Social Networking

It seems there is social networking going around everywhere! I ran across this article on BBC world news, which is a site that I follow on my bloglines about social networking that I found interesting:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7070815.stm

Then, I ran across this article about how Kylie Minogue has created her own social network called KylieKonnect for her fans to communicate with each other. The article can also be found on BBC World News:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7078581.stm

Another social network I ran across on gadling's blog is called dopplr which is a social networking cite for travelers. It is also a closed site which means one has to be invited into it, but you can read more about it on their blog:
http://blog.dopplr.com/

Blog thoughts

My CIS Modern Fiction students are starting to use the blog more. It is exciting to see them logging on and asking questions. I love that I have a place to post information for them as well, especially about things associated with the U and college applications that they might need, but don't need daily.

My AP Lit and Comp students don't use the blog very much. I still post information on it though and I will continue to monitor their usage of the blog.

My ninth graders are in the middle of the road. I wonder if a website would be more useful for all my students, but I do like the idea that they can have an ongoing conversation. I think I will have this information for parents at conferences so they know they can also use these blogs as a resource.

Other thoughts on technology--I love being able to present information on Power Point! Love it, love it, LOVE IT!

Teacher usage of the wikis...the jury is still out...


P.S. I found this info about Iraqis blogging, which I thought was interesting: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/7069943.stm

Thing 36: Social Networking

I remembered how shocked I was to learn about MySpace and how much information students were willing to share on it--personal information that I would never want shared in such an open forum. My students were talking abut Facebook recently and were telling me how much better this was for social networking. This is just beyond my grasp right now; I don't think I will be creating an account with either social networks any time soon.

On the other hand, I know a lot of people in library school with me have accounts on facebook. I know some teachers have profiles on MySpace. I am not sure why I have such a hang up about it, but maybe it is because I haven't tried it out yet; maybe it is just my techniphobia coming out.

Anyway, I learned about linkedin: relationships matter in class one day. This is social networking on a professional level, which I thought was really interesting. After you have set up a profile, you can network with other people that are either in your business or that you went to school with (you need a preexisting relationship with them). You can ask them to be linked to you and then you can share questions with each other through the first three rungs of connections. The answers can be rated then so you can see how other people view the advice that is given. You can also recommend people like an online reference which is good for job searching or if you are hiring, good for networking, and good for quick leads to find more information. It seems businesses are using social networking and the technology out there to their benefit while my first instinct is to bury my head in the sand...I see how the inner circle could be shifted based on how much technology one knows about. It is like a secret handshake or password. I imagine that libraries could also use a system like this to ask each other reference questions and the like. I can imagine teachers connecting to other teachers to ask questions about curriculum, etc. This could be really cool!

The website can be found at:
http://www.linkedin.com/

Think 6 and 7: Get to Know RPC/teacher page

I just assigned a seven to ten page research paper to my AP Literature and Composition class on Wednesday. This made me think that I should review the RPC so that I can share this information with my students. I plugged in the appropriate data into the RPC and it quickly gave me the project broken down into five parts. I really like this feature as well as the questions the RPC asks in order to keep students going through the process. It occurred to me when I was grading the CIS Modern Fiction journals for The Dubliners that sometimes students don't even know they don't know something so how can they ask the questions to answer these unknown problems. Then I thought, how can I answer questions that I don't anticipate? It is easy for me to answer questions after the project is finished, but then it is almost too late for students to get the greatest benefit from the answer. Anyway, this made me think that the RPC questions are very valuable. I am going to introduce this resource to my students tomorrow--and of course, I have already created a link to it from the AP Lit and Comp blog.

I really like the links on the teacher resource page. The checklist is really nice as well as the rubric programs that are linked. It is nice to have resources so teachers don't have to reinvent any wheels. All of this technology and researching these new things are just more reminders that I am bringing authentic lessons to students, which I think is really great.

Thing 16: MnLINK

I just reviewed MnLINK and what a resource it is! I am going to tell all my students about it and have already created a link to it on all my class blogs. I think this will be a great resource for them if they have a library card, which reminds me that I need to make sure they all have a library card! The fact that you can do an advanced search, request the search to limit it based on the format of information one is looking for--DVD, book, VHS, etc--but search all the library databases at the same time, and then you can request this information through interlibrary loan, is really amazing. I just assigned a research paper in my AP Literature and Composition class so I will make sure that I tell them about this resource ASAP. I am also going to post the information on the English department wiki so all the English teachers know about this resource.

