11
Jun

Collaboration and Voicethread

By burgundyproductions 0 Comments
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I cannot adequately express how important connections and collaboration between colleagues is to discovering new things and developing new ideas. If we all found or were provided more time to share… hmmm????

I discovered voicethread.com and the software Comic Life in my EDT 532 class recently and had the immediate opportunity to share these items with a colleague. Beginning next year he will be teaching English at another high school in our district and has been assigned and ESL class. We’ve been discussing ways to integrate technology with these students.

Many teachers in our district use Microsoft’s Photostory (a free download) to create photo essays. While these assignments are similar to what’s created using Voicethread, they lack the publication and collaboration that is inherent in Voicethread. This communication and collaboration, while great in all classes, seemed perfect for my colleague’s ESL students.

In addition, I shared with him the program Comic Life, a software application that easily enables the user to make comic books and save them as images or html. He immediately downloaded a trial of the software and went to work. He has an HP tablet PC with the program InkArt. It was awesome to see him create his own ‘crayon’ drawings for his comic book. His ESL students will have access to these tablet PC’s as well. I’m excited for them.

As we spoke he clicked the ‘classroom’ link on the Voicethread website and it opened an entirely new feature of Voicethread that I had yet to discover. ed.voicethread.com provides a host of other features to use voicethread in an appropriate and controlled environment.

Isn’t sharing wonderful?

31
May

What’s an RSS feed…

By burgundyproductions 0 Comments
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I was working with colleagues recently, discussing technology, and I casually tossed around the term RSS feed. I was presented with the question, “What’s an RSS feed?” I quickly tried to answer the question, but there is certainly much more to understanding RSS than I was able to quickly explain. So here is a little more on RSS.

Very simply the term RSS means Really Simple Syndication. Many people are familiar with the term syndication, especially in reference to television and radio shows or newspaper columns. The same concept applies with technology. Just as traditional radio and television shows or newspaper columns are distributed to a wider audience when syndicated, so is technology like web news casts, blog posts, or podcasts. The benefit of using RSS feeds is the compilation of various sources, or feeds, in one place. Many web browsers have feed readers included and there are a number of dedicated programs that act feed readers or aggregators. Instead of browsing to a number of different web sites to hunt down your content it is ‘fed’ to you. Anytime an update is made the newest content is automatically sent to your feed reader.

Users subscribe to feeds by clicking the feed icon on a website or blog. I’m sure many people have seen this icon but just didn’t know what to do with it. It’s often the small orange square with the white dot in the bottom left corner and two arcs beaming from the dot. Once the you subscribe only the content you want is sent to you.

At this point I have to refer to a great resource created by Will Richardson- anything more here would be rundunant when he has already created a great guide, “The How’s and Why’s of RSS Feeds”

or

Check out this video on RSS in Plain English

28
May

Thoughts on Twitter

By burgundyproductions 0 Comments
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I wanted to share my thoughts on Twitter. Yesterday while talking about blogging I was asked whether my blog was up to date. The short answer, “No”. But I did add that I had included a twitter widget on my blog in an attempt to have some up to date information. Twitter is a great little tool to update a portion of your blog quickly and easily. It’s so easy that it can be done via text message from your mobile phone.

I used twitter alot when I was on a trip to New Orleans with a group of students volunteering for habitat for humanity. It was a great way to keep people up to date with the events of our trip.

The premise of Twitter is providing an answer to the question, “What are you doing?”.  A kind of microblog, Twitter limits you to 140 characters per post (or “tweet”). You can ‘follow’ other Twitter users’ post on your twitter home page or on your cell phone, and other users may ‘follow’ you. This is how parents followed their children while we were in New Orleans.

In education it could be a way to post homework for students. The following Web 2.0 Teaching Blog describes some uses for Twitter in education http://web20teach.blogspot.com/2007/08/twitter-tweets-for-higher-education.html

27
May

Renewed interest and inspiration

By burgundyproductions 0 Comments
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When I first began my blog I had visions of typing away on my computer, writing on a variety of topics related to technology, with the hope of providing a source of information and ideas. I found that the idea was easier than the practice. Most often I found it difficult to separate my opinions from my daily experiences as an educator and technology resource teacher. In reaction, I didn’t post some of the things I had been writing and updates to my blog ceased.

 

Today, it is with renewed interest and inspiration from my involvement in the graduate Educational Technology program at Central Connecticut State University that I write and post again.

 

Creativity and the ability to express myself creatively are essential elements of my personality. Over time technology has become an essential part of my creative expression and fuels my personal interest in digital photography and video.

 

Developments in technology in recent years have promoted the use of technology to communicate and to collaborate. Technology developments are exciting and the future of technology lies in people being online, connected, communicating, and collaborating.

