Friday, 3:45. The end of a long, but productive week. My New Media class succeeded in publishing their first blog posts by the deadline (the end of class today).\
21 Classes has proved to be challenging, but not impossible for us to master. I am tickled at my students' lack of technological expertise with this particular literacy. I have a handful of students who are "pros"--comfortable with diving in and playing until they figure out how to do what they want to do. The others need varying levels of support, ranging from gentle prodding to hand-holding to a quick nudge.
Our class today was most exciting at about 10 minutes before the bell when I instructed the students who had successfully posted to go and help those that needed help.
I recommend 21 classes.com (forgive me blogger--I enjoy writing here, but the two-layer platform enables each student to personalize their own space and provides the teacher with an easily navigated site!) to any teacher!
I end the week pleased with the classes' set up. I have truly removed myself from front and center. The students sit in "Blog Pods" (our term!). They help eachother, collaborate, edit, and support. I moniter from the sidelines, on my Mac teacher computer, or wandering among the pods.
On Fridays, a student and I bring snacks, and the writers can get up from their desks and get a snack. Music plays on my laptop, thanks to Pandora (msn.com's customizable Internet radio) and the 50 minutes flies by. Why wasn't school this much fun when I was a kid?
Friday, January 18, 2008
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
New Semester, New Class!
Well ladies, I have made blogging on a weekly basis a goal for myself. It is also a required goal for my New Media Journalism students.
Yes, I have been tapped as the "Communications" teacher. I decided to re-name the course "New Media Journalism" because the former title did not match what the administrators articulated as the expectations.
So, here I am at the beginning of a new semester teaching a brand new course in writing for brand new media, most of which I am barely familiar with. I figured this blog would be an appropriate location for my first reflection.
So, how is it going? Surprisingly well. One of the gifts of early middle age is my newfound ability to "wing it". I find myself comfortable with setting a goal, doing a bit of background research and jumping in! Our first project is to be a class blog. So far, I have set up an account with 21classes.com. If you need a blogging platform for a class, I recommend checking it out. It is a bit more complex to begin with than blogger, but allows for a "two layer" blog. The first layer is a portal with a homepage for students to check out what's new from you. The second layer consists of the students' individual blogs which the administrator can choose to have listed on the portal page. This way, each student can design and write to their "own" blog and I can easily see what is new that each student has done.
Our blog can be accessed at DWSJournalism@21classes.com
We haven't posted yet, but I'll let you know when to check it out.
So far, I have immersed the students in gmail, google documents, and googlereader. I am committed to making this a completely paperless classroom and I am loving it.
I am a "digital immigrant" in this brave new world. You know what? I'm liking it!
Yes, I have been tapped as the "Communications" teacher. I decided to re-name the course "New Media Journalism" because the former title did not match what the administrators articulated as the expectations.
So, here I am at the beginning of a new semester teaching a brand new course in writing for brand new media, most of which I am barely familiar with. I figured this blog would be an appropriate location for my first reflection.
So, how is it going? Surprisingly well. One of the gifts of early middle age is my newfound ability to "wing it". I find myself comfortable with setting a goal, doing a bit of background research and jumping in! Our first project is to be a class blog. So far, I have set up an account with 21classes.com. If you need a blogging platform for a class, I recommend checking it out. It is a bit more complex to begin with than blogger, but allows for a "two layer" blog. The first layer is a portal with a homepage for students to check out what's new from you. The second layer consists of the students' individual blogs which the administrator can choose to have listed on the portal page. This way, each student can design and write to their "own" blog and I can easily see what is new that each student has done.
Our blog can be accessed at DWSJournalism@21classes.com
We haven't posted yet, but I'll let you know when to check it out.
So far, I have immersed the students in gmail, google documents, and googlereader. I am committed to making this a completely paperless classroom and I am loving it.
I am a "digital immigrant" in this brave new world. You know what? I'm liking it!
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Thursday, August 16, 2007
LiveJournal
Hey Irm! I was so glad to see that you had joined the conversation here! I want to get the time to read the blog your students wrote over the summer! Is it the same blog you invited me to join last year? If not, do you mind sending me an invitation? Deb talked about how well the sumemr blog was working out too!
I subscribed to livejournal.com; only to learn that the "technology know-it-alls" in our school district has blocked it!! It makes me positively nuts the way that individuals who are NOT teachers, and never will be, make those kinds of decisions!! And then folks like myself have to fight tooth and nail to get them unblocked, if we can argue strongly enough! After getting that out of my system, I can say I don't know if you can trust it or not. As far as I know it is ok.
One thing you could do though, perhaps as an alternative, is set up a free wikispace at: http://www.wikispaces.com/. You can control who gets to contribute and who doesn't and they can write away in that space just as they would in the journal. Those folks at wikispace are giving away free spaces to teachers and when I last visited their site, there were about 30,000 left. You might even want to check out this brief video, very cleverly done, about wikis: http://www.commoncraft.com/video-wikis-plain-english. You will see some other sites at the end of the video that also offer free wiki signup.
