BP3_edmodo

For my Web 2.0 tool, I have chosen to try edmodo. Edmodo (stylized edmodo) is a social learning network for teachers, students, and parents. It allows teachers, students and parents a secure space for the class to connect and collaborate. When using edmodo, teachers can post grades and assign homework to students. Students are able to submit their homework and see their grade. It is a closed and protected environment for the student. It is built on a micro blogging model.

There are many things that you can do. Edmodo has webinars that you can view on the how-tos of getting started, as well as professional development and other subjects. In the teacher rollout resource center there are a variety of content materials. These were created by educators and shared in the edmodo communities. They are; sample code of conduct; sample guidelines; letter to parents of what edmodo is and an invitation letter for parents; guides for parents, teachers and students; and most importantly, how to set up a student account. Thus, making getting started a guided and easy thing to do.

A recent addition is the ability to post quizzes, which I found when connecting to other social networks. As I explored edmodo, I went out to cyberspace and viewed Facebook, Twitter, itbabble, edjudo, blog edmodo, appappeal.com, and New Learning Institute among others. These are links, hopefully they work here in the blog, if you want to learn more.

There are many features that edmodo provides. The teacher has full control over who joins their online class groups. The teacher sends out an invitation with a specific code. Once all students in that class or section have joined, the teacher can close the class. It is a private space. The interface and actions are similar to Facebook, so students and teachers find using edmodo intuitive and easy to use.

Teachers can post notes, alerts, and assignments, generate polls, and create quizzes. The tools available are many including news feeds, a calendar that allows the teacher to create events, list due dates. A grade book is automatically generated for every different group. Teachers are also able to create an online information warehouse using the library tool that benefits the teacher as well as the student. Document and web resources can be organized into folders that later can be shared with the entire community.

There are communities within edmodo. Here I can have a safe place to ask questions, share experiences, have honest discussions, and learn from others. Students can’t view the communities, so my learning or opinions are not available outside of the community. I am protected, which sounds good and reassuring.

Students cannot have private chats with each other. They can’t cyberbully and they can’t invite their friends. The teacher is the Head Educator In Charge (HEIC). The students can post only to the teacher or the class and the HEIC monitors all of this activity. The teacher is also able to add hyperlinks, embed YouTube, videos, PDFs, document, images and just about anything. The students are able to do this also.

This is my page that I have created. I am just starting my journey on edmodo.

All images are my own screen shots.

This is a simple web 2.0 tool, but it does a lot and can be utilized in many ways. It will take a bit of playing with it to master it. Learning does take time. I look forward to using this in my classroom. I see a benefit to the parents so that they might get a better insight into what we do in class all day. The benefit to the students is that they already live in an instant communication world and this let’s school become involved in their world. We are not running away from this, but acknowledging it and embracing it, finally. I hope the students will appreciate our real involvement and attempt to join their world.

BP2_iGoogleScreenShots

I have had an igoogle page for years, but I hardly ever looked at it. It ran along the lines of who has time for this? My view is changing about this site. I didn't realize that you could do great things with the box of links. I see the advantage of using this page to quickly get to places I usually just left in my browser tabs on different browser windows, which created a lot of different windows with a long list of tabs. It got very messy.

This will "clean up my act". I feel the relief and security of order and a systematic way of doing things. It's a wonderful feeling.


As I am surfing time goes by and I am losing it. It is so easy to get lost in time, in cyberspace. I'll look at the clock and hours have gone by. Is this a good thing? Am I adding value to my life? I know that the house isn't always getting cleaned, the lawn doesn't get mowed, right now, I am NOT shoveling that snow that is falling now. 


Falling snow before Halloween? First time in 60 years. I should be planting my bulbs, not shoveling!!!! So, here I sit, trying to do my assignments and losing time. What about my plan book? What about that stupid grade book? They are not getting done. 