The Wonders of Wikis

Finally, we have actually "launched" the 9th grade academy wiki and the ninth grade advisors were really excited! I presented the information with my projector and laptop and walked them through how to use the wiki. Two people have already gotten on the wiki and edited pages. One advisor that has already edited pages was actually absent from the meeting, but since I posted the minutes from the last two meetings on the wiki she knew what to do--and she was excited to know where to go as well (I passed out a hard copy of the agenda into advisors mailboxes to let them know about the wiki.) I hope this is a valuable resource for all the teachers. Since we have 23 people in our academy, I think the wiki will be great to keep us all connected.

P.S. The wiki was received so well that one person brought me flowers the day after our wiki launch. It makes all this hard work really worth it!

Blog presentation

I gave four presentations today after school for four out of the five blogs I created for link crew; one of the other coordinators has a projector and is familiar with blogs so he could lead his own group through the presentation. I am very optimistic. The students seemed excited; a few of the link leaders are in some of my classes so they are familiar with my blog usage already, but a lot of the students seemed excited that they could use a blog for a school related activity.

Tomorrow the ninth grade academy will present the ninth grade academy wiki to the advisors. We'll see if teachers are as enthusiastic about new technology as the students seem to be.

Another Wiki

I just created a new wiki for a small group I am working with in library school. We are focusing our project on the National Geographic Library, which is very exciting. This library has so many resources and we hope to be better adept at working with technology so we decided to create a wiki not only to share ideas with each other but to ensure we know how to use the technology ourselves. I was happy to know how to set up a wiki to be helpful to my group--and it just gets easier and easier to work with technology the more I do so!

Seriously, I need to go grade some papers!

Blog blog blog blog...blog

Here I go again--procrastinating on my grading for technology. I created five new blogs yesterday for our Link Crew program. After talking to the other coordinators and hearing how they thought the blog concept would be great but their overwhelming emotion was stress since they have never created their own blog, I decided to make the blog for them. This way, we--the program--get the benefits of the blog with no stress.

For the link crew program, we have divided our over 100 leaders into five coordinators to monitor them and answer any questions. We have a "link crew review" one a month where the link leaders meet with their coordinator and process the activities of the previous month. This is not a mandatory session, but most of the students attend. Because it is not a mandatory meeting, it has been hard keeping track of who was not there and what to do with their "reflection journal" after they hand it in and how to incorporate them within the discussion held at the meeting. Additionally, we wanted a place for them to talk to each other, a central location where they can find resources, let us know when they are having problems, etc--a central headquarters if you will. We have tried having this as a physical space in the building but it is hard to maintain and we were dealing with a lot of different pieces of paper, notes they would leave us (and then we would wonder who took care of the problem) and stuffing mailboxes to alert them of any communications, etc.

The blog seemed to be the answer--a virtual headquarters where one coordinator would be able to talk to a small group of link leaders. In order to cut down on any stress that might come from integrating technology for the other coordinators, I can monitor the blogs and they just need to check it once a month--like the link leaders. I hope that by checking their own blogs, they will start feeling more familiar with the technology and take their blog's ownership on. If not, we still have a great resource for the students. I'll let you know how the process goes.

A New Thing

This really isn't about one of the "things" we need to do, but having the new computer has really inspired me to try out new technologies. Two of my colleagues and I are planning to take a group of students to England and Ireland this summer but we want it to be very literary and offer an independent study for it. We are in the advertising stage so we thought we should make a movie to play on the morning news--so I made one. I am super excited about it--my first ever imovie! I also made all kinds of cool flyers with "pages," which was also very easy to work with. I am used to working with Microsoft Publisher to make flyers and brochures so it was fun to work with apple's version of this. I made some fun flyers through comic life as well. There are so many fun templates to work with!

Additionally, for this independent study travel class this summer, I hope to implement the use of blogs as we travel as one of the class components. It will be a great way for parents to keep up with the travels as well as a great place for students to reflect on their experience. We'll see how it all pans out.

Thing 15: Collaboration--Take Two

I am really excited about how the wikis I have created are being used. I now have updated them both to be more useful. For example, for the ninth grade academy wiki, I have finished attaching the Wednesday lesson plans and have attached the minutes from the last meeting. I also created a "Frequently Asked Questions" link and answered some questions that I anticipated people might ask.

