Could Facebook be used in an educational setting?

Possibly…. but it would take a very dedicated teacher to try it!
I am not trying to dissuade people from the idea – I am all for trying to integrate new technologies if they are useful, if they can do something that no other means can, if they achieve growth in information literacy, if they are safe….

but to use Facebook in an educational setting, you would have to keep an eye on usage the entire time, to make sure it was not being used innappropriately. Teachers could post homework assignments on their students’ walls, post educational videos, websites they wanted their students to check out – they could use it to stimulate conversation or debate between students out of school hours, or to invite expert (who also had facebook accounts) to share their thoughts or ideas.

However I am just not sure if it would be manageable – the advantage of being able to post to all with one click is definitely there, but how would you be able to monitor or delete inappropriate posts? I myself am only really a facebook beginner, so the questions I am asking are not ones I have answers too – maybe there is an easy way that I have not discovered yet. I know companies like Flight Centre are encouraging their employees to use Facebook to maintain good client relationships, and communication between staff – again, it is about using webware in a way that wins for everyone – if people are going to access facebook during work/school hours, why not make it work for you?

One thing is clear – we need to keep on top of these things and continually explore the possibilities they present, because they are changing the way people socialise and communicate – and as social organisations based on communication (I’m talking about schools, here!!) I think it is pretty necessary we don’t bury our heads in the sand!!

So…. any suggestions? How would you use facebook in the classroom? Have you used it? Did it work? Was it too hard to monitor? I’m looking forward to the answers rolling in

Kay

Viral blog ranking

This entry is more about blogging than education, but I am trying to raise the profile of my blog, so that I can raise the profile of educational blogs in general… so I stumbled (literally) on this page and thought I’d give it a go.

Viral Reciprocal Carousel is a great free way to raise the ranking of your blog with Technorati and other opinion leade

– copy and paste from this line (including the line) —

Why this will work

• It provides value through personal recommendations
• Links to your blog with linktext of your choice
• Backlinks come from within a dedicated content about your blog
• Rotating content will prevent it from penalties from search engines
• It is viral – more participants means greater effect

How it works

Simply follow these few steps to get it working for you:

• Create a new post on your blog and start it with a few words about how you came into this carousel.
• Copy and paste the entire text between the red lines (including the red lines, too).
• Check if all links are working after copy and paste.
• Remove the very last recommendation from the list.
• Add a recommendation for a blog you love to the top of the list with at least 2 to 3 sentences about why you love to read that blog, and add a little note that you recommend it, together with a link to your blog. Here is an example:

MarcoRichter.net is a blog I love to read. It provides latest information about blogging, link building and blog seo issues. From detailed how-to articles to some ultimate resource lists, Marco covers a wide variety of information for your daily blogging routine. Recommended by: WordPress Web 2.0 Spot-Er

Blogs I recommend because I love to read them daily:

• Shambles – What’s new and exciting is a great blog, full of educational tips for icts and for new ideas for integrating web 2.0 technologies into teaching. Check it out for a fresh look at new technology! Recommended by Educational Resources Online.
• HowtoSpoter.com – Alex Sysoef is my blogging guru. His Web 2.0 Wealth blogging system is dynamite! And his blog provides more valuable information on blogging than any other blog I know of. It’s a must-read if you want to make money blogging. Recommended by: Blog Design Journal
• terrydean.org – Terry Dean is one of the original Internet Marketing guru’s who retired after having a huge success and going from pizza delivery to a true internet riches. I read his blog on daily bases among a few other. Always prefer to go to the source of information and his blog is one of them. Recommended by: WordPress Web 2.0 Guide
• canimakebigmoneyonline.com – run by George Manty is the definite ressource when it comes to monetizing your blog. Being more than 2 years on the scene, there are several hundreds of articles on making money online. Take your time to read through them all – it´s worth it. Recommended by: Marco Richter
• bloggingtips.com – More than 10 authors contribute interesting blogging topics to this site. If you want to stay updated on what´s hot in the blogosphere, this blog is a must read. Recommended by: Marco Richter
• bluejar.com – run by Sarah Pacopac does more than blogging topics and goes out to browser relates issues and also provides some design and affiliate marketing information. Recommended by: Marco Richter
• OneMansGoal.com – run by Bryan Clark is a good stop for bloggers wanting to learn more about generating visitors for their own blogs. He adds some time management topics for those among us looking for optimization of their daily routine. Recommended by: Marco Richter
• topsecretblogger.com – This one is a completely community driven project. Everyone is invited to sign up and write a post on the blog. Many contest will be attracting other bloggers to come in and join the project. I think this will become even more influential in the future, it´s definitely worth taking a closer look. Recommended by: Marco Richter
• probloggersmatrix.com – Mark´s blog is well-established and concentrates on topics about the relationship between bloggers and their readers. His posts are often titled as questions, what helps starting a conversation with the audience. Recommended by: Marco Richter

