the highlevel engagement?

Writing a blog, a wiki, a voice thread; creating a podcast or vodcast as a way of collecting information is empowering for students. (And perhaps you could argue that XBox is too). Unlike paper and pencil, these tools open up new ways for students to interpret and publish their information. They can chunk it and change it and own it in a visible way that Word or handwriting did not allow. Instead pf cut and paste, or linear paper and pencil report writing, studetns have power to create and change and make interesting choices, all components of excellent learning. When building a mixture of multimedia tools, the students own creativity and return to it again and again. Creative projects are the projects that the artists do not want to finish, because it never does finish. A piece of art can always be added to, a story can be retweaked, a persuasive writing will find more points of view if the product can facilitate that. If the web tools were the be all, students would not be adding to their school product, long ago marked, still at 9 or 10 o'clock at night. Yet this iswhat I see when students are involved in choices about what they learn and how the produce it. If the tool was the power, students would have created their own tool (wiki, blog, voicethread, animoto) and created a product for their personal recreational use. Traditional styles of production lacked of manipulativity and hindered the creative product, ending more about finding the material and publishing it andnot about using the learning to create. which builds intellectual engagement. Tools that put product creativity into the hands of the student in design and ease of language manipulation are the kinds of tools that allow students to use 'stuff'. When we make them accessible 24/7 through cloud computing and secure portals, students will be doing more 'homework' than they thought reasonable. The broad access to a worldwide audience leads to self imposed student accountability.

The tools are the bridge we are using to build creative intellectual engagement. There are others we use that we know do the same thing (such as taking the insect project and casting it in play form instead of a research report or worksheet. The play bridge is a facilitator just as web 2.0 tools are a facilitator,and will change rapidly with the changes in resources and increased access to technology.

The future is overdue. Let's make it now.

10 SUMMER READING ACTIVITIES FOR ELEMENTARY STUDENTS TO DO WITH THEIR PARENTS:

2010-05-13T14:16:00.001-07:00

Want to keep your children reading all summer?

1.       Find out why summer reading is important for your child. http://www.educationalgateway.com/summer-reading/index.html

2.       Pack up the kids and head to your nearest book store. Find a new book and enjoy reading together with a cool lemonade. Try reading books with a similar theme: For grades 3 – 6, Granny Torelli Makes Soup by Sharon Creech, and for mom or dad, Lottery by Patricia Wood, both about a grandmother and a relationship with a disabled child.

3.       Plan a ‘Book at the Park’ afternoon. Bring a few books and sit in the shade with slurpy while you wiggle your toes in the grass. Read ‘Voices in the Park’ for K-6, and watch all the people in the park and talk about how they are viewing the world as they walk by. Help your child understand different points of view as you create stories in your mind together while you read and people watch. For longer park visits, read aloud ‘The Ghosts of Rathburn Park’ by Zilpha Keatley Snyder.

4.       Find books of a similar theme or by the same author, and read and talk about that idea. Suggestions on a theme of Afghanistan for children: A New Life by Rukhsana Khan (Grades 2- 5), for Grades 4 -8, Three Cups of Tea Young Readers Version by Greg Mortenson, Listen to the Wind, also by Greg Mortenson. For adults, try The Kite Runner or A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini;Three Cups of Tea or Stones into Schoolsby Greg Mortenson.

5.       ‘Beachy Books’… Take a trip to the local public beach with a towel and a beach umbrella. If no beach is handy, set up the beach umbrella beside a kiddie pool.   Suggestions: Walter the Farting Dog : Banned from the Beach by William Kotzwinkle, or Floatsom by David Wiesner, or Scaredy Squirrel at the Beachby Melanie Watt.

6.       Use some old sheets and blankets to make a temporary castle. Toss in a few throw cushions and silky scarves. Put a handful of fairy tale books in the room. Mom or Dad may serve the princess with cookies and a sparkly drink. There are innumerable fairy talks in your local library, and a wealth of reinterpretations for older readers. Suggestions: Any books by Gail Levine (Middle years)

7.       Direct the neighbourhood kids to act out their favorite books: Acting Out: Six One-Act Plays * Six Newbery Stars: Susan Cooper, Avi, Sharon Creech, Patricia MacLachlan, Katherine Paterson, Richard Peck. ISBN 1978-1-4169-3848-4 (Available through Amazon.com) Perform the play for your extended family and neighbours!

8.       If you are going on a trip, find age level appropriate books about the place you are visiting or the communities on the way. Visit your local public library for suggestions of both fiction and nonfiction books. Bring the books with you on your trip and talk about the books while you are travelling.

9.       Plant a small tree or a garden and read stories together about trees. Solomon’s Tree by Andrea Spalding, Operation Redwood by S. Terell French, The Giving Tree by Sid Silverstein, The Lorax by Dr. Seuss.

10.   Find all the prize winning books you can from the year your child was born and share them with the child over the summer. Some Children’s award categories: Caldecott Medals, Young Readers’ Choice Award, Rocky Mountain Book Awards, Newbery Awards, Mr. Christie Book Award, Governor Generals Book Award, Nestle Book Award)

DARK TO BRIGHT: A Philosophical Diatribe About What I Know and What I Need to Share

2010-04-15T23:44:00.001-07:00

'To change the world from dark to bright,

First I should learn to read and write'
Susan Morgenstern

The book, 'I Will Make Miracles' by Susan Morgenstern, was parting gift from Duggan School when I left that school last year. The tradition at Duggan is to gift a departing teacher with a book placed in the school library that would be a meaningful remembrance of that teacher's presence in the school. It is a wonderful, thoughtful parting gift. I was so touched to be introduced to this amazing book that follows a small boy, through poetry, and with incredibly vibrant watercolour illustrations, as he plans how he will make the world right, safe from hunger, earthquakes, sadness, and weakness. The protagonist brings it all back to those first steps we have to take to tackle problems… basic literacy. I chewed upon many ideas to title my blog, and eventually could not let this go; it is a reflection of who I am as an activist and an innovator.

Please Excuse; A Course Should not Be a Rant!

EDES 544 has been a movement from darkness to an increasing brightness. It is a journey that will continue far beyond tomorrow's 8 am deadline for this final course blog. Like most people who spend their life in darkness (City of Embers) I could not imagine how much I was missing. I believed in my technical savvyness and had absolutely no idea how much would change. I began in darkness, where I believed I saw clearly, and have ended this course knowing that I have a path that will continue to challenge me as long as I want to grow. My eyes are getting used to the light but have so much more to see.

The tools provided to move forward have been thoughtfully and supportively provided by our guide, Joanne deGroot. Every step of the way she led us through Trailfires to understand one more piece of the Web 2.0 puzzle, and like any worthy guide, she let us find our way, our speed and gently led us forward. In the path, there were so many turns we all took, moving forward on our quests in unique directions and sometimes off the beaten track. There were so many choices and never enough time to explore all the opportunities. The sampling of Web 2.0 tools that forged our path gave us a unique and broad background, but there are seemingly infinite others out there. Brad (EDES Classmate) talked about MindMeister once on his blog; but it was a deflection for me at the time. Since then, I've found a wonderful and similar tool, Mindomo, and a shared work that graphically shows 30 different Web 2.0 functions and webs out to links to many applications that fill that function. This page is like a small but brilliant memory machine for me. As I share, in teaching units, the multitude of functions that are available on Web 2.0, I may forget the use of one over another, and there are many links on this amazing thinking map (a Web 2.0 Tool) that I have not heard of. I want to plot my yearly plan on this next year, I want students to plot their goals, I want to explore more new tools and gain a brighter vision of education. I want, I want, I want…. (I want to write like Brandi...) (EDES Classmate)

Although the tools that I have learned have been engaging, enlightening, informative, profound in the classroom, delightful to learn and totally refreshing, the greatest learning has been the development of a PLN (a Personal Learning Network). I began teaching in 1976, and have had countless hours of professional development, some of my own choice, much because of district or school design. All of it has been valuable, but none of it has been specifically tailored to my own learning needs. Between Google Reader, RSS Feeds, Blogs and Twitter, I am constantly being fed information on exactly what I am interested in. Having fairly carefully selected who I follow and who I subscribe to, I find that about 80% of the blogs and tweets that I receive (passively through feeds and tweets) are engaging and of interest to me. This filtered and meaningful list began with our guide's suggestions and grew from there. This is such a tremendous learning tool that when I looked up two upcoming conferences, I wondered if they were as valuable time and cost wise as spending time with my online PLN. Of course, nothing ever compares to the opportunity provided by sharing with like minded people, but this course has provided that from a context of my home, in my own time, with my own problems that abounded, and enabled me to participate when other opportunities would have been impossible.

Many of our alternative schools focus on these principles. Students often are in other places when we decide it is time to teach a concept, even if we think they are in class... (Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key.) Our entire philosophy of education in Alberta is about standardization, from curriculum to testing to classroom desks and schedules. Our libraries, our labs, our traditions are not about PLN's for teachers or students; they are about a defined set of expectations. Even in a staff meeting when talking about meeting the needs of all teachers, the consensus was a math consultant (when there is at least 40% of staff who do not teach math). Teachers are stressed, encumbered with a plethora of expectations; how do we get them to take the time to investigate these new tools that will in fact make their own PLN engaging and meaningful? One giant step forward toward the light: how do we get our processes, our vision, and our system, to see that students, too, need to develop and build a PLN. Moving our system, not just our teachers, is a primary goal that I see as an implication of this course.

The General Outcomes of the Alberta curriculums could lead to a bright and dynamic future for Alberta students. Several things stand in the way. A laptop for every child should be a minimal expectation from a very early grade. Although many dynamic activities can happen with limited support (scheduled computer labs, smart boards in classrooms) students ultimately need the hardware on demand and the teachers who can support it. This was a vision in the late '80s, although at that point it was a desktop. Now over 20 years later, we have not moved to that in most places in the world. We are all worried about provincial achievement tests, ability to answer multiple choice questions, our results, our standing, and our placement in the grand scheme that affects enrollment that brings in dollars. David Hancock, Minister of Education, can say time and time again that the Fraser report neither relevant nor meaningful, enrollment is decided in many cases by PAT results. Grade six students must sit and write, on paper, both a narrative story and a functional story (Newspaper article) in a set period of time ranging from 120 + 30 minutes to longer for ELL and coded students without a break. As I write this blog, I stand up and walk around, I chat with my family about my ideas, and I get a drink. Normal recess is eliminated for our 11 year old students. Authentic, real writing is a myth in such an exam setting. Imagine how difficult it is for students at this age to achieve what I am not yet able to achieve?

As a result of this course, every student in my class writes more effectively on a computer. They utilize spell checks and revise in an ongoing manner. Because we now use WIKIs and blogs and voice threads in our class learning, they have learned to improve their writing though dialogue and collaboration, all tools needed for 21^st Century learners; all tools needed for the workplace. There is nothing authentic about time monitored, technology limited, collaboration deprived writing. There is nothing authentic about teaching to this kind of writing. My student Wikis have shown me that my best students continue to be best, but my struggling students are so engaged, building, learning, fixing grammar and structure and context, researching sources and critiquing positively others work. Two wishes and a Star is powerless compared to the student who says,

Hey guys nice job but If I were you I wouldn't copy what other people said because you said the population is largest enough to sustain it...I know where that came from check it ou and make sure you put the ardress! :) nice Job http://au.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080609215815AA79wKa make sure you don't copy becasue your taking credit not the owerner of the typer :) GREAT JOB!~

-Angela

Angela struggles with spelling, with math, but she is investigating and searching and giving authentic and positive supportive feedback. Will this kind of writing pass a PAT? Does that matter? Authentic, engaged, and critical learning in the milieu that is being explored is what matters.

Emily, my most amazing, gifted and totally engaged daughter is in grade 11. Like so many 17 year old girls, she worries about marks and results, as she has grown up in a system that concentrates on this. She has written on a computer and researched on a computer since she was 8. When it comes to tests, to stories, to essays, to her first Diploma exams, she must use paper and pen. When she writes for class, she is able to use a computer (from home). We are disenabling students because we do not have the tools for our student to use. When Emily asked for the use of a computer for testing, it was disallowed; however, she can continue to be effective as a learner with her netbook outside of a testing situation.

Evidence shows that students in elementary grades have more access to computers than in junior high high or high school. My staff continues to suggest that a tool is too difficult to use , (blogs, wikis, broadcasted podcasts) and that it can wait until junior or senior high. I want to stand up and scream out loud! We are letting these students flounder on their own. What has happened to our education system? Unfortunately I know. We do not have the resources accessible to our students or teachers so as a result we continue to deliver in the ways that have previously succeeded to meet PATs and Diploma results.

Access to technology is almost always limited and untimely. One lab for 250 students does not provide sufficient access for students to act and react as needed in writing. I am seriously considering the costs of a hot spot in my classroom with 12 netbooks to open up the doors for my students next year. After learning all these tool and recognizing that I have 60 minutes once week to be fair to other teachers, I am frustrated with my inability to engage students with these tools. Fortunately, 100% of my class has access at home. Why can we not keep up with common technology?

How do we move our system, not just our teachers?

John Dewey was ahead of his time. Each of his quotes fits progressive, authentic learning. Teachers today tend to update lesson plans to incorporate 21^st Century learning by automating traditional practices. Use a word processer to write your thoughts, do online research as well as visit the library, or create a power point. These changes do not dig deeply into content and have little impact on student performance (Brooks-Young, 2010). New technologies and tools that we have investigated in our TLDL 544 class can transform classroom practice and the school day thereby creating positive impact on student learning.

When I critically evaluate my level of integration of technology into my teaching, using the Loti model, I feel, just like this course, that I have a long path to the light. In terms of a digital age framework, I have moved forward by need to move far beyond.

WHERE WAS I AND WHERE DO I GO?

I got my first AM radio transmitter at my high school grad. Now you can guess the reality of my age! School usage was unimaginable. Now, almost all students own an MP3 player. My school library bought one this year. Is there a digital divide between school and home? You bet there is! In 2006, 54% of teens owned at least one MP3 Player and used it over 16 hours per week. Users have learned to control what they play. Although available since 1998, they have been slow to arrive as school tools. By 2007, educator banned MP3 players as devices because they were used to cheat (recording of audio libraries with test information). By 2009, these bans were reexamined. We have begun to see the use for mobile technology in classrooms. The educational world has begun to view the need to see these devices as tools to improve skills, and to deliver instructional programs. Teacher created podcasts are beginning to be recognized as an educational tool.

I am to a great extent an audio digital neophyte. Prior to EDES 544 I never considered the educational value of a podcast or MP3 player, but now they are teaching tools I am committed to. I am now devoted to the aggregation of MP3 files through iTunes and have a new philosophy about talking about my learning. Not for me, but for my kids. A recent cooperative teaching project on Canadian and Albertan historical stories made use of Windows Movie Maker. Students were, without exception, engaged with the creation of the picture file. When recording their narrative, it was incredible the learning curve students had when using their own voice. This was new, it was scary and it was exciting. The majority of the class had not recognized the power of their spoken word. Class members excelled and others floundered, as the ability to be heard was new and scary and delicious. This was an authentic learning experience, both for the challenged and mainstream, for the ELL and the gifted. Never had these students had these students had as rich an opportunity to reflect on their own articulation. Their having to re-record because they recognized their volume problems, their having to re-record because they hadn't synthesized their own ideas, their having to plan ahead to comment and reflect; these were all very powerful skills. The technical learning of the software was peripheral to the self reflection that happened in the process.

Social Networking continues to be a limited platform for students worldwide. There are strict district acceptable use policies in place. Hargadon, (2009) in Teaching With Tools Students Really Use, suggests that there needs to be compelling reason to use, there needs to be specific focus and that it must be moderated. He suggests that the target audience is grade 7 and upward, but I believe that there is a need to teach appropriate skills prior to this.. Social networking has significant value as a place to share collaborative ideas. Social networks will not go away so teaching appropriate use will be important in the building of 21Century interpersonal relationships.

Technology is a bridge

According to NCREL, technology serves as a bridge to more engaging, relevant, meaningful and personalized learning, all of which can lead to higher academic achievement.

As Nicola says (classmate) , social bookmarking can bridge the gap between school library and their patrons. Ease of access and removing the walls of the library can create a bridge the moves the library into every home. Nicola's discussion of Diigo led me to finally separate from Delicious and move onto Diigo and see how a technology can ultimately link ideas and retain ideas that enhance my personal learning network.

Web 2.0 is a bridge to the curriculum, to student engagement, to authentic writing and investigations..It is a bridge to our past, a tool that becomes an historical reference, of our thoughts, our pictures, our idea and our activities. Thanks, Pauline (EDES classmate) for that perspective!

Technology is an enabler

Technology is part of the solution to problems in education but not the solution. A few simple changes in the classroom involving technology will bring big results in learning. Technology can give voice to otherwise classroom–quiet students. Through the use of twitter responses to what is being taught, to blog or wiki comments, there is less fear for students to reflect and make meaningful comments immediately in these written formats. Students who fear to talk in class are more willing to post a response.

Putting all of that aside, technology is a crucial "part" of the solution. But again it is not "the" solution. Being that it is part of the solution it has to be embraced by all in education. We as teachers, administrators, school board members and parents cannot simply cast technology aside as "another fad" in education. We all have to be both learner and champions of technology in our classrooms and offices.

