The main purpose of today is to set up an easy but powerful online space. This will be the launch pad for everything else we do. Think of it as your digital filing cabinet, your grab bag of Web 2.0 tricks, your online classroom.
Before we start, lets think about what you want to achieve from this session today. To do that we are going to use a Web 2.0 tool called Stixy. You will need to create your own Stixy account. To get started click here.
Once you have created your Stixy account, click here for this sessions activity.
Activity 1: Creating Your Online Space
- Get a WordPress Blog
- Change the theme
- Make a Post
- Embed YouTube (remember &rel=0)
- Try TubeChop.com
- Get Firefox for extensions like the video downloader?
- Embed all kinds of media in WordPress (maps, images, documents or polls?)
- A practice post with embeds
Fine-tuning your Blog
- Comment Settings
- Siderbar widgets
- Various How-to Videos from WordPress
- Add as a link to your Sidebar (video) or Add a link (page)
Pause for Reflection
From the Dashboard or your blog, go to “Pages” and edit the “About” page. Use this to reflection on how you think you might use your blog in a range of ways for yourself, your students and colleagues.
Activity 2: Look to Learn – Learn to Look
- Look to Learn – overview
- Look to Learn Web site
- Look to Learn Sample Prompts
- Thinking Routines overview
- Thinking Routines from the Visible Thinking team at Harvard
- Article on Making Thinking Visible by David Perkins
Online Samples
- 1984
- Miniature Earth
- VisionShift: Whose Future?
- “I Can”
- Nuclear Giving
- There’s Data in them ther Kids (cartoon)
- The Global Rich List (interactive site)
Activity 3: Some more Web 2.0 tools
The next activity is to explore some more Web 2.0 tools that you can use in the classroom.
Some more web 2.0 tools to try:
- Dropbox: Cloud storage 2gb free
- Diggo: Social bookmarking
- Netvibes: RSS feeds. Create pages for your own classroom
- Wordal: Create online word clouds
- Jot Form: Create online forms
- Will you type with me: Colaborate on the same document
- Mind Meister: Online mind mapping tool
- Slideshare: Share and download PowerPoint presentations
- Poll Everywhere: Online interactive polling
- My Fake Wall: Create fake Facebook pages
- Gap Minder World: World Statistics
- Paper.ly: Turn your Twitter feeds into an online newspaper
- About Me: Creat your own online business card
Finally
Please provide some feedback on today’s session using Jot Form.
