ED 632 WEEK 3 and 4

I have created a video that explains how to share your documents and presentations in Google Docs. Documents and presentations can be shared with other people as viewers or as collaborators.

This is helpful to me if I want to work on something with a teaching colleague. You can also group kids together to work on a project as a group.

Watch my tutorial video about sharing documents in Google Docs.

Google docs allows you to create:

• word processing documents
  
• slide show presentations
  
• spreadsheets
  

Google Docs allows you to:

• share documents with others
  
• allow others to view your documents
• allow others to collaborate with you

Google Docs is helpful for teachers who want to:

• collaborate on lessons and presentations with others
  
• have an electronic "in box" accessible wherever there is an Internet connection
• assign students to collaborative groups for project work

The sharing of Google Docs opens up a world of collaboration. Students don't have to meet at each other's houses to get work done. Teachers don't have to use jump drives to work on the same document. Once the document is shared, it is automatically updated when changes are made. You don't have to keep sharing and sending it over and over.

TEACHER TOOL BOX

I haven't had time to look at all these Web 2.0 tools that were suggested by my classmates in Ed 632, but I hope you can find some useful ones here. For a list of these with links, go to the blog for Social Web in Education.

• photo bucket
• picasa
• flickr
• discovery streaming
• national geographic videos
• hulu's movie and tv clips
• google maps and street view
• google earth
• wallpapers and screen savers from National Geographic
• pbs kids
• edu blog
• a to z teacher stuff
• jonathan bird's blue world
• dictionary.com
• big brainz (3d multiplication)
• multiplication.com
• voicethread
• promethean planet resources
• brain pop
• iweb
• zamzar (to convert video files....youtube)
• Julie ThompsonSmartboard Resources
• BBC School resources
• Discovery Education
• Who Dunnit?
• Mac VCR (record what happens on your screen to a Quicktime movie)
• Grammar Girl podcast "Does Grammar Really Matter?"
• Tumble Books (library collection online)
• google lit trips
• spelling city
• gaggle net (safe email for kids)
• net trekker
• personal webkit
• punctuation paintball
• lego link
• neoOffice
• Enchanted Learning
• Ed Helper
• Sellarium (solar system)
• Solpass (interactive games--fling the teacher)
• typeracer
• kids quintura
• google calendar
• die net
• widget box
• widget box today in history
• edmodo (micro blogging)
• nexio
• scholastic
• Promethean Plant
• NCTE Read-Write-Think
• NASA
• CIA kids
• I respond
• moodle
• audacity
• skype

Ed 632 Week 2

What is Web 2.0?

Web 2.0 introduces tools that give the average citizen the ability to share information with the world--to communicate and collaborate with others in real time. Will Richardson's YouTube clip on the read-write web said, "The idea is that everything potentially connects. Writing is not simply publishing anymore. It is engaging in conversations about what we are writing." Web 2.0 tools like blogs, wikis, YouTube, and others allow for anyone to post messages/photos/movies/music to the world and receive immediate feedback.

Web 2.0:

• is a shift from read only to read/write capability

• is connective reading and connective writing that starts conversations
• gives anyone the ability to communicate and collaborate with the world
• connects people as well as ideas in real time
• brings concerns for privacy, ethics, copyright, and truth

How does Web 2.0 impact education generally, as well as you as a classroom teacher?

Currently, most educators see the web as a way to gain information--to do research, find images and movies, or download music--all as consumers. Web 2.0 opens up a whole new world of communication and collaboration. It allows for a move away from lessons being completed with paper and pencil to online publishing. It allows students to share their ideas and projects not only with each other, but also will the world. It allows classrooms to learn from others in real conversations in real time. However, this new shift requires the educator to begin the daunting task of teaching and monitoring privacy, ethics, and copyright in an ever-changing medium. Before teachers can utilize Web 2.0 with their students, they will need to be trained, not only in the tools, but also in the areas of privacy, ethics, and copyright.

As a classroom teacher, I see myself being challenged to move beyond using the web as a consumer. I want to use Web 2.0 to channel my students' creative desires and social networking obsessions into their learning. I need to think beyond my classroom walls and imagine how my students can connect with the world. I should provide collaborative experiences for them, not only with their classmates, but also with others from around the globe. I will need to investigate how to use Web 2.0 for myself and then with my students, and at the same time, teach them about safety, privacy, ethics, and copyright.

Ed 632 Week one

This is my first online class. I just created this blog. It wasn't too difficult, but there seems to be so much that is new with technology. I feel like I'm paddling as fast as I can, but the river is still pushing me downstream faster than I can swim upstream. I don't want to be known as an "old fogey", a teacher who is out of touch. That's why I decided to pursue a master's degree in educational technology. ED 632-JD1 is my first class. If I want to continue being involved in education of any kind after I retire this year, I really need to keep up with the new trends.

First blog post ever

This is my first blog post ever!