BLOG Challenge Question 6:
Which Web 2.0 tools do you believe will have the greatest impact on schools?
Hello everyone. Mark, Pam and I are going to attempt to give you a brief overview of Web 2.0 tools in as few words a possible. Please review some of the tools and tell us what you think! We have two important questions for discussion at the end of this blog.
Web 1.0 refers to the World Wide Web before Web 2.0. It includes most web sites in the period between 1994 and 2004 (e.g., Britannica on-line). These offline, application-based web pages were static with no collaboration among users. Content was generally copyrighted and usage required a license or a purchase. Web 1.0 has been retroactively named after the introduction of the term web 2.0
Web 2.0 is a category of new internet tools and technologies created around the idea that people who consume media, access the internet, and use the Web should be active contributors rather then passively absorb what’s available. The term became notable after the first O’Reilly Media Web 2.0 conference in 2004. Web 2.0 includes but is not limited to Blogs (e.g., does this term sound familiar?), social networking applications (e.g., Facebook, MySpace), RSS or Really Simple Syndication (e.g., really brief overview of your favorite websites), and Wikis (e.g., public spaces that allow people on the internet to collaborate and/or share information).
According to Gwen Solomon and Lynn Schrum, the possibilities of using Web 2.0 tools in schools are unlimited. However, different computer-enhanced learning tools are better suited for different purposes. We believe the following Web 2.0 tools with noted benefits for administrators, teachers, and students, will have the greatest impact in educational environments. Consider the Web 2.0 tools below and let us know if you agree that they will have a significant impact at the elementary level.
PODCASTS
A podcast is a way of distributing music or speech multimedia files over the internet for playback on mobile devices such as iPods, MP3 players and personal computers. Podcasts can be downloaded automatically and accessed using current devices. Podcasts can be an effective tool for :
Replaying the audio of traditionally delivered information
Pre-teaching and vocabulary development
Professional development training sessions and lectures that need to be readily accessible at all times
Learning new material, subjects that are difficult to comprehend and foreign languages
Meeting the needs of students who require multiple input strategies or alternative methods of expression
Providing auditory input and repetition.
Presenting lectures, books, and magazines using an auditory format
Empowering parents and community members by providing information about educational issues, concerns and current initiatives.
See and/or visit Podcasts for Teachers (www.idiotvox.com/Education/PodCast_Review_Podcast for Teachers_ _ 13037.html).
WIKIS
A wiki is a web page that allows readers including administrators, teachers, and students to share and collaborate with others in writing, editing, and changing the Web page’s content at any time. Wikis can be set up on a school district’s server or accessed through a commercial service using a Web browser and an internet connection. Wikis keep track of contributions and changes to content. Popular Wiki sites dedicated to businesses and education are Jotspot, Pswiki, and Wikispaces. Wikis can be an effective tool for:
Collaborative authoring and planning
Collaboration and problem-solving
Peer editing during the writing process
Creation of electronic portfolios
Continuous exchange of feedback.
Visit Peanut Butter Wiki (www.pbwiki.com) or Wikispaces at (www.wikispaces.com).
GAMES and SIMULATIONS
Educational games and computer simulations available on the Web generally include the use of multimedia. Robert Marzano (1998) found that “the use of computer simulation as a vehicle with which students manipulate artifacts produced the highest effect size of 1.45 (n=1) indicating a percentile gain of 43 points (p.91). Interactive multimedia applications for elementary students in language arts, mathematics, science, social studies, the arts, and problem-solving are available without costs or by subscription. Popular sites have features that include standards-based activities, teacher guides that highlight learning objectives and progress summaries, resource links for teacher, students, and parents and message centers for users. Quality simulations can be an effective tool for:
Generating mental pictures and images to represent and elaborate on knowledge
Reinforcing skills taught in the classroom
Interactive, socially reinforced learning
Parental participation in the learning process.
Visit iKnowthat.com (www.iknowthat.com) or Knowitall.org (www.knowitall.org ).
ADDITIONAL TOOLS
Additional tools that can be used in conjunction with Web 2.0 tools to increase participation of traditionally excluded users include:
TALKING WORD PROCESSORS
An tool specifically designed to help Microsoft Word users with reading and writing difficulties reads text aloud and helps construct words and sentences. It also has advanced spell checking and word prediction of miss-spelt or unfinished words, a word wizard to search for forgotten or related words, a pronunciation tutor, a text reader, and a document scanner. Visit www.texthelp.com. and www.donjohnston.com.
