Annotated Bibilography Sample

Alexander, Bryan (2006). Web 2.0: a new wave of innovation for teaching and learning? EDUCAUSE Review, vol. 41, no. 2 (March/April 2006): 32–44. Retrieved April 18 from Educause Review Web site: http://connect.educause.edu/Library/EDUCAUSE+Review/Web20ANewWaveofInnovation/40615?time=1208531641

Bryan Alexander is the Director for Research at the National Institute for Technology and Liberal Education (NITLE). The author’s premise is that the Web 2.0 moniker is not well understood in higher education teaching and learning circles. He attempts, in a very scholarly written way, to explain the basic concepts, projects and practices of using Web 2.0 tools in higher education. He effectively explains such concepts as social software, microcontent and folksonomies. In discussing projects and practices, social bookmarking is highlighted for its usefulness in the academic pursuit of collaborative information discovery. Tools like Writely (now Google Docs) are also highlighted for their usefulness in allowing students to collaborate with peers and faculty on documents. While highlighting some concerns, mainly about the constantly changing nature of Web 2.0 services, many advantages for teaching and learning are discussed.

Classroom20.com Summary

I spent most of my time exploring social networks on the classroom20.com site and its accompanying wiki, classroom20wiki.com. This social network boast a membership of 7400+ members. The membership and topics are generally geared to K-12. However, searches like “higher ed”, “college”, “university” and “professor” would return limited topics on the use of Web 2.0 apps in higher education. One of the most interesting things about the results of the searches was that many matches contained links to other social networks more geared towards higher education, including many Ning sites.

I believe this site can be a very useful tool for educators looking for ideas and support for integrating Web 2.0 tools into the teaching and learning activities in their classroom (especially K-12). Some of the most useful aspects of this site are:

• Groups - The site contains a large number of groups that people can participate in based on specialty, tools and interests. For the newcomer to the site, it was helpful that the groups page listed the groups by the default order of “most active groups”. Elementary 2.0 and Distance Collaborations are the two most active groups currently.
  
• Live Conversations – The site’s companion wiki, classroom20wiki.com, hosts a series of live conversations about a variety of Web 2.0 topics that members can participate in. The sessions can be “attended” using a variety of tools, but Elluminate is the sponsor and preferred software for participating. The site also hosts recordings of the previous sessions.
  
• Live Workshops - The site also sponsors live workshops held in various parts of the country. These local workshops allow members to participate in the planning and presentation of the workshops and also get together face-to-face. As I blogged about in a previous post, one of these events is tentatively scheduled to be held in Chicago in July but there are very few details about the event posted so far.
  
• Hosts - The site’s main page has an area that lists and provide links to the profiles of members who serve as site hosts. These hosts are available to answer questions members (or prospective members) have about the site.

Going forward, I believe I’ll try to spend time on some of the sites that were linked to in my search results of higher ed topics.

New Digital Toy

Just a quick blog to mention a new digital toy that's on the road to my office. It's the brand new Mobile Digital Scribe by IOGear. Check out full details at the IO Gear site.

The Mobile Digital Scribe is an ink pen that doubles as a digitizer. It comes with a companion receiver device that stores up to 50 pages of notes that you take with the pen. You then connect the receiver to your PC via a USB cable and upload your notes. The included software can convert your writing to text or can save it as an image file.

When connected to a computer, you can also use the pen as a mouse. If you have tablet functionality in Windows Vista or with Microsoft OneNote, you can use the pen to make any laptop or computer act like a tablet PC.

I'm hoping to have the pen in hand by Friday. I'll post later to let everyone know how well it works in real life compared to the marketing materials.

Classroom 2.0 Ning Site Live Event

**Cross posted on edmt592.ning.com**

I've noticed in the blog posts that several people in EDMT 592 have joined the classroom20.ning.com network. I noticed today that they have a LIVE event happening Monday, March 24th, at 9p. The event celebrates the network's one year birthday. An agenda and instructions for "attending" the event are posted.

