L.A. Paun
MAT |
About This Project...
Issues & Contexts
The implementation of technology in education poses two specific issues: (1) teachers are unfamiliar with operating the technologies in question, and (2) teachers who are interested in implementing web 2.0 tools often do not receive active follow-up. It is important that the teachers themselves know how to use the web 2.0 tools that they plan on having their students use as it promotes technological fluency and literacy, both of which are state-driven standards set for our students.
The issues center around (1) the need for teachers to engage with and actively use such tools to become familiar with them, (2) reduce anxiety about incorporating technology, (3) to bring personal knowledge of operating the tools to their students, and (4) to be able to apply them creatively to their own content area.
The majority of our students use social media regularly. Only 58% of high school educators are likely to be a member of social media sites, and only 15% of educators are using them “to stay current with the latest Web 2.0 technology” (“A Survey”, 2009).
Innovations & Timeline
The project’s purpose “Web (2.0) Tool of the Week” is to maintain a website that will feature posts focusing on individual web 2.0 tools, their perks and quirks, and the opportunity to come together as educators and give the tools a test-run. The goal is to discuss, use, make, and share a product with each other. Through using and creating with the tools educators want their own students to use, teachers can become familiar with how to these tools to life in their own classrooms.
Activities & Objectives
· Maintain the website featuring two to four posts per month (bimonthly / one per week) showcasing one web 2.0 tool per post
· Gather a following of peers and educators who are interested in personally exploring and working with web 2.0 tools
· Allow followers to actively participate in discussions, or passively participate as readers
· Encourage followers to actively participate in sharing personal examples of a featured web 2.0 tool with each other
· Encourage collaboration across disciplines
· Implement new forms of blogging: screencasting, vidocasting, and/or voice-casting
· Share and use it within a PLC
Status of Implementation
The inputs that go into every post include: researching features, analyzing, and writing about individual tools; signing up and producing a product to personally showcase an application, twittering with educators to increase web visitors and discuss applications, features, and thoughts; moderating/replying to comments (website and Twitter); adding new features to the site such as a mailing list subscription and various widgets. Given all of these inputs, the time put into each post increased to 2+ hours.
The initial contact list of 185 contacts was prompted to complete my survey on the use of web 2.0 tools. The contact list consisted of students in the MAT or similar UNCC teaching programs that I have interacted with. Beyond my list of contacts, I have been regularly twittering about featured content to educator chats, increasing the viewer base. Twenty-three people in total have completed the survey as of October 8th. The survey’s purpose was to gauge the use and familiarity that educators and students have with web 2.0 tools. While the survey’s audience is targeted mainly at educator use, I found it necessary to include “student” as a qualifier since my contact list consisted of students in the MAT and similar teaching programs. Figure 1 displays results to one of the survey questions, confirming my thoughts that a large percentage of people are not using web 20 tools. Figure 2 displays some of the answers that the surveyed gave to the question “If you do not use web 2.0 tools, what are some reasons you do not use them?”
Using Twitter, I have created a widget of favorite tweets. The tweets I choose to favorite include messages directly related to the tools I feature and post about, as well as my interactions with other educators (their replies). It can be viewed here (https://twitter.com/LApaun/favorites).
I have not implemented any new forms of blogging yet, but I have begun gathering material and information for screencasting. Because of the multiplicity of available web 2.0 tools, I was able to initially post each week instead of posting bi-monthly. This allowed me to create and add content more rapidly as well as keep to the proposed timeline.
Process Reflection
One of the more ambitions facets of the project’s proposal, “encourage followers to actively participate in sharing personal examples of a featured web 2.0 tool” proved more difficult. While I did encourage active (creating content) and passive (reading) participation with prompting tasks and questions in each post, people were less likely to actively participate. However, through my interactions on Twitter I was able to find many educators who were eager to share their products with me. This usually took the form of a series of replying tweets, or interactions, and rarely in the form of a comment on the web site. It was this type of interaction that prompted me to start the Twitter favorites widget mentioned in the previous section. Judging by the influx of daily visitors to the website, I could tell that twittering had a big impact on getting my posts out to interested educators.
One issue with Twittering about web 2.0 tools (education chats have become very popular) is that usually the networked teacher on Twitter has already experimented with a variety of web 2.0 tools. It is harder to reach educators that have reservations about web 2.0 tools because they are usually not on Twitter.
