Social Bookmarking - a tool I definitely want to use.

I am definitely in favor of using anything that improves and makes my life easier. Social bookmarking is a tool that I plan to start using. I had saved bookmarks on my browser and quickly found that I had to get a method for grouping similar topics together. I did this by picking a word per group and saving related bookmarks using the word. It worked alright. I was still left with a huge list that I had to scan down each time I went looking for something.

Social bookmarking is so much better. On a large scale, it enables teachers to globally network with other educators, coordinate bookmarks within as well as between the different departments in your school, and collaborate with other schools currently working on the same or similar projects. On a small scale, it helps the teacher share resources with the students and also screen the sites the students are using. This also allows the parents to view what the students are working on and what sites they are using. The students benefit by learning social bookmarking. It is an "active" tool that they will find terrifically beneficial as they progress not only in education, but in the work force. It is another resource for them and one that they will be able to see how valuable it has been for others.

I looked at both Delicious and Diigo. There are a bunch of these social bookmarking sites and they are not all equal. When comparing Delicious with Diigo, I found Diigo a much more user friendly site. There are some things that Diigo has that Delicious does not. In Diigo you can highlight. I love to highlight so I can go back and just pick out what I deemed important the first time (a real time saver). I am also a big sticky note fan (adding comments), and I can't wait to see how I can sticky note in Diigo! I don't twitter, I am on Facebook (a lot of my computer loving friends and family have emailed me to death about joining--so I did and I accepted them as friends - to quiet them down) but I don't use it. However, I do have a blog and I'm told I will have a web site (I do want a website - for teaching) and in Diigo you can send bookmarks to the service you want to use. Diigo also does more than just bookmark the link, it bookmarks the entire page. This is important to me. I have found information on sites that I really wanted to use and reference and then when I go to use that site, or section of the site I liked, it is gone or not available. In Diigo, I would have had the page of information to reference.

Technological Perspective - Google Docs

In thinking about my perspective on the language that students speak and how it would differ from their perspective, I immediately thought of my son and daughter.

I think that because my children have talked about the new tech. inventions that they are interested in as soon as it comes out, I am used to the terms they use. What I found out from talking to Jeremy is:

• He does not know the proper terminology for the technology he is using. When I asked him what Web 2.0 was he said he didn't know but had heard it before. The generalization in the text that the Net-Gens don't read manuals, they just want to do, is correct as far as I can see.
  

• For the most part, technology information is both given to and received by peers. That generation does not care to know the proper terminology which is applied to the technology that they are using. What is important is the doing, and doing it quickly and efficiently.

• There is technology that he is not using or learning in school and therefore it is not important to him, because he does not need it right now. He uses Facebook as a message center but does not blog. He does not know about social bookmarks, has never used online graphing or photo tools and has never made a Wiki. What is really exciting is that he heard they are great for organizing events, and He wants me to show him how to make one!

• Both my children look up every thing on the web. My daughter found just the car my cousin, Barbara, was looking for on the web. Barbara had been hit from behind, her car was totaled and she needed a car fast. My daughter searched tons of sights, found one in NJ near my cousins house, that had just been posted an hour early. Everything worked out so well. The type of car my cousin wanted was rarely found as a used car. If it were not for the Internet and my daughters determination, my cousin would not have this car in two days. When the dealer was contacted they had already received a call from someone interested, but no deposit had been made.

However, Everything is not always easier the "net"way. Erica's driver license was stolen and so she searched the Internet and found out how to get it replaced. When she told me everything she had to do, I sent her to the Notary - a much easier process.

Today devices are much more user friendly. I really feel that my generation was leery of computers because when we started to use them--we had to learn programming languages-yuk! They were not user friendly. The process was down right painstakingly slow and labor intensive. If you were not the type of person who enjoyed this painful process and felt rewarded by achieving the success of getting the computer to do what you wanted it to do (just as important as getting the information you needed the computer to provide), you did not use computers unless a course required it.

What is funny is that I have started to change in how I approach new technology. I do not just get out the manual to learn how to operate it--I just start to explore the buttons and features. I haven't read the manual for cell phones in years. I used to need to know all about something before I used it--not anymore.


What is Google docs and why is it considered a R/W program? How can it benefit students?

Google docs is a site where you can do almost anything. It is a R/W site because it supports social networking by providing the ability to create and edit documents online individually or in groups. Each group has the ability to track the changes that have been made and publish the document. This makes it a great tool for the classroom in counts applications for any subject matter.
I haven't used it but have been told that some of the applications are easier than Microsoft office, so I will definitely give it a try.

The Net Gen./ Digital Natives

The Net Gen. and the Digital Natives are one in the same. They both:
1) learn by doing rather than thinking something through first
2) like working in teams (I have always observed this in labs)
3) like graphics and as little text as possible
4) want to be able to access information quickly
5) want to know the intended goal but to achieve it by random access--instead of the traditional
step by step approach.
6) they love multitasking--I never see my son doing just one thing
7) they prefer games to serious work
Today's students are different. I can tell that from my son (younger than the Net Gens) and my daughter (a Net Gen.). Maybe that is why I don't think the idea stated by Dr. Bruce Berry, in the article by Marc Prensky, that different kinds of experiences lead to different brain structures is radical. I think people sometimes label concepts, people and things "radical", when they don't want to accept an observed change, a change that will not be going away.
These changes in technology have affected our students. I hope most of the schools can afford the technology available that will help us educate our students by engaging them in learning activities that are both social and learner centered.
I am concerned that the Net Gen. and future generations are too impatient on all fronts. There are some things that just take time and practice, like learning an instrument. Not all material that has to be learned can be in a game format. I am also not in favor of word banks on test. Students will say they know enough of the material to guess when they see the word bank on the test. I really believe that it is important to incorporate three steps for long term learning, hearing, seeing (by reading) and doing.