Technology is a differentiator

Technology improves performance when the application adjusts for student ability and prior experience and provides feedback to the student and teacher about performance or progress with the application. Such a huge topic, but this is so intuitive. The best example is our course. Each of us entered into this new learning environment with different levels of growth. Each of us tackled the curriculum based on our own needs and skills.

Technology provides power

Technology drives change. It can place the power of learning into the hands of the learner. It can give students control and responsibility. It the old adage of 'one will live up to what one is expected of' is true, then technology is the true enabler and distributor of the power of learning.

Students have more technical ability than most teachers. We need to allow them that advantage and we need to teach them the skills to use it wisely. When we use students to mentor us we model the power of collaboration.

Technology engages millennial learners

A teacher's job is to help students learn what to say, how to say it and when to say it, and how to respond to feedback. Students' work is affirmed by web publishing. The audience creates motivation and students learn the power of their words November (2009). My daughter's cheer team works hard because of the performances, the dancers practice because of competitions, football players and choirs practice for the audience. An authentic audience for student writing and other production gives the students motivation and power. Their digital expertise builds their confidence and engages them in writing.

It is a curiosity of teaching that no two days are alike, but, if we are not careful, all the days can take a deadening sameness. We must remember that we have every opportunity to transform ourselves and our practice, just as we have every opportunity to stagnate, remaining much the same teachers we were when we began. ( Tomlinson) find this on Google books, saved on home The differentiated classrooms

The 21^st Century learner is a learner who takes responsibility for learning and managing their work. Teachers need to challenge the low expectations that exist for many students. Tools that were once impossible to use or afford in schools are now free and available through the web. Grade two students can create complex charts and graphs, elementary students can use once extraordinarily expensive tools to digitally change, enhance and create audio and video, and can become broadcasters. The skills to solve real problems (communication, confidence, critical thinking, interpreting data, collaboration, and organization ) are all intrinsic to Web 2.0 tools.

With mobile technology, we are still figuring it all out. I have to wonder how many parents even realize their kids possess the capability of recording and broadcasting to a potential audience of billions? And if they do know, how do they feel about that? We hurried to be online so we didn't fall behind, and now we block so much in fear of too much knowledge. Parents have little idea of what is going on online. As an educator, as a leader, it is imperative that digital citizenship be a part of everything we teach. In our school 3 year plan, I've been able to promote the imperative that not only do we need to educate students about Web 2.0 technologies, but we must offer opportunities to share this with parents and build understanding of the guidelines for safety and the partnership we are embracing as we move forward. We need to teach students and parents, and manage realistic fear.

Despite my mother's greatest fear, I attended a 'free' school in the '60s where I managed my learning. (AISP, North York, Ontario) I built the program that engaged me that fit with the curriculum. I explored literature and philosiphy that made me think and mattered. I learned, and it isonly this learning htat I still remember. There wasn't the tools that we have to manage this easily, but there was the will. That is what we need now.

Technology, in particular, Web 2.0, creates many issues and problems in the classroom. Availability, access and usage should not be one of them in a province and a system of such wealth and potential. My job, Mission Possible, is to make this happen. Melvil Dewey, that librarian who organized and structured what is now the standard for small libraries, said

'The librarian must be the librarian militant before he can become the librarian triumphant'.

The librarian triumphant that I long to be will be able to introduce to teachers the power of a Personal Learning Network. The Librarian Triumphant will engage with teachers as they learn to use Web 2.0 tools. The Librarian Triumphant will light a fire (as John Dewey says) and 'give the pupils something to do, not something to learn' The ideas of our past work for our future. Our tools are different if we want to engage students.

We are well into the 21st Century. If there are schools and districts out there still talking about preparing kids for the 21st Century, they have missed the boat. Their kids are already behind.

The journey begins now. Are our students, our teachers ready?

UNLINKED RESOURCES:

Brooks-Young, Susan. (2010). Teaching With the Tools Kids Really Use. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin Press.

Courtney, Nancy (2007) Library 2.0 and beyond. Westport, CO :Libraries Unlimited.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

Gantos, Jack. (1998) Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key. Harper Collins.

Morgenstern, Susie (2008) I Will Make Miracles. New York : Bloomsberry Childrens Books.

November, Alan. (2010) Empowering Students with Technology. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin.

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Schrumm, Lynne; and Levin, Barbara (2009) Leading 21ST Centruy Schools. Thousand Oaks, CA :Corwin.

A LITTLE BLOG WILL DO YA…. NO BLOGGING BABIES HERE!

2010-04-08T21:38:00.001-07:00

I wish I'd known about blogs in 2008, when I spent many hours with Dreamweaver, fiddling with some sort of new foreign language called HTML, learning over the phone from that my son. I totally would have done a better job of creating short, sweet and regular updates if I'd been blogging. But that is what a blog does, and a website is different. I feel quite reflective writing about blogging at this point in the course; this journey began with a total immersion experience in January. I am, finally, after three and half months, bloggin' about bloggin'.

No Blogging Babies allowed in this classroom! It was sink or swim from the first assignment. Although I didn't quite swim, more of a doggy paddle really, this has been boot camp blog-wise. It hasn't mattered what we were learning, we had to blog it.

BLOGGING AS A TOURIST TO BLOG IMMERSION: REFLECTIONS ON THE PROCESS OF LEARNING ABOUT BLOGGING AND RSS FEEDS

It all began with curiosity. I'm always asking questions and wanting to know NOW something new. I wanted to figure out swimming as a toddler at Indian Lake in Quebec, so I threw off my lifejacket and jumped off the deep end of the dock. My father, who seems always to be running after me for some reason, threw down his rye and coke, cigarette in hand and fully clothed, raced off the beach to rescue me. I didn't need it! I was the one who always found the Christmas presents and at the tender age of 6, perfected the art of unwrapping and rewrapping them days before Christmas. I was the teacher librarian who tireless advocated for automating my school library in 1984, just because I wanted to figure out something new (and I was sure was better). I dabbled in a library blog in the fall, because I knew it would be useful and a new challenge, but tied to being in a new school, returning to Teacher Librarianship after a long hiatus, and taking on an administrative role as well, it was really just like a tourist who picks up a few words of the foreign language. January began with that full immersion experience. Just like those children who go to French Immersion, their eyes pop wide when they are first exposed to the French only language. They have to quickly figure out how to say 'Je veux aller aux toilette, madame' very quickly to prevent embarrassment. I had to learn how to use a blog effectively very quickly.

It took me my first blog and a careful critical look at other classmates' blogs to realize I didn't know how to link anything, didn't know how to cite anything, but at least I had bitten off a fair chunk. I graduated into grade one. It took me several blogs before I could embed a file. I figure out how to cite… grade 4. Now that those basics have been mastered, we get into the tough stuff. The skills are less defined, the processes involving higher level thinking.

From the start, I'd set up, as suggested, a Google Reader account, and subscribed to the blogs of my classmates and my prof's recommendations. Task done, then ignored. I spent the next many, many blogs surfing for articles, following trails from one blog to the next, and Trailfires, while Google Reader worked silently away, completely ignored. Occasionally I'd read in a discussion that a classmate had discovered that her reader was her new best friend, or that the reader was the savior of the day. I made promises to myself, I will go say hi to my Google Reader, but, for shame, I left her alone even longer. Not one work of complaint did I hear from my hard working colleague.

I vaguely understood that my reader had a slave that did her work. RSS feeds, (Real Simple Syndication) were just like the Dragons in How to Train a Dragon, feeding Reader with everything I'd asked for. It was the tool that made Reader work. I'd implemented it in January, and just left the two to get my work done. This pair of tools together can save me so much time, I can subscribe to even more blogs!

Where is the best place to get information? The Trailfires have provided the most directed information, as they are clear and linear; providing an excellent scaffold to learning about both blogs and RSS Feeds. The blogging world is very immediate, far more so than print materials and often more immediate than electronic publishing. Searches for blog information on the Google Blog. The textbooks have been useful; the feed that I have to my email from Amazon has led me to two excellent books published in 2010 that made my thinking about blogging clearer. (November, 2010; Brook-Young, 2010)

How will I write it? Blogs, I've come to believe from the hundreds I've now read, need to be short and to the point. My verbosity gets in my way; I believe a wider audience will be gained by shorter, more frequent blogs. The hook is vitally important too; that is drawn from the content but also from the personality of the blogger and is one of the ways to build voice and readership. We all love to read Brandi's blogs because she has voice, she has a hook and she makes the reader want to learn more. I want to write like that. I enjoy most the blogs I've read that are personalized. Perhaps this addresses the slightly voyeuristic needs in all of us and our desire to connect to the world when we read blogs. Technically, I will write it on Word 2007! That belated discovery was an aha moment and has decreased a lot of frustration that occurred writing in the draft format. How I design and layout the page will be an important first decision; if the design frequently changes, the repeat reader may not hook to it as easily. Think first, act later… remember that! I've been playing with widgets of which there are millions on the web. Do I want my reader to know he is only the 17^th person to visit? Do I want them to see that only Edmontonians have been on the blog? Will that information help readership or reduce it? Do I want a search key, do I want to link to twitter or Facebook or have a follow button? Design will be a great attractor once someone is on the sight, so like writing, it has to be done effectively.

Key to a good blog will be good writing. Copyblogger, a favourite blogger I subscribe to, in 11 smart Tips for Brilliant Writing, knows that KISS rule. Short sentences and paragraphs, simple words, active voice, don't overwrite, edit, don't be redundant or ramble, don't use fluff words. I definitely have LOTS to learn. (Remember that both 'erudite' and 'verbose' can be replaced with simple words that will engage all readers. (The temptation is in me to go back through this blog and erase, cut, shorten, and perhaps I will do blog version number two at the end… ie the Twitter tweet). Readers connect if it is personalized, real and entertaining; these ingredients engage and connect the reader to the blog.

Who will read it? The perennial topic of voice that confounds every novice blogger, but is compounded by the dual purpose of writing for a curriculum expectation and a rubric and a mark, and balancing that with my desire to write for a different audience. Dean Shareski in Ideas and Thoughts believes that audience is critically important. He defines three types of audiences.

Audience as eyeballs: This is the teacher who keeps the class entertained and engaged but doesn't contribute anything. This is the blog that is linked to others without and real connection. This might be like the Twitterer who started following me this week with 25,000 people they follow, but less than a 100 who follow them.
Audience as teachers: These are the bloggers that result in some commenting, and therefore creating a purpose for writing and disseminating their ideas. Commenting on other's blogs can be difficult, particularly if the comments are reflective and thought provoking. Blogs become a discussion.
Audience as co-learners: These are the powerful bloggers who are sharing as co-learners. Blogging needs to be shared beyond the classroom to be most effective as a classroom by itself cannot by any means reflect the linking of learning that can happen through a global audience.

I believe we made lots of progress and certainly became co-learners as bloggers by the end of the course. Time limitations certainly affected the number of direct comments I've posted, but our course blogs are often being read by our classmates and the ideas and thoughts that each of us our posting directly relate to the shared learning that is happening through the reading of each others' blogs. I believe this audience factor will be critical if I continue to blog. I believe that the course focus limits the audience. For now, the main readers of my blog are classmates and colleagues, although it is growing if cluster maps and Feedjits are accurate. I would like to be writing with an audience as co-learners; writing this blog has been about professional development and learning. With the pace of technology change, what we have learned is the beginning of a journey that I can see has no visible end in sight. The learning and growth that is possible through a blogs is unlimited and I do not want it to stop. I look forward to the day where commenting and linking with other blogs, reposting and learning is co-operative across the teacher librarian world.

Why would they read it? If
you want to get, you've got to give. I've learned that I can't just blog and believe that anyone will find me in cyberspace. I've got to read other blogs and comment. I've got to be thoughtful and reflective and not just say, 'great job'. If my comments spark an interest then we take first steps on a reciprocal journey. If I can share the blog on other social networking forums, I can attract readers. Feedjit tells me that significant percentage of the people who read my blog found it on a Facebook post or on a tweet. I felt like a boaster, sending out tweets about my blog, but it has been effective. Reposting others blogs has built a few followers who are thankful that I have read and shared their ideas. I've learned that I need to advocate for my readership; if someone doesn't understand blogging, which includes the majority of elementary teachers, a simple message will not lead them to read my blog. It particularly won't get them to set up an RSS feed! No one in my school blogs, uses Google Reader, or understands an RSS feed. There is still a deep rooted traditional understanding of professional development; it is delivered to them in a block of time and the agenda (learning) is designed by an instructor. People will read it because it is an idea they want to explore, but it has to be short… to quote an old advertisement little dab will do you. And if it comes right to you, and you don't have to look for it, then you are far more likely to read! Professional development with RSS feeds is person, self directed, timely, engaging and cheaper.

REFLECTIONS ON BLOGGING FOR PERSONAL AND SOCIAL USE

With so many types of blogs (The 25 Basic Style of Blogs) out there, and so many functions that blogging has filled, I can foresee a continued growth in the blogosphere despite the periodic reports that Social Networking sites are attracting more clients. Blogging fulfills a different purpose with more comprehensive information. Twitter and Facebook are excellent pointers to blogs where readers can get more information. When I've shared with connections that I have been blogging, I have repeatedly heard about people who blog about their trips and holidays (life blogging). What a fantastic way to keep a memory in picture, writing and video. I've been following a blog for years (Daveberta) and have often found that that has been a first source to learn about provincial politics and to read interpretations and opinions (insight blogging). I might eventually use a life blog, and intend to keep up a technology education blog of some sort, I have learned that whatever blog type I do, it will be short and simple. Simply understanding that there are differences in functions of blogs themselves will help me interpret and understand the blog I'm reading

My Netfirms account expired and although it is on the list of things I've been meaning to do, I am wondering if I really do need to keep a web page. I can blog easily and if one style of blog does not meet my needs, then there are others (Weebly with pages as well as blog, even wikis can be used like a blog and have some different functionality). The first decision will have to be to figure out the intended purpose of the blog, what audience am I reaching for l targeting, and the best marketing and advocacy I can use to get there. This will determine how I design and write, how noisy or quiet the page is, (do I use many widgets?), what colour will it be, what colour is the writing. Just like buying a car, what it looks like is darn important because that is what the reader notices first. If they like the look then they might step inside the car, look at the engine, take a test drive (metaphorically speaking). If I do decide to do a blog, I have to be committed. I've spoken about loyalty and true love before when talking about delicious, and then I abandoned my relationship for the more hip diigo with its yellow highlights. I'll have to be careful that I truly make a lasting commitment that I don't just follow another lark. Perhaps I need to be careful that I don't take another blind jump off the deck before I get my water wings badge!

Part of my most recent personal learning was realizing that I can RSS feed from my bookmarking site! When I want to know what new bookmarks are there from my network, I can have a feed! My students all use a social bookmarking site (some classes on Delicious, some on Diigo) and now I can RSS feed the sites they are adding! I can get feeds on my favourite subjects. Steve Harris shows the steps to accomplish this. I can see I have learned so many new tools and discovered so much on the blogosphere that I will need to quit my day job to keep up with my web life. I need a second life…
Greg Schwartz, in his Web Junction article, succinctly summarizes the reasons one should blog:

Reason #1 - Writing a blog keeps you current.
You'll want to know what's going on in the world before you start talking about it. Posting regularly to a blog encourages you to actively engage the process of information seeking and current awareness.
Reason #2 - Blogs are an advocacy tool.
If you want change, you have to talk about it. Blogs are a great forum, not only for exposing the world to the issues facing both libraries and librarians, but also for thinking through your ideas and cultivating means of expressing them effectively.
Reason #3 - Blogs build community.
Some of you are probably thinking that no one will read what you have to say. When I started my blog, Open Stacks, I shared your skepticism. As it turns out, no matter who you are and what you write about, there will be others who share your interests. I was surprised to discover that, as a librarian, you already have a built-in community of people interested in you and your perspective. You can, and probably will, meet people that you may not have met otherwise, becoming part of a very progressive segment of the LIS community.
Reason #4 - You are unique.
One of the problems with librarianship is image. Stereotypes of librarians abound. Publishing a blog is an opportunity to demonstrate your individuality and thereby work to dispel some of those pervasive myths. Even if you don't think of yourself as unique and fear being redundant, your voice is yours and yours alone, so join the chorus.
Reason #5 - Do it for you.
Never discount the power of writing as catharsis.
Reason #6 - Lastly, it's easy, so no excuses.
We've got no excuse. We need to build a community. I'm toying with the idea of gathering a group of like minded teacher librarian types to coauthor a blog… any takers? Together we're better… we can blog about it and share the work. Sounds intriguing to me. Do I see any wannabe writers out there looking for a forum? Or, even guest authors? There are blogs that are shared…

REFLECTIONS ON BLOGGING AND RSS FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING

I am always searching for ways to encourage students to write. Writing has to be meaningful to engage students. Engagement is the key to effective learning. The work I have done with blogging has engaged students who never write to write stories and reports and to rewrite and to begin to comment reflectively. If there was no other reason to use blogs in school, this would be enough. Whatever style of writing that occurs, be it functional or narrative, when writing for an authentic, students perform better. I've seen students complain that if they'd known it was for marking they would have tried harder… not a purely authentic audience in my mind! I've seen that on HLATs (Highest Level of Achievement Yearly Writing Assessments in Edmonton Public) where the audience in limited to a possible external marker, students put forth in most cases their best efforts.. I've seen it conclusively with the writing my class is doing, even though it is only shared (for FOIPP reasons) within the school community. I have linked two PDF files, that contain samples of work in progress as the students collaboratively write for their own school community about an issue they have chosen to analyze on their own time, out of school. Group 1 (2 students) wrote about whether the Olympics and Paralympics should be combined; group 2 (2 students), wrote about the Canadian Seal Hunt. Research supports the argument that sharing writing for larger targets increases performance. I see it in myself in writing this blog; if it was only the professor, I know I would have compromised on content during stressful times, but couldn't let myself do that when it was for public viewing.