This carousel has been started by Marco Richter – the basic concept is a slightly adjusted version of Alex Sysoef´s reciprocal review carousel.

– copy and paste up to this line (including the line) —

So now apparently I sit back and watch the hits roll in…. fingers crossed!

Kay.

Inquiry Based Learning

As a newly graduated Teacher Librarian (although without a Teacher Librarian position!) I am very interested in Inquiry Based Learning. We live in an information age, and the problem for students today is not accessing information, but accessing the right information, at the right level, at the right time. Whereas once students researched from the encyclopedia and several non-fiction texts, today students can access an unlimited number of resources via the web, as well as a great number of additional resources via state, local and school libraries.

So the challenge is, how do we teach students to deal effectively and critically with this information overload, so that they can synthesise it and add this new knowledge to the knowledge they already posess? The answer? Teach them through doing, and start early!

Inquiry based learning is well supported online. Anyone new to the idea can find numerous websites that support both teachers and students. Even early years’ students can successfully begin to develop information literacy.

A very indepth website that offers a fully developed workshop that covers exploration, demonstration (via video clips of real classroom activities), explanation and implementation is http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/inquiry/index.html .

This site is really cool, and has everything a teacher needs to begin including an inquiry based approach in their classroom.

Another well known information literacy tool is the Big 6. The founders of the Big 6 are Mike Eisenberg and Bob Berkowitz. Taken straight from the very informative Big 6 site is this description:

The Big6 is a process model of how people of all ages solve an information problem. From practice and study, we found that successful information problem-solving encompasses six stages with two sub-stages under each:

1. Task Definition
1.1 Define the information problem
1.2 Identify information needed

2. Information Seeking Strategies
2.1 Determine all possible sources
2.2 Select the best sources

3. Location and Access
3.1 Locate sources (intellectually and physically)
3.2 Find information within sources

4. Use of Information
4.1 Engage (e.g., read, hear, view, touch)
4.2 Extract relevant information

5. Synthesis
5.1 Organize from multiple sources
5.2 Present the information

6. Evaluation
6.1 Judge the product (effectiveness)
6.2 Judge the process (efficiency)

http://www.big6.com/

Using a process such as this, teachers can help students draw from a mass of information what they really need and what is the best to answer the question, and to formulate it so that the information is presented in a format that they not only understand, but own.

One day I hope to be able to initiate this process as a teacher librarian, but for the meantime, I will continue to try to influence the curriculum of my school towards this goal – have you had success with inquiry based learning? Let me know! I always love to learn more!!

Kay.

The kids we teach….

I have some friends whose five year old is working with his Dad to build his own computer.  His mum told me that he cried one day when he couldn’t pause the free to air television so he could get a drink – free to air television was such a foreign experience that he couldn’t comprehend why he didn’t have control over it like everything else he watched online and on his Xbox.

This is the future. Granted, this family are early adopters. They live and breathe technology, and so it is natural that their child does also. However, it will not be long before this is the norm,and quite frankly, school is not designed to cope with it.

