Empowering Practice - Will Richardson's Session

A couple of minutes to go before Will Richardson's session starts. Will set up a wiki several weeks ago for the session at http://empoweringpractice.wikispaces.com with the agenda. The session hasn't even started and he's already sharing a great site Joyce Valenza posted: http://voicethread.com/ - easy, easy FREE site for uploading an instant narrated digital story.

The session is an overview of Web 2.0 "transformative" tools: blogs, wikis, RSS feeds, andsocial bookmarking. These technologies have introduced "hugely disruptive times in education." Learning the tool is only a piece of it. The key is learning how to create our own personal learning environments. Our students need to know how to do this, given the Dept. of Ed's prediction that the future holds many job changes.

We're starting with WikiSpaces.com to take a first-hand look at this collaborative tool. Whereas blogs are about conversation, wikis are about collections (e.g., building a media textbook as a classroom project). Oops...tech problems here at the Georgia World Congress Center. Wikispaces has slowed to a crawl. We're moving onto to RSS.

RSS feeds bring blogging updates to the reader. We're looking at Google Reader right now. Blog readers can almost become a "daily curriculum." (I've been using Bloglines, but I like the interface of Google Reader, but don't like the fact that when you insert a blog topic, the list that appears on the right-hand column gives only sites' RSS URL, not the actual blog URL. So that's a few more steps to decide whether to subscribe or not.)

Will is making a strong case for the need to learn organizational "folksonomies" where we decide the organizational setup. If there is a website you like, but don't know if there's a RSS feed, just input the URL to the Add Subscription window. Or as a Google search, put topic +RSS to find the feed. You can also narrow your searches by using Google News or use the advanced search in Google to limit to a single source such as CNN - great for tracking just one news topic, e.g., Darfur. Right click on RSS feed icon to bring up the unique address of a feed. What's key is giving our students tools for finding disparate sources from disparate geographies and multiple views. If it's opinion you're looking for, go with Google's Blogsearch. "Shared items" feature is handy if you have many following your writing. Hint: TinyURL.com is great source for shortening addresses. Book read recommendation: Everything Is Miscellaneous by David Weinberger.

The biggie for organizing blogosphere "stuff" is using tags. Moving on to delicious.com, bookmarking for the blogosphere. The tagging feature is important for being able to find a site again. It's also important to think about what others would be looking for. There's also the opportunity to save a tag in a unique way, e.g., engPer1. To have Will Richardson, for example, researching sites about blogging, for instance, just go to Will's delicious account and add /blogging - http://del.icio.us/willrich/blogging. Copy the URL and subscribe to Will's research threads. Besides subscribing to other bloggers' delicious accounts, you can also forward sites to colleagues' accounts. You can use the same steps to get specific RSS feeds on YouTube and Flickr.

Will is also using Pageflakes, which I started exploring in Dave Warlick's Sunday session. Big difference between Pageflakes and Google Reader or Bloglines is that it can be shared. Lends itself nicely to an online portfolio (hope it's not blocked in school districts). Pageflakes is more transparent since it can be shared out to the public, or to selected groups. "The world is made of small pieces loosely joined."

WikiSpaces is up and running again, so we're heading back in. Note: login for the educator's commercial-free wiki is at bottom of login screen. The neat thing about WikiSpaces is that you can also upload files, and even embed video files! For cool class projects with wikis, check out Vicki Davis's project connecting a Georgia classroom to a classroom in Bengladesh = Flat Classrooms Project.

We're heading into Learnerblogs - because Edublogs is still down due to server upgrade. And we all agree - James Farmer is a hero for offering this robust, FREE tool for educators.

Read Around the Planet

I've been looking forward to this session because I'll be meeting via IVC with Janine Lim, whose Out on a Lim blog I've been reading for several months. Janine is sharing two projects she's initiated for the Berrien County Intermediate School District in Michigan.

• Mystery Quest - Middle schools project that are project based and FREE and tie into district standards and curriculum. Janine has posted resources online to go with the project. She shared some sample clips from an elementary and middle school Mystery Quest. She can bridge multi-point IVCs for conferences going beyond point-to-point. The format is generally 2.5 hours, starting with an introduction (just to test audio - which is key with this project). Students move on to the presentations, taking notes as they go. Janine sets the clock and groups head off to do the research. Forty minutes later, students return and are allowed to ask one clarifying question. Five to ten minutes to reconsider answers - then they return and share their answers.