 

This is the primary motivation for my return to the Ed. Tech program at CCSU. I hope to learn the tools that will help me better connect and communicate in a growing tech driven society. I’m most excited to learn Flash and web development tools.

 

So to my classmates who are now finding their way here to my blog- welcome. I look forward to working with you.

 

 

 

23
Dec

Why wiki?

By burgundyproductions 0 Comments
Categories: Why Wikis?
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I’ve been on a mission to convince, cajole, or coerce (gently of course) my colleagues to use wikis and Web 2.0 tools in their classroom.

My convincing speech always begins with the questions, “Have you heard of a wiki? Do you know what one is?” My colleagues nearly all reply with a cautious, “Yes” because they are at least familiar with Wikipedia. The conversation continues and ultimately they say, “But, I don’t know how I’d use them?” or “Why should I use them?”

So, why would a teacher want to use Web 2.0 tools in their classroom?

Besides sounding cool and techno-hip while talking about your class wiki, there are a host of reasons to embrace the use of wikis in your classroom.

They are the logical step.

Our students are the “Net Generation”. They’ve been using a mouse since infancy and can “hunt and peck” faster that most adults who have taken typing courses. They live by cell phones, text messaging, instant messages, e-mail, and send invites to school club meetings across Facebook. This is a technology that students have embraced, yet most schools have not.

We owe it to our students to allow them to use this technology to demonstrate the same skills we already require. We also have a responsibility to teach them to be effective communicators. With the increase of this technology it is imperative that they use this technology effectively.

They reinforce life-long skills for a life-long leaner.

Isn’t this the goal of so many educational institutions? These exact words exist in our school’s mission statement- “to graduate life-long learners”.

More and more companies are seeing the value of these tools and are embracing them in the ways in which they conduct business and communicate with customers. As companies embrace the use of this technology, the ability to communicate effectively on line will be crucial. Chris Anderson of Wired Magazine and Ross Mayfield of Socialtext have created a wiki on Fortune 500 companies that are using blogs.

They expand the classroom.

Wikis offer an outstanding opportunity for teachers and students to communicate and collaborate beyond the walls of the classroom. Just like on-line classes have allowed so many people to pursue degrees within the confines of their own varied schedules, Web 2.0 tools in a high school classroom will also allow students to work and communicate on their own terms.

Important also is that the users have control. Used in a classroom setting the tools encourage responsibility. Everything students contribute is recorded and visible for their peers and teacher to view. They automatically have a responsibility to the group.

The free-form concept of a wiki allows ideas to grow.

I love the concept that the group is ‘smarter’ than the smartest individual in the group. The communication and collaboration inherent in a wiki allows students to draw from the intelligence and experiences of the entire group. In addition the hyperlinks in a wiki can allow students to expand their information and contacts to other information on the web.

While slower, a wiki is like brainstorming. A student can post a few sentences or a paragraph and spark a discussion that evolves in time to be something amazing. Toss a snowball on a hill and watch it build as it rolls.

Collaboration has been a staple of teacher training and classrooms for years. This is modern collaboration.

Technology allows for the combination of a large variety of different information and presentation types.

Wikis may include any of the following and much more- video, photos, text, slideshows, audio, music, charts, graphs, calendars, maps, html, etc.

Definitions of some Web 2.0 tools

I’ve borrowed this list from Vicki Davis, of Westwood Schools, and her classes wiki.

Blogosphere, Wiki, Social Bookmarking, Podcasting, RSS feeds, Folksonomy

11
Dec

Every thing happens for a reason

By burgundyproductions 0 Comments
Categories: General
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I am a firm believer in the statement, “Everything happens for a reason;” however, I am still often surprised when everything comes together like a well-executed plan.

Last year a co-worker’s retirement opened the opportunity for me to change jobs. For eleven years I was a high school English teacher. Having always had an interest in technology, and feeling tired of correcting essays, the new position of Information Technology Resource Teacher seemed inviting.

As exciting as this all was, I had concerns. The official job description for my position states that I am to help teachers implement technology in their classrooms and serve as the first step in the repair process. With the number of desktops, laptops, and printers in our school, repair is a major part of the job. Repair takes most of my time as well– and although one cannot not implement technology if the technology does not work, I was more attracted to working with teachers and students than being what I call the ‘electronic janitor’.

During the first two months of school my time was filled with constant repairs. There was little time to work on implementing technology in classroom and work with teachers. In what free time I had I read journals and tech blogs looking for ideas and projects. One such blog was Victoria Davis’ blog at coolcatteacher.blogspot.com . As I sat in office in walked a colleague, Brian Wall asking “What do you know about wikis and RSS feeds?” I pointed to the articles I had been reading and the conversation continued into what is now our wiki/blog project.

The timing of every thing couldn’t have been better. A moment of perfect timing has lead to this burgundy productions blog(my first blog) and wiki, and a project that hopes bring all the good in being the Information Technology Resource teacher.