I completed the rest of the Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts... book and was somewhat lost with RSS feeds, but found some of the information valuable.
Since I am a novice to podcasting, I appreciated the reading on that area of technology and hope to use it eventually. As a matter of fact, I vaguely remember reading that podcasts were the technology of the next semester classes... so I may be required to make one! (I hope so)
For our group meeting to make decisions about our project for my EDC 665 class, Todd, Jessica, Rita, and myself decided to use Skype voice chat. With voice Skype, Todd said he has a software that allows him to record the conversation for later review. In essence, this is a podcast. In the book, it mentions downloadable software called www.powergramo.com. I am considering this software because I already have Skype.
Audacity is another piece of software to use. I also learned a bit about flickr and how to annotate a photo as a learning experience for students. I would like to learn more about screencasting, of which the book also covers, but I feel like I have to get podcasting down before I use podcasting with video.
I am impressed with the number of teenage kids who are masters at podcasting and all things digital. Although podcasting does not tie into my ARP, I would love to learn the trade and be able to teach future students or understand their love for the technology.
Maybe I should start by buying an MP3 player.
Showing posts with label wikis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wikis. Show all posts
Monday, February 18, 2008
Saturday, February 16, 2008
EDC 665 -- Book of Choice -- update #1
I am currently 2/3 done with my book of choice for Melissa's class. The book is by Will Richardson and is titled Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and Other Powerful Webtools for Classrooms. Jessica and I selected the same book because our backgrounds and ARP's are similar.
At first, I read reviews about the book and was a bit apprehensive because a couple people commented that the information provided was "nothing innovative" and information they already knew how to do. Well, given that I am relatively new to using these tools (although I know a bit about each one), I really was looking for ways to incorporate what I, an adult, use at home with my students (fourth graders) in the classroom.
The first 50 pages or so are devoted to Will's accounts of blogs. He speaks in great lengths about ideas for blog use within the classroom and hits on the richness of using blogs to teach writing (of which I had a bit of an "aha" moment given that I love writing and have a background in that, as does the author. I wasn't too impressed with the blog information, but appreciated the links to other popular education blog sites. I was also not as impressed with the blog section because I recently did my own online research on blogs for my ARP and just learned all of the first 50 pages from reading other people's blogs to learn how to create my own. I then set up a blog and added my entire class of 31 kids to it at learnerblogs.org. If I had read the book a week prior, I would have had more to highlight.
I then learned quite a bit about wikis. I understand the use and all, but really appreciated the real-life accounts from actual educators who use wikis for group projects with kids, etc. I did feel a bit outcasted given the majority of examples are from the high school perspective. I learned a couple cool things about wikipedia and how they have wikirecipes and wikitravel ---of which I love both ideas. The wikirecipes is for people to share their favorites. Wikitravel is used to update on best travel deals.
Back to education... I leared about PBwiki of which I've only heard Margaret mention a few times in class. I might play around with one and set one up during the third phase of my ARP.
Finally, I ended today's reading with learning about RSS feeds. This is something I have struggled with, but also don't know how applicable the feed is for my students as we use the blog site. Given their age (9-11) and their conservative parents, I selected an education blog site that allows me to add only the kids I want and it is password protected. I think for now, that is all I am comfortable with. It didn't require any RSS feeds but just me using my blog to add users.
The final, really cool thing I learned was about RSS feeding of information I would like. For example, I could subscribe to all the RSS feeds out there about "global warming California"...etc. I could also subscribe to feeds from my favorite news sources so I no longer have to go to my favorites and run down the list everyday.
I am looking forward to learning about podcasting (if there is anything new to learn). Fun fact: Alan November was mentioned under good blogs sites. We just met him at FETC. It's cool to place the education connection.
At first, I read reviews about the book and was a bit apprehensive because a couple people commented that the information provided was "nothing innovative" and information they already knew how to do. Well, given that I am relatively new to using these tools (although I know a bit about each one), I really was looking for ways to incorporate what I, an adult, use at home with my students (fourth graders) in the classroom.
The first 50 pages or so are devoted to Will's accounts of blogs. He speaks in great lengths about ideas for blog use within the classroom and hits on the richness of using blogs to teach writing (of which I had a bit of an "aha" moment given that I love writing and have a background in that, as does the author. I wasn't too impressed with the blog information, but appreciated the links to other popular education blog sites. I was also not as impressed with the blog section because I recently did my own online research on blogs for my ARP and just learned all of the first 50 pages from reading other people's blogs to learn how to create my own. I then set up a blog and added my entire class of 31 kids to it at learnerblogs.org. If I had read the book a week prior, I would have had more to highlight.
I then learned quite a bit about wikis. I understand the use and all, but really appreciated the real-life accounts from actual educators who use wikis for group projects with kids, etc. I did feel a bit outcasted given the majority of examples are from the high school perspective. I learned a couple cool things about wikipedia and how they have wikirecipes and wikitravel ---of which I love both ideas. The wikirecipes is for people to share their favorites. Wikitravel is used to update on best travel deals.
Back to education... I leared about PBwiki of which I've only heard Margaret mention a few times in class. I might play around with one and set one up during the third phase of my ARP.
Finally, I ended today's reading with learning about RSS feeds. This is something I have struggled with, but also don't know how applicable the feed is for my students as we use the blog site. Given their age (9-11) and their conservative parents, I selected an education blog site that allows me to add only the kids I want and it is password protected. I think for now, that is all I am comfortable with. It didn't require any RSS feeds but just me using my blog to add users.
The final, really cool thing I learned was about RSS feeding of information I would like. For example, I could subscribe to all the RSS feeds out there about "global warming California"...etc. I could also subscribe to feeds from my favorite news sources so I no longer have to go to my favorites and run down the list everyday.
I am looking forward to learning about podcasting (if there is anything new to learn). Fun fact: Alan November was mentioned under good blogs sites. We just met him at FETC. It's cool to place the education connection.
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