These are effective tools for:
Students in K-12 grade with limited reading skills
Students having difficulties expressing their ideas in writing
Students who need to write and work independently
English language learners
Parents with reading and writing difficulties
While many of us in the web 1.0 generation are just getting used to setting up an e-mail account on Google and finishing up our latest Powerpoint presentation.
I did an old fashion thing with a new twist the other day. In the past when I wanted to learn about something new I would go to the library and check out a book on that topic. So, the other day I went on Amazon and did a search for web 2.0. I was amazed at the amount of books that are out on the topic.
As Monique noted in her opening part of this blog, Web 2.0 technologies are already changing the playing field for education. As noted on Pam’s section for Web 2.0 tools the one constant is that our students are no longer content receivers. They are now content providers and BIG TIME!
As you’ll see here in the secondary setting these technologies are creating huge changes in how educators and students receive and respond to information. In fact, our students control the information. I encourage everyone to check these tools out during your “free-time”.
Web 2.0 Tools in a Secondary Setting
As Pam noted in her elementary school section of Web 2,0 tools, this generation is full of innovative and creative tools such as Podcasts, Wikis (collaborative publishing), Games and Talking Word processing.
Writeboard
Writeboard is a collaborative writing tool where users can write, share, revise, and compare their documents online with others. It is not an advanced system featuring a WYSIWYG editor, Ajax, and flashy effects, but that’s what I like about it. Writeboard is a personal favorite of mine and as a matter of fact I am using it right now for this very post. It includes version control with text comparing and is great for essays and write-ups of any kind.
Check it out: http://www.writeboard.com/
Fleck
Fleck is a really cool tool that allows you to annotate websites without ever having to download any sort of software. A student could add post-its all on their favorite web pages or web pages that they are using for research. A student can then send them to their peers or look at them in list form on a personal web page.
Check it out http://www.fleck.com/
School 2.0
School 2.0 is a fascinating brainstorming tool designed for schools and communities to help envision the future of education. The School 2.0 site states, “While School 2.0 depicts a variety of educational and management scenarios that utilize technology, the examples, information and ideas included are designed to serve as prompts for discussion and should not be construed as a recommendation of any particular technology or scenario.”
Check it out: http://etoolkit.org/etoolkit/
For our blog discussion, we pose the following two questions,
"What do we do when we keep offering 2.0 services like Blogs and Wikis, and the students just walk away?"
Terence K Huwe (2008, January). The Joy of Finding Out What People Don't Want. Computers in Libraries, 28(1), 26-28
and
"Are there additional tools you believe will have a significant impact on schools?"
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4 comments:
Good questions and great summary of tools. I'll tackle your question about students walking away from our offerings of Blogs and Wikis. In general, I suspect we don't offer these options that often. However, if we do and students balk, I suspect it is because something else has come along that has captured their interest, perhaps and most likely, a new innovation. I think the best method to determine why they lack interest is to discuss the options with the students. In my experience they have never been shy about sharing what is holding their interest and what isn't.
I suspect they are using tools we haven't even heard of. Perhaps allowing the students to design the activity that utilizes the innovation makes the most sense. For some teachers that may be threatened by letting go of some of the control, this may be too risky. But for teachers who don't mind learning from students from time to time the benefits could be extraordinary.
For your second question re: what other tools may have a significant impact on schools, I think every innovation effects schools...we just don't utilize the learning. Students with access (you know my concern about the inequity so I won't go there again)are using Web 2.0 n ways we can't even imagine. To be able to tap into their experiences to shape what we do in the classroom is exciting and again, often overlooked. I think just based on the things I've developed at the mere awareness stage during this semester, we don't know what we don't know. We also don't know enough to ask proper questions. What we do know is we need to tap into these technologies in a huge way before we lose our students in body and mind.
The textbook, Web 2.0 new tools, new schools, does a fantastic job of describing the tools that will have the greatest impact on schools and how to use the tools. Solomon and Schrum asked “How wired are students?” Students spend more time online than watching TV, communicate with friends through instant messaging, download music on their IPODs and MP3 players, and hang out on myspace, surf the Web and meet friends online. Students are comfortable and engaged with games in their homes (e.g. Playstation 3) and for personal use (e.g. cell phone/games). For example, it would be great to use take a lecture and use podcasting to communicate the content to students. In addition, it would be engaging to create an interactive blog topic in a given school and share and receive responses from students locally and nationally on a content-specific area or project. Just imagine the feedback and integration of ideas.