Lisa Zawilinski in 'A Framework to Promote Highter Order Thinking', The Reading Teacher (2009) defines four types of elementary blogs: Classroom News, Mirror blogs (Reflective), Showcase Blogs (Highlighting student work) ,and Literature response blogs. Within the library context, students can participate on blogs, by sharing ideas about their classroom learning, about the books they are reading, about book clubs, write book reviews, create a school news blog, talk about the technology and skills they are experiencing. It can give them one more reason to come to the library, virtually as well as physically. Students can do the blogging, or we can blog with the student audience in mind. We can blog in the library to keep our staff informed about projects, programs, equipment, new technologies (and old!). Roselle Public Library runs a blog that discusses books beyond its library border youth. Teenreads.com reviews books by teens, kidsread.com carries reviews by children. Both give examples of the kind of writing we can see by students when they have an opportunity to write for an authentic audience. They would be excellent models to use to model what kids can do when blogging about books.

There is always the concern about internet security as we open the world to our students. There is a wealth of information out there providing guidelines and parameters for World Wide Web postings. There are policies and regulations about the use of internet, and there are restrictions for underage access to many web sites. Often, students need email addresses to join a cloud platform that will be secure once they are using it, but are limited in access without one. Many elementary students do not have email addresses. Some school districts provide email addresses to their students. As more opportunities become accessible to students, the issue of monitored and secure email needs to be addressed by parents and students alike. My students write on a site with an imaginary email address so they cannot be sent real email, and all posts are monitored through an RSS feed. Guideline for internet usage should be shared with parents, with guidance on how to monitor their child's appropriate use. I feel that schools and school libraries have a responsibility to teach the school community about the tools and safety issues and protections we are using with their students. The blogs, wikis, tweets and social networking sites are new to most parents and we need them as partners in learning, not isolated and out of touch with the new technologies. We need to connect with parents and make them understand that thy, too, are welcome to post on blogs. In Your Guide to Getting the Most out of 2KM's Blog you can find an excellent poster to show parents how to get involved in their child' blog, step by step.

Kim Cofino's (at ISB) grade 4 students created some excellent student blogging guidelines that they have found apply to all grades, they are simple and easy to understand and include rules, but also questions that lead the student to think about the guideline:

Student Blogging Guidelines

As a student blogger at ISB, you are expected to follow these blogging guidelines below. Use the questions in italics to help you decide what is appropriate to post on your blog.
Only post things that you would want everyone (in school, at home, in other countries) to know.
Ask yourself: Is this something I want everyone to see?
Do not share personal information.
Ask yourself: Could someone find me (in real life) based on this information?
Think before you post.
Ask yourself: What could be the consequences of this post?
Know who you're communicating with.
Ask yourself: Who is going to look at this, and how are they going to interpret my words?
Consider your audience and that you're representing ISB.
Ask yourself: Do I have a good reason/purpose to do this?
Know how to give constructive feedback.
Ask yourself: What will I cause by writing this post?
Treat other people the way you want to be treated.
Ask yourself: Would I want someone to say this to me?
Use appropriate language and proper grammar and spelling.
Ask yourself: Would I want this post to be graded for proper grammar and spelling?
Only post information that you can verify is true (no gossiping).
Ask yourself: Is this inappropriate, immature or bullying?
Anytime you use media from another source, be sure to properly cite the creator of the original work.
Ask yourself: Who is the original creator of this work?

Kim also writes about the guidelines for commenting. Students can learn true reflective commenting when guided through the process. Instead of the typical 'Great job' comment, she points out the need to leave a comment, that it must consider the purpose of the blog and be constructive, have a personal connection, add meaningful information, and follow the writing process. Comments are not short form text messages; they are a published piece of work. Teaching students to create appropriate and thoughtful comments would make a meaningful contribution to the quality of responses on the web.

RSS Feeds are useful for teaching and Learning. In our extremely busy personal and professional lives, keeping up with communication is often a challenge. Communication with parents and families is often a challenge when parents are working during the day. Homework blogs set up with RSS feeds to a parent's and/or student's Google Reader account would be an excellent tool for teachers to use. Teachers and students can get RRS feeds from Amazon based on an author or a category such as Young Adult books. Students can use a Google reader account to collect news on a topic of interest or research using an RRS feed, and therefore access news from around the world. I have set up RSS feeds from different Teacher Librarian Sites in order to keep up.

We need to increase communication to build community. School leaders have a responsibility (and in fact it will determine a level of their own success) to communicate extremely effectively. (Schrum and Levin, 2009). School leaders are using blogs to communicate with parents, family and community members and are writing weekly about efforts to meet schools and student's needs. Leaders can blog about how and why teachers are using tools such as blogs, wikis, and Google Docs. Links to school leaders who blog can be found at http://supportblogging.com/. Click on the List of Bloggers and you will connect with school administrators and how they are using blogs as public relations, news, events, field trips, and to post alerts, to report issues related to local politics (ie: West End Facility Usage that leads to school closures!) These types of blogs can be informative not only for the parents in the school community, but for the trustees as well. (Schrum and Levin, 2009). According to Richardson, (2006) in his list of blog uses for school leaders:

blogs can be used to advocate for what is working and what is not,

to post school related events ,

to post informative links,

to communicate directly to parents, to reflect on administrative experiences,

to log your learning,

to share tips with other leaders

post questions to generate input

to explain how-tos

to exhibit exemplary class work

to explore issues related to 21st Century leadership

to provide web links

to share photos of school activities and work

to encourage and set an example for teachers and students to blog

I'm not doing the doggy paddle any more, but I've got a ways to go before I am a competitive swimmer. Perhaps you could say that I am working on my Bronze Medallion. I'm as a blogger, confident enough to get out there and try it, have a lot of knowledge, and ready to take on the next level, doing it for my own delight. Edmonton Public has talked about student engagement in terms of visible delight; that truly has been my experience with learning to blog. I have had to hold myself back in the staff room talking about what I'm doing, and when working on units with my colleagues, I've had teachers comment that their head is spinning with so many ideas and new thinking. I take that with great humbleness, because it has been the course process that has gotten me to the point that I feel, at each moment, on top of what I'm learning (even when there seems to be too little time to put it all into my blogging!) In the end, my curiosity did not kill the cat, but made me, just a tad, ocd about this great learning blogging experience!

For now, this blogger's going to close. Till next time…

Unlinked Resources Used:

Brooks-Young, Susan. (2010). Teaching With the Tools Kids Really Use. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin Press.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Bloggin and RSS Trailfires.

November, Alan. (2010) Empowering Students with Technology. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin.

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Schrumm, Lynne, and Levin, Barbara. (2009) Leading 21st Centruy Schools; Harnessing Technology for Engagement and Achievement. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin.

TWEET TWEET! SPRING IS HERE!

2010-04-05T13:17:00.001-07:00

Spring Break! Historically, this is the week that I expect all the winter snow to disappear. The roads will be awful but the freshness that surrounds the new season wraps me in optimism. When I lived in Fort McMurray, Spring Break was always the week I chipped away at the ice on the driveway and became excited about the season that is unflolding. Birds singing, sunshine, warm late summer nights.

The new season. In Edmonton, the driveway has usually been clear alread. The snow in the yard is, this year, almost gone. Windows open today, (March 28th) I awoke in the bedroom today with the call of the birds. I love hearing that sound as I awake; it makes my morning feel alive. The upright juniper outside my window is often the home to small birds, and this morning I finally heard them! Wait… it was a bit sporadic, a bit canned… I finally realized I'd left my computer open and Tweetdeck was announcing incoming tweets! A sigh, and then the overwhelming temptation to find out what are my twitter friends talking about.

Twitter twitter down the stairs,
Whose loud tweets have led me there?
Is it Teacher List with a new site

Or is it that that Singapore Guy posting at night?

Is Buffy mentioning a restaurant again?

Or is Justin talking about PC pain?

Is Brandi sharing about student teachers
Or someone chatting about movie features?

Am I going to learn about a new web site

To share with my staff, to spread the light
Or will I laugh at a friend whose child disobeyed
Or read about blocks that have been arrayed?

Whatever the case, I have to admit,

That 'Tweet' on the laptop has led to me to sit
Many hours in front of my LCD screen

With hopes that ideas and knowledge I'll glean.

Learning to Snack: Reflections on the Process of Learning about Twitter

I've known about twitter for a few years but didn't sign up until late fall. For several months I sporadically looked at it, but as my list that I followed was limited, I didn't get much out of the tool. In fact, what Michael Martine says, (retrieved March 28, 2010) resonates with me. The first time was very slightly informative but not completely engaging, but the more I experienced it and learned how to use it, the better it became. It was the course that led me to increase my following. Originally, I was disappointed that more people were not following me, but as my lists grew, I realized that what was important for me was not who was following me, but who I was following. What at first I conceived as social voyeurism became a personal learning network.

What we have to do is deliver to people the best and freshest most relevant information possible. We think of Twitter as it's not a social network, but it's an information network. It tells people what they care about as it is happening in the world.—Evan Williams

The name itself, Twitter, led me to see it as a superficial tool, much like I've used Facebook status. I have no friends who Twitter, and the few politicians I first followed used it more as a short commentary. The 140 word limit is not sufficient to communicate any in-depth ideas, short of "I attended…". Twitter is like having a small snack; you get a taste of an idea and if it works well, it makes you hungry for more. It wasn't until I started following educators tweets that I understood that there were links with strange shortened web addresses. Hashtags confused me until just recently, and the language itself ('hash'… is this a snack? what the heck did that associate with?) was over my head. What was tweetdeck?

…we came across the word "twitter," and it was just perfect. The definition was "a short burst of inconsequential information," and "chirps from birds." And that's exactly what the product was. Jack Dorsey

No one could really explain to me why Twitter worked or why it was valuable. I can't explain it to my colleagues, both in the education field or in the political field, although they are somewhat more receptive, given that there is a huge need to use social networking communication.

Twitter is like sex. You can read all the stuff (or look at it) about sex all you want, but if you've never had it, you simply have no idea what it's like. And once you've had sex, you know you could never hope to really explain it to someone else. You will sound like a complete idiot if you try."

For the first time, I am disappointed with Lee LeFever's video on Twitter.

His simplistic overview of ideas has always been informative and enlightening, but his treatment of Twitter feels superficial to me. The interpretation of Twitter as a way to understand what friends are doing in between blog posts and emails feels more like Facebook Status Updates than productive usage. I am placing a value judgment here but the video did not resonate with the possibilities I see for Twitter. Charlyen Kingston in her excellent ebook, Twitter for Beginners, proved a far more valuable introduction to Twitter. Commonly considered 'microblogging' (in 140 characters or less), Nick Wesselman calls Twitter a global conversation where one can listen to every conversation they wish and reply to any whenever they want. Great! My voyeurism will be fulfilled!

Wikipedia informs me that when I search in Twitter it accesses EVERY public tweet, making Twitter the most timely way to see what is happening right now. News becomes instantaneous and accessible to everyone with access to the internet. In Edmonton, the number of people sharing information and Tweets is steadily on the rise according to MasterMaq's blog. Sadly, it has not yet impacted my colleagues and the information that I find so easily accessible is not as easily shared with my local contacts who remain skeptical about the value of twitter.

As I learned that the articles were for me the essence, (I know, that is what my dad said about Playboy) I began devouring the links. New ideas, new thoughts about the topics I was interested in. I began looking at who other people were re-tweeting and who were their followers, and slowly built a network. Every new connection was a new opportunity to learn. Making the most on Twitter by Charles Arthur in the Guardian (retrieved March 28, 2010) introduced me to Whoshouldifollow.com and I discovered a wealth of library twitterers that I now follow. I learned What people Tweet from Twitter for Beginners : by Charlyne Kingston

Observations about life. Interesting things to read.
New blog posts
A humorous take on life events
Inspiring thoughts.
Professional news
Workaday life details.
Business issues and challenges
Family life details.

I'm still at the stage of keeping my personal life to myself, and follow only those who are similar. Although I enjoy and respect the tweets of many of the people I follow, I do get frustrated with my professional contacts who share their airplane schedules and their restaurants and their shoe collections. My interest remains in professional issues and current news, and wish to keep workplace details and family life details separate. Perhaps it is those people who purely see twitter in terms of a chatter or brief SMS who critique the tool as a devolution of communication. They do not see the huge opening it has to knowledge when used as a tool to open up the web.

Phil Bradley, in Twitter in Libraries speaks more to the uses that I am using: Social networking, updating information, trending information, searching for information, and asking questions. He suggests that librarians are posting to twitter but not following others and that it , that is like standing in a crowded room and talking but not listening. It is important that the communication be two way.

I recognize that Twitter can grab you. Tweetdeck in the background wakes me up on a beautiful spring morning and calls me to my laptop. As I am working on other materials, a tweet will appear on my screen and I will be distracted from the work I am doing. In the online book, How to Get Focused, Scott Scheper writes about how to keep focus while using Twitter. Twitter as We Knew it is Dead: The 7 New Dependable Ways to Use Twitter tells the reader to not use twitter fluff, avoid using clients like Tweetdeck and and Seesmic, to market yourself outside of Twitters with links to Twitter, use Tweet schedulers such as Sharefeed and Hootsuite and Twaiter, to always respond to people that @yourname, to follow only those who provide valuable information, and to limit the times you check twitter each day.

Despite this, I did learn that Tweets fade away, and the use of Tweetdeck has kept my tweets more organized with columns for the groupings (hashtags) and direct tweets and mentions. Tweet! Tweet! I've grown to colse to 200 interesting, articulate professionals that I follow, and I've learned that the people I follow are more important to me that the number who follow me. It is MY personal learning network, and if I am helping others great but it is not about my building a popularity contest.

I had fun learning to change my Twitter background to look more like a Blog, and even more fun turning my blog background to look like a Twitter background. There is one reliable truth in all this Web 2.0 learning… I Can spend huge amounts of time fiddling around and accomplishing little if I don't stay focused! (but it is fun!) I've found that the larger my focused network grows, the more I am learning. I get excited when I get a tweet, I get even more excited when 'famous' people actually send me a personal tweet! Wow, I have made some serious connections.

For a snack, Twitter sure can take up a lot of my time!

SNACKING VERSUS MEALS: REFLECTIONS ON TWITTER IN TERMS OF MY OWN PERSONAL LEARNING

Twitter has clearly become my own personal learning network (PLN). I enjoy seeing what others snack on and even share some snacks of my own, but my real love is in the main course.

The isolation of a teacher librarian is unique. Seldom do we have professional opportunities to share in the day to day activities of our job. We all value the times we get to meet with our colleagues in other schools, but for myself, they are few and far between. I like to get ideas and apply them so I prefer my learning in small chunks. My twitters have become for more valuable to me than many other sources of personal learning. Certainly, my Twitter learning follows me out of school; I do not have my Twitters go to my cell phone as other educators do. Twitter could eat up a great deal of time. I do check out my Tweetdeck (apologies to Scott Scheper) at home, and find that as a result I am thinking about work regularly outside of the job, which from an employers point of view, is a good thing.

In the Future Buzz, Adam Singer suggests that Twitter should be your outpost and your blog your home base. Certainly, it is the links that I learn from and I recognize that any conversation must be two way. If I expect to learn from the links (and not just 140 character tweets, then I too need to keep my blog as my home base. If I miss out on a blog posting, I can still find it later and utilize the information. If I miss a tweet, it is in 'archive purgatory' and will likely never be seen again. It is like missing your between meal snack, but I will crave the main course, the contenet of the link, be it a blog, a picture or a web page. Twitter has become, for me, a way to navigate the web and to find out snack-sized bits of information so that I can then find the main course. Just like television news, you only see a tiny bit, and I hunger for the more detailed information I would find in a deepr news source.

I wonder if I should use one of the sites mentioned by Scheper to spread out my tweets? I have noticed that I tweet in clusters, which makes me visible only to those who are checking out Twitter around that time. Should I send similar tweets out over a sread out time period (as I've noticed others doing) so that my tweets and ideas get more exposure. At this point in time, I'm not sure that the tweets I'm sharing are that important, but if I build my network, and feel that I am sharing valuable information, I will have to consider this dynamic.

There are clearly dynamic ways that I could be using Twitter to keep my personal connections in the forefront, if only I could convince family and friends that Twitter could be valuable. Colleagues, as well, both teachers and teacher librarians, are not yet ready to take the plunge. I have work to do still in this area!