Here's their description of the event:

************************
Monday, March 24th, at 6pm Pacific / 9pm Eastern / 2am GMT we'll be celebrating the one-year birthday party for Classroom 2.0 by having a "working party." Our goal--to set up a new volunteer host system, to say hi to as many new members as we can, and to look forward to the coming year of innovations in Web 2.0 / collaborative technologies in education. You'll have to provide your own refreshments for this party... :)

Thanks to Elluminate for providing us with our new hosting platform for these LIVE conversations. And a shout-out to Nate Lowell who figured out Monday, March 24th, was our first birthday!"
************************

I hope to be home from my son's wrestling banquet in time to join in. Maybe I'll see some of you online.

New EMU Email System

Some of you may have read that there is a committee currently working on identifying a new email/calendaring/collaboration tool to replace the ones included in my.emich. I've had the opportunity to participate in many of the meetings as an "unofficial" member.

The committee recently narrowed the choices down to two: Google Apps for Education (gmail) and Zimbra. Many of you are probably already familiar with Google Apps (gmail, calendar, Google Talk, etc.) but I suspect most of you have never heard of the Zimbra collaboration suite.

The committee plans to meet early next week to make a final recommendation. For anyone who has a few moments to spare this weekend, I would really be interested in your feedback on the Zimbra tool. It's easy to set up a demo account at:

http://www.zimbra.com/products/hosted_demo.php

The demo accounts come pre-populated with some email and calendar information to make it easier to get a feel for using the suite of applications. If you get a chance to check it out, please send me an email and let me know what you think. My demo account email address is:

221wa6bx@demo2.zimbra.com

The product also has some add-on tools to allow people to use Outlook (Windows) or the Mac OS suite of tools like Mac Mail, iCal, and Address Book. The Outlook add-on makes it work just like it was in a Microsoft Exchange environment.

Certainly I would also be interested in anyone's feedback on the Google Apps for Education suite, too (http://www.google.com/a/edu).

Thanks! All feedback will be welcome and I'll be sure to share it with the committee during their deliberations early next week.

del.icio.us links

Yes... I am just getting around to blogging about social bookmarking.

You would think a higher ed technology administrator would have used a tool like del.icio.us before, but I've just started using it during this class. I've enjoyed browsing the links that everyone has tagged with EDMT592. It's going to be very useful for completing the collaboration project.

I'm back...

Yeah, I know... I've been MIA for a few weeks. I won't bore anyone with the details. Needless to say, I've got a bunch of catching up to do so I'll start with blogging about that fact.

I just got back from the Educause Midwest Regional Conference in Chicago on Wednesday. This is the same conference that Dr. McVey attended and emailed the EDMT592 class about. It was a great conference. (NOTE: I am SO GLAD that the snow happened after I returned versus hitting while our group from EMU was in Chicago. That wouldn't have been any fun!)

Hope everyone gets to enjoy a long weekend.

Dana Boyd's Social Network Podcast

Just finished listening to Dana Boyd's podcast regarding her research on students and their use of social networks. I thought it was very smart of her to begin her podcast with the reminder that social networks are ubiquitous among teenagers today. Most adults, including K-12 and higher ed teachers and administrators still don't get that, but we NEED TO!!

I agree with Dana that educators often find themselves stuck in the middle between parents and students expectations of how social networks should and should not be used - in school and at home. Parents and teachers must team up to help students understand the appropriate (and inappropriate) uses of these powerful tools.

Dana's discussion about friends lists as "imagined audiences" was very insightful. I had never thought through the differences between students with public profiles and broad friends lists versus those with private profiles and select friends lists. These students uses of social networks are quite different and educators need to understand both uses.

One of her most powerful points was that online social networks lack the "social context" to help students understand what behavior is acceptable. The example she used was that being in the classroom is quite different than being on the beach. Students understand the "social context" of these physical locations and would never, for example, lay out a beach towel in the middle of a classroom and start rubbing on suntan oil. Unfortunately for students, this social context doesn't exist on social network sites and therefore many students post things that come back to haunt them.