References
[Web Based Recording]. (2009). A survey of k-12 educators on social networking and content-sharing tools., Retrieved from http://www.edweb.net/fimages/op/K12Survey.pdf
The implementation of technology in education poses two specific issues: (1) teachers are unfamiliar with operating the technologies in question, and (2) teachers who are interested in implementing web 2.0 tools often do not receive active follow-up. It is important that the teachers themselves know how to use the web 2.0 tools that they plan on having their students use as it promotes technological fluency and literacy, both of which are state-driven standards set for our students.
The issues center around (1) the need for teachers to engage with and actively use such tools to become familiar with them, (2) reduce anxiety about incorporating technology, (3) to bring personal knowledge of operating the tools to their students, and (4) to be able to apply them creatively to their own content area.
The majority of our students use social media regularly. Only 58% of high school educators are likely to be a member of social media sites, and only 15% of educators are using them “to stay current with the latest Web 2.0 technology” (“A Survey”, 2009).
Innovations & Timeline
The project’s purpose “Web (2.0) Tool of the Week” is to maintain a website that will feature posts focusing on individual web 2.0 tools, their perks and quirks, and the opportunity to come together as educators and give the tools a test-run. The goal is to discuss, use, make, and share a product with each other. Through using and creating with the tools educators want their own students to use, teachers can become familiar with how to these tools to life in their own classrooms.
Activities & Objectives
· Maintain the website featuring two to four posts per month (bimonthly / one per week) showcasing one web 2.0 tool per post
· Gather a following of peers and educators who are interested in personally exploring and working with web 2.0 tools
· Allow followers to actively participate in discussions, or passively participate as readers
· Encourage followers to actively participate in sharing personal examples of a featured web 2.0 tool with each other
· Encourage collaboration across disciplines
· Implement new forms of blogging: screencasting, vidocasting, and/or voice-casting
· Share and use it within a PLC
Status of Implementation
The inputs that go into every post include: researching features, analyzing, and writing about individual tools; signing up and producing a product to personally showcase an application, twittering with educators to increase web visitors and discuss applications, features, and thoughts; moderating/replying to comments (website and Twitter); adding new features to the site such as a mailing list subscription and various widgets. Given all of these inputs, the time put into each post increased to 2+ hours.
The initial contact list of 185 contacts was prompted to complete my survey on the use of web 2.0 tools. The contact list consisted of students in the MAT or similar UNCC teaching programs that I have interacted with. Beyond my list of contacts, I have been regularly twittering about featured content to educator chats, increasing the viewer base. Twenty-three people in total have completed the survey as of October 8th. The survey’s purpose was to gauge the use and familiarity that educators and students have with web 2.0 tools. While the survey’s audience is targeted mainly at educator use, I found it necessary to include “student” as a qualifier since my contact list consisted of students in the MAT and similar teaching programs. Figure 1 displays results to one of the survey questions, confirming my thoughts that a large percentage of people are not using web 20 tools. Figure 2 displays some of the answers that the surveyed gave to the question “If you do not use web 2.0 tools, what are some reasons you do not use them?”
Using Twitter, I have created a widget of favorite tweets. The tweets I choose to favorite include messages directly related to the tools I feature and post about, as well as my interactions with other educators (their replies). It can be viewed here (https://twitter.com/LApaun/favorites).
I have not implemented any new forms of blogging yet, but I have begun gathering material and information for screencasting. Because of the multiplicity of available web 2.0 tools, I was able to initially post each week instead of posting bi-monthly. This allowed me to create and add content more rapidly as well as keep to the proposed timeline.
Process Reflection
One of the more ambitions facets of the project’s proposal, “encourage followers to actively participate in sharing personal examples of a featured web 2.0 tool” proved more difficult. While I did encourage active (creating content) and passive (reading) participation with prompting tasks and questions in each post, people were less likely to actively participate. However, through my interactions on Twitter I was able to find many educators who were eager to share their products with me. This usually took the form of a series of replying tweets, or interactions, and rarely in the form of a comment on the web site. It was this type of interaction that prompted me to start the Twitter favorites widget mentioned in the previous section. Judging by the influx of daily visitors to the website, I could tell that twittering had a big impact on getting my posts out to interested educators.
One issue with Twittering about web 2.0 tools (education chats have become very popular) is that usually the networked teacher on Twitter has already experimented with a variety of web 2.0 tools. It is harder to reach educators that have reservations about web 2.0 tools because they are usually not on Twitter.
References
[Web Based Recording]. (2009). A survey of k-12 educators on social networking and content-sharing tools., Retrieved from http://www.edweb.net/fimages/op/K12Survey.pdf
My Network
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