early college conference

Conference in Jersey City has been great.

Still seeing if my account is active!

Thing 23

Wrapping all the web 2.0 "things" up. This was a lot of information, good though. How would a person implement all of the 2.0 things we learned? My answer is VERY SLOWLY! My plan is to briefly revisit each thing and see what I think will be of the most value, to me and my teaching staff, and figure out an effective and useful way to implement. I plan to start slow.

Personally I have already benefited from some 2.0 tools, blogging comes to mind. I've been trying to find a nice 2-3 day hike I haven't done yet and was stumped, I turned to some blog sites and found some nice recommendations.

Professionally I have lots of ideas. At the Monroe County Middle College I could have a daily blog about the school, events, themes, etc. We could build a library of videos that explain each and every position available in health care. I plan to assess the needs and desires of my teachers and look at web 2.0 and see if there is a way I can use some of the tools we've learned about here can help address these needs and desires. Sharing this information is crucial to successfully using it, all of it. Not only sharing that it's available but how easy a lot of it is to use, a couple on line tutorials, mini lessons and a person can be up and running using different tools. The key is continual usage. To make it part of your normal day and for school leaders to expect staff to use the tools and information.

I want to improve my skills at RSS feeds, I want to develop a very valuable and rich source of information - I don't want dozens of feeds coming in all the time, I want a few useful ones. I need to take time to read and evaluate value in the feeds. Initially I will start with that and try to develop a useful list of these. I will of course share them with my staff and others through del.ic.ious and other means.

Creaing a PLN to me would start with developing a blog site or a wiki where all staff can add their information and guidance to a topic. I plan to create a wiki specific to each core subject being taught in my school and looking for opportunities for my teachers to integrate subjects and provide authentic learning experiences to the students.

So many possibilities, so little time!

Thing 22

My own PD online! What a great opportunity to let a professional choose what they think will make them better! As an administrator I would have no problem allowing my staff to choose a PD subject/topic/lesson that they thing would allow them to excel in their subject area(s). We talk a lot of individualizing lesson plans for students, individualized education plan, individualize this and that, but often we send teachers to PD or only give them a select few to choose from. With web 2.0 it allows the teachers to create their own PD. I will make this option available to teachers and find an effective way to record it is begin done, and how is it going to impact their daily teaching.

I absolutely would do my own PD online, I am taking an optional 23 things to know about web 2.0! And I think others would if there is a way we can allow the teachers a way to replace an already existing PD activity with a 2.0 activity.

The advantage is subject/person specific professional development. If a social studies teacher wants to start implement Google Earth in his/her lesson plans, and is given the opportunity to learn how to use this in a PD opportunity, instead of being made to go to a PD session on writing lesson plans, what a benefit to the teacher and the students. In a way, I think this might help prevent "burn out" in teachers...?!?

My experience with this course has been positive, more self discipline was needed, and I need to continue (start) to build this type of "work" into my daily schedule. If I just put it in, like it's an appointment I'm a lot more likely to do it! I'm thankful I am at the Monroe ISD and that access to many of these sites are not blocked, reading some of the issues people ran into was discouraging and frustrating for them, I'm sure.

Thing 21

I had no problem using zamzar-it worked seamlessly and I had my video in less than 1 minute! I had a hard time getting vixy to load and I could not figure out how to use download helper with

A simple reward of video in the class is having more tools at your disposal. Some risks include accuracy of content (may take some checking before using-probably not a huge concern), availability of movie if you are pulling straight from the web (could be solved though by using vixy or zamzar), or inappropriate content.


I've always liked this video about the 50 states and the capitols...it's fun!

I also found a cool short video on what a respiratory therapist does, for me and the Monroe County Middle College developing a "library" of these would be fantastic.

Thing 20

Yeah-I'm sure students would enjoy listening to podcasts, many different ones I'm sure, of course there will be podcasts that students don't want to listen to as well, just as there are books students like and dislike, movies of the same.

Yes, I think students would jump at a chance to use the internet in many of the ways we have in the 2.0 class. I still think most students use traditional web 1.0 services such as email/research/etc. and some limited 2.0 apps such as picture sharing/chatting/document collaboration. But give them a chance to produce a podcast that could potentially be heard worldwide, talk about an audience. I'm sure the quality of work, at least at first, would be to the best of the student's ability.

