535 Week 6- In Which I Don't Exactly Make This Difficult

I recall writing in one of my blog posts that once we learned about RSS feeds, it would over-take my use of Twitter for finding appropriate news and ideas. After using Feedly for just a few weeks, I think that prediction was correct. RSS is a simple way of getting useful information- and I don’t have to wade through lots of unrelated tweets to get the material. I currently only have about five sites in my RSS feed, but I would like to add to that and use it on a regular basis as part of my Professional Learning Network.

Specific
My goal will be to double the size of my RSS feed to ten sites that regularly post quality content. I feel this is an attainable goal- I don’t want to set the bar too high and clutter up my RSS feed with mediocre content. Right now, the advantage of RSS over Twitter is that all of the content is all relevant and useful. I’d also like to set a pattern for checking my RSS feed. Coaching can make my life pretty busy, so I’ll set the goal of checking my RSS feed three times a week, and reading at least two articles each time.

Measurable
Obviously, it will be easy to measure whether or not I have ten sites in my RSS feed, and whether or not I’m reading at least six articles per week. The measure I want to focus on, though, is quality. If I only read six articles per week, that means four of those sites didn’t put up anything that I considered worth reading. I expect to regularly go beyond six articles per week, so if one site regularly doesn’t make the cut, I need to find better content.

I would add that I should set a goal of implementing something I read into my classroom, but I balk slightly at that idea. It seems odd to set a goal of implementing an idea that I haven’t heard yet, under the assumption that there will be something I like. I’ve made numerous changes to the structure of my classroom over the course of this program, most with very positive results. I don’t feel that I’m hesitant to make changes or try ideas that I think would work. I think the main focus for me should be on getting a better variety of information-the implementation will follow.

Attainable
This goal seems very attainable, as long as I make it part of my regular routine. There is no shortage of quality blogs and websites, and the RSS feed makes checking them more convenient. Although there are many nights during a sport’s season that I come home, eat, then go to bed without opening my computer, I just need to make a point to do it.

Realistic
I feel this goal is very realistic. In fact, it’s probably setting the bar pretty low. However, I think RSS can be very useful, and I don’t want to turn it into a chore.

Timely
I will be starting to goal of checking the feed at least three times a week starting immediately. As for the goal of adding five more sites to the feed, I will continue to read on Twitter, and will keep an eye out for sites that are regularly linked. As I find blogs and sites that I like, I will add them. I will set the goal of five more quality sites added to my feed to be accomplished by Spring Break. Again, this seems like a very easily accomplished task, but I really want to focus on finding sites that will regularly produce high-quality content- not just a site that occasionally posts good content between posts along the lines of “Here’s a little something that just crossed my mind."

On an unrelated side-note, my Language Arts 2 class started a unit last week involving blogs and wikis.  Here is the link for the wiki.  I just showed them the basics, then turned them loose.  It's interesting to see how each group is using the tools slightly differently, but they're all doing an awesome job so far.

535 Week 5- Facebook, Ning, and Google Sites

I'll try to avoid repeating anything I've already said in previous posts or in my Eyejot video, but I make no guarantees. I liked reading about friendship-based and interest-based networks. I obviously have my Facebook account to keep in touch with my friends, but it made me think of a few years back when I started following a Sabermetric-heavy baseball blog. I had no interest at all in math, being a Language Arts teacher, but the fact that math was used in relation to something I already like really piqued my interest. I ended up coming around to the idea of advanced stats, and it's been easier for me to see how measurements and formative assessments could really be useful in the classroom. Getting kids out there into the online world increases the chances that they can find something of interest that can relate to the goals of the unit.

The addition of Facebook and Ning was almost a little overwhelming for me. Between blogs, wikis, Twitter, and making class websites, it seems like the ways to get information from one person to the other is never-ending. But, I suppose that's a good thing. We don't know which of these technologies will survive, which will mutate, and which will die on the vine. Letting students get comfortable with a number of different technologies helps assure that when the next big thing comes out, they'll be better prepared for it. Plus, if students know 50 different ways to send information, they can choose the best one to complete a given task. And weighing the benefits of different forms of communication, then deciding based on audience and purpose is critical thinking- just a little added bonus that wasn't even part of the lesson.

535 Week 3- Podcasting and Google Sites

I posted on the message board yesterday that podcasting is something I'd love to include in my classroom, but there are some hurdles in the way. I've often been frustrated with colleagues' hesitancy to include technology in the classroom, and their way to invent reasons it wouldn't work. I guess you just have to pull up your britches and get it done. Now that I've thought about it for an extra day, I think I'm going to offer it as a choice activity for a book group project later in the year. I think it's a great way to reinforce learning, encourage discussion, and would really appeal to some of my students.

Google Sites is something I also hope to start using with my students. We're currently wrapping up a research unit where the finished product is an advertisement and a business letter. In the future, I may put less emphasis on the letter, though I would still like them to be familiar with the form, and focus on making a website for their imaginary country. Once they get the hang of it, it would be a great option for all their other projects.

What I like the most about learning all of these tools is the wide variety of project options I can offer to my students. They've reacted very positively to all the tools I've added as a result of this Masters program, and I'll be taking my first crack at wikis next week. Hopefully all of these tools will be standard options for my students in the not-too-distant future.

535 Week 3- RSS and Photo Sharing

In talking about Twitter a few weeks ago, I said that I would probably dump Twitter for RSS as soon as I figured out how to use it.  After tooling around with RSS for a little while, I do like it, but I don't think it does quite the same thing that Twitter does.  It's great for keeping up with a few blogs that you find reliable and informative.  Instead of having to remember to go visit a whole bunch of different blogs, they come right to you.  I can see this being especially helpful for those blogs that don't follow a regular posting schedule, or don't post very often.  It's something I will likely continue to use as an educator.  That said, I think it would be annoying to subscribe to dozens and dozens of blogs- it would be tough to get past all the mediocre content to the really good stuff.  Twitter is great for people being able to share the one good article on a site that may have been posting so-so content for months.  If other people are willing to sift through a huge RSS feed and share the good stuff, then I'll go ahead and let them.

So RSS turned out to be pretty much what I expected.  The activity on photo sharing and creative commons licenses surprised me.  I used Flickr for this because I had used it in the past to post some of my wonderful Photoshop experiments onto a baseball blog.  Thus, the site itself didn't really surprise me.  When it came time to make a license, though, I wasn't just going through the motions anymore.  I had to take a second and think, "Ok, if someone decided to use one of my pictures, how would I want that to work?"  For me, it was that moment we always hope to get out of our students- when the work they post online really starts to feel like something that can be shared with an entire community.  This is something I think I will start to do with my own students.  The simple act of licensing their own content may flip that same switch for them, and make them feel like the content they post for my class is not just something to get done for Mr. Granger, but something they can be proud of.  It's kind of like that moment when their art class project gets hung up on the wall.  The added upside to this is it gives them a look at copyright laws from the other side.  Right now, when most of my students hear "copyright", the first thing that comes to mind is "that annoying thing that makes me have to paste the url for any photos I use in a Power Point."  But, deciding how their own content will be used may give them a better understanding of why copyright exists, and maybe change a few minds.

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