REFLECTIONS ON TWITTER FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING

I wish all my students had smart phones. I wish we could be using Twitter or Edmoto to enhance class conversations. Imagine the engagement students would have if they could twitter a response to a question instead of waiting in line with their hands up? Like an elluminate session, questions can be asked as they come to mind without interrupting the teacher's dialogue. Imagine the power of students who, when faced with a difficult idea, could ask the question from home? Professor David Parry observed that class chatter went beyond the classroom when students began to use twitter for class purposes. Even if the teacher does not respond, the student feels they are making progress on their work. Imagine the power of a classmate stepping in to help? We develop learning networks and active engagement. Alberta, like many other jurisdictions, have taken on student engagement as a focus along with 21^st Century literacies. Imagine the learning network if Alberta students worked together using Twitter to share, build, learn and develop multicurricular local and global ideas.

This is, for my class, still a dream for the future. In an elementary school, smart phones are limited to a handful of students. Truthfully, phones are banned, a barrier that could be overcome. When there is only one student who has a cell phone, then the idea is still out of reach. Despite my dreams 20 years ago that there would be a computer on every child's desk, I now believe this step will be skipped. Student owned smart phones, mobile computing devices, ipads and netbooks will likely supersede any resource allocation be school districts.

I am pleased that, to date, Twitter has not been blocked on my district's computers. There is potential for us to develop communication in our staff groups at a professional level to disseminate information, to share ideas and to learn from professional practice before we integrate use with students. Until professionals acknowledge to potential in this media, it will remain off limits in our classrooms. Broward County Public School uses Twitter to disseminate information to parents, students and staff. This is a start, and as we open these avenues, eventually we will discover, as I am convinced, if there is a safe, beneficial learning and teaching application. Perhaps it will end up in a modified environment such as Edmodo (a private micro-blogging service that provides privacy controls in virtual classrooms where one does not need an email, and can work in broad ways to facilitate Twitter-like communication).

Laura Walker in Tech & Learning suggests nine reasons to use Twitter in school:

Together we're better
Global or local, you choose
Self awareness and reflective practic
Ideas workshop and sounding board
Newsroom and innovative showcase
Professional development and critical friends
Quality assured searching
Communicate communicate communicate
Getting with the times has never been so easy!

I ran across an amazing school project as I worked on Twitter. A teacher, fron the appearnances of the pictures, in Middle School, was planning a service trip for her class to Nicarauga to help in schools and libraries. She used a wiki for the student groups to record information about their work (including contacts with governement and business in Nicarauga and in their community, fundraising objectives, and over-the-summer projects in preparation for the trip the following November. Over the summers, students were required to tweet their progress, report on the Wiki, and fulfill requirements to prepare using 21st Century literacies. She did this on a challenge from her principal. She posted Vlogs and students had to respond in the same manner. Unfortunately, in the process of this last week, I've lost the link to this site. She demonstrated a meaningful, engaging learning environment using multiple tools. Students were highly engaged and fulfilled difficulut, responsible learning tasks at highler levels of thinking. The technology engaged them and gave them a responsibility to use tools wisely.

If we deny access to tools like Twitter to all students, there is a digital divide between those students who have access at home and those who do not. As we as educators ponder the pros and cons of modern technologies, many of our students are so far beyond the ideas we are discussing that it is a moot point. However, we become responsible when there are divisions of access and when we are not teaching appropriate use. Twitter is a powerful educational tool, but left in the hands of the self-taught adolescent, it easily becomes purely a brief status update tool, another form of SMS. The power of the technology is lost. If we need to teach for the future, we need to embrace it now.

@nancyacavanaugh

Unlinked Resources Used:

Black, Elizabeth. Web 2.0 and Library 2.0 : What Librarians need to Know. Courtney, Nancy (ed), (2007) Library 2.0 and Beyond. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited.

Brooks-Young, Susan. (2010). Teaching With the Tools Kids Really Use. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin Press.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Podcasting Trailfires.

November, Alan. (2010) Empowering Students with Technology. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin.

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

http://karenbrooksucboces.blogspot.com/2010/03/must-watch-educational-videos-on.html

2010-03-25T10:51:00.000-07:00

http://karenbrooksucboces.blogspot.com/2010/03/must-watch-educational-videos-on.html

A Vision for K-12 Education

2010-03-23T12:24:00.001-07:00

SOCIAL NETWORKING: Been there, done that…. from the '60 to the present, has it really changed?

2010-03-21T22:58:00.001-07:00

When I was seventeen, I used to sit in the park on warm spring and summer days. My friends and I would talk about meaningless things, topics that I can not remember and likely had little significance. We were a mixed group of teens, guys and girls, various 'classes' of people, various incomes and various interests. This was a pleasant experience for all of us, never prearranged, not a date, just a change to shoot the breeze.

Unfortunately for me, my father's office overlooked that park, and he would storm down across the green and break our group apart. He was always worried about what was going on and who I was with and what influence that would have on me. Alternatively, I would chat on the phone for long periods of time with my friends, sharing ideas and taking about fashion or the next dance or the boy who sat behind me. My mom didn't much like any long times on the phone, either, worried about what was going on. Phone calls were limited to a few minutes.

This was social networking in another era. This was my chance to reach out for emotional support, to share trivial matters with peers, to make connections and learn how to interact with others. Parents and educators worried then about how we networked similarly to how parents and educators worry today.

Our world has changed, but not so much that we are different people. Adults are protective of their children, kids are involved in innumerable activities and seldom is there time or parental will to have kids 'hanging out' in a park. Nevertheless, children, and teens especially, still seek to make connections with peers. They need to socialize fairly freely, to learn interaction, to test their boundaries, to find emotional support and to make various connections. What has changed is the platform.

Reflections on the Process of Learning About Social Media Sites

My first social media site was, of course, the park. My more recent web based learning began with Facebook years ago. It was, at the start, slow and felt fairly useless, but as I built friends and tested out functionality, I have found that I utilize its functions fairly fully. Beyond Facebook, my Social Networking has been limited, so I looked forward to finding out more in this chapter of Web 2.0 course. I have always questioned, passively, the blocking of Facebook in my school but hadn't actually thought about MySpace or other sites. I had dealt with five students who had used Facebook to post teacher hate notes and student threats, and their subsequent suspensions. Instead of leading me to support the banning of Facebook, I wondered whether keeping it away from teacher's eyes just allowed for more and underground abuse. The trailfires once again proved invaluable to opening my eyes to broader issues and to understand more clearly the role of a social network.

Social Networks connect people who share common goals or interests. (NCTE Inbox, retrieved March 18, 2010) They are, or can be global. The media has reported more about the dangers of social networking than the positive results (Greenhow, 2006), which include creativity, technical skills, appreciaiton for diversity, and communication skills. I realize now that Second Life is a Social Networking tool, but like Joanne DeGroot states on her trailfire, 'most of us don't have time for our first lives!' How true. Besides, I don't need any other place I could spend real money for virtual assets. I am surprised that real colleges and universities have established a presence on Second Life and that there are distance courses available. Perhaps I will look this up when my first life courses are finished.

In the Wall Street Journal blog Gary Hamel (retrieved March 18, 2010) suggests that 'Generation F' (Facebook users) will expect a working world that simulates the Facebook world, where ideas are equal, contributions matter, hierarchies are natural, leaders serve, tasks are chosen, one shares, not hoards, groups are self defining, opinions compound and are peer reviewed, intrinsic rewards matter, and activists are heroes. This list of salient features of social media makes me consider seriously the very positive educational skills that social networking sites can provide. Are these not the basic skills we want to engender in our students?

There is no end to where the social networking will take us. According to Sam Edelstein on his blog, Suite101.com,(retrieved March 18, 2010) Facebook has recently added QR codes, a barcode that eventually could be used to identify people and products that will move you directly to their website or social networking site. We will be using tools like Facebook much more interactively in the future. In this profound TED.com Video, Pattie Maes shows how different technologies will be mashed together with Facebook to totally change the way we see the world.

Reflections on Social Networking in Terms of My Own Personal Learning

My learning curve with social media sites began about four years ago, joining Facebook. Like any other site, it started very small and I had limited friends, and so the tool was of limited use. I joined upon the invitation of one of my children and became her 'friend'. I still find this word strange and confusing. It seems to be a common term across all sites, but I would be more comfortable calling it 'Contact" or "Connection'

My use was limited to a few notes to my online kids who lived in opposite end of the country, and looking at a few pictures. I had a limited number of contacts as most adult friends (real ones) were not members. Email still worked better for communication with people for me, at least.

In 2007, I ramped up my Facebook usage for political reasons. I created groups and used Facebook as an event creator / notifier. I began to post on topics of interest in various groups and built very quickly a network of like-minded people who also used Facebook. It proved to be an effective way to share information and to connect with many people, but it was quite limited in the demographics of who I could communicate with, limited mainly to younger people and to some other politicos who wanted to try to be cutting edge. The linkages to groups was valuable, keeping me informed on different topics. As groups are updated or new groups are formed, I am invited to join. The Facebook connection allowed a new way of sharing information and local news in a timely way. I have kept a totally open Facebook page with limited privacy settings given that the nature of the profile has been far more political than personal. I learned quickly not to share anything I would be embarrassed or ashamed of or was too personal.

I continue to use the event component of Facebook to share public events. Private (personal) events can be created as well, but I have not used Facebook in that way as I would just as soon use a more personal method of contact. Very public events have tended to create uncommitted attendees; I have observed frequently that large rallies or meetings have 'friends' RSVP that do not show. Perhaps the anonymity of the type of event or the large size of the event means people don't feel that same commitment to attend. Smaller events tend to get more honest responses. A recent event I hosted had 14 confirmed guests through Facebook; only one was not in attendance. I must note, that Facebook is not broad enough to use a sole method of communication; the event had 75 attendees, more than 60 of which did not get contacted through Facebook. Each week I receive at least a half a dozen invitations to attend events, or news updates about issues that are informative and that I would not otherwise know about. Facebook has value for me, even if I am not actively posting personal information.

Personally, I don't chatter on Facebook. Many do, particularly young people who use Status Updates as a way of reaching out to create connections, just like I did in the park or on the phone. Teenagers now do not commonly contact each other on telephones. Text messaging, IM'ing (on Messenger or Facebook) and status updates are the norm. Often so busy with activities and increasingly rigorous education expectations, reaching out and connecting in these manners reaches more friends at points of time, when it is timely for them, unlike the instantaneous demand of the telephone. Lots of the messages are inane, meaningless, unnecessary in first look, but are a new way for students to remain connected in an increasingly hectic life. Social networking sites have replaced what were the traditional networking sites of my past, many steps improved upon. Connections build from one's friends to one's friends' friends. When a status update is created, far more people see and hear it, and hence are more likely to communicate with youprovide you with a connection in the world and often emotional and personal support. The question becomes if this is meaningful communication, or whether it has to be meaningful in traditional ways.

There are many Social Networking spaces, all with a slightly different emphasis. I joined LinkedIn, which has a stronger connection to providing a business link, and is less useful for my needs. MySpace started out being big, particularly in the United States, but has fallen behind Facebook in popularity. It remains a strong space for music connections and for younger teens and can be gussied up (individualized) more than Facebook. Moodle is a social networking space particularly designed for use by educators. There is penguin and webkinz and shelfari. There is Neopets and Friendster. Facebook recently topped Google in number of hits… social networking is not going to go away. Although Facebook began as a college / university platform, it has rapidly expanded to world wide popularity.

Lee LeFever's Social Networking in Plain English provides its typically clear, concise explanation of social networking. He does not mention Nings, which appear to be capable of a more customized social network where you can decide who to invite, what they see, what they can do and allows a variety of tools including podcasting and video. The administrator can control access in all ways, so it can be moderated, remain private and safe. A Ning can be used to connect students, build discussion forums, use for literature circles and bookclubs, create podcasts, post information to students and parents, and create groups. It can be used for a class or an entire school and remain safe and secure. I am a member of the TeacherLibrarian Ning and through that, many sub groups. I am a member of the Classroom2.0 Ning and receive continual information that builds my personal learning including live broadcasts and discussions. I am part of a book club with teachers all over the world. The Ning offers a wealth of opportunities and tools and from my perusal, a more professional forum than the social / political forum of Facebook.

Part of my personal learning curve has been to deal with inappropriate content. Despite protections, people can set up accounts and then delete them. One such account was created that sent a message to me and a daughter, including extremely inapporprate malicious content. (The account, subsequently closed after messaging). If written on paper, this would have been considered serious, but because it was on Facebook, the police figured that the best thing to do was to quit using Facebook. They would never have suggested to quit using the mail if it had been received by mail. The fault seemed to hint at my having Facebook, not to the sender for creating the message. It seems that there is an expectation of inapporpriate usage that one should be expected to accept from social networking sites.

Any content should be monitored; if one doesn't want the world to see it, (including future employers, past teachers, family and friends, now and in the future), it should not be posted. This however, has to be taught!

Reflections on Social Networking for Teaching and Learning

Everyone needs to build and maintain relationships. Social networking is a basic human need. Our tools have changed for many of us as our world has changed. Like my parents, we are often cautious that the methods students use to network might have adverse effects. We don't accept change easily, and so many of these sites are blocked in schools due to a fear of inapporpriate usage and content. Yet new ways of communicating will have impact on overall communication skills, and I suggest in a positive way.

Barring access to Facebook and other social networking sites is reactionary. We do not ban books because it might have a detrimental affect; we closely access if there is a real issue. Social networking sites can be strong educational tools. Photos and stories can be shared. Groups can be used to share ideas; one comment on a Blue Skunk Blog by Linda Fox suggested:

"a group of students each one creates a Facebook page for one of these folks: Abe Lincoln, Salmon Chase, Edward Bates, William Seward etc. Then they go in and create a Facebook Group. - explaining how these folks worked together. What were the controversies, decisions etc? Great way of demonstrating that they not only understand the history here but also the concept of leading and making decisions by listening to all sides and points of view...Projects like this require lots of research, knowledge and understanding. Facebook is a great way to demonstrate learning in the area of biography, history etc."

There is, of course, likelihood that students will misuse this tool. It is also true that students misuse and are inappropriate when passing notes… but we do not ban paper. The digital world is not going to go away and students must be taught the skills necessary to be appropriate and safe online. There is a tendency for youth to 'befriend' anyone who asks on Facebook. Teaching them the proper skills before they have built networks on their own that are difficult to detach from is an important responsibility. Teaching students about the permanence of their profile needs to happen before it is too late. I liken this abdication of educators to do this teaching to the sex education of my childhood. We were taught nothing until long after we had mislearned the facts, often too late and ultimately embarrassing. Students need to learn social networking skills young. Just our school system and parents kept human biology facts out of reach for many of us, (and we still found out in our own ways) we must teach appropriate usage to students as they are using the tools whether we want them to or not. We shouldn't kid ourselves that even if parental controls are on at home, even if it is banned at school, students ARE on these sites and then are secretive about it. They log on on the local WiFi, at their friends' house, ro access the neighbours unsecured wireless connection. It is better to teach proper usage than to bury our heads in the sand about the possible repercussions that will happen anyway.

My school district blocks Facebook from students. Students are texting and connecting in any case the same messages and we are not able to stop that. With the increasing number of smart phones, access to web sites will not be controlled by board bans. According to Nilay Patel, in engadget.com, (retreived March 18, 2010) Apple just placed a patent for iGroups, a social networking site for the iPhone. Social networks will grow, not disappear. Often, people of all ages are more likely to want to do something that is banned to see what the fuss is about. As Facebook is basically used for social and recreational uses, and messages can be forwarded to one's email account, or cell phone anyway, this will not be the hill I die on. However, I agree that being friends with students is unwise and that policy, as directed by the ATA, is wise, particularly as students hit teen years and misperceptions could lead to job risk. As Blue Skunk Blog states, (retrieved March 18, 2010) 'it is recreational in nature and likely a nuisance to keep kids off of it (Facebook)". Nings, on the other hand, are a more professional forum. Some school districts have banned Nings because they can carry YouTube videos (that could only be viewed outside of the school blocks). It seems that educational institutions are often being reactionary and not visionary.

Having looked at Wikis and blogs, I can see that a Ning would be an ideal place to house the collaborative work that can be done on complex projects. It appears to provide a wider platform for tools (the difficulty of hosting podcasts on some websites such as Weebly and Blogger) and the ability to have an infinite number of groups, pages and cohorts make it ideal for multifunctional tasks. Social Networking has created a boom among students in writing to share poetry and stories on social sites. Building a Ning to share these in a safe closed environment would foster a desire to write for publication. It will allow us to be constructivist. We need to model and teach with appropriate tools, and we need to be 'digital immigrants'. The largest growing group of Facebook users is over 25. Teachers need to find a way to bring these tools into our classrooms. It will develop bonds that will tie to outcomes we desire, and it will build social interaction in apporpriate ways if we choose to teach it.

The persistence of social networking makes it clear that it is here to stay. (Brook-Young, 2010). Ipsos Reid has just announced that online use in both below 35 years of age and over 35 years of age has become greater than television viewing, which has not declined in weekly time. We are an online socially connected world, and it is our job to teach and model this.

Unlinked Resources Used:

Black, Elizabeth. Web 2.0 and Library 2.0 : What Librarians need to Know. Courtney, Nancy (ed), (2007) Library 2.0 and Beyond. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited.

Brooks-Young, Susan. (2010). Teaching With the Tools Kids Really Use. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin Press.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Podcasting Trailfires.

November, Alan. (2010) Empowering Students with Technology. Thousand Oaks, CA : Corwin.