Dana gave a bunch of good suggestions for educators. Some that I believe may be most important for those of us in higher ed are:

• We need to realize that content on personal profiles often mirrors what's going on in the real world
• We need to be watchful for students whose profiles suggest they need help and then make sure that help - whatever it may be - is given
• Privately (not via posts) ask students about questionable information they post (or others post about them). For example: what do you think your parents would think about that?... what do you think a potential employer would think about that?... do you think that post could affect your safety or the safety of others?)
• Create your own profile AND keep it current and NOT LAME!! Write about your experiences without lecturing.
• Realize social networks are not classrooms!

I was very impressed overall with Dana's podcast, both as a parent and as a university administrator.

What I Learned Tonight

My Web2.0 adventures this evening led me to Liz Davis' blog. She has a regular post called "Two for Tuesdays" that lists two new sites she's run across in the past week. Her post for today included an intriguing travel site I had never heard of - SideStep.Com. Seems to work very much like Orbitz. Always nice to have another site to try to find the best price on flights and hotels.

Classroom 2.0 Live in Chicago?

The Classroom 2.0 Ning site has a very interesting post on a recent Classroom 2.0 LIVE conference in San Fransisco. According to the Classroom 2.0 LIVE site, they are planning 11 more of these conferences around the country throughout 2008. It's possible that they may come to Chicago in April.

I'll keep an eye on this to see if they schedule a date for Chicago. That might be an interesting end-of-semester trip for anyone in EDMT 592 that was interested in a few days in the Windy City.

College2

After seeing Buck's post about college2.ning.com, I decided to check the site out. I've now joined and will begin spending time to see what info I can pick up about how Web 2.0 apps are being used in higher ed. I'll make sure to report back.

My first YouTube Video

This is completely unrelated to EDMT 592, but I'm excited I've posted my first YouTube video. The video is a time lapse movie our church created to show how we transform a middle school gym into a "high tech" worship center every weekend.



Let me know what you think.

SL Experiences

I've had a blast exploring Second Life (SL) on my own and with our EDMT 592 class. In SL, you'll come to know me as Sterling Milena.

My first experience in SL was, like several of my classmates, a frustrating experience. After free-falling onto Orientation Island, I found myself awkwardly learning to move around. All in all, Orientation Island was worth the few hours I spent on it. Learning to walk, drive, touch, sit and change my avitar's look took some time, but was fun (especially for homework). My biggest frustration was that I could not figure out how to complete the "movement" section of the island. I learned later from someone else in SL that this was a known "bug" that SL is aware of.

The most interesting thing about my first few visits to SL was having several of my teenage children huddled around me while I was"doing my homework". They were fascinated that I was taking a course that required me to hang out online in what looked to them like a gaming environment. With them sitting by my side, it didn't take too long to discover why there is a separate SL for teens.

I also enjoyed the class interactions in SL. Especially after I got my headset working and was able to use voice chat. (Text chat was very tough to follow... especially with a crowd of us exploring things together.) I really liked flying together to another part of the island and honing my skills using the mini-map. Plus, flying is just cool.

The locations we visited were pretty incredible... the Sistine Chapel, NASA's island, the moon and a Shakespearean theatre. The chapel we visited was also intriguing to me, especially reading their signs about virtual services they hold there on a regular basis. I also spent time roaming around on my own at EduNation and on the University of Arizona's campus. Let me tell you, teleporting is certainly much easier that long plane rides!!

I just received my copy of "Second Life for Dummies" from amazon.com. I look forward to continuing to explore and learn about SL. It's going to be exciting trying to figure out how it can be incorporated into classroom experiences here at EMU.

Hey, it's my first post!

Hi everyone! Welcome to the first post to Ron Woody's Blog. An intriguing title to be sure.


I've created this blog for a graduate course I'm taking at Eastern Michigan University. It's a special topics course in the Educational Media and Technology (EDMT) graduate program called Virtual Worlds and Social Networks. Blogs are one component of online social networking we will investigate to determine how to effectively use them in education.


I'm having a good time in this course and look forward to using this blog to share my thoughts on the experiences we have.