Twitter

I have to agree with what other's have said, I didn't find Twitter all that useful for education.  I didn't really know who to follow because it didn't seem like there was much to say about educational interests in just a few characters.  It felt more like status updates that I'm not really interested in.  I'm not sure it is something I would incorporate into the classroom?

PLN

I found GoogleDocs extremely useful.  I love how easy it is and the fact that it compiles data and puts the information into charts has already impacted my professional life by saving me time and giving me the tools to present great PowerPoints.  I really enjoyed working with and following others with Delicious.  I have found some good ideas from seeing what other people have found.  We use Calendar through Outlook where I work, but it was great timing for this class to introduce Doodle.  And outside Vendor just set up a meeting using that tool- I'm glad I knew what is was and how to use it!

There were things about the Wiki that I liked, and things that I didn't like.  I think it can be a useful tool with less people and smaller projects.  It was very time consuming when I was not able to Edit the page because it was in use by another classmate.  I also found it difficult to know where to post things at times and having to page through so many entries from previous classes made it very time consuming as well.

I will continue to work on developing and using a PLN because I believe it is essential to stay current, and quite frankly, keep up with my students!  Sharing these ideas with others is important for many reasons, including the fact that it helps to continue growing your own PLN.  A great way to share ideas, tips, and "how-to's" is to create a blog as a resource for colleagues to become aware of these tools and be inspired to use them.

Week 7 questions

• Looking at others' links: Go back and look at the websites collected by the class under the tags. Are there any there that you want to save to your own list?

The website I want to save to my own list would be the Online Colleges website in Sommer's delicious bookmark.

• Choosing tags: How has your own list of tags grown? Were you consistent in using tags? Did you use many tags for each link? Did you use synonyms or stay consistent in your use of terms? Did you change your mind about tags you wanted to use? Did the tags used by others impact your choices? Did you find yourself using the same tags across different tools (e.g., del.icio.us, your blog, wiki pages)? How would you approach teaching tagging to students?

My tags have grown by a few each week.  I have been consistent in using tags, but probably needed more becuase I had redundency in my tags.  I didn't change my mind about tags I wanted to use and I stayed consistent.  The tags used by others did impact my choices because they alerted me to new tags that I could you.  I did find myself using the same tags across different tools.  I would approach teaching tagging to students by following their peer's tags, using a larger variety of tags and always being open to new tags they see others using.

• Tag clouds: Check out your Tag log or cloud (under Tags - My Tags). Which tags have you used the most often, other than those assigned for the class?

The tag I used most often was education and college.

• Annotations: Did you add annotations to each link? Why or why not? What would be an advantage of doing this?

I did not add annotations to each link, however, I now see that it would have been useful so I could better track my tags/searches.

Connecting with others:

• How could you use del.icio.us to connect with others interested in the same topic? Try this for one of the tags you used for a topic in this class. Who did you find used many of the same tags and bookmarked things of interest?

I found other students by using the same tag that appeared to be following the same subject.  This helps in the research process especially when working on large projects like a thesis.

• How might you use the Network feature of del.icio.us? Try this with one other person (not someone in the class, but someone who appears to have a similar interest).

I could use the network feature by connecting with others interested in the same topics by getting various points of view from other professionals all over the world.

• How could you use del.icio.us or a similar product (Diigo, BuddyMarks (filtered), Scuttle (on own server), FURL) among a group of people like students in a class or a group of friends?

These tools could be used to do research gathering for classroom projects and demonstrations.  They could also be used to see who is using research tools (and what tools they are using) for papers,etc.

Web 2.0 tools

One of the Web 2.0 tools I have found that would be great in the classroom and one administrators should use is the blog.  I think having a blog is a great tool where instructors can give updates on projects, helpful "hints" for course work, deadline reminders, class cancellation notices, and even an area where students could post comments/questions.  Fortuneately, where I work, it would be up to the instructor and not administration, so there wouldn't be much "convincing" that would have to happen.  The value to the students is great especially when considering you can give helpful hints on projects and post class cancellations so they do not waste a trip to campus.

Delicious

Delicious is an interesting tool that I actually thing will help in my thesis research.  I believe Sarah blogged that it felt a little intrusive to use other's bookmarks, but it is helpful!  I like that you can create idea lists (like vacation destinations or even recipes to use in the future).  I really like that you can follow your favorite user's bookmarking (like Diane Ravitch :).  Overall, I think it's a great tool that I will continue to use even after the class if over!

Web 2.0 Tools

Google Sites is a great to help even the most technology challenged build an easy and useful website.  I actually used this tool to help my friend build a website for her newly launched business...great timing!

Concept Mapping was a great tool and I really liked the outline format that helped with easy organization.

Photobucket is a tool that I have used quite a bit over the years and it works well for me when posting images for marketing programs and marketing for support for students clubs!

Benefits of Twitter

I see Twitter as a great benefit to the classroom to update students on due date reminders, classroom activity ideas, and even class cancellation notices.  Twitter or another microblogging tolld can be used in education for many things including announcements for events, field trips, promotions, activity schedules, and even meeting outcome updates.