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

A Serving of Mashed .. Mixing it all Together to Make a Fabulous Dish

2010-03-13T23:13:00.001-08:00

Recipe for a Great Tool: Reflections on the Process of Learning about Multimedia Sharing sites

9-10 Sources (From Trailfires, Google Searches, Proquest, Books)
15 - 20 hours (Can be modified according to experience and time, usually an increase)
8 - 10 Voice overs
50 - 60 Pictures (to be filtered accordingly)
1 microphone
1 hour of time to figure out if you have a camcorder working
6 heaping tablespoons of patience
5 PD Sessions
1 (minimum) curriculum to keep in mind
0 Children to take up your time

First, take be sure that there are not children around. This tends to create a erratic flow that can impact the final result of the mashup creation. Put them in from of a computer or a netbook and tell them they can't come out until they have an online identity that you can monitor and have created a blog using solely html. That should give you about 3 hours.

Sitting at a quiet desk, consume the 6 tablespoons of patience. Do not consume less. More is often beneficial. Patience for some comes in a 750 oz red bottle. For others it is a small pill. Zen Buddhism works too.

Check that the computer is set on 'cooperation' and not 'crash' mode.

Begin.

Trailfires are such an enlightening beginning. The Common Craft Videos will once again enlighten you on the concept without overwhelming you with the detail. You can begin. Lee LeFever will show you that that Social Networking is like an ice cream store.

Stop. Go eat some ice cream with pickles. It will calm you down or make you believe you are pregnant. If you find it is the latter, you have some content to use in your microphone.

The second trailfire, created by VoiceThread tells you how to do Voice Thread. This is just like the section in my 1964 edition of the Joy of Cooking (Rombauer, pg. 292) that clearly, step by step, tells me how to cook and mash a potato. I needed to see and read it first but found, shortly that it is REALLY simple and self explanatory.

Trailfire 3 is piece of cake (Rombauer, pg 616) and we all like to eat cake. Animto has been a staple like flour and potatoes since 2009. Animoto created this slideshare. I learned that you can embed an Animoto in Facebook or export it to YouTube or embed in a post! I can remix if I don't like it. Over mixing might affect cake or mashed potatoes, but not an Animoto!

Trailfire four (Walking Papers) reminded me that one recipe for library success will be to use Animotowith my library club and create book trailers.

Trailfire five, by Joyce Valenza in School Library Journal reminds me that Animoto is light, like angel food cake (Rombauer pg 619) and does not facilitate as many design and thought processes as other programs (Photo Story 3, which is a downloadable program, leaves design in the hands of the user). Animoto has web connectivity that builds online relationships.

Finally, Trailfire six gets serious. There are 700,000 images shared on VoiceThread from the New York Public Library to use; all of which make fabulous primary source material both for Animoto and Voice Thread. They are all licensed to share. One can also copy a Voicethread, allowing great opportunity for resource growth and online collaboration. Even if I search for a picture through VoiceThreads, creative commons licences will provide a link to the source, allowing credit to be given to the source with ease. No more secret recipes. We need to remember to credit our sources.

Ruth Cullum in 6 + 1 Traits of Writing reminds us that using technology can be an excellent vehicle for building writing skills. Voice Threads is a powerful tool for writing and critical thinking.

Schnell (2007) provided the best explanation of what a mash up is. It repurposes web content by combining third party data sources. This is an equation where 1+1=3... by combining data from different sources, more is created. Shelfari and LibraryThing are two mashups that deal with books. Mashups access data from sites like Amazon, eBay, the Library of Congress, and Google and integrate them to provide enhanced information.

REFLECTIONS ON MULTIMEDIA SHARING FOR PERSONAL

I learned to love Animoto this fall when I could make a multimedia presentation of a friends wedding. She emailed me back and chastized me for taking so much time to make this when I was so busy! Of course I didn't mention that this was just like one of the Joy of Cookings Quick Cakes, put it all together in one pan and "presto'... I had video to make her envious.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Somewhere along the line I must have tried Voice Threads, because as I logged on, it told me I had used my three free Voice Threads. As so many of the tools we use are free now, I was quickly reminded that there are tools we still have to pay for. Sigh. Just like finding you are out of flour, it was a huge disappointment when I wanted to make a cake (a video). Three is a maximum. Well, I know my spring form pans came in a set of three, and if I wanted another one I had to buy it. On this online world, though, I could just log in using a different email.

I find that Voice Threads allows me to make something I've never done before. I am successful in using my mike and camcorder for the first time on my laptop. Finally areason to have purchased an ingredient I had never used before. I created a video of myself on a voicethread form my class. Well, it did take several times, just like a soufflee, but I finally created something light enought for my class to engage in.

I'm known for storing recipes and pictures that sit on my computer and never get seen again. Multimedia sites open this up for me to find again and for others to share, for the world to view. Although originally falsely quoted, I will use this an an analgoy to my cooking and media sharing, from Marie Antoinette, Let them eat cake... or devour the mashing media. There is nothing better that a plate of mashed potatoes with gravy. For students, a learning tool that allows them to incorporate all that they have seen and heard and, voila, mash it up, and you get a great repast that can be reposted.

There seems to be unlimited ways to use these tools in my personal life. Both these tools are excellent and engaging ways to share family, friends, events. The grad class in my daughters school could share pages on Voice Thread and comment on it, keeping a wonderful record of their grad year. My next vacation could be documented on Animoto. Tonight's birthday party may well become the next platform to create a multimedia presentation!

Reflections on Multimedia Sharing in Teaching and Learning

There seem to be innumerable ways to utilize these tools in education. As an inquiry based project, a Voice Thread can be used to direct learning in a collaborative way. Using pictures from primary sources, students can develop their visual skills. There is increase access to learning as these tools can be utilized at home and at school. As an introduction to a unit, Animoto would make an excellent tool to engage the students. Generative learning will occur when students create the presentation using the tools and have to find and explain their use of pictures and videos. The creation of a VoiceThread by students could be an excellent review of a unit, synthesizing what the students have learned. Both Animoto and VoiceThreads would be excellent tools for book clubs to use, for literature circles to create, for book talks in the library.

In an attempt to test out the educational uses of VoiceThread, I have created one to be used by my class for grade six Social Studies.

The the beauty of having a collection ofpictures ready to use is the ablity to quickly apply them to another funtion. Here, this Animoto will be used to introduce the topic.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

As the technological world advvaces at exponential sppeds, we can expect that future learners will be far more fluent in all types of technolgical tools. The Student-Teacher Digital Divide and Six New Technology Roller Coaster Rides by Lester Towell., retrieved frm Proquest March 14th, 2008) suggests that students will have shorter attention spans as a result of this.They also will have more digital connections, more personal connections and fewer wired connections. Teachers need to reach these students with a varied technological pedagogy and maintain relevance. Utilizing Multimedia Sharing sites to not only present material but for studnets to generate material moves a great way toward this necesssary change.

Unlinked Resources Used:

Courtney, Nancy (ed), (2007) Library 2.0 and Beyond. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Podcasting Trailfires.

Callum, Ruth. 6 + 1 Traits of Writing (2003) Ney York : Scholastic.

Christopher Harris. (2006, May). SCHOOL LIBRARY 2.0. School Library Journal, 52(5), 50-53,9. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1041606431).

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

A message to Ralph

2010-03-13T22:29:00.000-08:00

What we post is part of our past, it reflects our thinking and mindset at the time, but in this digital world, what we post is part of our future. I created a web page in 2007 in anticipation of the next Alberta Provincial election. When the election was over, I took it down except for a "thank you" page. Surprisingly it is still there; I've caught links to it through searches and through those 'people finder' sights. Pictures that I had posted, words I had deleted.

That's okay for me; I've kept my online identity such that I don't mind if the whole world reads it. I don't post pictures of me in crazy clothes or making stupid faces. I don't want the public world to see me stupidly; I don't want employers to make judgements on my personal life. As a parent and as an educator, I've seen students (and adults as well) post compromising posts and pictures. Ones that make oneself look silly or stupid, ones that are poorly written and full of errors and deflaming comments. I've seen students suspended and expelled for deflamation and libel; and charged with crimes.

Recently, I was told about a recent posting by a student from many years ago who posted two deflamatory comments on Facebook. I don't know where his feelings came from as I was surprised, but I do really want to comment on the thread in which no one supported him. Bravo to all the students who did not enable this kind of conversation. I have huge respect for the two students who stood up. Thank you, you are a person with integrity. You know who you are. You remember that we need to stand up.

I dedicate this video to all of those students who think that the web is a venue to say things you are not proud of or would say in person. To the ralphs of the world, to use a recent movie, I see you. More importantly, the world sees you and I suspect few respect what they see.

Doubts About Digital Natives

2010-03-10T10:21:00.000-08:00

Tom Kuntz in his blog expresses doubts that educators can assume that those born between 1980 and 2000 are 'digital natives'. There is no special path to understanding the new technological world. In my experience, our students are digital natives only in that they are reliant on the web to provide them with research, they are often shallow in their searches, and usually do not know about many of the resources and tools that are there to help them.

They are, however, usually much more fluent in finding the correct keys, negotiating a new site, and are higher risk takers than the adults around them. This can't be interpreted as being a digital native. We need to teach our students. This often will be a collaborative teaching as we are learning together. We can not assume they know it all.

My two youngest children born in 1985 and 1993, both feel that although they can word process fill in spreadsheets, chat on Facebook and email, that they haven't a clue about other technologies. Sad statement that none of the new technologies have been addressed or taught in their schools.

Wordle of Wikis

2010-03-10T08:52:00.000-08:00

Wikis... Think Pair Share

2010-03-07T13:12:00.000-08:00

THINK: Reflections on the Process of Learning About Wikis.

This is my world; the new flat world of Web 2.0. This week I've spent an inordinate amounts of time thinking; thinking about wikis, thinking bout Web 2.0. thinking about the new world that I live in. I've been reading. I've been thinking. I've tried to use new language with my staff (with limited results). "What, a Wiki? A Vlog? Maybe the students can write a report? Sounds easier. And, by-the-way, what the heck is a tweet or a wordle or prezi?"

My collapsed world (as seen in the collapsed balloon) reflects a wiki world that is slowly inflating and is also flat. Wikis are are phenomenal educational tool that I have never used. Other than searching on Wikipedia, my Wiki world was non-existant. It certainly was not about my participation; it was, like the Web 1.0 I was familiar with, a repository of information for me, not for me as a contributor.

The beginning: I learn to think and realize that there has been a world-tilting change occuring in in our technological world. Once again, our world is flat. Imagine the shock of our scientists! More and more, technology experts are claiming this new knowlege. The world is no longer round; it has become flat, accessible and globally collaborative.

What does that mean? I am disposed to think about this in terms of wikis as well as other Web 2.0 resources. I've been proud to feel my mind is expanded, like the mid millenium thinkers, I knew the world was round, I've accepted the sciences that led to our understanding of the spherical nature of our world. Shockingly, I've read over and over again in my readings about WIKIS that our world is once again flat. Have I regressed to the middle ages? What does this mean? Shall I punch out my globe? If I do, will I see only an entire world or will I be able to look beyond our northern hemisherical thinking to embrace an entire planet.

I explored Wikis from other schools and educators. I thought about the limitless potential there is for sharing and to use to inform, debate, discuss, learn, and develop whrough a collaborative sturucture. I saw Wikis from grade one to grade 12, from educators across the planet. I looked at thematic Wikis and multilingual news wikis and wikis designed for teachers to share. I've read Joyce Valenza's Wiki for librarians. I've seen Glogsters on Wikis. You can embed games on Wikis. There are wikis for everything and anything and I am just beginning to explore this new world. We can collaborate, we can share, we can organize and use wikis for instruction.

I have learned that there are similarities between a wiki and a blog: both can be public or private. Teachers canto set up private wikis for collaboration with students, staff or parents. Wikis allow for different pages, where blogs are liner and date sequenced. In a wiki, information is displayed in the order in which it is posted, not in reverse chronological order as it is on a blo

The challenge I have heard most often about Wikis is the fear of a lack of authority in the Wiki text. If anyone can say anything, then anything can be said. With teachers, I've heard this often about citing Wikipedia as a source.

Readers should check for citations, check for validating data from alternate sources, and should participate actively by joining Wikipedia and correcting entries that you believe erroneous. We must be teaching students to analyze critically everything they learn on the web; Wikipedia is an excellent source to modle this teaching with.

Our instantaneous access to global communicaiton, be it through Wikis, Blogs, or other Web 2.0 technologies, does lead to a question about what is nws? Is it the same news we used to see on the front page of the Globe or the Journal? News has become more personal and we access information based on our community and interests, and so some of the 'chatter' we see on the web, in Web 2.0, may not suit our interests. We have a choice what news we consume; there is just more of it and more variety. Even in the Journal, I choose what news I read. What is important to another (sharing their personal stories) may not be of importance to me. The new media allows us to share with small groups and to target audiences, to decide what news is relevant to us.

PAIR: Discussion of Wikis in Terms of My Own Personal Learning.

What is happening in Singapore this week is what matters to my school. What happens in San Diego matters in my school. We can learn fr0m each other. We are a collaborative world. Wikis are one of the the glues that can make this flat world unified. I began my learning as a thought and inquiry based project. Why do wikis work? Why do we use them? How are they applicable to my job? How will they enhance student learning? Are they worth my time? I read the resources. I read the trailfires. I read wikis and blogs and wikis again. Everything I read reinforced this idea.

I have been reflecting on how easy it has been to fall behind in the learning curve when it comes to new technologies. We become content with our body of knowledge and our strategies and tools that we are using. Wikis have been around for a while, but they are new to the majority of teaching staff.

In Wiki Technologies and a Return to Rigor, Michael Roe wonders why the technologies we actively share in our world are missing from the classroom? I believe it is not a matter of active decision making, but a matter of lack of knowledge. We need to be continually sharing our new learnings with staff, as teacher librarians and as classroom teachers. The role we play in school libraries is to continually be learning and facilitating the learning of our staff.

Some argue that technologies are missing from our classrom due to lack of hardware and software. Yet, according to webtoold4U2Use, wikis require no knowledge, no hypertext, are easy to monitor, are easy to share, are free, work on old computers, facilitate collaboration, work on slow internet connections; in other words, are accessible and possible in just about any learning community. The missing link, I propose, not to be a neanderthal, is the lack of proper support in the school community to understand the role and possibliities in open to teachers, and further, to extend my thesis, the lack of a teacher librarian to facilitate the dissemination of knowledge both to students and to teachers.

Tony Keefer writes, in his article Web2.0 tools for the Classroom, in Choice Literacy.com, that when writing is authentic, when studetns are writing for an audience, then they do not feel like they are doing writing. It seems to me that a part of my job, then , is to inservice teachers about this, to provide opportunities to make writing authentic and real. When studetns are writing for an audience, as a Wiki certainly provides, then they know they are being read, perhaps by a global audience. Teachers cannot be expected to know new technologies and platforms; my job it seems is to disseminate and assist in some of that collaborative learning. This really supports the emerging division of labour in school libraries of an 80 / 20 split between technology support and library support, as 21st Century literacies are explored. My job is an evolving one.

On a purely personal level, I see Wikis becoming a very powerful tool in a political sense, allowing constituents to express thei ideas and have an open dialogue in communities that have lost that community cohesion... where town hall meetings are unusual and where we don't all meet at the cloak room of our children's schools. Wikis can be an effective tool to build a political dialogue.

SHARE: Reflections on Wikis in Teaching and Learning.

Many middle and high school staffs have computer technologists, have library techs, and yes, even have teacher librarians (apologies to the American trend to label teacher librarians as librarians... I KNOW WE all know the difference). Those that have qualified educators that are also librarians are often so oversubscribed in terms of responsiblities that our roles can be diminshed. I perform a full time job as a teacher librarian in a point four time... We must keep up with the myriad of library and educational responsibilities that exist for us and now it is clear to me that we must also make sure that we share continually the new learning and technologies that make literacy engaging and authentic. I imagine I could create a VERY LARGE facebook group of cohorts who are feeling that their responsibility cup is full!

Teachers and students need support to enter into new methods of learning. Computer technologists tend to work on the technical side, building our capacity and fixing our problems and adding links to our hardare. Teacher librarians teach how to integrate new tools into critical learnings, and in such, are the instigators of a future world of techno -savvy, inquiry based, knowledge based collaborative learning.

If authentic writing engages the student; if authentic writing includes writing for a real audience, then Wikis are an ideal tool to build that authenticity with colaboration and a wide participatory audience. We can be united by new technology as a means to bring engagement to literacy learnings (engagement being a primary AISI focus both for Alberta Education and Edmonton Public).

New technologies such as wikis allow us to move outside the box and meet student needs and build engagement. Everyone who contributes to the wiki has ownership and, as a result, is more invested in a project. Wikis have the potential to differentiate for learning in ways that traditional tools could not.

Ken Haycock suggests that we co-create content and this builds engagement. It is our professional responsiblity to make this happen with students. Students at all levels need to be leaders, to teach and to be taught. Wikis clearly open this opportunity to students. Literature circes are shown to be an excellent example of co-creative work as people co-create content. http://wandawiki.wikispaces.com/.

In different groups in literature circles. students of all levels of proficiency have opportunities to be leaders, to teach, and be taught by other group members. Sharing their work and learning on Wikis enhances the literature circle enormously and builds more accountability.

Yet, despite all this positive rhetoric, I am still left with the question as to how we make this work in a classroom that has limited technological access. Students co-create content, yet if they have limited access to computers, this obstacle is not just untimely, but seems insurmountable in many classroom situtations.

