20 Web 2.0 tools evaluation

I just finished a class the other day that taught me 20 web 2.0 tools.  I was initially taking it for re-certification to be honest, it turned out to be a great learning experience with a lot of value for my classroom.

I learned about blogspot which has allowed me to create this blog.  I really feel that blogspot will be a part of my class from now on.  I will probably reorganize what I have here because I'm kind of doing this particular blog for two purposes which has really cluttered it up a bit.  I'm not sure I would have used this program at all if it wasn't for this class.  I saw blogging as something beyond my ability and I found out that it is really amazingly easy.

I learned skills for dressing up pictures with mash-ups, animoto slide shows, and how to create glogster posters.  I will probably use some of the mash-up type things again, they could probably help me create some nice graphics for my class.

Another big focus was aimed at helping us establish broader professional learning networks.  We learned about diigo, google reader, twitter, and facebook.  All of these help us reach out and connect with other people.  This becomes valuable to us as educators through the wealth of knowledge that opens up to us by joining other networks of educators.  Now that I am so connected it leads me to many interesting articles and resources for my classes.

I would recommend this class for people of all levels of ability.  From beginners to some that are more advanced, this class will definitely help you learn any new programs, and help you create a broader professional learning network.

Free tech for teachers

Marcia Jensen our librarian turned me onto this blog that follows technology that could be useful for teachers.

http://www.freetech4teachers.com/

While perusing this site a few times I have found a couple interesting resources.  I haven't decided how to use them yet but they do have promise.

I found a couple tools for creating flashcards that looked like they could be beneficial to students in there studies.  I do wish that students in our building had the opportunity to use these more in class during lessons because that would be ideal.

The first flashcard site I looked at was Zen.do.  This program was for note-taking during lessons.  The neat part of this program was that you could highlight important notes and it would create note cards for you.

The second flashcard tool I looked at was called Cobocards.   I liked this one better than the other one just because it seemed more organized.  You had to type in the information for the note cards which could be more time consuming.  It didn't seem to be that bad when I watched the video tutorial.

Both of these sites could be a great help for students that like to use flashcards for studying.  It would definitely be quicker for me typing than creating flashcards by hand.


Another resource I came across when reading an article on the blog.  I clicked to read the article and it took me to Scribd.  Scribd is an online publishing site where people can upload or print off articles.  I was reading the article and I became distracted by Scribd and started messing around doing searches and found that this could be a great find.  Lots of free resources so far from what I have found that could benefit my classes.  So far this might be the best tool I have found while being networked with the blog link above.

Networking is a powerful resource.  My librarian gave me this site to look at and explore, I was able to find some interesting tools.  Maybe I won't use the flashcard tools much but maybe someone will read this and explore, like, and use them.  I know I will use Scribd as a resource for my classes and this Site opened the door for that for me.  You have to go exploring to join the networking that is taking place all over the Internet, who knows what you might find.

Mashup use in the classroom

The previous two posts show some mashups I created using various web tools.  Mashups can provide an interesting method for helping to dress up presentations.  Out of the three I posted I think the poster could be the most valuable for Sociology classes.  Students could find a picture that represents current topics and create a quick and powerful representation and see how it affects people.

Any students that want to do this just go to BigHugeLabs.com and create a poster.  Survey the reaction of your friends and family and bring it to class to share.

More Mashups

 Interesting methods of tweaking your photos for presentation.

My kids from Cartoonize.net







Here is a trading card from BigHugeLabs.com