Tag: class

Learning with Web 2.0 and Social Media #idt7078

IDT 7078I’m very excited to be starting another learning adventure with graduate students here at The University of Memphis. For the next seven weeks I’ll be teaching IDT 7078: Seminar in Instructional Design and Technology. This semester’s topic is Learning with Web 2.0 and Social Media. Many of you may recall (because you were active participants) that I previously taught this course with a similar topic (Teaching and Learning with Web 2.0) in the Summers of 2008 and 2009. In both of these instances the students collaborated to publish the first two editions of the ebook Teaching and Learning with Web 2.0. Their exemplary work earned nominations for the international Edublog Awards (2008, 2009).

I also offered this course during Spring 2013 and the seminar topic was Learning with Web 2.0. It was the first time that I’d incorporated my work from Harvard, the idea of making thinking visible with technology, into a course. It pushed everyone’s ideas about thinking, learning, understanding, and technology. This experience as well as the work and research I’ve continued to do in the past year have resulted in the development of the class that starts today.

This semester’s class promises to be another outstanding experience for all of us. It has been designed utilizing some of the best practices and student feedback from the earlier offerings, and now incorporates many of the innovations in technology that have been developed in recent years. As we consider all the “cool” technologies and social media we will always keep the focus on their contributions to learning. These technologies can help us go a long ways in making thinking visible.

It’s going to be a different sort of experience and a wildly fun journey into learning. We invite you to join us!

hgsepzfol #hgsepzfol

Bring on the Learning Revolution!

“In this poignant, funny follow-up to his fabled 2006 talk, Sir Ken Robinson makes the case for a radical shift from standardized schools to personalized learning — creating conditions where kids’ natural talents can flourish.

Creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson challenges the way we’re educating our children. He champions a radical rethink of our school systems, to cultivate creativity and acknowledge multiple types of intelligence.” (Source)

“Very many people go through their whole lives having no real sense of what their talents may be, or if they have any to speak of.” — Sir Ken Robinson

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Bill Cosby Addresses Graduates

Educator and comedian Bill Cosby spoke to the class of 2012 at Temple University’s 125th commencement. Dr. Cosby spoke about the troubles facing young people entering today’s work force and challenges the graduates to “wake up and not dream through” the next stage of life.

Hats off to this year’s graduates!

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Class Activity: Take a Virtual Trip through Google’s Servers

Here’s a quick activity that you can do in your classroom to explore the topic of sustainable energy. It comes to us from Google.

Introduction

Ever wondered what happens when you send an email? How does an email travel from your computer to your friend’s smartphone across the country or around the world?

Take a journey with Gmail and find out. In this short video you will follow an email on its journey to see what happens once you send a message. Along the way, you will learn about some of Google’s efforts to minimize its impact on the environment.

 

Exploration

Take a journey through Google’s data centers by following an email along its path. Along the way, explore Google’s data centers with videos, photos and more. It all begins when you click send. Click on the image below to begin the online module.


Google Green

Google claims it is creating a better web that’s better for the environment. Google states, “We’re greening our company by using resources efficiently and supporting renewable power. That means when you use Google products, you’re being better to the environment…At Google, we’ve worked hard to minimize the environmental impact of our services. In fact, to provide you with Google products for a month, our servers use less energy per user than leaving a light on for 3 hours. If you add in our renewable energy and offsets, our footprint is zero. And we continue to find new ways to reduce our impact even further.”

Learn more about about Google Green here.

Educational Connections

Science – environment, sustainable energy, renewable energy, green

Geography – locate the nearest Google data center using Google Maps

Math – calculations regarding distance, time, rate

Language arts – write a sample email, follow the writing process to edit and re-write your email

 

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Wordles of Every Inaugaration Speech [Video and Gallery]

Governing Dynamo has developed a gallery of all 56 American presidential inaugural addresses that includes full transcripts, Wordles (word cloud visualizations) and video footage. The video below can be a useful way to navigate through the gallery. Click on the glowing green dots in the video to learn more about an inaugural address.

Research and Collaborate with SimplyBox

SimplyBox is a free service that allows you to visually capture any part of a web page. As you collect items that you captured, you organize them in boxes. You can then share these items or boxes with friends, colleagues, … the world. The result is: efficient and visual collaboration around content. They call it “content networking.” (Source)

Overview

Research

  • Collect only the parts from a web page that you want.
  • Write your notes/comments on the content you found.
  • Have a direct link back to the sites each of your items were collected from.

Student Collaboration

  • Collect into a box useful content from the web and add your comments to it.
  • Share the box with your students, even if they are not SimplyBox users.
  • The students can add their comments and content.

Connecting Beyond the Classroom

  • Create boxes with content related to the different topics you teach.
  • Exchange the boxes with other teachers (even if in different schools!.
  • Have them help you find more content and engage their classes in the discussion.