The newest thing that I added was that for each advisor I have included on their own page a list of their advisees with the link leader that is mentoring the advisee. This will cut down on a lot of paperwork and paper-chasing. This way, advisors can edit their lists as new students are added or leave the advisory when they need to versus in past years when we (the ninth grade academy coordinators) generate a paper list twice a year. Then each advisor edits the list and hopefully returns the list to us, which doesn't always happen so then we have to chase the advisors around until we get all of them turned in again. Then we take the paper copy and adjust our records. Then, we pass out the lists to the link leaders so they know who is added/subtracted from their list (...and we have expected them to be mentoring those students who they/we didn't know about...ridiculous!). This will allow advisors to have control of this process and it will allow the records to be updated when they see fit and everyone can see the records as well. I love that each time the wiki is updated, I will get an email about it which means I don't have to check the wiki unless I get notified of a change--and that no one else needs to get these notifications if they don't want them because unwanted emails are the last thing we are trying to generate. Link leaders will be able to mentor their ninth graders more effectively and efficiently as well which is the goal!

On top of all those benefits, it introduces the wiki concept to so many teachers. One teacher has already gotten on their page and updated their list of students and formatted the page the way she wanted. She was really excited about it too, which really is the end goal. The ninth grade academy coordinators have prided ourselves on creating a user friendly program that is effective. I am happy to add this new technology to enhancing this mission. (This wiki has not been publicized yet. We will introduce it to the advisors at our next meeting October 23rd. The people that are testing it out are the other ninth grade academy coordinators).

The other new feature I added to the English department wiki is for each individual English teacher's page I have typed their room number and schedule so we have easy access to when people are teaching which subject and when their prep is. I also started to add links to the curriculum I have created so that people can use it when they want to. It gives new teachers some additional support as well as gives them insights on the expectations we have as a department. The department is currently reorganizing our books and once we have this data available, I am going to add the book list for each class. This way we can see who teaches what and which books belong in which class.

It also gives administration another resource as well. If a parent wants to know what the curriculum is for each class, the administration will have a place to go. Currently, the administrator has to track down who teaches the class and then ask them to print out their lessons which is time absorbing. The parent may or may not pick it up, which creates waste of time and resources. Lastly, we all know of those teachers who are not quite following the prescribed curriculum and say they didn't know any better. Despite the fact that they should know better, this gives everyone another place where she/he can take responsibility to look at what the curriculum is for each course.

The greatest thing, though, is we can really collaborate with each other and share best practices. We can actually support each other on a common mission instead of recreating the wheel over and over. Each person can add things and collaborate when he/she has the time, a seemingly decreasing resource, and can find answers to questions when they have them. The opportunity to really share best practices is really exciting! I imagine that instead of taking the time to reinvent something someone else has, we can use that time to make everything that much better.

Thing 33: Some other thing

I have been trying to change the template of my blog. I have grown bored of it and wanted to freshen it up; maybe if its skin was changed, it would allow me to find more creative things to write about as well. The remaining things on the list don't intrigue me presently so I have procrastinated tackling any of those things to change the appearance of my blog instead, which is neither a mandatory task or an efficient one--and as it turns out, an ineffective one to boot.

I tried some of the templates that blogger offers and grew tired of them even faster. I went to some of the sites that blogger recommends to find a new skin and searched these sites for what seemed like hours. Well, it actually was hours...There are so many to choose from, but now I cannot figure out how to attach it to my blog. I tried changing my blog's html to classic to see if that would make the new skin attach, but that did not work either. I have run out of ideas and so my blog has returned to its old skin; sadly, it did not evolve into something new and beautiful. I have nothing to show for my hours of labor, but I do have thoughts ruminating so although I have lost this battle, I have not given up the war.

Projector usage

Today I used my projector to give a power point presentation on T. S. Eliot for my AP Literature and Composition class. It was easy and it really kept the students' attention. They really liked the transition effects from slide to slide. It was also really fast to shift my previous notes into a power point presentation since they were already typed; I did it over my lunch break on a whim since I have all of these great resources available to me. I hope to create a power point presentation for each major lecture. It will make things easier in the long run and more digestible for the students. I love my projector!

Thing 15: Collaboration

I brought my students to the library the second week of school to start the collaboration process, which is the usual procedure for me. I love being able to bring my students to the library and have Leslie give them an introduction to the library and the research process. The students watch attentively and they get a bookmark that Leslie makes with the passwords to the databases so they can access them from home. The next week we return to the library to check out books and get these great handouts Leslie has available in the library giving students the correct way to cite different sources using MLA format.

What was really interesting to me is that because of the MILP surveys, which were given after the two different trips to the library, I get to see how much work I need to do to get them to understand research. I don't know if any of the information Leslie presented on when into their heads based on an initial glance through the surveys. It was really eye-opening that we can go through all of the correct steps and the students may not absorb anything. The collaboration process has just begun! More on this later as we go through the research process.

