Monday, July 28, 2014

Thing 10: Google+

I initially dabbled in what Google+ was offering when it first launched a few years ago.  At the time, though, it was still very early and very few people seem to be using it.  Again, I was using it as an extension of my personal life (mainly connecting with friends around the world).  However, since joining ISM and seeing how connected our school is through Google and their suite of apps and programs, I am becoming more and more interested in Google+.  For the complaints I had about using Twitter professionally, Google+ eases some of them.  During my day-to-day life at school, I am connected to Google almost constantly.  I leave my email open and work through Google Drive often, so Google+ is a more natural extension of my professional life than logging into a Twitter account would be.  I can imagine Google+ becoming another Google product I use daily.  I think the trick is finding communities that key into my interests as an educator.  For this activity, I visited the links given in the activity description and ended up joining a few communities.  One of these already provided me with a neat online tool I had never heard of: Thinglink.

I played around with making a screencast using Google Hangouts earlier in the year, and it was a neat experience.  I can really see Google Hangouts as another neat tool to use.  If I didn't have Skype, it would probably be a great way to connect with friends and family around the world.  I could see using it in the classroom too, if I didn't teach 12 year olds that is.  I wish that our kids had access to Google+ and Hangout, as I think they could be neat extensions of our classroom learning.  Despite that, I can see myself using Google+ more and more this year!

Thing 9: Twitter

I have used Twitter in my personal life for a little while.  I mainly use it to keep up-to-date on a variety of interests and hobbies.  I find it to be a great way to self-curate the media I want to consume.  Twitter tends to be my go-to place for world events, technology news, hobby-related information, sports highlights, etc.  It provides me with a quick shot glance at the world at large, and from there I can drill down further if I want to.  I use it to keep in touch with some friends back home too.  I have used Hootsuite on mobile before, but I am cell-phone dumb now so I no longer use it.  I don't really enjoy being quite that connected either.

I haven't used Twitter for professional learning or as a professional community, but I do see the advantages.  The D123 video was great, and it definitely got my interested in the idea of having a professional Twitter account.  I like keeping my personal life separate from my professional, so I would need to manage two separate accounts if I create a professional one. Colleagues don't necessarily need to read my angry tweets about how poorly my favourite hockey team is doing, and my friends don't need to read about classroom planning.  Having said all that, I don't know how soon I will create an account for professional reasons.  As it is, I don't tweet a lot.  I mainly use the platform to passively engage with my interests outside of my professional life.  In creating an account for the teacher side of my life, I fear I wouldn't contribute enough to keep me motivated to continue using it.  My interest is piqued, but I'm not quite there yet.


Thing 8: Digital Storytelling

I have toyed around with digital stories before, but never in any great detail.  I think that students could get a lot out of a project that lets them create digital stories.  The biggest problem is access to technology that allows them to create these sorts of projects.  However, our students will usually have the access required.  I can see using this type of activity in a few ways over the course of the next school year.  We have several assignments in Grade 6 where we encourage students to complete them in more non-traditional ways (ways other than slideshows).  I could see showing students examples of these digital stories to help them think outside of the box.  I don't imagine doing this sort of thing consistently in my personal life, as I don't really see a purpose there.  At any rate, it was/is a neat project.

Here is my example:

Monday, July 21, 2014

Thing 7: Infographics





I had a good time making the inforgraphic on Infogr.am.  I think that the site is incredibly easy to use and visually appealing.  I was able to play around with it, and I never once felt that I didn't know how to do something.  I had it crash on me, but the site automatically saves what you do so I didn't lose any of my work.  Learning to read infographics is an important skill, and it is one that we are trying to teach in Grade 6.  I think that a greater focus on how to access the information contained behind to beautiful visuals found in most infographics is an important skill for young students to learn.  I would like to use this program to get the kids actually making their own infographics too, as I think making them will give the kids insight into how to read the content to understand the purpose.   Very useful website!