Thing 10 - Wikis

Wikis are in my future! We're thinking about a wiki in our building to support teachers using technology. It will be a collaborative gathering place for tutorials, tips and resources. This will be fun. There is also an art teacher in the building who is interested in collecting student feedback on artwork. A wiki may be the way to go. (I mentioned this in my post on the 23 things on a stick wiki.) It was interesting to see the variety of wikis. The St. Joseph County Public Library subject guides were very interesting and really a variation of what many of us currently offer on our library websites - subject based resources. However, I keep only current subjects in the curriculum on my webpage. This would be much more efficient. Though editing was restricted to library staff, patrons could submit requests and comments. It was also interesting to see that the Book Lovers wiki had moved on to online reviews in their library catalog. I've added some of these wikis to my Delicious account. (You'll remember that I completed Thing 11 earlier in the process.) A resource like PBwiki that is designed for use by educators is great.

Wikipedia is allowed by some teachers in our middle school; others prefer not to have students use it in their research. I have taken the position that it is important for students to understand how information is edited in Wikipedia and why they must be careful. I encourage students to find information in more than one source and to pursue discrepancies. Wikipedia often has very useful links and intertwines with associated articles. We need to teach our kids to use it wisely.

Thing 9 - Online Collaboration Tools

In our district, our technology committee has used Google Docs for meeting minutes and many shared documents. It worked well after resolving a login glitch. I like the option to get an email update whenever changes are made to these documents. It has made collaborative development of documents much easier. Additionally, it gave easy access to community members on the committee who would not have access to the district network where documents were formerly stored. I also have a Zoho account, as we have considered Zoho Writer, in particular, for student use. Although most students manage transfer of documents between home and school, occasionally there are problems. We believe that online access to documents may work more effectively for some students.

An Extra Thing

I do not want to lose track of the presentation, 101 Free Learning Tools, which I found at the Slideshare website so here is the link - http://www.slideshare.net/zaid/101-free-learning-tools-presentation/ What a resource!

Thing 8 - Sharing Your Creations

Next day...
While browsing other blogs, I found someone who successfully embedded their Zoho presentation. Back to the drawing board. This time I switched over to the Edit Html page and it worked. Duh.




Really... I hate to share my creations. I am sure there are others like me, who just aren't the sharing kind. Sure, I share with students in the library; I share with colleagues; I share with friends, but to share with the world? Oh, no. However, in the interest of progress with 23 Things and my desire to analyze the options available to kids in the educational setting, I have a link below to my brief book presentation created on Zoho. It must be public (UGH) to "share" the link. It appears that it can be embedded into my blog, but early attempts failed.

http://show.zoho.com/View.do?P_ID=283823000000004017&P_STIME=0&TP=true&displayall=true&THEME=colorful_chords&USER=gabrielsons&DOC=Summer%20Books%202008



It finally sunk in. Last year, a young and enthusiastic Web 2.0 colleague at school brought Zoho to my attention. We were talking about word processing. I understood, but lacked enthusiasm. Today, as I looked at Zoho Show, I got it. Students experiencing difficulty with transfer of documents between home and school, due to version or system incompatibilities, m ayuse online document resources. I tried Zoho Show and it worked!! It was easy to login (I had my login), easy to create and save a new presentation. My colleague has moved on to another online resource called Buzzword. We'll have to compare the two and decide what will work best for students. There is an art research project coming up soon; we may be on a roll before the end of the month!

Thing 7 - Web 2.0 Communication Tools

In our school building, email has greatly improved communication. Each day a staff bulletin is distributed by email, giving me easy access to all teachers and staff for quick announcements. When I have more information to share, I have developed a format in MS Publisher that I use for monthly - or so - newsletters. I use it to promote our services, share new resources and keep staff informed on library/lab use. With live links, teachers are able to take a quick look at resources and move on. It seems much more efficient, as well as useful, than anything I have done in print. However, I have also experienced the frustation of email overload. I am committed to managing listservs and subscriptions more effectively this year.

I have also made my email available to students who need to transfer a document to school. Though the transfer of documents is easier now with student email and flash drives, some students and parents appreciate the option of email to my desk. When I receive a document, I save it to his/her student folder, so it is available when class begins. Certainly, I have learned to reserve time for this mission during particular projects where my services have been used heavily.

Email has become a great benefit to our annual Scholastic book fair. Our parent organization will email parents with information about the book fair, in addition to some of the more traditional communications avenues. We also used email to line up volunteers. This proved to be much easier than connecting with phone calls!

Web 2.0 communication tools, such as email, text messaging, instant messaging and web conferencing, are enough to make your head swim. In addition, the current school environment does not support the use of email (except in "scholarly" pursuit), text or instant messaging. So where does this lead? I am excited that our new library catalog upgrade to Destiny allows students to submit book reviews. Students write, then submit their reviews online. Each review must be approved before being posted. I would like to use this feature as soon as we better learn the program and address necessary logins questions. We may need to seek programs, like Destiny, that bridge the Web 2.0 communication abyss in education.

Increasingly, I have found text messaging an effective way to communicate with my own 20 year old son. It is less "invasive" and a great way to make a quick connection. What could be more effective than a personal communication device attached at the hip! I haven't used IM and have always believed that a phone conversation was just as effective. As much time as I am spending on a computer these days, I am beginning to see the advantage!

I have attended MINITEX webinars in the past couple years and found them to be very useful and easy to use. I have also attended web conferences for software promotion and training. This would a great tool within the district, especially if it were free. Having just adopted a be new software, it would be so nice to conference with others in an environment where we could all be looking at the same screen.

Thing 6 - Online Image Generators

"Later" became "sooner" when Thing 6 took me back to the Big Huge Labs website. Soooo....my motivator poster seems more like an online image generator than a mashup. I'm back to my initial conclusion; mashups are just too darn random for me. However, I had great fun with the image generators. Though many are limited in flexibility, they do provide quick and easy options for using photos. Of the image generators that I tried, Map Maker, Matte and Calendar were selections to which I might return. Through color-coding, Map Maker allows the user to see the states he/she has visited. What a great introduction to this unit of study. Also, using image generators may be a novel way to draw attention to announcements on classroom TVs.

Trading card - this trading card illustrates the book, Twilight. Trading cards may be a way for students to share a synopsis of a book they have enjoyed.