• Read Around the Planet - Sponsored by the organization Twice, it's a celebration of Dr. Suess's birthday. (Used to be called Read Across America.) Project started locally - and has exploded! Timeline: Register in November. Before teachers can sign up in December, connectivity must be verified. Tip: Be flexible in the time slots. If you want to connect with UK, sign up for early morning times. Teachers notified in February and then it's up to them to work out details for Feb 25 - March 4 dates.


• World Language Day - Added to the mix last year. Fun way to match up with another class studying Spanish or French. Teachers can pick their level.

This was a great 30-minute session! I'm looking forward to connecting Elk Grove students with Michigan students.

Grossology - Distance "Edutainment" Is Here

I'm listening to Professor Poopsalot via videoconference. We've had an interactive tour of the digestive system and are now looking at a recipe for making "Perfect Poop Every Time." Yah, this is pretty gross, but what kid wouldn't love the chance to make and discuss poop?! The series is based on the book by Sylvia Branzei and is produced by the folks at GrossologyLIVE.com. "Live interactive video experiences" is how they describe the series.

This 4-part series is sponsored by NSF and in partnership with Purdue University, but is currently available only from several hospital sites. Their goal is to move into the classroom. I'm heading up to the front of the conference room to put my name on their waiting list for pilot classrooms!

PhotoStory: Documenting Historical Perspectives through Multimedia

Just joined Kathy Dorr for her PhotoStory workshop. Love these FREE Microsoft downloads! Kathy is starting with 4 essential questions:

1. How can the use of technology foster a deeper understanding of history for our students?
2. Why are differing perspectives necessary to understand historical events?
3. How can use of technology foster creativity?
4. To what extent does technology use provide an effective learning environment for diverse students?

Kathy is using a WebQuest assignment she designed called History and Its Impact on Me to pull everyone into working with documents as we learn PhotoStory. She has provided a comprehensive packet (not sure if it's online) for participants to follow, including several scoring guides created with Rubistar.

First tip for PhotoStory: To write on a blank slide, a feature that is not built into PS, create a blank slide in PowerPoint and save it as a jpg. You can then add a title and/or text to the blank slide. To create a project, you start by importing a photo, and then you basically just "next" your way on through, picking options along the way. The "wow factor" kicks in when you get to the Create Music screen. No more copyright issues! Although, I hope in the next version it will be easier to create music pieces that are truly a little more somber. I worked on a piece about my grandmother, who was widowed in 1915, a single parent five years before the 19th Amendment was passed. Somehow the ragtime selections didn't really enhance my project.

PhototStory3 would be an easy format for showcasing student projects on the K12HSN website.

PM Sidebar Envy Session

Back from a lunch break. David Warlick is doing a Second Life demo right now. I first explored SL in November with IntelliGirl Sara Robbins. So many possibilities for forming or joining collaborative communities in SL, although I agree with Dave that we need a SL designed for just for kids.

Moving on to search engines...Google can find blogs fast, but blogpulse is even faster. Trend search feature if very cool! If you type in NECC07, for instance, you'll see a burst of activity starting yesterday.

RSS feeds - Dave Winer invented this tool to allow people to stay on top of information. Professional Watch picks up when others have included you in a post, without using trackback, and is "drag 'n droppable." Mac platform only :-( With aggregators - and Web 2.0 - we're training information to find us. Advantage of Bloglines web-based aggregator is that you can pull it up anywhere, which can be a problem with browser-based readers. For Web 1.0 (static pages), you can use Google Alerts to see if a site has been updated. Besides Google Reader and Bloglines, we looked at NetVibes, which can turn your aggregator almost into a newspaper. Pageflakes is a new aggregator that promises to be a drag & drop/design your own program, due to their just receiving a ton of money. Love Pageflakes!!!

We're having some "play time" right now, so I'm heading off to Dave's Nuggets page on the wiki.

Del.icio.us hint: to find someone's delicious account, add their name after delicious, e.g., http://del.icio.us/gailhd. Note: RSS tag is at bottom of delicious, which allows fast way to subscribe to other people's tag-specific sites.

Podcasts: slapcast.com is a cheap ($5 per month) site for storing podcasts and uploads to your blog with a flash player. Podcast Pickle is another, along with DivShare. To make a podcast subscribable, try Podomatic or Feedburner.com. From iTunes, click on submit a podcast. Feedburner allows you to paste in the URL of your current podcast. It "cooks" it to make it compatible with iTunes.