Classes often are scheduled into limited lab time, there is little access to adequete classroom technology, and hardware is often problematic. Yet, as I stated earlier, wikis require no knowledge, no hypertext, are easy to monitor, are easy to share, are free, work on old computers, facilitate collaboration, work on slow internet connections; in other words, are accessible and possible in just about any learning community. Wikis can continue to be worked on in the home, as they are not limited to school platforms and will work on vitrually any computer. Students can continue to collaborate, learn, and produce at school and at home.

Wikis will encourage participation by quieter students. The online world engages students 24/7 and leads to generative learning and investigation. Students feel an ownership and will take a greater when theri work is shared.

Wagner (2008) argues beyond the technical limitations, there are needs to balance standardization that limits students ability to critically think. Standardizing (accountability pillars, testing) prevent teachers taking risks. To compete globally, student must show:
1. Critical thinking and problem solving; 2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence; 3. Agility and adaptability; 4. Initiative and entrepreneurialism; 5. Effective oral and written communication; 6. Accessing and analyzing information; and 7. Curiosity and imagination. All these skills are intrinsic to using collabotartive, authentic tools like wikis.

Wikis at Wikispaces cater to education, as they have no age restriction. Teacher control of content is easy. Since Wikis and Blogs can strengthen reading and writing skills and teach students about the new literacy of the Internet age, I am collaboratively planning a wiki with the Grade six science teacher, Rayna Arndt. The cross curricular Science / Language Arts / Technology project will focus on careers in forensic science. We are at the stage right now of building the inquiry questions that the students will use and planning the Wiki setup. As well, the grade six class will be working on social studies using a wiki. In pairs (to show collaboration) students will pick a topic with two sides. In the wiki page, they will explore the pros and cons of the issue, usings internet research, and provide a conclusion supported by their evidence. They will need to post pictures, use links, cite sources, be collaborative, add a wordle or glogster and comment on other's pages (modeled after this course structure). They will present to the class to combine in oral skills. I will be using pbworks.com for this project, partly to compare to the wikispaces in a real environment, and partly as it has been recommended as easier for students to use.

In order to build my competencies in Wiki - making, I have set up a very basic Wiki for our staff. Few know at this point how to use a Wiki, so I have chosen to build a Wiki that increased dialogue, input and collaboration in the library. The Wiki has pages for Collaborative Unit notes, for acquisition suggestions, for listing of Web 2.0 tools, and as time evolves the wiki, more will be added. At this point, only one staff member has been introduced to it but I suspect that it will be valued and there will be thoughtful suggestions toward its development.

In "Library 2.0," Harris (2006) talks about the use of blogs, podcasts, and other Web 2.0 applications in the literature and reading promotion efforts of teacher-librarians. Says Harris, "The heart of the concept, though, is not about the tools, but rather the communities and the conversations that they make possible".

Unlinked Resources Used:

Boeninger, Chad F. (2007) "The Wonderful World of Wikis: Applications for Libraries." Library 2.0 and Beyond. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited.

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Podcasting Trailfires.

Dreon, O., & Dietrich, N.. (2009). Turning Lemons into Lemonade: Teaching Assistive Technology through Wikis and Embedded Video. TechTrends, 53(1), 78-80. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1680515581).

Christopher Harris. (2006, May). SCHOOL LIBRARY 2.0. School Library Journal, 52(5), 50-53,9. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1041606431).

Imperatore, C.. (2009, March). Wikis and Blogs: Your Keys to Student Collaboration & Engagement. Techniques, 84(3), 30-31. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1667558511).

Learning and Teaching in WANDA Wiki Wonderland: Literature Circles in the Digital Commons. Teacher Librarian, 37(2), 23-28. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1938481291).

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Roe, M.. (2010, January). WIKI TECHNOLOGY and the return to rigor. Leadership, 39(3), 20-22. Retrieved March 7, 2010, from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1951887201).

Where the Wild Things Are!

2010-03-06T15:49:00.001-08:00

Voices Through the Dark: I Keep Hearing Things

2010-02-28T21:35:00.000-08:00

In the Dark Ages: Reflections on the Process of Learning about Podcasting

Never was I more convinced that a topic would be easier. After tackling media previously in the course that I was unfamiliar with, I believed! YES! This is just like the audio recording of my past. I knew that if I just found an MP3 player, I could do this, just like I did in the 1980’s when I created listening stations. How could I go wrong on this one? I knew it was a useful learning tool; heck, I have dome it all before.

Or so I thought.

Once again, my mind needed expansion. I was back in the analog age but the digital Web 2.0 world is not just about production, but about publishing. I had felt somewhat prepared for digital audio recording as I had created clips for my Glogster presentation, so I had figured out how to use an MP3 player. I’d even figured out how to download the sound bites into the computer and upload them onto Glogster, all helping to build my false sense of competencies.

Chris Kertz in “Podcasting in Libraries”, Library 2.0 and Beyond (2009, Nancy Courtney, ed) quotes the New Oxford American Dictionary, defining podcasting as “a digital recording of a radio broadcast or similar program, made available on the Internet for downloading to a personal audio player”. Kertz states that it is the RSS feed that defines a podcast.

Kertz notes that podcasting was the word of the year in 2005 (other contenders… bird flu and persistent vegetative state) … a mere five years later, it is still an emerging technology however it has made huge inroads in peoples listening and learning modalities.

Podcasting in Plain English, like all the common craft videos, provided yet another excellent succinct explanation of how podcasts are used.

The trailfires, including, appropriately, podcasts, walked me step by step through many parts of podcasting.

Kertz in Library 2.0 and Beyond was detailed in how podcasts can be utilized in an educational setting. From library instruction to booktalks to professional development, the ways that podcasting can be used spans the range of the tasks we do in school libraries. It is a tool for education, it is a tool to support collaborative learning; these ideas were easy to wrap my head around. The set up description seemed simple enough. Richardson's advice (Blogs, Wikis and Podcasts, 2009) to try it out myself first proved fortuitous. What I imagined as a fairly quick process turned out to have far more challenges than I had imagined.

The technical learning in podcasting was a steep learning curve. Truly I found it was three steps up, two down, and I've not yet reached the peak, if one could find an end in the learning curve that is invovled in the read / write web. I'm in the dark every step of the way. The primary steps that I had done before (recording MP3 files, downloading htem onto the computer, adding them to a Glogster) were all attainable, but allowed me only to start the learning 'climb'. Files in hand. I had two projects in mind when planning to podcast, (Do to learn, my mantra) and I collected the audio I needed for one of them with ease.

I had downloaded Audacity mid February to use to edit the files. I watched YouTube Vidoes on using Audacity.

Finally, frustrated, I used a friend's Cool Edit 2000. Using this program, which eventually became Adobe Audition, I was able to create tracks and build my podcast. You are able to down;oad trail versions of Cool Edit however the versions have limited functionality and links to purchase the software do not work, likely due to Adobe's puchase. Cool Edit, however, would only download a WAV file, and I wanted an MP3.

Once again I returned to Audacity, having found new videos that step by step assisted my understanding of using the program.

I loaded the WAV file, and tried to export to an MP3, learning that I needed a LAME download. Despite numerous sources reporting the ease of that process, I was not successful in loading (or finding?) the needed DLL file. Hours have gone by as I have played with making this software work! Thank you, Zamzar, for successfully converting my WAV to MP3.

The learning curve continued as I then realized that Blogger does not host MP3 files! I am incredulous that video was so much simpler than my audio! I followed the lead from a classmate to go to VoiceThreads, and found t I had already used my three free tries. The web is out to get me, keep me quiet, keep me in the dark. I follow Will Richardson's advice to upload my audio to OurMedia.org as it provides "free storage and bandwidth for your .... audio files..." The site will not allow me to register! Eventually, I recollect that Glogster will hold audio files, and am delighted to learn that there is an embed code so I can put it directly on the blog.

There's a Light: It is Getting Brighter and Clearer: Discussion of Podcasting in Terms of My Own Personal Learning

Despite the frustrations of the technical aspects of audio and podcasting, I have gained a great deal of knowledge and understanding through this week.

I slowly, through reading trailfires, texts, interviewing and articles, am beginning to understand that a podcast is closer to radio than my outdated learning cassettes. It involves having a conversation. It is not the straight dissemination of information (MacQuarrie, 2010) as an essay would be or a CD that is designed to impart knowledge on the listener. It requires voice. It requires one to understand the very unique way that good radio reaches and holds its audience. Andy Barry, on the Feb 25 th episode of Anna Maria Tremonti (Part 2 The Current, 25 o2 Andie Barrie), talks about how the listener perceives radio very differently from television. Television is directed to an audience that is usually more than one, and is distant in its connectivity to the viewer. Radio is heard by singular listeners. The mike is kept about the same distance form the broadcaster as would occur in a natural face to face conversation. The resultant feeling is that the radio announcer is talking directly to the listener. It is a personal conversation.

Good podcasting, as a new form of radio, needs to be personal, make the listener feel directly engaged, and do all the things that good radio does. The listener has the choice to turn you on or off, so care has to be taken to engage the listener personally. I am beginning to understand my own preference when listening to radio (CBC over EasyRock) and my preference in most cases for radio over television as I feel more intellectually engaged.

Podcasting is likely to now have me looking a bit like those teenagers hooked up to their earbuds all the time, something I would not have suspected of myself. I've subscribed to a large number of podcasts that have caught my attention and am anxious to listen to them all. From Just One More Book, Coffee Break French, Tech Chick Tips, David Warlick, Grammar girl, SOS Podcast and Radio WillowWeb, I've only just scratched the surface of the opportunities I want to indulge myself with when I have some time. The Education Podcast Network has so many exciting podcasts I want to explore. It is time to dust of my iPod and actually make some use of it!

David Warlick, particularly, models the intimacy I spoke of earlier when he podcasts. I felt he was directly speaking to me so I am more encouraged to continue to listen to his podcasts. As time is always of the essence in a household where one works and takes courses and parents, the on demand characteristic of podcasting has a great appeal. Richardson (2009) speaks about the ease of consumption and the advantages of on demand as opposed to live streaming, stating that it is the distribution of the media that is the huge advantage. I certainly agree as in this modern busy age, I crave information on my own terms.

Discussion of Podcasting in Terms of Teaching and Learning

I am done with aliens, podcasting here I come!
(Jeff Cobb)

This Podcasting Mini Guide title is apropo of how kids learn. Engagement is a key. The boys I taught 20 years ago were caught up in science ficiton and alien characters; the boys today want to have relevant web based tools to express their ideas with and when engaged in the new read / write web, are as absorbed in generative learning as they were absorbed in their fantasy characters. As a teacher it is our responsibility to provide opportunites for this growth, to better prepare the students for the world they will be part of and to teach them to use tools appropriately and safely.

Silvia Tolisano in the LangWitches Blog writes about the process to prepare, plan and create a podcast:

1. Decide what theme/purpose (Interviews, Documentation, Research)

2. Prepare your students (Sound waves, practice, personal voice, expression, segmented audio)

3. Sound Editing Software- How -To Lesson (Record-pause-play-tracks, volume, highlighting, effects)

4. Record audio footage (Introductions, Segment construction)

5. Segments (Assign to different students)

6. Transitions (background music, sound effects

7.Outro (credits)

There are multiple skills gained when students produce a podcast. Besides reinforcing content that hasbeen taught, podcasting is a tool that develops a broad range of skills that reflect learning outcomes across the curriculum. Our students are eager and ready to use these technologies; it is a steeper learning curve for us as teachers to change our thinking and planning to keep up with new opportunities.

In the process of producing the following podcast, students were actively engaged and excited about producing work that they could share. Since pictures and full names are not used, we are able to share the podcast on the web without any FOIPP issues. A second podcast was also in production with a grade four Social Studies class, talking about Alberta's regions, along with a Grade 6 French class, also talking in French about the regions. We were not able to find the time to complete the audio recordings, I will continue this podcast using the students to learn to use Audacity (keeping my fingers crossed!) Next steps: I will be letting the students participate fully with the recording and production; they are already planning for that exciting event.

To listen to our first podcast, about Martin Luther King and creating a podcast, and click on the Player at the top right side of the page.

Unlinked Resources Used

Blackall, L. (Producer) (Retrieved from the World Wide Web: 2010, February 5). Renaming Del.icio.us tags. Podcast retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7amUaTv-S_U

Kretz, Chris. (2007) "Podcasting in Libraries", from Courtney, Nancy, ED.Libraries 2.0 and Beyond, Westport, Connecticut : Libraries Unlimited

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

DeGroot, Joanne. Podcasting Trailfires.

MacQuarrie, Jim. CBC Producer. Interview, February 24th, 2010

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

From the First Twinges of Love... How Social Bookmarking Relates to the Science of Love.

2010-02-15T12:35:00.000-08:00

From Ignorance to Lust: Reflections on the Process of Learning about Social Bookmarking

Falling in love can be a lot like technology. As metaphors go, this might be somewhat oblique... but I can see a lot of connecting points. At first, you glance at someone or something and might think that they look interesting, or perhaps attractive, but often just a passing glance, a twinge of interest, a thought there might be something to be explored.

Eventually, you may be surprised by something that is new and exciting, and, as the Science of Love suggests, (CBC Podcast, Feb 10, 2010) that first stage of lust may set in. You want to learn and spend time and get totally familiar with that new heart in your life. You feel a close connection and want to delve deeper. Surprisingly, you eventually move past that and feel a deeper connection, as there is a world of learning, learning that can become a lifetime of growing. What you learn to deeply love is not always what made that original connection. And there is that moment of making the plunge, of risk as you open yourself to a new way of connecting and growing.

The adventure into social networking, particularly social bookmarking, has felt like that moment when you take the plunge, where you realize that what you knew and loved originally was just that original and somewhat superficial but enjoyable lust… and that there is an entire adventure out there that you had no idea about. This has been a period of recognition that my journey has only just begun and I must be open and ready to meet new challenges head on, apparently for the rest of my life, as I see no sign of this cyber world becoming less important in my future and it is my job, no, my responsibility to open myself up to it.

Social bookmarking was a totally new glimpse for me through January. It was out there, a word, an idea that I did not understand and had never contemplated. Apparently, he had been around for awhile and attracted others’ lust and love, but for me he was just a brief flash, kind of like Edward as he moves through Bella’s first moments as a whisp of wind… hmm, interesting, but a bit dangerous and new and I think I’ll play it safe. If I could carry the analogy further, I would suggest I couldn’t even tell the colour of his hair, much less look into his eyes. As someone who prides themselves in comprehension and technological risk-taking, I was less than comfortable with my total lack of cognition.

Yet, as I caught a bit more of the texture and form, I recognized and connected with a piece of my life. Social bookmarking is a method for Internet users to share, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web resources. Organization. Oh yes, the bane of my existence. Was this finally something that would fill that empty hole, make me whole? I am making that first connection. The first twitches of love… lust began.

I am paper phobic. How can anyone work in a school for a gadjillion years and still not be able to manage the paper on their desk? I am an obsessive reader, not a billboard nor a cereal box goes unread, and yet I can never remember the places that ideas have come from nor the finite details of their contents. I have sticky notes everywhere, which I can not find, and when I do, often don’t understand. I have a favorites list that scrolls down forever, some sorted, most not. I have home notes and school notes and the laptop favorites and the political favorites. I visit classrooms and have no idea what my favourites are or where to find that fabulous note about a cyber place I visited. Connection! Electrical sparks fly and I do what great learners do, I connected social bookmarking with my browser favorites. I am in lust. Like Educause’s scenarios about Dr. Smith, (Seven Things You Should know About Social Bookmarking) I used folders to organize bookmarks, but it is inefficient, there are multiple folders, on different machines, and googling is easier but unreliable. I am not able to share, much less remember!

I read all the Trailfires, I read Merchant and Davies, and I read Richardson. I watch YouTechTips on YouTube. Tagging is the practice and method of collaboratively creating and managing tags to annotate and categorize content. I begin to understand that there are new ways of grouping and sharing and finding information. Delicious was the first to invent tags, and I learn that this new flirt of mine, social bookmarking, whom I really don't yet understand, has been hanging around since 1996! Why could I not have met him earlier?

After joining both Diigo, Delicious and iCyte, and reading about the data loss of Magnolia, I began the journey with bookmarking the trailfires on Delicious! A novel concept, I can now find all of the links Joanne gifted us with by going to Delicious. I can find them at home, I can find them at school, I can find them even when Blackboard isn’t working for me. This is better than human love; heck, it is there whenever and where ever I want this. I want it! And I can find it! No hidden liaisons for this love, it is there for me anywhere. Oh, yes, just like first love, do I really WANT it all the time? I back away, I play it safe, I retreat to some things I am more sure of. Will it betray me and turn out to be less than I hope?

I learn that I can download my favourites to Delicious bookmarks! Lust grows, and I download all 250 some-odd favourites from school. Sobering thought, I now needed to go and make these bookmarks shareable, (unlock them) and I have a chance to reconnect with things I’ve added to favourites at school for 8 years. I edit, I share, I delete, I add. I’m compulsive and want to impress my new lover, who is Delicious. I start unlocking things one by one, spending hours, and then watch Leigh Blackall's video, Renaming Delicious Tags. I love my lover so much I decide I need to talk about him and share him with others. (Sound familiar? Lust is very powerful!) Using best practices from teaching, I know that I learn best what I teach others, so incorporate bookmarking into a cooperative teaching unit.

