Racing ahead, falling behind.

I have been grappling with incorporating technology, web 2.0, and other "alternative" methods of teaching for the past few weeks. I have a Twitter group of educators and technology pioneers that I follow regularly. From this I read how others are using various technologies in their classrooms. Of course being very curious I follow links provided and discover new web 2.0 sites.
I also use an RSS feed to aggregate blogs that I read. This allows me to quickly scan what other bloggers are thinking. I also blog myself but not as regularly as some.
A web 2.0 that I have been using in the classroom is PBWiki. A wiki is an easily edited read write web page. I have been using this in my classroom having my student create web pages about their art work. The kids are very interested in publishing to the web but I do not have the time in my class to devote to an in depth study of wikis by the students.
Another wiki that I use regularly with web 2.0 is Wikipedia. Some view the information on Wikipedia as suspect because anyone can create or edit entries. But because of the rapidly developing aspect of web 2.0 wikipedia is often the only source of information. (That is why many of the references in this blog use Wikipedia) Often current events are updated on Wikipedia as they happen. I am writing this on the evening of February 19th 2008 and early this morning Castro announced that he was steping down as the leader of Cuba. Just a short time later that day contributors had begun changing the entry on Castro to include the fact that he had stepped down and his brother is taking power. I think that this feature of a wiki is very interesting.
I have also begun a lesson plan wiki to collect and share lessons with other art teachers. Blissart is also a PBWiki that I encourage other art teachers to add to, the password is #1art, go figure.
To be continued.....