I think it is exciting that you have set up blogs for each of your classes. Are you using blogger in Google, or another blogging source? I look forward to knowing more about what your students end up doing with the blogs. Please also let us know here what you decide about the wikispace, and/or livejournal. By the way, do many spots get blocked at your school? Were you able to access livejournal from the school? I don't think I have even revisited the site since I learned it was blocked by the district control freaks!
I always love learning about what all of you are doing!
I subscribed to livejournal.com; only to learn that the "technology know-it-alls" in our school district has blocked it!! It makes me positively nuts the way that individuals who are NOT teachers, and never will be, make those kinds of decisions!! And then folks like myself have to fight tooth and nail to get them unblocked, if we can argue strongly enough! After getting that out of my system, I can say I don't know if you can trust it or not. As far as I know it is ok.
One thing you could do though, perhaps as an alternative, is set up a free wikispace at: http://www.wikispaces.com/. You can control who gets to contribute and who doesn't and they can write away in that space just as they would in the journal. Those folks at wikispace are giving away free spaces to teachers and when I last visited their site, there were about 30,000 left. You might even want to check out this brief video, very cleverly done, about wikis: http://www.commoncraft.com/video-wikis-plain-english. You will see some other sites at the end of the video that also offer free wiki signup.
I think it is exciting that you have set up blogs for each of your classes. Are you using blogger in Google, or another blogging source? I look forward to knowing more about what your students end up doing with the blogs. Please also let us know here what you decide about the wikispace, and/or livejournal. By the way, do many spots get blocked at your school? Were you able to access livejournal from the school? I don't think I have even revisited the site since I learned it was blocked by the district control freaks!
I always love learning about what all of you are doing!
Sunday, August 12, 2007
A New View?
In many ways I find it hard to believe we are beginning our second year of school since we first started our conversation about new literacies, new technologies, and new ways of thinking about literacy in our classrooms--and in our world--in the summer of 2006. Last year was definitely a challenge for me, in so many ways, but I can tell each of you that working with you on this new literacies project was the highlight of all that I juggled and endured. As we embark on a new year, and hopefully the last few months of my "official project" (for I fear I may never cease to follow my interest in this topic) I hope we can extend our conversation of new literacies in this space.
Initially I am setting the blog up as a private space, so that we can all feel at ease about posting our thoughts, questions, discoveries, ideas, challenges, successes, and anything, really, that we wish to share. My own personal journey into this endeavor has taught me there really aren't any wrong or silly questions, that there are far more questions than answers (no matter how much I study), and that our individual understandings are enhanced so much more through our shared understandings than when we try to "figure any of it out" on our own.
So, my new post here is titled, "A New View" because I really wonder if any of you have a view that is slightly new. I can tell you that I definitely have a new view of new literacies after a year of focusing on this topic. Not only did my work with all of you over last year shape and mold my view significantly, I also read some wonderful resources that helped with my understanding as well. I will be most happy to post some of those titles here (if anyone is interested) and/or send pdf files, or urls for others.
Other professional experiences have also greatly extended my view of new literacies. I look forward to sharing more in this blog. I have several new ideas for this school year and look forward to implementing some of them in Patrice's classroom, hopefully some others in our school as well, and introducing them to the rest of the faculty as Patrice and I plan professional sessions for the faculty at our school. Heck we might even present one of them at GCTE!
So how do you view new literacies these days? What kinds of ideas do you have for teaching new literacies in your classroom this year? Please jump into the conversation! We don't get to converse nearly enough about this topic, or any other for that matter!
Initially I am setting the blog up as a private space, so that we can all feel at ease about posting our thoughts, questions, discoveries, ideas, challenges, successes, and anything, really, that we wish to share. My own personal journey into this endeavor has taught me there really aren't any wrong or silly questions, that there are far more questions than answers (no matter how much I study), and that our individual understandings are enhanced so much more through our shared understandings than when we try to "figure any of it out" on our own.
So, my new post here is titled, "A New View" because I really wonder if any of you have a view that is slightly new. I can tell you that I definitely have a new view of new literacies after a year of focusing on this topic. Not only did my work with all of you over last year shape and mold my view significantly, I also read some wonderful resources that helped with my understanding as well. I will be most happy to post some of those titles here (if anyone is interested) and/or send pdf files, or urls for others.
Other professional experiences have also greatly extended my view of new literacies. I look forward to sharing more in this blog. I have several new ideas for this school year and look forward to implementing some of them in Patrice's classroom, hopefully some others in our school as well, and introducing them to the rest of the faculty as Patrice and I plan professional sessions for the faculty at our school. Heck we might even present one of them at GCTE!
So how do you view new literacies these days? What kinds of ideas do you have for teaching new literacies in your classroom this year? Please jump into the conversation! We don't get to converse nearly enough about this topic, or any other for that matter!
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