Personally I have not found any podcasts that are of benefit. Professionally, probably the podcast by Michigan State Superintendent for Public Education, Mike Flanagan's, it's nice to be "up to speed" on his views/ideas of things, it provides for nice talking points.

Thing 19

Almost there! Thing 19 was about Podcasting...which I was really excited about because I often want to listen to Mike Flanagan's podcast. I listened to "This I Believe-attitude" which is from a school in Charlotte, MI. It was a motivational podcast.

I did not like the quality of some of the podcasts. It's hard to tell what the quality of a podcast will be by the tag/descriptor. I would combat this by compiling my own list of appropriate podcasts according to subject/topic and allow the students to use only those, or require one of those and allow students to use the web for another.

As teachers students often view us the teacher as the professional on the subject, when we know we are not! The best use of Podcast I can imagine is hearing true professionals on the topic begin covered. It's obvious through browsing through all the podcasts available there is a podcast on many topics and many subjects.

Thing 17

My wikispace is
www.rgkrueger.wikispaces.com

Check it out!

Thing 18

I added a clustrmap to my blog...I don't expect to see too many hits. I may "convert" this blog to a personal blog at the end of the class and make it about Michigan hiking, biking, etc.

Thing 14

I'm liking blogger just to keep track what things I've finished. I think I'm going to talk my wife into creating our grocery list online so I can add things to it!

Thing 15

I created a page on Pennsylvania. I invite anyone to join me who is interested! I look forward to working with anyone.

Thing 16

Creating a wiki is easy! It's amazing how much user friendly things have become in the last few years.

Thing 8

Delicious...I learned about this a year or so ago. I never bothered with it, I didn't realize it would come back to haunt me. I've added some bookmarks, I don't know if I will use it personally or not.

I think current events would be huge with delicious. Many of the other tools we have learned about would be great for current events too...RSS feeds.

For a high school or college student I would push delicious as a tool to use. A typical high school or college student may find themselves working on multiple computers throughout the day, different pc labs, houses, etc. Most of us know the websites we visit frequently for our daily dose of the internet but how great would delicious be for a research paper? You find a page you want to use, but when you go to school in the morning for open lab, you can't find the exact article again. Delicious would help with this.

Thing 13

Editing pictures with picnik was rather easy...easier than I thought it would be.

And below is a Christmas card I created with one our cats curled up in a pile of the "snow" my wife uses to decorate around Christmas time.

http://www.dumpr.net/photo/6543434538bb1c7f/

One cool project I could think of would be restore an old family photo. This could be done in conjunction with a genealogy lesson. Of course a teacher could always have their students make funny faces of the teacher.

Thing 12

Flickr is cool, I use Google Photos for online photo sharing, but I don't back up every photo there. I use it just for sharing. I think the biggest benefit of photo sharing in classroom is the ability this has to bring things to life. When you talk about place in social studies, I'm sure it doesn't matter where, there will be so many photos about the topic being covered. This feature can add layers to a lesson plan, beginning with the photo being just a photo, but beyond that looking at the people in the photo and kind of "dissecting" the photo; why is that person wearing those clothes? What is that building? And so on. For photo sharing the easiest connection I see is to social studies.

I feel redundent in the pitfalls/drawbacks section. Availability of technology and monitoring this would be two concerns.

Thing 11

I found this slideshow to be pretty inclusive of many things we are discussing in our class. Even though this appears to be from a couple years ago, it's kinda cool to see some of the early(ier) thinkings of the "social web"

http://www.slideshare.net/charleneli/sxsw09-the-future-of-social-networks

One possible use of slideshare in the classroom would be to assign the students to find information on a math concept, instead of giving them the information. The slides below would be for a quadrilateral lesson. Information is completely at their fingertips. We don't have to show them how to do every little thing, tell them what they need to know, let them find the information and then prove that mastery to us...just assign topics to know but not solutions.

http://www.slideshare.net/corinnegallagher/sorting-quadrilaterals

Problems would still be that digital divide that people talk about, not everyone has a pc or internet at home, or access to the library after school to use the "free" computer and internet at the library.