Dave's closing thoughts: "Blogging has made me a much better writing because I constantly practice writing."

Image: "Tim Wilson's Flickr page." TimWilson. 24 June 2007. NECC. 24 Jun 2007 .

Technorati Tags: blogwalker NECC07 k12hsn Warlick

Blogging the Sidebar Envy Session - with David Warlick

Dave Warlick is here now. We're doing our note taking in a wiki space he set up prior to the conference. Dave recommends pmwiki.com (does lots and the programming is simple and saves everything on the file) and mediawiki.org (tougher programming and saves on database) for uploading handouts, both allow you to password protect pages, but aren't quite as user friendly as WikiSpaces, (my favorite).

What's the difference between Web 1.0 (e.g, New York Times online) Web 2.0 (e.g., Digg - articles that people have submitted). Audience decides what's important, not some editors - http://labs.digg.com/bigspy or http://labs.digg.com/swarm has visualization of how Digg works.

Web 1.0 is about information that is networked, digital, and overwhelming = Respects authority. A wall remains between people and what is published. Web 2.0 is increasingly participatory; reader directed; and people connecting = No containers = Respects the readers. There's no stopping the community. Information gatekeeping has become a personal skill - and an ethical skill. Therefore we have to rethink what it involves to be literate. Literacy involves reading and exposing; employing the ideas and information, and expressing (writing skills are critical!). It's not just if can you write a coherent paragraph, but can you use the information, images, multimedia to produce a message. Ethics! Ethics! Ethics!

Dave also likes Edublogs :-), but uses WordPress to avoid some of the "flakiness" that can happen when James Farmer is upgrading things. All blogs have setup for "tagging" posts. He's setup a technorati tag generator at http://landmark-project.com/blogtags.php. Faster and more manageable than "categories" option, since "categories" are not read by all search engines. "Technorati is to the blogosphere what Google is to the Internet. Technorati indexes over 70 million blogs! Take advantage of Dave's Ping option to help Technorati find your blog post fast.

Issues with images: go to http://flickr.com/creativecommons - copyright-free photos for teachers. Most people have name listed, or login listed. For citing photos, use Citation Machine, via Landmark. You'll be citing the page, not the image per say, but should cover you legally.

An interesting site for checking blogosphere statistics is http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/000493.html. Stats show blogosphere is doubling every 6 months, with Japanese being the top blogging language and English second. Sifry pulls from Technorati for his stats.

Dave raises an interesting question: Are students more likely to work for attention than for grades? Because attention is what Web 2.0 is all about. He recommends "The Search" by John Patel to learn more about the power (and possible financial gain) of search engines. "Google, in a very real way, has become the sidewalk we walk down to do business."


Image Citation:
"Moodle Class." Dinghyman's Photostream. 5 Jul 2006. 4 May 2007 <http://flickr.com/photos/pnelson/183006968/>

Technorati Tags: blogwalker NECC07

Blogging the Sidebar Envy Session

I'm blogging my first NECC session from my dog Nola's site because Edublogs is down:-(.

Chris Lehmann is the first speaker. He's introducing some thoughts about Web 2.0, starting off with a new word "prosumer" = consumer + producer. He also warns about the "transparency" issues that come with blogging. It's easy to forgot that others, including our students, may be reading our posts. But in a way, doesn't that open new avenues for students if they can be reading how we process our teaching practices?! Dan Meyers, math teacher in California, for instance, reflects on the challenges of being a 3rd year teacher. Having a community to share with has expanded his practice to include teachers who critique his units. Big point: blogging is not just reading; it's writing.

Steve is a principal at a high school in Philadelphia, Science Leadership Academy. His faculty connects through Moodle. Thanks to a "hack" that Steve wrote, parents can connect and check grades. Great way to bring parents on board with what's going on at the school site. We talk about schools being "transformative" but we rarely think of that as a two-way track. But our students can be change agents too.

Bring your administrators on board! They need to understand that Web 2.0 is messy, but not optional. Provide administrators - and teachers - time to experiment. "Blogging is just reflection. You shouldn't be too busy to reflect!" But pedagogy comes first. The tool is meant to facilitate learning; not the other way around.

Core values of Chris's school = inquiry, collaboration, presentation, and reflection. Inquiry driven and project based. Students publish their writing for publication via lulu.com (read piece by Will Richardson).