Week+4


 * Week 4 - Monday, June 3 - Sunday, June 9 **


 * This Week's Lesson: ** Digital storytelling, vodcasts, and using social media as educational tools

**Required Readings:** There are TWO readings to complete this week

**Required Viewings:** There are FOUR viewings to complete this week

**This Week's Assignment/What's Due:** There is ONE thing due this week

**Reflections on Last Week**

Here are some comments to wrap up last week's work, plus a few notes on the end about class business. The video runs about 8 minutes.

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There are two parts to this week's lesson. One is to consider 'digital storytelling' as a specific pedagogical move to engage students and to help students organize their own learning. We'll start by reading an article by Bernard Robin (2006) (the paper is uploaded below) , which suggests that, "digital storytelling can generate interest, attention and motivation for the 'digital generation' students in today’s classrooms. The process can capitalize on the creative talents of students as they begin to research and tell stories of their own as they learn to use the library and the Internet to research rich, deep content while analyzing and synthesizing a wide range of content. In addition, students who participate in the creation of digital stories may develop enhanced communications skills by learning to organize their ideas, ask questions, express opinions, and construct narratives. It also can help students as they learn to create stories for an audience, and present their ideas and knowledge in an individual and meaningful way" (p. 4).
 * This Week's Lesson **

You have a major assignment due this week, which is to create a vodcast - as an example of digital storytelling - to present key content in a class that you teach. The assignment is described in further detail below.

The second goal of this week's lesson is to consider social media as an educational tool, by focusing specifically on  schools that[| collaborate using social media]//and// teachers and their uses of social media. A key example of this is the <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">social networking phenomenon of micro-blogging and its potential uses for educational purposes. Micro-blogging has become quite popular in the last five years. Facebook updates and Twitter are examples of micro-blogging which combine the conventions of texting with blogging. <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; line-height: 1.5;"> If you want to think more about how one school is *thinking* about social media, check out Chicago Public Schools' "Social Media Toolkit," with information and resources intended to be used by principals, staff and community.


 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #0000ff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Google+ Communities **

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">One of the social media tools we won't talk about much in this class but is still worth mentioning is Google+ Communities, which is a social forum, of sorts. These are communities of people who are interested in the same things and who regularly share ideas, content, and/or updates. There's everything from a Harry Potter group (with 85,000+ members) and an Android Group with over 107,000 members to two of the communities to which I belong, one being the EdTech community with over 4,100 members and another, the [|Google Apps for Education] with almost 4,500 members. This is yet another example of ways people are using media to "socialize" with others.


 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #0000ff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Facebook **

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">How many of you have a personal Facebook page? Some teachers have decided to create pages for their students/classes, as a means of providing course content and interaction between students and the teacher. From Edudemic, here's a list, for teachers, of "Things to do and not do with Facebook". You should also check out their 2011 article, "Every Teacher's Must-Have Guide to Facebook." You can also check out Facebook's page, "Teaching Digital Kids" as another resource. Some of this week's readings enable you to read and think about how teachers use Facebook in their classrooms and teaching. You might also consider checking out Edudemic's "100 (updated) ways to use Facebook in your classroom." And, from NPR and KQED (2011), here's "50 Reasons to Invite Facebook into Your Classroom."




 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #0000ff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Edmodo **

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Although we've already done a little bit with Edmodo, it fits well in this week's focus on social media. Some teachers like the idea of Facebook but are concerned about using it in their classrooms. In response to this, <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Edmodo has become a free site many teachers (including some of you) use with your students (and their parents/guardians) in your own classrooms. Some of you have already reviewed Edmodo for one of your tech tool posts and/or you already use it in your classroom. It "looks and feels" like Facebook but is intended specifically for classroom teachers and, in some circles, it has been nicknamed "Twitter for teachers." It is a fairly recent technology (circa 2008) which according to its website, has become " the fastest growing social learning network in the world." <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Edmodo provides a free classroom communication platform for teachers, students and administrators on a secure social network. The actual platform looks like a simplified, scaled down version of Facebook. Yet, Edmodo because it caters specifically to an educational community, does not have the security issues one might commonly associate with Facebook. Teachers (and students) use Edmodo to post homework reminders, share links,and school notices. Edmodo can be embedded into classroom websites and allows students to access it remotely even with mobile devices. For this week's viewing I have also including a tutorial video which explains more about Edmodo.


 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #0000ff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Twitter **

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Twitter is another social media site in which you are limited to a total amount of characters for each Tweet (i.e., 140 characters). Started six years ago, Twitter is now used around the world by educators and non-educators alike. So, Twitter is a great way to quick comments, links, and snippets of information (many media outlets like the BBC and CNN use Twitter in this way). Teachers are using it in their classrooms and with their students (K-higher education) to provide platforms for comments, ideas, and group discussions. Some teachers, who don't have the technology to support Twitter in their classrooms, have still taken to the idea of having students (individually and/or in small groups) write "tweets" in hard copy form as a means of encouraging concise, short responses to content. Check out "The Twitter Spectrum for Educators" from Edudemic, in which people use Twitter to "watch" others, "talk" to a broader community, and "produce" content and ideas for sharing. According to //A Washington Post// article, "Teachers Take to Twitter to Improve Craft and Commiserate" and another Edudemic blog post provides teachers with "25 Ways to Use Twitter to Improve Your Professional Development". T <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">he education community continues to ask: //<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">How can Twitter be used in educationally profitable ways in the classroom? // <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Some of this week's readings focus on the ways teachers are using Twitter for classroom use AND professional development. Personally, I find Twitter to be an incredibly rich resource which I use for my own professional development and learning. Unlike FB, I only post tech/education related content and I only follow people who will help me develop myself professionally (e.g., I don't follow celebrities, etc. - not that I follow them on FB, either, actually). For me, my FB account is my "social" account and my Twitter account is my "professional learning" account. My Twitter profile is **eduteachlearn**, if you want to find and follow me.




