Continuing Personal Professional Development in Web 2.0 Tools

My introduction into the world of Web 2.0 technologies has been very interesting and informative. This class has allowed me the opportunity to explore a variety of Web 2.0 tools, including Twitter, YouTube, Netvibes, Protopages, and Diigo. While I had previously had some experience with YouTube and was aware of Twitter, the other tools were new to me. Over the past six weeks, I have discovered elements of all of these tools that I believe can make them useful tools to incorporate into an educational setting. I know that I have just begun to touch upon all of the multitude of Web 2.0 technologies available and I hope to be able to continue learning more about other tools as I continue my educational journey in both my graduate courses and my teaching career. A personal goal of mine is to never stop learning and with the many ways that technology quickly changes, there will always be something new and exciting to explore. My plan for continuing to learn more about Web 2.0 technologies involves taking advantage of professional development workshops/classes offered through the school district where I work, as well as using the tools that I learned about in this class to keep myself informed about changing technology and explore new tools. There are always various technology classes offered through the regional education service centers and those classes are certainly something that I want to take advantage of. Just this past year, my sister was able to attend one such class that involved teaching educators new apps for iPad that they could incorporate into their classrooms. When I am not able to attend these type of classes, I plan to continue to follow various technology or educational technology (ed tech) resources online using tools like Twitter hashtags, Diigo shared bookmarked pages, YouTube videos links, etc. Using these tools will allow me to keep up with new information related to educational technology and Web 2.0 tools. Most importantly, I think that the best way way for me to continue learning about Web 2.0 technologies is to not be afraid to try new things. While I do not have a classroom of my own at the moment, I hope to secure a classroom position in the near future. Having my own classroom can only further motivate me to continue to learn more about new tools and technology in hopes of using it to transform the way that I teach and the way that my students can learn.

More thoughts on Diigo and Social Bookmarking

As I have gone throughout the week, I have experimented more with using Diigo and further contemplated the idea of social bookmarking. Reading the posts in the class discussion board this week introduced me to many more ideas regarding both. I have to say that the more that I am using Diigo, the more that I think that it will be a helpful tool for many of my future classes. It was suggested to me through the discussion board this week, to take a look at the public feed on Diigo to gain access to many popular bookmarked sites. After taking a look, I discovered a good number of resources that I was previously unaware of. In addition, I also found that by searching for various tags I was able to find information/ websites that I would certainly never have found through my own research. I think that this is what I like the most about the idea of social bookmarking. It allows me to gain access to a wealth of resources in a shorter amount of time because other users have already discovered treasures that they were kind enough to share. Another advantage that I had not really considered regarding social bookmarking, is the fact that should your computer or device fail, all of your bookmarks are saved within "the cloud" and can be easily accessed with another computer or device. This is something that many people in the class discussion board touched upon due to the fact that at one time or another, they have lost valuable information due to a device failure or had to spend a considerable amount of time transferring information/ bookmarked sites from one device to another. Diigo eases the worry of loosing bookmarked information/sites and makes the process of transferring bookmarks from one device to another unnecessary. While I am certainly no expert yet when it comes to using Diigo and social bookmarking, I can definitely say that it is something that I will continue to practice using and I anticipate it being an extremely helpful tool for my future classes.

First Impressions of Social Bookmarking and Diigo

When first considering social bookmarking, I have to admit that I was not sure that the concept was something that I would be able to use in my daily activities, simply because I am not really a person that participates/ uses various social networks on a routine basis. This class was my first adventure using many of these tools and I did not imagine that I could ever really utilize social bookmarking features. As I established my account and began to learn more about Diigo yesterday, I found that this tool might have changed my perspective on the benefits of social bookmarking. I like the fact that I can access bookmarked sites from anywhere instead of them just being saved on my home computer. In addition, I can see how sharing sites and information with others can really be useful. I think in many ways, being able to see a lists of sites and resources that other individuals have found helpful is great because it can provide me access to information that I might not be able to find in my own research. I know that I have not yet learned everything about social bookmarking, but my experience using Diigo has been positive thus far.

Some thoughts on the Advantages and Disadvantages of Web 2.0 Tools in Education

Before beginning this class, my knowledge of Web 2.0 technologies and really technologies in general was very limited. When it came to the idea of using technology in an educational setting, I was only aware of the tools that I had seen other teachers use and those were few in number. As this class has progressed and I have been researching various tools and technologies for the class projects, I have gained a greater understanding of some of the advantages and disadvantages of using Web 2.0 tools in education. I would say that, in my opinion, one of the greatest advantages of using these tools is that they offer educators the opportunity to change/enhance their students' learning/classroom experience. The incorporation of these technologies helps to engage students so that they can become more actively involved in the learning process. I have seen how static classrooms can often become and I hate to admit that I have often been the type of person that falls into a pattern of always doing things the way that they have been done before. This idea can negatively affect the learning process and the use of Web 2.0 tools in the classroom allows teachers to step outside the norm and change the way they present information to their students or help their students learn. While these tools can certainly be helpful, there can also be disadvantages to their use as well. One of the issues that I can see in using Web 2.0 tools in an educational setting is the fact that this technology needs to be carefully evaluated and/or monitored when being utilized by students. While there are numerous tools available that are deemed appropriate for classroom use and use by certain age students, I still believe that it is important that the teacher take the time to determine if the use of a particular tool is appropriate for the students in his/her classroom. Another issue that I would consider a disadvantage to using Web 2.0 tools in education, is the fact that while some tools are extremely beneficial, there can often be a substantial learning curve to implementing these tools within the classroom. If the use of a Web 2.0 tool requires a teacher to spend too much class time teaching the students how to use the tool, I do not feel that the tool is serving its intended purpose. Trying to implement Web 2.0 tools in an educational setting can also be difficult if the school lacks the proper resources to successfully use the tools in a classroom setting. Coming from an area where budgets are often tight and schools are not always equipped with the latest technology, I have found myself often wondering if I would be able to successfully implement one of the many great tools that I have discovered through this class. While this is not necessarily a disadvantage of Web 2.0 in education, it is something that I often contemplate. Overall, if teachers find the right tools, I believe that the use of Web 2.0 technologies can be a wonderful addition to a educational environment. I hope that when I have my own classroom, I will be able to incorporate some of the tools that I have learned about in this class.

