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Putting myself in the position of a second-year ELA teacher in a Cobb County school one online website I would be willing to argue for is Glogster Edu. I had never heard of Glogster or Glogster for Educators until it was presented in the class, but I now have three of my own glogs, if that tells you anything. As soon as I checked out the educational glog site I was hooked and overwhelmed with possibilities for my future classroom, only to find out that Gloster is considered a “social networking site.” This means that in most school systems Gloster will be inaccessible to you and your students! So why do we have an entire class in college devoted to teaching us interesting and useful ways to use online and digital applications to engage students with high-level and interesting projects if we can’t even use them when we get to the classroom? Is it an evil plot to get our delicate pre-teacher hopes up for nothing?

One teacher argues they are “Virtual Online Posters”. They take a trip down memory lane as they remanice about their old poster makin’ days, but now we have a much cooler and more efficient ways to make posters that display what the students have learned. 

Posters are a good medium for students to convey what they have learned. The author of this glog, Tony Vincent, states, “A lot of thought goes into making a poster. The poster-maker has to decide what and how much text to include. The creator also needs to decide what images to use and their placement. Layout, colors, and theme are important considerations when designing a poster.” Not only do the students have to use creativity and thinking skills but they also feel a since of accomplishment because their work can be published for everyone to see. I mean they have their own personal website to show off. In my opinion this makes the kids become more invested in their work.

Secondly, consider this glogster project concerning the topic environmental heroes. This one specifically is obviously about Jane Goodall, but how much more interesting is this as opposed to the everyday research paper these students are used to writing? Not only are projects like this more enjoyable to the students, but they are also beneficial to teachers. They provide an opportunity to see the student’s creativity, and they are also a lot less boring to grade! I mean, am I right?

Another example of a useful way to use Gloster Edu is in this 1st grade glog. 1st graders like things that are visual and interesting, which is what this glog site provides. It’s also a useful and easy to use tools for parents to keep in touch with what their children are doing at school. The page is easy to navigate and pretty self-explanatory.

Teachers even make glogs with useful resources for other teachers to have access to like this glog about different web tools. What a fun way to share interesting classroom activities, technologies, and strategies all on one single page! What if every teacher created a glog like this with websites and tools they have found to be helpful in the past. This would be a tremendous tool for beginning teachers and even older teachers who may be a little out of the “technology loop.”

LET’S HERE IT FOR THE GLOG!!!!

This is my VoiceThread project

http://voicethread.com/share/697127/

After watch Tim Tyson’s Closing Keynotes video and visiting Mabry Middle School’s websit, where he is principal, I had a greater understanding of the opportunity we now have to global distribution. In the closing lecture he made, he started off with a student that called on the frist day of summer vacation because he wanted to come in and continue work on a school project. He would not take no for an answer as the secretary tried to explain this just wasn’t possible.  He insisted on speaking with Dr. Tyson. Do Tyson explained report cards were already finalized and ready to mail out, and he responded that he already made an A on the project. All this student wanted was to make his project good enough to be posted online, as Dr. Tyson had promised. Can you imagine a student, on his first day of summer vacation wanting to come back to school to work on a project that he had already made an A on? This is the kind of environment that is needed in most schools today, a place of learning that the kids long to come to–not dread.

Dr. Tyson creates this atmosphere with his students, his employees, his teachers, his school. He is active in the school and the student’s lives, but what he is most known for is putting into action the idea of ”School 2.0.” The Mabry website is amazing. If you haven’t seen it, go check out the film festiville they participate it with awards and everything. I’m not talking a couple of dollars and a hand clap. These kids were getting iPods and creating amazing informative movies about topics they were passionate about: abortion, religion, organ donning! I tip my hat to Dr. Tim Tyson. This guy is amazing.

As BWP states, “Welcome to the Twitterverse!” In chapter 6, “The Social Web,” is where this section is located. I have heard of Twitter, but honestly, I haven’t become a “tweeter” yet. I’m not hardly convinced it’s worth my time. I admit, I do the whole Facebook thing, but I definitely limit myself on my time spent on such things because if you aren’t careful one link leads to another, and another, and another, and well, you get the picture. Before you know it time has flown by and you’re still left with a pile of English homework–yey. However, this section on the “Twitterverse” has made me respect all the “tweeters” out there a little more.

I like how they use the term “a network at my fingertips” to describe how Twitter has evolved into something much more helpful (and even educational), as opposed to simply posting whatever you are doing for that second in time and following all these people. (I don’t know, but to me that’s kind of “stalkerish” isn’t it?) Anyhow, I thought it would be useful to use their idea and follow other educators to get ideas for lesson plans, school assignments, or just teaching in general. I’ll talk all the help I can get.

