RSS, Social Web, and/or Flicker--which one will you try with your students? Be brave!!! Tell us your success and/or challenge. Feel free to get a fellow teacher to partner w/you if it helps. Come on! You can do this!!! How well did it work/not work? WHY?
I am petrified to try any of these tactics at this time. I am going to stick to responding to each other on Scoot Pad and updating our feelings on Scoot Pad. (that one is pretty fun)
ReplyDeleteI am concerned about keeping the kids safe in these social networking sites. There is just no way to keep outsiders away from them on Twitter and I am too uncomfortable having them share images with Flickr. Any suggestions from the more technologically savvy people would be appreciated.
Even if we set up our own facebook account just for our class to update our classroom status, we can't keep our "followers" from posting their profanity or personal views on partying etc. Scary for young children...
I definitely feel your anxiety about introducing our elementary students to the "social" areas of technology. I will also be looking forward to any comments and experiences from other teachers about their experiences.
DeleteI too am concerned about the safety of exposing our children to these venues. It is definitely something that will need to be closely monitored by the teacher once created. I know our students would love to have access to these things so I plan to experiment with them very slowly and carefully. I would like to personally learn more about how each of them work before I have my students do it.
DeleteI have tried RSS. I chose Google Reader as my aggregator since the book recommended it. It is free, easy and web-based. I subscribed to some news feeds just to get started. I have found that RSS can help keep my email free from mailings that can now be sent to my aggregator. I am still in the "wet feet" mode as I am exploring this tool to decide on the best uses for me.
ReplyDeleteI have also tried RSS (glad to know what that was!)using Google Reader. I did subscribe to some feeds to get started. One problem I encountered was that the feeds I subscribed to and what they actually sent that ended up in my Reader account were not the same. The subjects were totally different. Then, I had to go in and unsubscribe from those feeds. However, I was successful with several feeds. Now, I just feel like I have something else to "check on" every day...as if two email accounts were not enough! I see the usefulness of RSS and need to explore it some more, maybe setting up folders for organizing things I want to keep.
ReplyDeleteI read these posts prior to setting up my RSS using Google Reader, so I was prepared for what I encountered. I went ahead and set up folders and double checked the usefulness of the actual feeds. You're right, some of the feeds are completely unrelated to what you initially request. I think I'm going to enjoy having the web constantly do research for me that will benefit me in my daily speech-language services.
DeleteI set up my RSS using Google Reader to send me information on treatment strategies for speech-language disorders and autism. I'm excited at the research the web will do for me 24 hours a day and I look forward to getting some great new ideas on how to help my students. Because of privacy issues with my students on IEPs, I didn't feel like Social Web or Flicker would have been quite as useful in my classroom.
ReplyDeleteI set up my RSS feed in Google Reader. I added topics about Christmas in different parts of the world because 3rd grade is going to focus on this for the next 2 weeks. I am experimenting with using this as a way for me to gather information to share with my students. Also, I am curious to see how this will work if my students set it up. I am not sure how safe it will be as it may pull random websites, so I am planning to see what results I get for a few days before I attempt to let my students use this.
ReplyDeleteI agree, Elisha...I am also planning to see what results I get before letting my students use these resources. I think Flickr and RSS feeds might work for my project-based learning group, but I want to experiment for a while myself before sharing with my students.
DeleteI, like Mrs. Williams, have set up my RSS feed in Google Reader. I added subscriptions about reading strategies. I am experimenting with this. I want to see what kind of feedback/results I get from this. Third grade will be completing our research project on Christmas around the world this six weeks. I will set up a feed for my students with this topic. I am going to set my own up first to see what kind of results I get. I am worried about what kind of results will come up for the students. I am going to preview information before I let my students set up their RSS feed. I had no idea what this was until I read this book. I really do think this is an awesome thing to have. I hope I get great results to share with my students. The book said to make sure you pick good websites before you subscribe. Hopefully the web sites I subscribe to will have great, clean information for my students.
ReplyDeleteI am also wary of using these strategies with this age group. I also use ScootPad and the kids love it! They enjoy responding to my questions or prompts. As they get older, some of the strategies will be useful.
ReplyDeleteLike others, I am a little leery about using some of these strategies with our young students, but I think Flickr would be something I could use with my 3rd grade project-based learning group. They could use it as a form of digital storytelling, to create a virtual field trip, or as an alternative to PowerPoint by utilizing the slideshow feature. RSS feeds might also be useful. I will definitely have to test each of these for a while before letting my students use them.
ReplyDeleteI am also concerned about the associations of the children. I feel these avenues are a bit out there for the little ones. I use scoot pad also and the kids love it. This is one that I will continue to use. The only downfall is that I have to help each child individually with spelling since it does not accept inventive spelling.
ReplyDeleteI agree with everyone, I am concerned with the students using social networking sites at this age. I like using scoot pad and the students love responding to it. Scoot pad is safe for them and I plan to continue using it. As Jeanine stated, as the students get older some of the strategies will be useful.
ReplyDelete