Adventure in Aggregating Pages

This week, I have been experimenting with the two different sites that were mentioned in this week's lesson on Aggregating Pages. The first site that I tried was Netvibes. While I like the look of some of the widgets on this site and I think that I was able to get everything that I needed to have linked to it, I did not find the site as user friendly as Protopage. With Protopage, I was able to easily established the look that I was wanting for my dashboard and adding widgets to the pages was a very simple process. This site seems to give the user a bit more creative freedom when it comes to designing the look of the page. I did have a bit of trouble when it came to adding my YouTube channel with my playlist. At first, I was not sure how to add it with embedded codes for the videos, so I simply added a link that will open to my playlist. After posting my dilemma to the discussion page and searching online resources for more information, I was finally able to figure out how to get the videos to appear and play from the Protopage website. This is something that I had not done before, but have learned a little more about through this process. During the week, I have experimented with different widgets on the site and while some were easy to use, others did not work like I anticipated they would. I was able to add the videos from my YouTube playlist, as well as a link to that page. I also added a link to my ePortfolio and my Blog for ETEC 527. In addition to those items, I added links from Twitter and other interesting widgets like news feeds, weather, and a calendar. I like the idea of creating a dashboard site, and Protopage makes the process fairly simple. Here is the link to the page that I created. http://www.protopage.com/shelliharrel 

Reflections on My YouTube and Twitter Adventures

This week, I had the opportunity to explore YouTube a bit further than I have before. While I had heard about YouTube for quite some time, the first time that I have ever contributed to the site was two years ago. During this time, I worked at a public library and we had the opportunity to enter a video contest to try to win a Children's Learning Station for the library. I was tasked with creating the video and positing it online for entry into the contest. While I am far from an expert film maker, I did manage to put together a video that I was quite proud of. Although the library did not win the contest, it was a great learning experience and with some more practice, I was able to create two more videos to post on YouTube to help educate our library patrons on the proper ways to return materials to the library.

Since I have had the experience of creating and posting a video, I spent this week taking time to look at the enormous variety of videos available for viewing on YouTube. I searched for videos on using Web 2.0 technologies in the classroom and found a great deal of information. There were videos on all different types of technologies, some that I knew about and some that I did not. I also learned a great deal about new Web 2.0 tools from discussion with my classmates. Some of the tools that I was introduced to that I really liked included Storyboardthat, Quizlet, Instagrok, Prezi and Glogster (and that is just a fraction of the tools available). In addition to finding out more about Web 2.0 technologies, I also search YouTube for videos on Wikispaces and found numerous resources that helped me to gain a better understanding of how wikis work. I was a bit apprehensive about the use of wikis before this course, but as I  learn more about them, I am becoming more comfortable with the idea of wikis and possibly using them as a tool in my future classroom. We were tasked with also looking for videos that related to the content area where we currently work or hope to work in the future. I have always been interested in learning about and teaching History, so I searched for videos related to that field. While I did not have enough time to explore this as much as I wanted to (planning on looking at it more later), I did find a very interesting video that led me to information on Game-Based Learning. The concept is something that I was not very familiar with, but after watching a few videos and reading more information, I really like the concept and the students seem to really get excited about learning. The video,Game-Based Learning Brings the History of Civilization to Life, offered insight into one Social Studies classroom that has implemented a game-based learning curriculum entitled Historia. This video was quite interesting and informative and makes me want to continue learning more about Game-Based Learning.

This week, I also searched YouTube for informational videos about Twitter. I am gradually becoming more used to Twitter and there are quite a few tutorials and learning videos related to Twitter available. I am learning to search for various educational hashtags and thanks to the list posted this week, I have a large number of hashtags that I can search for and learn from. One of the things that I still struggle with when it comes to using Twitter is the idea of limiting my responses. I am making an effort to remember that it is simply a tool to initiate conversations and share information quickly, not to carry on lengthy conversations. I have tried the idea of using Twitter on my phone, but find it difficult due to the fact that I have an older phone and it does not run as smoothly as I am sure it would if I had a newer model phone.

I have learned a great deal this week through my exploration of YouTube and Twitter. I know that I still have further to go, but I am gradually becoming more and more comfortable with using both of these tools. In addition, I am learning more about how these tools can be used in an educational setting and have already begun to develop ideas as to how I can use them in my future classroom.