I eventually realize that I can network, and try that. Sadly, it seems that everyone has so many different logins and names that I can only find two friends to share these bookmarks. Not everyone hears about my new lover. I learn to send bookmarks to my students' Delicious account. Eventually I totally overwhelm my browser page with toolbars and sidebars.

I have seen tag clouds before and lose several days trying add a cloud of my many new bookmarks onto my blog. I want to have a widget, put it in the side, so it doesn't disappear further and further down the page. I look through blogger, I look at colleagues web pages, and finally I settle on a post. I loose many hours working on this. Low and behold, I have 100 tags showing and I learn to edit the html code (Paul, you would be proud of me!) to show the top 50.

I did explored similar platforms but my first encounter was with Delicious, and just like in love, I looked around to see what the choices were. Perhaps unfortunately, I am monogamous and although I discovered that Diigo had more bells and whistles (sticky notes, highlighting, full page saving rather than just the url,) I’m a loyal kinda gal and stuck to my first love. I’ve found that I prefer the simpler kind of option in life. I just don’t have the time or interest to play around with two guys at once, although I did do the looking. I know that two can be just as exciting as one in this world, but I just can't do it. (Just looking can’t be all bad with love, right?)

Falling in Love with the Familiar: Discussion of Social Bookmarking in Terms of My Own Personal Learning

Every love has connections to what has been in your past. In the early 1980’s, I was an educational risk-taker, automating my school library. Eventually, I travelled and helped others learn to do likewise. Mainly a self trained A-Type kind of person, I struggled with Sears versus actual library needs. My grassroots training knew I could not deviate from SEARS List, my card typing-cross referencing anal retentive personality knew this, but I confess that, given the search capability of an online system, I added subject headings that fit our schools need (aka local tags). This was my deepest secret which I finally share, like an addict who eventually confesses. More than that, I shared this strategy as an automation consultant (often saying, “Don’t tell anyone I said this but you actually CAN add subject headings (tags) where you want.”) No one will catch you, no one will fire you, everyone will thank you that YOU CAN finally find the prescribed resources for your curriculum in your library.)

I believe that Folksomony is an idea that has its roots in the thinking that emerged in the 1980’s when many of us saw the need to understand ourselves socially and collectively rather than as a set of rules. I was not the only person who questioned the dynamics of systems that limited connective language in libraries (Sears) and the emerging learning world. Glimpsing into our future, we will see so many cross-relationships between programs and language and searching that our entire world of knowledge will open up for using ways we cannot imagine.

I only began my lusty relationship with bookmarks when I saw a connection to my own life and confusion (my favourites buttons). I imagine that finding that personal connection is what opened the doors for me; this will be critical to remember when I share this with teachers who see no connections yet with their world.

Without a doubt, there are challenges with tagging and folksomony. One of the problems is the lack of standardization, a problem I quickly noticed with my own tags. It suggests a need to, at least as a professional, recognize and utilize some standard headings. I struggled with whether I should use “Social_Studies” or “socialstudies” or "social studies" as I created tags for students to follow. To make them accessible in my own site is possible and attainable, to make them available to others in my network and the world creates problem in consistency .

EveryJoe talks about The Several Habits of Wildly Successful Delicious Users.

1. Make Marks (Done, and must continue)

2. Tag (Done, need 'cleaning and continuation)

3. Use Inbox (Tried and will continue)

4. Mix and Match (Done, a bit of Boolean searching)

5. Stalk (Got to get to this one)

6. Let it Go (RSS Feed) Tag Cloud but can do more)

7. Move it Around (Got to get to this one)

8. Explore More. (The love continues)

Learning about Social Bookmarking at first overwhelmed me and I still feel that like any love, there is more still to learn than I know now. As well, it will be constantly changing. Somehow, stickys have started to appear on my Delicious account, when I believed they were only available on Diigo! I will have to commit to this relationship and keep building from the strong basis I'm developing. That's how love works. You can never be complacent!

Sharing the love: Discussion of Social Bookmarking in Terms of Teaching and Learning

When we make connections with our lives, our world and with media, ideas grow. I find my teaching style leads me to share things that excite me. Division two students know little about the Read / Write Web, often having limited and controlled access to the web, often without an email address. Things I am learning are foreign to them and yet they will be the users and builders of these social communities. I find sharing my learning with them excites them about the possibilities of the Internet beyond the game playing / word processing world they know. Teaching them the skills that I am learning is a double-edged sword: I get to try out and therefore stand a chance of remembering a skill, and they learn something powerful and new and productive. They are engaged.

My new cooperative unit with a grade 4/5 Social class on Canadian Stories from our Past was the perfect opportunity to share my love of bookmarking. It quickly changed its introductory focus to a social bookmarking theme. Room_fifteen is our newest social bookmarking Delicious member. We made mistakes, and explored the tool together. Prior to researching, students were required to open Delicious and add their bookmarks. The shared class login seems to be working; students add their websites, tag it with topic relevant tags, and add their names so the teacher and I can check where they are going and the resources they are using. Classmates can see what other tags have been created. My lust / new love is shared with 29 students and a teacher. The teacher is a-gogged with learning a new way of sharing and emails the principal with how much SHE is learning.. Eventually, I add bookmarks myself in my Delicious account and send these to the room_fifteen account. Lust deepens. Next lesson, they will build the tags and bookmarks and see that they have mail in their inbox!

Teachers are often lost. If I am feeling like this is new, and I am the ‘tech expert’, how do teachers feel? Think Like a Teacher, addresses this, comparing her inability to see in 3-d and feeling left out to how learning disabled students feel when we talk about ideas they cannot fathom, to teachers who feel left behind in a technological age. You can't be my teacher addresses rather precociously how students feel being left behind in a digital age. The balance between where the students exist and where most teachers exists is a conundrum we must address in education, both through technological upgrading (financial resources) and through professional development (both human and financial resources).

My school is involved in a large project to provide ongoing, intensive professional development to teachers to address this gap in age and ability however it often has provided moments of unequivocal stress to our teachers rather than strategies to move foreword. It is a bit like when a new lover takes over your life so completely that you need do back off and say no, I am me and I am not ready to make you my everything, my total life. Make me meet you in small steps, make me learn to love you piece by piece. I can’t give you everything… if not I am gone. We need to find the connections that will build theri desire to move forward, not retreat.

Teaching Today suggests that there are three powerful reasons to use bookmarking in the classroom, including classroom management, (ease of sharing and changing computers to retrieve information) collaboration (sharing bookmarks) and news (catheterizing news feeds so that important current events can retrieved easily). The potential to use librarything.com to build an online catalog is so very exciting that it sends love shivers up my spine! I know that the power it would have for students is incredible.

Despite the challenges, the accessibility / retrievablility of information and the shared communities and networks that are created outweigh the challenges in my opinion. Social bookmarking allows us to read and connect with others with what others read as well (Richardson 2009) and builds our access to information and our PLN. We can find others who have bookmarked the same sites, you can find who has bookmarked your site, you can retrieve materials with the same tags and locate others who have similar interests and ideas. The potential to work collaboratively in your school or further educational community and share resources is limitless. As an aggregator of ideas, social bookmarking tools are unparalleled.

I am in the nether lands of moving from lust to love. Don’t misinterpret my feelings, I am one of those who grasp hold of the potential and strive to make it my own true being. I save lust for the important and I believe social bookmarking deserves a brilliantly strong place in this emotional stratosphere. There is so much to learn and discover. I feel I have dived into a world that was invisible in my past, an idea that had no real form. Ahead of me there is a wealth to learn, and a whole new way of interacting with information. I love the medium as it is safe and it is growth orientated and I can use it to build my connections and links with the world. Besides allowing my students to share bookmarks on research topics, we can subscribe to RSS feeds and receive updates. I can build professional networking. The potential to collaborate with other schools particularly in our Technology Without Borders Project, is exciting. I have no fear of sharing this with my students, I believe this relationship is a safe learning haven for them, too!

Untagged Resources Used

Blackall, L. (Producer) (Retrieved from the World Wide Web: 2010, February 5). Renaming Del.icio.us tags. Podcast retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7amUaTv-S_U

Davies, J. & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social participation. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

Darrow, Rob. California Dreamin’ (Retrieved from the World Wide Web: 2010, February 5) http://www.icyte.com/saved/robdarrow.wordpress.com/87245%202019

DeGroot, Joanne. Social Bookmarking Trailfires.

McNeely, Ben. Using Technology as a learning tool, Not Just a Cool New thing (2010, February 13)http://www.educause.edu/Resources/EducatingtheNetGeneration/UsingTechnologyasaLearningTool/6060

Put a Delicious Tag in Blog (Retreived from the World Wide Web: 2010, February 3) http://tips.blogdoctor.me/2009/04/put-delicious-tag-cloud-in-blog.html

Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Nancy's Delicious Tags

2010-02-07T21:22:00.000-08:00

TagCrowd - make your own tag cloud from any text

2010-02-07T16:17:00.000-08:00

TagCrowd - make your own tag cloud from any text

Listen to the voice of a digital native

2010-02-04T09:56:00.000-08:00

Creativity in Education - TED

2010-02-02T23:32:00.000-08:00

Anything from TED is worthy of my time but this has struck me as an impartant message to teachers everywhere.

I Need My Teachers to Learn

2010-02-02T22:19:00.000-08:00

A WONDERFUL catchy song about changing how we think about teaching.

10 Reasons to Use YouTube Videos in the Classroom

2010-02-01T15:40:00.000-08:00

Video Sharing in a Changing World

2010-01-31T22:16:00.000-08:00

Except for the names and a few other changes… the story’s the same one! Reflections on the Process of Learning about Video Sharing

Change is difficult. A fact all of us know, but it is inevitable. When it comes to technology, in schools, change can be staggeringly slow. Cost, shifting philosophies, time and tradition stand in its way. The use of over 50 user-generated video sharing sites (Wikipedia, 2009) has had some affect upon teaching, used as a distributed learning tool, but negligibly as a shared learning tool.

Neil Diamond hit the nail on the head with this song, at least with this line which always sticks in my head from “I am… I said”.

Every step in our journey with technology is about change and it is moving exponentially faster.

1953: I’m born, to be the middle child in a middle class neighbourhood.

1959: I watch my first television show… Ed Sullivan

1970: I learn to program a computer using punch cards. I learn to love Neil Diamond.

1984: I own my first computer, an Apple

1987: I am teacher librarian in a school with a computer lab!

1987: I own my first colour TV

1993: I’m an elected trustee in a major school district in Alberta. I have been using my own PC for ten years for writing articles and a novel (unpublished, I confess). I’m in the wealthiest school district in Alberta, and I am a constant advocate for email for all staff and trustees. I am using personal email to my limited contacts, but cannot communicate with my colleagues. My beautiful daughter, Emily is born. The chairperson of the board at the time introduces me at a function as “the only person who would go so far to promote email by naming her newborn the next closest word to email, Emily.”

1996: My advocacy finally works. The argument for years was the inappropriate sharing, the ‘fact’ that email would have no educational value, the item spent off-task… this sounds just like YouTube today. Children should not view videos unless they are filtered by the teacher.

2007: I use YouTube and other video sharing sites to find interesting videos.

2009: I learn to download videos for educational and personal uses.

2010: YouTube is blocked in my school district, as it is in many Alberta districts. There are considerations about inappropriate content. Students can not choose Google Videos. They may come upon something that would be inappropriate. We choose to block it rather than teach appropriate usage. I am still in a school with one computer lab. I learn that YouTube can be joined, that it has communities, that it is empowering as a teacher, that it is participatory. I learn to embed a video in a blog.

My personal computer use has been very business oriented (lessons, spreadsheets, income tax, some web work, and Facebook.) I have never made a movie before this week. I had taken a few clips on my camera that are saved but never shared.

I surprise myself that I have ‘believed’ that the ultimate use of YouTube is to view clips, most of which are personal videos. Don’t get me wrong, I have spent many an evening trolling and enjoying videos. I’ve found many that I’ve been able to download and share with my students as educational tools. (a skill most of the teachers on my site do not share) I’ve visited the site hundreds of times, but did I ever notice that I could ‘sign up’? Perhaps, but if it did, it meant nothing in terms of practical or educational utilization. I didn’t own a video camera and didn’t want to post baby films.

Throughout the 90’s I chaired the Central Alberta Media Services (CAMS) which distributed film and videos to member school districts. We talked about Video Streaming and the opportunities that lay if we could move in that direction. Still, my mindset was about receiving information, not in the sharing of information. I consider myself somewhat tech-savvy so this week of learning about video sharing was a huge wake up. I had bought into the district line, at least passively.

I’m a hands-on kind of gal. I remember and learn from what I do. I’m also a single mom – owner of a puppy – community involved busy twenty-first century teacher and teacher librarian. During the week, I did not have time to read the texts, but I looked at my skill set and realized that I had never made a video. Here was my jump-in moment. I was in charge of the assembly on Friday and needed to share the learning that was happening in the classroom. What better opportunity did I have to figure out, create and share a video? My plan cemented in stone when my principal suggested that, given the time frame, it was not possible. I set about a new learning curve.

As usual, I put the cart before the horse. In the process of learning how to create a video and to cut and edit (admittedly simple once you learn to use MovieMaker), I still did not understand the power of the medium. Embedding it with voice clips into Glogster added further challenges. Finding a way to be online in our gym was a major challenge. The result, though, was a six minute video that demonstrated the power of literature circles to a school that had never used them. The response from teachers and students alike was uplifting, because they saw Literature Circles i in action with the children they knew in a situation that was familiar and therefore possible for them.

To view the Glog and embedded video I created about literature circles, visit my Glogster site.

http://mrscavanaugh.edu.glogster.com/glog-707/
http://mrscavanaugh.edu.glogster.com/glog-568/

Stage two, of course, has been reading the literature including the texts and the trailfires. Should I have read them all before I created? YES!!! I knew that to start with, but found that I couldn’t manage the evening time during the work week. I knew the creation process of video making was crucial. Reflectively, I would have read Davies and Merchant first. I would have read about the disruptive affect of YouTube (Richardson, 2009) before. I would have had the students holding the camera and editing and producing the video as a richer learning opportunity. I would have read YouTube4You (Proquest, 2009) as a lengthy but clear 'how to' for YouTube' before I even began. I will have my students create a video of their own literature circles in the next two weeks, selecting and cutting and pasting the comments that they are most excited about. If I had been able to spread this project out over time, it would have been a different video. Nevertheless, I cannot teach students until I have figured out the process, so the learning and process was valuable if not where I would like to take it.

If I had read Richardson first, I would have bought an external microphone. I would have created the storyboard first rather than as an editing process. I would have put more planning into place.

Thank the Lord for the Night Time…
Discussion of Video Sharing in Terms of My Own Personal Learning

It is only after the kids are in bed, my personal daily obligations are fulfilled, that I can take the time to reflect on where this tool takes me personally and professionally. An insomniac, I can and will stay up as late as I need to in order to work through a problem, however I will pay for it the next few days.

As a multi faceted learner, I am thrilled with the opportunity to learn using videos. I find the medium more engaging than reading, as I can see, hear and write at the same time and it helps me retain the information presented. Due to a short term memory deficit, I look for any tools that will help me retain information. In a classroom setting, particularly if using Smart Boards with a Smart Video Player, this seeing / hearing /writing can also be joined with quick slide reviews of the videos combined with classroom discussion, adding a further depth of learning strategies to meet the diverse needs of the classroom. Further, if we take the learning one step further, and have students then create videos (thereby teaching a skill) we create powerful learning opportunities for our students. When information is presented to me in varied formats, I learn better. When I read text, I retain little. I imagine I am no different from most of the students we teach.

I am an involved person at a provincial political level. There is no doubt that future elections in Alberta will be highly influenced by the videos that are created in online video sharing spaces. No longer are the communications controlled solely by the traditional media, but by the use of social networks. The first negative as have appeared just last week against the Alberta Liberal Leader in Facebook. They appeared like a Progressive Conservative ad, but were disclaimed by that party. Now the video has been removed. Immediate clips of valuable information and political messaging can be immediately accessed by a broad range of constituents for little cost. As a secretary of a provincial party, it will be incumbent for me to advocate that our methods of communication need to make YouTube a central part of our future campaigns. I will be sharing Politiking online : The transformation of election campaign communications (Panagopoulus, 2009) with our communications staff.

There are huge risks in video sharing as every parent knows. Paul, my eldest, was 17 when he was hired to build the email database for the school district. He was computer literate from the time he could touch a computer, and now as a computer engineer and software designer, he knows more about how to use the computer than I can ever hope. Emily had her first and secret web site using NeoPets at nine and was already receiving inappropriate emails. Is the answer to keep our children off of the computer? Is the answer just to give up and not protect our children? I believe that the best solution is somewhere in between. As a parent, I monitor my monitor children’s use of the internet. We have had many discussions about appropriate use of sites like YouTube. Its community control emphasis (Davies and Merchant, 2009) can lead to some inapporpriate materials. It is my responsibility to teach them or else the utilization will just go underground. It has made for active and interesting discussions about trust and created some challenging moments in our relationships. It has paid off with an intelligent, well versed teenager who uses social websites for positive reasons and rejects inappropriate content accordingly. Way to go, Emily.