Mom calls and finally wants to try Skype, but she doesn't have the latest version so I can't see her screen, but she can see mine. What a break-through, before the newer versions of Skype, I had to imagine and remember what someone else's screen would look like. Now, I can share screen and walk my mom or dad, or whomever through what they want to do. 


Technoclown solves cyberspace problems! And, the parents can see what I can do. Yeah!


I just love what we can be capable of doing now. But, the question still remains, when will I do my plan book, grade book, and shovel snow? I say never, but, reality will change that.

Here are my screen shots for the three tabs I created. 

Home with Facebook and Twitter

FSO/AR with the box of links for Google and Tools and the box of links for Capstone

Resources with box of links for Lynda Training and box of links for ETC Resources

All images are my own via screen shot.

BP1_Welcome to My Blog

Welcome to my Blog. This is a bit difficult. I have been hesitant about posting my life out here in cyberspace. When I started Full Sail I was fairly quiet about my presence on the web. I joined Facebook so I could monitor (spy on) my son. Fortunately we have a great relationship and he allowed me to friend him. He was off to University. He was going to Full Sail, far, far away from New Jersey. I wanted to know who he really was. Kids don’t act the same way with you as they do with their friends.

 

I discovered he has a really great sense of humor and he and his video game programming friends speak a different language. I learned that his friends give him support on creative treks. They discuss the pros and cons of newly released games and the broken codes in them. They share industry talk and information. They compare the companies they work for and the jobs they have. They are completely wide open and raw about who they are and where their place is in the world. I have learned a lot about my son’s abilities to successfully function in the world. And all of this blossomed in front of me because of Facebook. I don’t think I would have been so at ease about him being away at school if I had to rely on only a landline phone as in years gone by.

As for me, it’s been nice to find lost friends. I left my home in San Francisco and the opportunity of bumping into someone decreases when you leave your home base. So catching up with people has been fun. But I don’t post or check Facebook often. I don’t play any of those games either. Who has time for all of that? I am not here to have fun. I don’t have time for fun.

When this program asked us to do a video biography I was fine with that. Then we were asked to post that video on the web. I was a little upset. We hadn’t been told we would put it out there publicly. I would have done things a bit differently had I known it would be public. I can do it over, but again, time is a big factor, and when can I find it? Over the last couple of months, every time I was asked to post something, I had to stop, pause and think. Then I would tell myself it was fine and post it. I am now just posting. Writing a blog? Here we go again, pushing my limits. Stop it Full Sail, you are tiring me out. The in-fighting in my brain is  getting too loud.

Now I see almost everywhere on the web, “sign-in using Facebook”. I really don’t like that. I don’t want to be so intertwined and totally connected to everything, or have Corporate America track me. I feel some of the evolution of the web has lead to some very real concerns about civil liberties, protection of speech, and invasion of privacy. We have seen too many examples about the possibility of losing your job as a teacher because you are exercising your constitutional right to free speech. America holds teachers to an 18^th century set of standards and morals. The entire world has moved ahead except the educational system. We are still operating in the dark ages.

I am adjusting to the invasion of my privacy from the EMDT program. I am trying to over come my suspicion of the wide openness of the Internet. We are asked to do projects and then let the entire world view it. I am old school and I step lightly and cautiously as I venture out into the unknown. I am starting to have fun again.

I hesitated when asked to be creative, I was scared, unsure and thought, I can’t do this and they want me to advertise that by posting it “out-there”.  Then I started really playing with the tools and low and behold, from somewhere down deep un-squishing happened. I started to remember I was a creative individual and I had done great projects in the way-back time.

The educational system I have been working in lately had squished the creative right out of me. Full Sail has forced me to pull the other me out into the light and jump into the public community of the web. I am trying more and more tools and producing creative material. I am rediscovering who I was, who I am and I am curious about who I will become.

Photo from Microsoft Office Images

I am becoming more confident now and it is getting easier to expose myself. So I fly through cyberspace, feeling naked, but getting over it. I am joining a community of wonderful interconnected learners and, I think I may be having fun!