 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #0000ff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Today's Meet **

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Another "Twitter-like" technology is called Today's Meet. Today's Meet, though, allows for more privacy than Twitter. It allows you to extend a discussion online, but only with the people you choose to invite. Today's Meet allows teachers to"embrace the backchannel" of discussions in the classroom. According to Today's Meet website, "the backchannel is "everything going on in the room that isn't coming from the presenter." The back channel is where people ask each other questions, pass notes, get distracted, and give you the most immediate feedback you'll ever get. Instead of ignoring the back channel, TodaysMeet helps you leverage its power. Tapping into the back channel lets you tailor and direct your presentation to the audience in front of you, and unifying the back channel means the audience can share insights, questions and answers like never before." Check out social studies teacher, Bob Henson's use of Today's Meet with his students.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Today's Meet is also user-friendly, although in order to use it effectively your students need to be working individually or in pairs on a computer, laptop or tablet. Before a classroom discussion, you create a "room" on Today's Meet and then decide how long you intend to keep that discussion open. After that, Today's Meet will create a url link to your "room" and you send that to the people you would like to invite as part of the discussion. A participant joins in by adding his or her name and then contributing thoughts to the discussion. Many teachers have used Today's Meet as part of classroom discussions, debates, and even as a way to do brainstorming. Check it out and see if it could offer any affordances for your own teaching practice.


 * <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Required Readings: (there are TWO required readings this week) **

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Bernard Robin (2006)

and then read ONE of the following:


 * <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">The Hechinger Report. (2012). Twitter and Facebook might soon replace traditional teacher professional development. //Huffington Post//. <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">NOTE: This is a short article that reports on teachers' and companies' uses of social media to receive and deliver educational professional development. See what you think!


 * <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Gabriel, T. (2012). Speaking up in class, silently, using social media. //The New York Times//. <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">NOTE: The first article appeared last year in The New York Times and provides yet another look at teachers' uses of microblogging. You should also read through the comments, posted in conjunction with the article; these will give you another sense of the wider "conversation" some are having, focused on micro-blogging.


 * <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">Crowley, B. (2012). Tips for tech-cautious teachers. //Education Week Teacher//. <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">NOTE: This short article focuses on a larger question related to how (and when) teachers integrate technology into their teaching. Not only is this content applicable to this week, as we think about teachers and social media, but it's also pertinent to the entire content and course outline of TE 831. As you read through this author's ideas, consider the ways you fit or don't fit into her label of a "tech cautious teacher." Moreover, be sure to check out the Twitter feed she references in this piece.


 * <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Required "Viewings": (there are FOUR required viewings this week) **

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">**1.)** View the Slide Share Presentation, "Using Facebook and Twitter for Learning and Teaching" by Zaid Alsagoff (2012)

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">**2.)** Choose __ONE__ of the following SlideShare presentations to view, focused on Twitter OR watch the five-minute video focused on Today's Meet

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">"Are U Ready 4 Twitter" by Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano (2012) <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">"Twitter in Education" by Bram Faems (2012) <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">"Introduction to Twitter for Educators" by Samantha Morra (2009) <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">"Learn It In 5: Get Your Students Backchanneling with Todays Meet" by Mark Barnes

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">**3.)** Watch this (short, 8 minute) TED Talk on Twitter by co-founder, Evan Williams. In this video, he explains how Twitter started.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">**4.)** Watch __ONE__ of the following five TED talks (they're TED shorts, which means that they're shorter than regular TED talks), focused on social media. Although these videos are not all necessarily focused on education, they provide insight into social media and its varied uses.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">a. Alexis Ohanian: How to Make a Splash in Social Media <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">b. Clay Shirky: How Social Media Can Make History <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">c. Stefana Broadbent: How the Internet Enables Intimacy <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif;">d. Seth Godin: The Tribes We Lead


 * <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Georgia,serif;">This Week's Assignment/What's Due: (there is ONE things due this week) **

Because the vodcast project is significant, and because you are likely very familiar with the micro-blogging and social media tools discussed above, your only assignment this week is to complete and post your vodcast. The complete project is described here (including 5 exemplars to learn from), and I ask that you post your work here.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 10pt;">**Looking Ahead:**

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; line-height: 20px;"> You will need to post your second and final Tech Tool post on Sunday, June 16. In addition, since the content of that week's lesson is on connecting our general discussions of educational technology.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; line-height: 20px;">In addition, next week's lesson focuses on applying our discussion of educational technology to a specific subject area, context, student population and/or age/grade level. Part fo that work will be to re-purpose a lesson plan you've taught before to include different/more kinds of educational technology. It is also due Sunday, June 16 and is worth 20% of your grade.