I like how the sections moves on the encourage us in ways to instruct our students to use Twitter in a more educational manner. They give a blog from the “Twitter in Academia” called academicHack blog that’s worth checking out. Who knows, I may be tweeting sooner rather than later…

Until today I had never heard of Glogster for Educators. This program basically allows you to create “online posters.” You may be asking, “So, why would this be beneficial to educators and their classrooms?” Well, that’s an excellent question. I believe Glogster allows students to display their own creativity. The best part is, you don’t have to be an expert artist and know how to draw a complex picture, like on an actual poster. Nope, you just have to create a Glogster account and everything is done for the student virtually. You have clip art, different texts, music (something you can’t really include on a physical poster), videos, pictures, and you can embed links to other important information pertaining to your glog!  Another benefit of creating a glog as opposed to a poster is that it is environmentally friendly. Make a glog, save a tree–yey!

There is also a Glogster that isn’t created specifically for educators that anyone can use to build a glog that represetns something of interest to them. It’s really cool to go look through these glogs because you can find tons of links to information on specific topics, videos, and personal opinions all right there on one page, or glog should I say.

Here is an exampleof a glog someone made about Jane Goodall. Doesn’t this look like a good substitution for a boring research paper???

Check out this glog a teacher made to organize classroom material, rules, guidelines, homework, etc. The whole look of it is very appealing to a student, in my opinion. I mean, I got excited about school when I looked at it!

“Media literacy education provides a framework and a pedagogy for the new literacy needed for living, working and citizenship in the 21st century. Moreover it paves the way to master­ing the skills required for lifelong learning in a constantly changing world,” says Tessa Jolls CEO of The Center for Media Literacy. Remember those days where we were just taught to read letters and books (printed texts)? Well, those days are long gone. In today’s technology driven world “Media Literacy” is an inevitably growing trend. Teaching kids to interpret and read the language of images and sounds is now crucial to the classroom, especially if the kids are going to be able to analyze these types of “texts” or to even survive in society!

I have mixed feelings about all the technology and media control, as I’m sure many do. I like how Elizabeth Thoman puts it, “At the heart of media literacy is the principle of inquiry.” Teaching students how to critique and break down the images they are shown on the TV, Internet, Video Games, etc. is a valuable tool to use to sort through things to “trust” and things not to “trust.” Not to sound to cliche but you really can’t believe everything you read, especially in the world of things like National Enquire and SNL. I mean do we even have our own voice anymore? The media controls what information we have, from a presidential election to crimes on the evening news. So, what are they not telling us? The article states, “It’s amazing how many people do not understand the difference between a daily newspaper and a supermarket tabloid, what makes one website legitimate and another one a hoax, or how advertisers package products to entice us to buy.”Being able to filter through the images we are bombarded with countless times of the day is necessary or else we would be so overwhelmed we couldn’t stand it. So how do you do this? The article presents several ideas.

Literacy for the 21st Century suggests that we start programming Media Literacy skills into kids as soon as the Toddler stage. They suggests things such as children’s picture books or a game they call “spot the commercial,” which teaches the kids to distinguish between the actual program and advertisement. Here is a passage I couldn’t pass up from Literacy for the 21st Century

“As children grow and are able to distinguish the world of fantasy from the real world they live in, they can explore how media are put together by turning the sound off during a cartoon and noting the difference it makes, or even create their own super­hero story using videocams or cell phones and easy to use editing software. When students begin to use the internet to research school projects, they can compare different websites and contrast different versions of the same information in order to detect bias or political “spin.””

The tremendous effort that is being put forth to target our children, or even us for that matter, scares me. It’s getting out of control. Honestly, I like to keep things simple, and in a way technology and Media Literacy does that. However, in another way technology can make everything a lot more complicated.

I found CML’s Question/Tips Chart to be extremely beneficial. It’s something worth checking out if you haven’t. actually the entire article is worth looking into. Yeah, it’s lengthy, but even a scan of the content can be worth while. I promise!

To view Danielle and Kristin’s Video Clip Assignment:“Back to the Future: A Comparison of Past Predictions and Future Technological  Advances”     CLICK HERE

So many targeted sites, so little time! I know I went off on Webkinsin the last post, but just in case you missed it, here is another link to the wide world of Webkins, which is hitting kids pretty hard. I know back home my sister has a shelf full of Webkins that she doesn’t even play with anymore. It’s just another phase, not to mention huge waste of money!

So how bout’ that Axe? Dr. Crovitz suggested this site, and I just ended up sinking 10 minutes of class time to the Axe YouTubeSite. I don’t recommend clicking this link unless you have time to get sucked into obnoxious videos of the things that happen when you do, or even worse the things that happen when you don’t, use axe. Poor guys…I just watched a 5 minute video of girls evaluating guys hair and a spokes girl suggesting the Axe shampoo that would work to fix the disaster. Please!

This site also has its own Facebook, which is definitely built to appeal to today’s generation, and it has its own show called “The Fixer Show.”  Here you just see more things, some that are pretty questionable, about what happens when you obtain the “power of axe.” This is one of the most over the top “boy-targeted” websites I’ve ever seen. It actually makes me feel sorry for the boys who believe a body wash can change everything. Come on guys!