Heading for the Future : Discussion of Video Sharing in Terms of Teaching and Learning

As a professional, in my role as Teacher Librarian and as a Curriculum Coordinator, I have realized just how important it is that we respect and collect forms from students in September to give freedom to share videos and pictures. My school chose not to distribute FOIP forms (Freedom of Information Protection of Privacy) unless it was needed. I now have no ability to share resources, even without names school information, unless I poll every parent and get unanimous agreement. Even more important, for future years will be my role in assuring parents of the value of video and photo sharing as an educational tool. As with email in the past, video sharing is an invaluable tool for communication, self reflection, and communication, understanding the world, our own identity, people and the future of our society.

Challenges:

It is without doubt that some parents will not release permissions, but knowing our restrictions and parameters ahead of time will facilitate student created video sharing. The use and misuse of the media is something that could and should be addressed in a parent seminar. Care will always have to be exercised in how we share personal information and respect the privacy of our vulnerable students. That, however, is a challenge that is possible to overcome with teacher / parent literacy and respect.

Permission is just the start, and the challenges and rewards of using video sharing in the classroom are manifold. The two greatest obstables are ones that can be overcome with the right resources, both fiscal and human.

Without appropriate tools, it is extremely difficult for a teacher to imagine creating and sharing videos. When there is only one school camera, when the classroom has only one lab fully booked and no classroom technology that supports connectivity with the students, the teacher feels overwhelmed with technical obstacles. With old, slow computers without headphones, without microphones and with a 30 minute time block in the lab, there is limited opportunity to introduce a keyboard, much less how to use a camera and to work through developing a video and uploading it to a site. Once cloud computing becomes fuller and capable of a larger range of tasks, perhaps then schools will find using netbooks and wireless labs financially accessible. Perhaps when we as educators worry less about locking one school camera up because it is equal in value to 3 textbooks, we will buy Flip Videos and Cameras and makes them accessible.

The greatest obstacle is teacher literacy. We are caught in our ways of learning from the past and the styles of teaching from our teaching history. The first video we create will take time and effort after a long and draining day of being on top in the classroom. The first video we upload will take a ‘seismic shift’ in how we think about learning. The first videos that students upload will be the beginning of the future of a new generation of learning.

The solution is to bring education forward through professional development and opportunity to experience the possibilities in video sharing (as well as other new technologies that move the web from an information provider to an information sharing tool). My role, as a teacher librarian and curriculum coordinator (and classroom core teacher) is to model these technologies and support the growth of teachers in experimenting and developing their skills. At a school level, I am encouraged to do this, and all teachers are encouraged to participate, as we share a Technology Without Borders Project through out year. This professional development program combined on site small group self directed pd with multi school grade level sessions. At my school, this has been a gift and a stress, as there never seems to be enough time, personally or in the lab, or enough resources (cameras, computers, connectivity) to act on suggested ideas. My time is limited to assist to less than half time, but that has been the stronger impetus for the staff as they can learn along with me in a cooperative collaborative teaching project. As well, I am learning along with them, so we are all on an upward curve. Video creation and sharing is a totally new concept that will be very interesting to begin as a project with the teachers given our restraints.

Opportunities

The great opportunity that is easily surmounted by students and staff is the accessing of videos online that have been shared by others. TeacherTube is accessible to everyone, and teachers now have the ability to override the YouTube blocks and so, when the technology exists in the classroom, can share video learning with students. As well, there are thousands of streaming videos accessible to student and teacher alike on United Streaming (Discovery Education) and videos specifically geared to curriculum on the Online Reference Centre supported by Alberta Education. Teachers have little time to discover these tools, but they are easily shared and need to be referenced at staff meetings and in mini tutorials to both students and teachers and parents. (Note to self… set these up!) We need to go beyond the worksheet textbook lecture read/write way of teaching and move students to be able to critically view and understand the power of the visual.

A bit more problematic but a fabulous opportunity will be to use classroom videos. The opportunity to create mini lessons on video and post them on sites like YouTube or Teacher Tube of classroom blogs provide opportunity for students to reinforce their learning or to provide a preset prior to the lessons. It is there for review or for initial learning and is created to fit a teaching style and curriculum uniquely yours. Similarly, the many libraires that have used video sharing to post informative and engaging videos to promote the use of their libraries suggest to me that I should try this and pot in on my school library web site.

The greatest opportunity will be when students can create their own videos and share them, and as well reflect and discuss their learning and their classmates learning. With closed classroom blogs, this will certainly be attainable. The students can become engaged in higher level learning skills and be working in an environment that clearly engages them, including skills and strategies that will inevitable be part of their future. When they create for a public eye (even if it is as limited as their classmates, teachers and parents) and when they are using Video that requires them to analyze what they are communicating not just though word but through visual media, they will be more engaged and more inclined to critique their own production. In school, I remember the Shakespeare I acted in, not the Shakespeare I read. What is a more powerful experience if a child also gets to see and reflect and understand themselves more fully through self viewing from a shared video file, can think about how to change, can listen to others and make informed decsions? We are, in our classrooms, creating the broadcasters of tomorrow (Davies and Merchant, 2009) and we need to use the tools to empower them.

The global connections that YouTube has built transcend space and time (Wesch, ) and allow a greater of linking of people. He argues that the web moves us from connecting through roadways and televisions (place to place) to connection of people to people, increasing our connectivity, mediating human relationships. The anthropology of YouTube was a particularly engaging video link that has led me to new, insightful understandings of the importance of our developing students' and personal slills in using video sharing.

When a picture painted a thousand words, the world opened....

2010-01-24T20:34:00.000-08:00

Reflections on the Process of Learning about Photo Sharing

Early man painted the hunt on cave walls, history was shared with oral tradition. Our lives were defined by our stories, and if we could talk, we could share. The printing press changed literacy. If we could read, and further write, we could share. The art of the story teller drifted into the realm of artists and thespian; the written word then afforded us more precision in expression. The written word could be shared through books and magazines and tracts; the written word gave exactness and accuracy and hence overshadowed the power of the spoken word or the image of the picture. For centuries, the picture was of minor use in developing a story, particularly on the personal level. The invention of the camera certainly changed some of that. We began to catalog our own stories in albums and in boxes, but it has only been in the past decade that the picture has emerged again as a truly viable form of personal storytelling, thanks to the new ability to share our stories in picture form.

Sharing of photos felt to me like an archive, which is exactly what it is. At last, the world can see the historical and important pictures that define world history through the commons on flickr. At last we have a chance to store images that are our past, to be able to pass the story down through generations without fear of paper decomposition or loss in the mundane events of everyday life. At last we can classify and retrieve in ways we had never thought of previously. This was never an issue for my parents, who were always limited in their photo taking by the cost of development. Our stacks of photos and slides seemed ominous upon their deaths in the early 90’s, but is a tiny anthill compared to the images we now save with digital imagery on our computer hard drives. Sorting this monstrous archive will be a challenge to my survivors if I do not does some work now. Flickr provides an incredible opportunity to store our images off of our hard drives for safekeeping. This I knew before my exploration of the Web 2.0 tool; what I didn’t understand was its ability to categorize, sort, tag and retrieve in a way that builds access and builds community and educational opportunity. Web 2.0 for Schools awakened in me a interest, but it was Richardson iin Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts that provided a stronger practical foundation to take the photo plunge. As usual, the Common Craft Video was a perfect tool to highlight the ease and simplicity of the process. On a purely personal level, I have struggled with organizing prints. I have discarded albums, I have labeled the backs, I have put them in sequential photo boxes, and then the camera went digital. I have stored them in files with dates, with topics and with labels I can no longer understand. I can’t find anything. Despite the photo mess in my life, and the fact that I long ago had a Webshots account, I never connected the Photo Sharing capabilities with my own needs. Uploading a dozen pictures to Flickr this week gave me an insight into how I can now sort, categorize, manage and retrieve pictures. I learn from the reading, however it is the act of creating a Flickr presense that was the most effective teaching tool for me.

Discussion of Photo Sharing in Terms of My Own Personal Learning

I will be able to find my trip to San Francisco from this past summer and compare to summer 1981. I will be able to find collections of pictures of my first born and sort by year. My children will be able access this same group of pictures, be part of an ‘affinity group’ (Davies, Marchant, 2009) and will be able to make comments on them and make reflections on their memories, attach them to the pictures and share these across our family space. This, given the diverse geographical space we occupy across the country, is reason enough to embrace this technology with abandon. We can, with geotags, see our world in ways that were never before possible. In 2009, flickr was a word to me. It was a web site I had never explored. It was another of those things I wanted to do in my future.

The seamlessness of the transfer of a Yahoo product (flickr) to a Google product (Blogger) was very surprising; the portability of information and the breadth and potential of one’s online identity boggles my mind. I can clearly see that there will be infinite ways I will have to continue to learn about pictures and communication and connections with my world community.

Discussion of the Tool in Terms of Teaching and Learning

Twenty eight students, reading levels between grade two and grade eleven. Writing levels between grade one and grade eight. This is a typical Alberta grade six classroom. Three students are coded with special needs, several are ELL (English Language Learners). All of them have lives and stories to tell with such a diversity of skills that would challenge any teacher. There are writing disabilities I know have never been diagnosed. There are children who have physical challenges holding and managing a pencil. All of them have stories and lives to share; many are frustrated with their inabilities to express themselves. How do we tell our stories? How can I look at Marie who has level 2 English but appears brilliant and dedicated to learning, to Avery who talks a blue streak but can’t spell or write a complete sentence, to Katie, who has her hand up all the time but can’t seem to get the words out? Stories began with images and words.

Welcome to the world of Web 2.0. Techniques, skills, tools, abound and can help the learners at all their levels become storytellers. Those who struggle with concrete written structures can use an abundance of pictures to tell their story. Those who can write can enhance and have choices in presentation. Those who are researchers and historians can find primary sources in images to support their thesis. The world has changed and it can and will have a huge impact on those 28 grade 6 children if we can make this world theirs. I was in grade 6 forty six years ago. My world was closed: my classmates, my family, the few streets I travelled on my bicycle, the skating rink on the next street. Television was limited; the world was a safe haven.My 28 grade 6 students are in a world so different from mine that, if I had moved instantaneously from one place to the next, culture shock would have been severe. Jessica is on Facebook every night and sending messages to over 300 friends. She shares pictures and videos, not all of which are appropriate, hourly if not more frequently. Everyone knows her favourite song, her favorite band, her most recent crush. Those who have never her met her in person will know her at the mall… her profile picture changes as regularly as her preference in boys, probably more so. Her web cam records pictures and her iPhone keeps her up-to-date no matter where she is. Selena, on the other hand, has a limited number of social networking friends. Her parents monitor everything she does. She posts pictures and makes some comments. Joshua has no access to a computer. His parent’s camera uses film and he has not got his own computer. He can’t post his Facebook profile at school with an image so he has no online identity. When asked, he shrugs. “That’s for geeks and nerds, I don’t care.” Sadly, Joshua is also one those students who struggles to write and express a story. He is discouraged when the class has access to the computer lab and he has not got the computer literacy skills to flow freely through the assignments. Can’t sign in on some of the sites because he has no email address, and his school does not provide them. He finds it a bit awkward to navigate the web because he has no opportunity to develop these skills. He certainly has no picture of himself to post!

Our world of students is so very diverse in terms of their technical savvy and it is a challenge for me as an educators to meet an increasingly broad gap in skills and competencies. My own competencies are struggling to keep up with the opportunities for education on the web. As a Teacher-Librarians, I have a mandate to provide tools for learning but the world is changing faster than we are and some students like Jessica have technical skills, some students like Joshua are handicapped by their environments, and most are pretty much figuring things out piece meal as we are.

With the advent of EDES 501, I knew I had to take advantage of these new technologies, and designed a cooperative teaching project with a grade 4/5 combined class that explored regions (Alberta and Canada) through photo websites. The students used flickr and other tools that tagged to flickr (GalaxyTag) to find appropriate photographs of their region to reflect the online and print research they had done in the first weeks of January. Using the photo production tool of Photo Story 3, the students put together their stories of regions. Tag Galaxy was my first real opportunity to comprehend the power of Tags, and it was only though the research for this course that I saw the connection and the development that this facility enables. Children were empowered to tell stories using pictures as a powerful story telling device based on extensive research. Not only did they engage in research in an unprecedented way, the compilation of pictures and comments were made using higher level thinking skills and critical observation with an engagement in learning that regions projects had not shown previously. Still, I was not cognizant of the power of the tags within flickr. Because of the video savvy of our young people, (here I am referring to the use of moving images such as on television and Web) and the still - visual savvy of the previous generation (here I am referring to the strategies of looking at the written word and looking at pictures provided through text and other non fluid materials) we as educators need to rethink our own history and roles as literacy educators. Just like the printing press changed literacy, so does the web change literacy not just around written words but around the published image? Perhaps, given technology, we are finally able to move back toward literacies that do not just rely on reading print material. As a professional in a school library, this brings forth incredible challenges. Do our collection acquisition practices reflect the need to teach new literacies? Does our teaching of new literacies reflect the need for digital storytelling and photo sharing of knowledge? Does our technology in our schools even begin to keep up with our need to stay current in our world? How do we convince an increasingly financially stringent system that literacy is a developing and evolutionary process that needs to be supported, first and foremost, by our school system in light of an increasingly divergent level of access at home? Given the stratification of society with technology, are we not increasingly responsible to level the playing field?

“The bottom line is that all these advances in media technologies are making it even easier for young people to spend more and more time with media. It’s more important than ever that researchers, policymakers and parents stay on top of the impact it’s having on their lives” (http://weblogg-ed.com/2010/no-choice/ Richardson)

In developing a project based on photo images, it was inherent on myself and the classroom teacher to provide a format that best met the needs of our project and students. Skills involved in any of the platforms were similar. We compared Photo Story 3, (a free downloadable software that is hosted on your computer), Animoto (a web based application that would be accessible from home and school but required logins for the students) and Windows Media Player, hosted on the school computers. We chose Photo Story 3 as it easily accessed shared photos (flickr) and did not require email addresses, but allowed an ability to create a digital story easily shared among students and a genuine learning experience that focused on skills and content.

I am still a neophyte when it comes to using digital photos online, and sites such as flickr and Webshots. Doors have creaked open. I am struggling to embed comments and geotags and will continue to work on that. I can see opportunities to differentiate learning, to present materials in diverse and interesting ways, to find images and ideas beyond the range of my classroom and school and thereby open an entire new world to my students. I can visualize a world where students are equalized in many ways by their access to photos and to the web. When we overcome the challenges of hardware in classrooms and schools, we will create an equal playing field for students. All of our Maries, our Averys and our Katies will find opportunity to express themselves in ways we have never dreamed possible. Our minds, as educators, will be opened to the minds of these students who have been for too long limited by the power of the written word when the accessible picture was their entrance to their world.

21 Things for 21st Century Teens: What Would You Include?

2010-01-17T21:19:00.000-08:00

21 Things for 21st Century Teens: What Would You Include?

The Adventure Begins....

2010-01-17T15:32:00.000-08:00

.... at warp speed! I feel lucky to have already been familiar with Facebook as a Social Media platform but I am now tweeting and blogging and working on nings. Who had heard of a Ning before this year?

I'm diving head first into university, after a long hiatus, into this brilliantly engaging world of Web 2.0. I've always been a bit of a techno-lover but somewhere in the past few years I see I've been like an ostrich with my head in the ground. As far as educational uses for the web, I've been naive and dismally narrow as the cyber world has blasted off. What makes this course exciting for me is how practical the learning is, for my own use and directly for the students in my school. The opportunity to grow with other colleagues and to work collaboratively is unique, given that Teacher Librarians exist independently in schools but model and strive for continual professional collaboration.

Two years ago, with the initial help of my son, I set up a web page for another adventure. Paul, bless his heart, thought I should have a blog, but that so confused my mindset that I rejected the idea. Two years later, I wish he'd been more persuasive. Using Dreamweaver and keeping abreast of the web site was a challenge!

This fall, I started a blog for my school library on Wordpress, (as this was the platform Paul had originally led me to). I initially had some difficulties with it; eventually resolved. Then I started another blog on Weebly this week. Wow, I will be familiar with three platforms! As you can see I'm using blogger now.

Weebly feels more like a bridge between website and blog. Unlike Blogger, which does not allow extra pages, and Wordpress, which allows extra pages but no commenting on them, Weebly allows one to have pages or blogs, and as many as you want. You can have a blog as a sub page of a page, several blogs, several different pages. I will continue using both Weebly and Blogger this winter to investigate how I would use them with students. Check out the link to Lynnwood Library and see how I've developed blog pages for my two book clubs and link pages as well as a very easy-to-add contact page. I like Weebly's ability to merge blogs and pages.

I'm still figuring out RSS feeds and Google Friends and how to best use Google Reader. I bought an iPhone (because I thought I could finally justify it to myself!... self gratification sure works!).

Having had a profile on the web for a while, it was VERY interesting to see how my web identity had grown. It is a bit scary how much information is out there. Thank you to a 501 classmate who pointed out the various sites to check your onlne identity. Between the 3 sites, I found out my phone, my address, old deleted pictures... I'm very glad that I have (almost) always been very careful not to post anything very stupid on the web, Facebook, etc. We need to protect our personal identities.

Thanks for listening and reading my first course blog! I'm so looking forward to sharing in the next few months.