It is necessary for the teachers and administrators to provide the access and exposure students need to use the tools in a class setting. School systems have isolated technology into categories and digital schools. In most urban schools it is limited for all students. Get schools and staff ready for the 21st century student. Students need graduate from high school ready for college and eventually job ready.
This time of year book companies are overwhelming school administrators with book fairs and visits to sell textbooks. When has a school administrator or other school staff participated in a technology fair for instruction in the content areas that has software aligned with the text and integrates instruction? In a poor urban school district could it be about the available resources (e.g. money).
In revisiting the blog question, Which 2.0 tools do you believe will have the greatest impact on schools? It is important to consider who we are customizing the technology for to meet the student where he/she is with technology. Some of us are light years away from a 13 year old tech savvy middle school student.
Great recap and thought provoking questions. I agree with both Kim and Angela from the standpoint that many times students who are not engaged are actually on to the next thing, and that keeping pace with these interests in hampered by money, time, and manpower resources.
I do think there is also the real phenomenon of students who turn away due to a lack of accessibility. When I taught at St. Elizabeth's, one of the nonpubs, I had a young man with Asperger's (in addition to a host of other issues) who had significant motor control issues. The answer was to give him an Alpha smart (go figure!). It didn't work.
This young man's motor coordination was as poor with typing as it was with traditional pencil and paper tasks. He would avoid any tasks that required use of the machine and would certainly resort to aggression when pushed. Now, his sending district paid a lot of money for full-time 1:1 assistance to have someone fight with this young man to type on his Alpha smart. Consider if this had happened: that 1:1 helped him to set up a PPT presentation with limited text fields and recorded audio through Adobe Presenter so he made his own Podcast?
Unfortunately, as we have discussed, there has been a trend to go back to the well - over and over and over - instead of trying something new. The Web 2.0 tools afford us that something new, but we must still use the principles of investigation to ensure we are using the right tools for the right student at the right time.
This also means we have to be willing to go low-tech to get high-tech results. Positive reinforcement is a valuable tool in the special educator's arsenal. Breaking larger tasks whether they are technology based or not, into smaller, discrete steps has a proven track record. Sometimes in the zeal to use technology, we overestimate its effectiveness and plop a student in front of some new software and with the mistaken belief that simple proximity to technology will cure all that ails him.
And, as Kim noted, we have to follow the student's lead. When the student doesn't respond to the group activity on Wikis, we need to be okay with the idea that the Wiki may not be the answer. Maybe that student needs their own blog, or they need to do something offline, or they need simply to dictate their ideas. Once we get the baby steps, we can scaffold into the higher level skills.
Speaking of higher level skills, I taught many students who could not functionally read but could play the most involved role-playing video game (back in the day when the characters didn't talk but you had to read little text boxes - I know, some of you are saying what characters - it was all flat lines and a bouncing period - but I digress).
Students will always perform better at tasks for which they are motivated. They will figure out the big ideas even when missing the subtle nuances, and really, how is that different than teaching strategies such as dollar-up or functional sight words? We should bring in more video games into the classroom; not merely for leisure but for authentic learning. Ideally, we would use more simulators to address the transference problems already raised about platforms like Second-Life, but really the choice is best dictated by the student's interest. I also see this used with emerging technologies like haptic controllers (check out http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/index.cfm?i=52851;_hbguid=3871d445-4cfc-429b-95ff-387a6c83d7b1) which simulate the sense of touch. So you could have a vocational course where you teach students how to assemble a motor or prepare food through the game, The Sims. The concept of high-interest low readability already exists in the literary education circle, so perhaps it is time to apply this same framework to our use of technology supports.
The recap of the Web 2.0 tools was great and to the point. Thanks.
I agree with everything that Kim, Chris and Angela have said. I believe that our students “walk away” from the 2.0 services for two reasons: access and knowledge of how to use them. Most students have friends that show them how to use these technologies or they are very capable of figuring it out for themselves. However, I do not feel that those two options exist for many of our students with disabilities. The fact that schools are so far behind the rest of the population in the use of these technologies contributes to the fact that teachers are not able to teach the necessary skills to their students with disabilities.
All additional tools will have an impact on schools because education is not up to date right now. Our students graduate into colleges or the work force and have to be trained how to use these technologies. The continuing development of tools just adds to the gap that exists for our students.
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