Student Web Pages

My students have been working on their web pages for about 3 weeks now. I began by training about 5 students (that is the number of laptops that I have set up in my classroom) on the use of PBWiki. Then these 5 were responsible for training the next 5. This way I could continue with the regular instruction of the class and students were responsible themselves for learning to create their web pages ans for catching up on what I had been teaching in class.
So far most students are accepting the added responsibility.
I have even had reports of students working on and teaching about web page creation during their computer lab time. I am especially pleased about this development because from my observation most time spent in the computer lab is spent playing "educational" games.
I'm hoping that from this other teachers will encourage students to use their time in the computer lab for the creation of more original works.

Student Web Pages

For the past few months I have been reading and studying about using web 2.0 in the classroom. I am now in the process of involving students in the creation of authentic writing about their art on their own web page. They are very excited about the prospect of reaching a very wide audience with their art and writing. I am using a wiki space called PBWiki and it is very easy to use. I have created a site for each class I teach and each student in that class will have their own page to work on.
This week I gave them all a very brief overview if the project. I started by explaining that we would be using a piece if art that we have been working on from the beginning of the school year. I photographed the art and the students wrote about their art. I showed the students how I use paper and pencil to plan out my web pages and that was what they would be doing.
I have always had a difficult time getting students to write about their art in my class but with the prospect of writing to the web most students took off. Many wrote on both the front and back of their papers. Whoa what a hook!
Another feature on PBWiki is the comment section. This allows students and others to make comments about a page and the content of that page. I think that this will also be a powerful tool in getting the kids reading, thinking and writing.
Next week I will be showing the students and interactive net safety presentation. The district is asking that we do this and I think that it is a good idea to explain to the students what to look out for while working on the web.
This should be fun.

Vision of Students Today

Viki!

While browsing members web pages on a Twitter session I came across this fun Widget. Voki lets you create an animated figure that speaks with your voice.

Get a Voki now!

K12 Online

In one of the many blogs I read I came across a reference to an online conference for educators interested in emerging technologies. Wow this seems to speak directly to me and the focus of my interest of lately. Right now if you access the web site you can find "teasers" videos of the scheduled events. My understanding is that you can view the workshops live online and interact with the presenters. That should be pretty cool. I'm going to try and catch some of the presenters.

Social Bookmarking

Social bookmarking is the latest of web 2.0 that I have discovered. OK it’s probably a discovery that has already been found by many before me. But I still find it exciting. This is yet another way that information can be saved, stored, organized, and shared with others.

del.icio.us is a website that allows users to create editable pages of links. This could be a great tool for teachers. Now we can easily save and share web sites with other teachers and students. Here is a link to my del.icio.us page. http://del.icio.us/ChanBliss here you will find a link to a video that explains social bookmarking.

As I play with this I’m sure that I will find more things that can be done with this “technology”. I guess on a basic level it allows you to carry your favorites with you.

Learn, teach, learn, teach

I’ve been reading other blogs about using web 2.0 in an educational setting. I guess as with any emerging theories there are many different opinions of how web 2.0 should be used in the classroom.

Some see the use of the web, blogs, podcasts, wikis, MySpace, Flicker and other collaborative web based tools to be liberating and empowering. Others cannot understand allowing that much unscripted, unsupervised activity in a classroom or any learning environment.

Being a classroom teacher I understand the need for control. Conversely as an artist I understand the need for freedom in a creative environment. The challenge now is to balance the two needs.

Of course mistakes will be made but those mistakes should not be a signal to return to the old ways of teaching. With the speed of change happening teachers must learn to teach as they learn. Learn, teach, learn, teach… It is a brave new world that is recreating itself faster than we can get use to the old one.

Social networking in schools

From a report by the National School Boards Association the internet isn't as dangerous as people think, and teachers should let students use social networks at school.

From this article it appears that the dangers of the internet are created more by the media and political fear mongers that reality.