Twitter during surgery!

Take a look at this!!!

http://gmy.news.yahoo.com/v/12610355

Crazy

Thing 10

Google Docs is awesome! It completely solves the "my dog ate my jumpdrive" issue, seriously, she did. I have used Google Docs for some things in the past, in fact, before we even got to Thing 10, I used a google doc to save my usernames and passwords!

I use this tool currently personally and professionally. Personally I have used it to create spreadsheets that have helped friends and I plan for a trip. Professionally, a group and I have access to an agenda we can all add items to.

I have had problems with compatibility before. I have used the presentation before but have had issues when I opened it up in PowerPoint.

I see many many uses for Google Docs in the classroom, especially on group projects. I see more immediate use for this tool than some others.

Thing 6

I have created a blogger account at Bloglines. My username is rgkrueger.

Thing 5

I think the power of web 2.0 is pretty obvious, the Gen Y Guide-Web 2.0 @ Work, this person actually got a job at IBM as a result of Web 2.0.

One personal experience I had with web 2.o was last summer. Three of us were planning a week long backpacking trip to Isle Royale National Park. One was/is a full time student and works full time, another lives is Baltimore, the other was me. We used Google Docs to create a spreadsheet that we could all view and edit. We planned what each other was bringing, paying for, packing, responsibilities, etc. It made planning for the trip a snap.

Professionally I feel that I can use web 2.0 to maintain professional conversations, networks, collaborations, with others who are educational professionals.

Ultimately, for the students it provides yet another learning modality. How great of an experience is it for a student to be in a world cultures class and be having an essentially real time conversation with someone from an area being studied-South America for example?! It provides another layer of learning and provides some authenticity. We know from our own lives that we learn best from doing, we can't take trips around the world when studying various cultures but web 2.0 provides an opportunity for some authentic learning related to the subject.

My wife has a friend in Argentina. They began writing actual letters-on paper-about 13 years ago, about as long as my wife and I have known each other. They have had the opportunity to watch instant communication evolve. It's been really exciting to see how their communication has evolved as well...we had the chance to visit Buenos Aires in 2006 for a couple of weeks. It provided us with a great learning experience, a lot of that experience could have been documented and shared with a class through web 2.0 applications.

Thing 4

Whether or not education has changed is an argument that can be made either way. Sure, it's changed a ton, with increased standardized testing, the available technology, the increased pressure of 'needing' to go on to post secondary schooling, or at least training. On the other hand, it hasn't changed very much at all. You still sit in a class, mostly in a row, or at least a group (see how teachers mix it up), you still learn how to add, subtract, nouns, verbs. You get my point, I hope.

In my opinion, the biggest change in education is the availability of information. I loved that line, something to the effect of where did people ask these questions B.G.-Before Google. We literally have information at our fingertips. We can find answers to virtually anything within seconds. Just amazing. As information is more available, students already "know" the answers. Our biggest issue as educators is to make sure that students understand how to use what is available. We have been moving from teaching content to teaching skills, I expect it to continue.;

Thing 3

My initial thought is that blogging is truly a two way street. This reiterates that the Internet (Web 2.0) is a read/write relationship, not just read. Teacher and students can virtually interact with each other...amazing. We used the Internet while I was in high school, only for research, not once did we ever post our own material, and being allowed to use it for research was minimal. I feel that blogging is going to be similar to many other "advancements" in the past. If the technology is used, it can be great. I feel there is tremendous potential for blogging.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I have never blogged before this class. I don't really think I have ever read one, and if I did, it was not too prolific because I don't remember...

I have the same fears that most likely have, abuse of the blogosphere, inappropriate content, etc. but I also realize that things of such nature can't prohibit the use of something so awesome. I do not mind sharing my thoughts publicly on a blog.

My First Blog

Hello World! This is my first blog...ever. I hope this class will be interesting, more importantly useful. One thing I worry about is how much time we spend in front of a pc already, I do not want that to increase greatly...I feel the outside world has too much to offer. I'm a big fan of running, hiking, kayaking, snowshoeing, you name it, if it happens outside I've probably at least tried it.

I look forward to getting to know everyone virtually, and maybe even in person at some point!