Thing 4: Get to know your public library

The busiest public library in the state, the Roseville branch of the Ramsey County Library, is very close to my house. I would never guess it is the busiest library in the state since every time I am there, it is peaceful, it has the feeling that there is a lot of room to wander without being interrupted by other people, there is never a long line at the check out desk. Being a library student at St. Kate's, I have researched a few public libraries, special libraries, and I have access to the library at St. Kate's and the U of M. This is how I discovered it is the busiest library in the state.

Anyway, I obviously believe in using libraries. I tell all my friends to go to libraries for resources, to study, to get a cup of coffee even. I think that I spend a lot of time at various libraries studying a variety of subjects depending on the library I am at. When I arrived at the public library on Sunday, I remembered why I am not the best library patron. I had not returned one of the books I had checked out last time and I had already created a $7 fee--on one book. I could have just purchased the book at half price books and had all the time to read it (I didn't get to read that book that created that fee). On top of that, I checked out another book--despite the fact that I didn't get to read the last book I checked out. It is like netflix. I let the movies sit in my house for weeks and then half the time I return them without watching them. I returned home thinking, "Are you an idiot? Do you not have enough to do that you must check out a book that you will not read and have to pay for anyway?" I feel guilty already.

In any case, most of my students have a public library card just based on a show of hands in an informal class survey. I meant to get some applications on Sunday, but I was thrown by my $7 fee. I will have to return soon to get them for the students who do not have a library card--which might get me to return my latest check out before a fee is earned.

Sitemeter

I thought that I had attached my sitemeter to my blog the first day I set up my blog. A few weeks later, after getting two weeks of 0 visits to my blog, I continued to live in denial that I had attached it. Then I got an email, thank goodness, from the sitemeter people who said I hadn't finished the process and they gave me a step by step video to watch online. Now, I hope that I have attached it correctly. I am not sure really since I haven't had a chance to watch the whole video so I watched the first few seconds and guessed from there. It now says I have had one visitor to my blog, so that is better than nothing; one is always better than none.

P. S. Now that I know how to attach the sitemeter to the blog, I have added a sitemeter to all of the blogs I have. It is really cool! I love being able to see how many people visited the blog and where they are visiting from. I attached one to one of the wikis I created as a trial run. I wonder if anyone knows if this can be attached to the wiki because right now I just have the html on the wiki, but the icon doesn't appear anywhere. If anyone knows if this can be done, please let me know!

Blog usage--homework for parents

Another English teacher sent me this link to a New York Times article about an English teacher in New Jersey who requires the parents to log onto the class blog and comment on different pieces of literature. The teacher states that if the parent does not respond, the student's grade could be effected. Can you imagine how this would work in St. Paul? The idea is that students will do better if their parents are involved. The parents comment on different excerpts that the students are studying. If the parent states in a letter that they would not participate in the assignment, the student was not penalized. If the parent wanted to email or call their response in, the teacher would also accept this. Fascinating idea...

Here is the address of the article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/04/education/04homework.html

Thing 32--Take Three: Wikis

After creating the English Department wiki, I presented it to the department today. I was actually surprised about how warmly it was received. One never knows how technology in general will be received--if it will be interpreted as more work or not. I am optimistic that it will be used. A few teachers seemed to have the same vision for its potential as I had when creating it. Using technology is great, but being able to share the excitement is so much more powerful.

On a side note, the other wiki I created is being temperamental. I created an avatar for each of my coworkers that co-coordinate the ninth grade committee with me. That was great fun! I called another teacher that is one of the co-coordinators and we had such a great laugh at the first four that I had created--one of them being her. She really liked them and so I thought that it would be fun to have her help create the last avatar with me. This way, I had to walk her through the necessary steps in using the wiki and also how to create an avatar. The likelihood of her using the two wikis I created is much higher now (she is also an English teacher). If everyone had the opportunity to have a one-on-one mentor to coach them through the process, one would never get frustrated with using new technology. (Of course, it is time consuming and an unrealistic idea, but a gal can dream!) Now, when I log into the wiki, one of the avatars have dropped off the page and when I try to reload it by entering the edit page, it gives me the whole page in html. I don't know what to do!

Thing 32--Take Two: Wikis

As I suspected, I have could not stop at creating just one wiki and have now created a second one. I keep seeing ways that technology would be helpful all around me. I also think I am postponing my grading by playing with technology--so this one will be the last wiki I create for a while.

This second wiki is for my English department. I keep thinking that if I can introduce new technology to even one other teacher, I could reach so many more students--it could have an exponential effect. I created a page for each teacher and for each course we offer in the department, which currently is 30. This way people can collaborate easier for the subjects they teach. The wiki can be used as a kind of server--as well as a great resource for new teachers teaching a course. I don't know if the other people in my department will use it, but I did talk to two people who seem interested in at least trying it out.