Even at the most well resourced classrooms, access to technology is limited. Limited not only by cost, but also limited by the current curriculum, which was written in a pre-digital age. And I am not sure what the answer is, as I don’t think any of us know what a curriculum written for the digital age will look like. Even the most savvy teachers struggle to cover what is expected without adding what is actually needed.

There is a danger that we will assume that ‘digital natives’ as Marc Prensky calls children will ‘teach themselves’ about technology, and that teachers will only need to pick up the slack in less technological advanced areas. However we cannot make this assumption. Kids pick up what they need to know, and teach themselves to a certain extent, but just like those children who came to school knowing how to read, having just ‘picked it up’, we still need to teach them formally, to ensure there are no ‘gaps’ in their knowledge. The problem is that where we are relative experts in the area of traditional literacy, we are virtual beginners in the areas of information and technological literacy, and how this develops in the young learner….. so many issues to consider….

That’s my rant for today!!

Have fun. Kay.

I’ve been slack, but look at these great resources!!

I apologise for not posting for a long time..I admit I have been slack, and have been revelling in my new found freedom from study (having recently completed my Masters in Education).

However… do I have some sites for you….

Ever wanted to do some mindmapping but haven’t had the software to do so?? Check out bubbl.us….. it is truly the coolest free mindmapping you will ever find@@

Need a calculator for advanced math?? (well, I don’t but some people might…) check out

http://www.calcoolate.com/index.html – the Coolest calculator on the web….

What’s wrong with conventional calculators?

Let’s take the windows calculator as an example.

• What’s the deal with drawing buttons for each digit on the screen when we have such buttons on the keyboard?
• You can not type into a number. If you forgot a digit, you have to erase all last digits and retype them again.
  Try to type 12345, and then change to 19345.
• You can perform just one operation at a time, no “complex” arithmetic like (2+3)*4
• Why is there no history of previous calculations? The entire memory is 1 number (good old M+ and MR). PCs come today with megabytes of memory, why limit to one?
• It’s inconsistent. Try this: runs the windows calculator, Select View | Standard and type 1+2*3=. You should get 9 as the answer. Now change to View | Scientific, and type again 1+2*3=. This time you get 7.
• No unit conversions. Does your current calculator know how many feet are 100 meters? How many Fahrenheit is 32 Celsius?
  How can I replace my windows calculator?

Need some help with your Shakespeare?? Check out SparkNotes – for free online study guides…  http://www.sparknotes.com/

Want to write your bibliography?? Take the pain out of the most painful part of an assignment with EasyBib: http://www.easybib.com/

Taking notes, and are a fan of Facebook?? Check out the newest facebook application, Notecentric,  a web based note taking application. Notecentric keeps your notes organized and readily available online. Your notes are always in one place, so you don’t have to worry about synchronizing them. Check it out at http://www.notecentric.com/

More ideas coming your way, the next free half hour I get!!

Environmentally Friendly Green Black Google!

Some of you may have already heard of Blackle – Google’s energy saving sister site, which is exactly the same as Google except for its black screen, which saves energy. How? According to Blackle, research tells us that  “Image displayed is primarily a function of the user’s color settings and desktop graphics, as well as the color and size of open application windows; a given monitor requires more power to display a white (or light) screen than a black (or dark) screen.” Roberson et al, 2002

So to save energy in a completely painless way, go Blackle!!

Another site that gives heaps of green tips is Treehugger. I am not the world’s biggest greenie – in fact sometimes my showers tip over the four minute mark, and I have been known to forget to turn lights off…. but if setting my homepage is as hard as it gets, I am in!

So why am I writing about this in what is supposedly an educational blog? Well, imagine if every school altered their settings so that all of their computers featured blackle instead of google – surely heaps of energy savings to be had there, far more than just one individual home computer. So come on teachers – Blackle is it!!!!! 

Until next time..

Kay.

