March 3, 2008
E-Journal Entry #4
EDT598
Dear Journal,
I have had a good week concerning EDT598 and the subject of technology. I am finally caught up on all of our reading assignments from the textbook and related articles. This has slowed me down with my Forest59 Blog entries as I want to include my comments on the reading, in addition to our class work and other assignments. The assigned chapters and related articles dovetail nicely with the class work and assigned web sites we have been exploring!
I though our class on February 25 and the related assignments were quite interesting! Even though I struggled to keep up while we set up our del.icio.us accounts, I did get my account set up and, basically, understood the process. As I started to add links to my account and re-tag them for my own use, I was able to successfully negotiate the options and complete the exercise pretty smoothly. I have to admit I enjoyed creating categories and organizing my tags! It is easy to see how this 2.0 Web Tool can assist teachers and students to get organized and stay organized with Web Sites for class resources, pertinent to the work to be done. And, of course, all done in real time!
I visited the “education-world” web site and read all the links. There was a lot to absorb. This site does a good job of reinforcing the material I am reading in the textbook and related articles. Social Bookmarking as the open source, web based, metadata driven movement that is a big factor in “flattening” the world. By using “tags” and “tag clouds” as the key to organize your on-line bookmarks and connect your information, data, and research with others across the globe, the on-line social bookmarking systems circumvent the “bottleneck” of time and materials that exist in more traditional forms of information gathering.
While reading through the top sites cited on “education-world” I found the link ”wikipedia on social bookmarking” to be more interesting and useful than ”teacherlibrarianwiki”. I found the link ”tags vs. trusted sources” most interesting as the author is looking for the balance between the desire for relevant information and the time to put into creating systems to deliver the information. I think about this one a lot as the course goes on! The link ”Reinventing radio: on phonetags” was interesting. I can see it having benefit on the business side of radio and music, especially in creating play lists and deciding the style of music or particular artist a recording studio might produce and promote. The top sites, according to “education-world”, for social bookmarking are ”del.icio.us”, “Scuttle”, “Furl”, “BuddyMarks” each of which have similar and differing features that make their use better for some situations and not as good for others.
The reading in the textbook (Chapters 4&9) did a good job of relating the Web 2.0 tools, introduced in earlier chapters, to the schools of today and in the future. I am starting to see how these tools could be used in my own classroom to enhance the learning that is currently taking place. Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, Social Bookmarks, and other Web 2.0 tools, combined with a supportive school community could even help shape my Band Room into a model for other 21st century Band Directors! Well, that is all for now. Shawn.
