Response to Standards #1

2.  Communication and Collaboration

Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, across the global community, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others.  Students:

B.      Effectively communicate and publish to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats.

This is a standard I would like to keep in mind and work on incorporating into my classroom this year. I have many differing ways for my students to ‘publish’ their final work on a variety of projects, yet I often veer towards the comfortable, both for myself and my students. We often use the document camera for students to share their work, but other than that I have done little beyond using the computer for my students to type of final copies or make title pages. I really would like to add some digital media experiences into a project. I have videoed their speeches before, but why have we not then gone the next step and put them on the web so that parents and grandparents could see them. (Because I don’t know how!) I wonder if we could do something like this and have a way for family to respond. I am even thinking having each student be responsible for posting one compliment to a couple of other students is a very interesting way begin to exploring with this standard in mind.

Response to Chapter One

Wow, I know my understanding of computers and the technology surrounding them is limited, but this chapter really sets me up to acknowledge that I truly have a very small grasp of 'computer land'. I enjoyed learning about Web 1.0 and Web 2.0, I honestly don't think I had any inkling that they existed prior to reading this chapter.
I appreciated the simple explanation of the differences between the two and identifying Web 1.0 as being the "static Internet" (p5) brings back memories of my beginning use of the computer. It is amazing to recognize the differences between the static internet and the one where we are currently operating. I found it interesting that they noted, “No one quite knows when we transitioned to Web 2.0…” (p7).
I am astounded at the minds of the people who have created these tools. I often have a difficult time even understanding how they operate, and yet someone else came up with the idea and put it together so that it actually works. Wow.

Organizational Tool Post #1

I decided to try a social bookmarking site. I loved the idea of making a list of websites that I could keep sorted out by units of study, and it was an added bonus to realize that I could also use it as a way to give my students a specific set of websites that I would like them to use. 

I really like the idea that I can have them open one link and then be able to search around within that link to different sites related to our unit of study. I would also like to play around with the idea of making the lists (called stacks) available to the kiddos at home and their parents. 
I chose the 'delicious' site to try out; both of the sites listed in the book were free, but the diigo site was only listed as a 'free trial'. 
I was able to set up two different stacks related to different units I teach. I played around and was able to send a link to my stacks to one of my cohorts. I have also gotten a couple of emails from the site, one that says someone is following my stack and the other that someone commented on my stack. However, the comment one was suggesting that I check out their site for fashion elements with me. If I end up getting things like that I will need to play around with the privacy settings.
At this point I feel successful in that I have at least got a start, but I also feel like there is a whole lot more to still figure out. I am excited about the possible use of this tool in my class.

First Post

Here we go, a first post.