Why too much praise can hurt…

I was always uncomfortable with the idea that children should be praised at every turn. Life, in the real world, is just not like that. Children who grow up expecting to be praised every time they do anything will surely be in for a rude shock when they hit the world of work, where praise is far less common, and critics are everywhere.

Well, it seems that some of this discomfort was well founded. While this blog has always usually focused upon ICT, there is a wealth of other educational resources online also, including the following article at http://snipurl.com/1oapi

I have included the first part of the article here so you can see what it is all about…

How Not to Talk to Your Kids

The Inverse Power of Praise.

• By Po Bronson

What do we make of a boy like Thomas?

Thomas (his middle name) is a fifth-grader at the highly competitive P.S. 334, the Anderson School on West 84th. Slim as they get, Thomas recently had his long sandy-blond hair cut short to look like the new James Bond (he took a photo of Daniel Craig to the barber). Unlike Bond, he prefers a uniform of cargo pants and a T-shirt emblazoned with a photo of one of his heroes: Frank Zappa. Thomas hangs out with five friends from the Anderson School. They are “the smart kids.” Thomas’s one of them, and he likes belonging.

Since Thomas could walk, he has heard constantly that he’s smart. Not just from his parents but from any adult who has come in contact with this precocious child. When he applied to Anderson for kindergarten, his intelligence was statistically confirmed. The school is reserved for the top one percent of all applicants, and an IQ test is required. Thomas didn’t just score in the top one percent. He scored in the top one percent of the top one percent.

But as Thomas has progressed through school, this self-awareness that he’s smart hasn’t always translated into fearless confidence when attacking his schoolwork. In fact, Thomas’s father noticed just the opposite. “Thomas didn’t want to try things he wouldn’t be successful at,” his father says. “Some things came very quickly to him, but when they didn’t, he gave up almost immediately, concluding, ‘I’m not good at this.’ ” With no more than a glance, Thomas was dividing the world into two—things he was naturally good at and things he wasn’t.

For instance, in the early grades, Thomas wasn’t very good at spelling, so he simply demurred from spelling out loud. When Thomas took his first look at fractions, he balked. The biggest hurdle came in third grade. He was supposed to learn cursive penmanship, but he wouldn’t even try for weeks. By then, his teacher was demanding homework be completed in cursive. Rather than play catch-up on his penmanship, Thomas refused outright. Thomas’s father tried to reason with him. “Look, just because you’re smart doesn’t mean you don’t have to put out some effort.” (Eventually, he mastered cursive, but not without a lot of cajoling from his father.)

Why does this child, who is measurably at the very top of the charts, lack confidence about his ability to tackle routine school challenges?

Thomas is not alone. For a few decades, it’s been noted that a large percentage of all gifted students (those who score in the top 10 percent on aptitude tests) severely underestimate their own abilities. Those afflicted with this lack of perceived competence adopt lower standards for success and expect less of themselves. They underrate the importance of effort, and they overrate how much help they need from a parent.

When parents praise their children’s intelligence, they believe they are providing the solution to this problem. According to a survey conducted by Columbia University, 85 percent of American parents think it’s important to tell their kids that they’re smart. In and around the New York area, according to my own (admittedly nonscientific) poll, the number is more like 100 percent. Everyone does it, habitually. The constant praise is meant to be an angel on the shoulder, ensuring that children do not sell their talents short.

But a growing body of research—and a new study from the trenches of the New York public-school system—strongly suggests it might be the other way around. Giving kids the label of “smart” does not prevent them from underperforming. It might actually be causing it.

Read more here:  http://snipurl.com/1oapi

Alan November: a guru

Want to find out where it is really at when it comes to technology and education? Visit and read anything that Alan November has put out – and you will be greeted by down to earth, practical and useful information about how it is important for educators to change their approach to the classroom and technology, and how we need to take advantage of rather than shy away from the huge world that technology opens up for us. So who is Alan November? This is from his blog:

Alan November is recognized internationally as a leader in education technology. He began his career as an oceanography teacher and dorm counselor at an island reform school for boys in Boston Harbor. He has been a director of an alternative high school, computer coordinator, technology consultant, and university lecturer. As practitioner, designer, and author, Alan has guided schools, government organizations and industry leaders as they plan to improve quality with technology.

Alan is well known for applying his humor and wit to inspire us to think about applying technology to improve learning. His areas of expertise include information and communication technology, planning across the curriculum, staff development, long-range planning, building learning communities and leadership development. He has delivered keynote presentations and workshops in all fifty states, in every province in Canada, and throughout the UK, Europe and Asia.

Alan was named one of the nation’s fifteen most influential thinkers of the decade by Classroom Computer Learning Magazine. In 2001, he was named one of eight educators to provide leadership into the future by the Eisenhower National Clearinghouse. His writing includes dozens of articles and the best-selling book, Empowering Students with Technology. Alan was co-founder of the Stanford Institute for Educational Leadership Through Technology and is most proud of being selected as one of the original five national Christa McAuliffe Educators.

You can keep up with Alan November’s thoughts and work through his blog at

http://nlcommunities.com/communities/alannovember/default.aspx and you can also read a number of his very informative articles and find his suggested useful websites through this site: http://www.novemberlearning.com/Default.aspx?tabid=1

As usual, there is far too much to read, and not enough time to do it, but by even subscribing to his blog using rss, you can at least take the time to see through the summaries of his entries where his thoughts are at … and who knows what this might inspire??

Until next time!

Kay

Keeping in Touch with Netvibes

This unique mashup allows you to capture all of your information needs in one place. By registering (it’s free) you get your own page that you can design however you choose. You can include your email account, your blog/s, any number of cool widgets, ALL of your rss feeds and heaps more! You can even include ‘universes’ that have pages devoted to celebrities and other interests. I have included a screen cap of my netvibes page so you can get the feel of it… I have a main page that has basic info that I would use like email, blog, news feeds, weather widgets, to do lists, photos from flickr etc, then several other ‘tabbed’ pages that have all of my rss feeds grouped according to category eg Japan, Education, Web 2.0 as well as my delicious page and other delicious pages that I manage or am interested in. It is a great little tool for keeping on top of everything – try it out!

(click on the thumbnail for a full size screen capture)

http://www.netvibes.com/

Kay.

Everything is Miscellaneous…..

I don’t know about you, but it seems like every day there is more to know, more to read, and not enough hours in the day to do it. I spend countless hours on the net, surfing, discovering sites and tagging them to read ‘later’ – but ‘later’ never comes – each day brings yet more sites to read and discover, and I seem to never catch up on those ones discovered previously.

Obviously others are feeling the same way, as the publication of the book ‘Everything is miscellaneous’ by David Weinberger explores just this topic. He argues that we need a change in thinking, and that this change is already on the way. A blurb from Amazon neatly summarises the book:

Human beings are information omnivores: we are constantly collecting, labeling, and organizing data. But today, the shift from the physical to the digital is mixing, burning, and ripping our lives apart. In the past, everything had its one place–the physical world demanded it–but now everything has its places: multiple categories, multiple shelves. Simply put, everything is suddenly miscellaneous.

In Everything Is Miscellaneous, David Weinberger charts the new principles of digital order that are remaking business, education, politics, science, and culture. In his rollicking tour of the rise of the miscellaneous, he examines why the Dewey decimal system is stretched to the breaking point, how Rand McNally decides what information not to include in a physical map (and why Google Earth is winning that battle), how Staples stores emulate online shopping to increase sales, why your children’s teachers will stop having them memorize facts, and how the shift to digital music stands as the model for the future in virtually every industry. Finally, he shows how by “going miscellaneous,” anyone can reap rewards from the deluge of information in modern work and life.

From A to Z, Everything Is Miscellaneous will completely reshape the way you think–and what you know–about the world.

Sounds to me like a book to have…. you can find it on Amazon by clicking on the title above.

Until next time!! Keep tagging!