Podcast

This is an example of the posting on the first day.


Clickbelow to hear about how my first implementation went.

Podcast


Some of my students got right down to business posting to each other's blogs. Many also practiced posting to the sample blog we created in the demonstration. We made it fun. We created a post together to show how easy it was to post a comment to blog.

I enjoyed teaching two different classes about blogging, one after the other. They both went smoothly. I had more examples with the second class. At times it was difficult because everyone went at their own pace so I was going from one person to the next troubleshooting. As I said in my podcast, some students really went out of their way to help out.

TechQuest Research

My TechQuest research has gone very well. I have enjoyed researching the topics of blogs, professional development and technology education. I used this knowledge as I began to worked with my college writing students and other professionals. I also had fun with new research tools that really helped along the way.

The most important tool I learned to rely on for conducting this research was the delicious bookmarking tool. At first, I didn’t quite understand what I was to do with this tool. I had never tagged things before and didn’t quite understand the need for tags. I am sure this is where many of my students will be in their understanding about the need to Blog. I felt lucky to go through this process because I would be better able to relate to my students when they tried new technology tools like blogs during the implementation piece of this TechQuest. The website to set up a delicious account is below.

Resource: http://delicious.com

One thing I learned about social bookmarking was the need to be consistent with my tags. I found after placing commas in between my tags that they were then attached to the ends of the tags. I didn’t realize this until I went back to look for my research on copyright. I had resources under copyright, and copyright. Obviously, I changed this and checked off another skill gained through problem solving. After discussing this with our professor, I learn an even more efficient way to change my tag labels in a group. I am sure if I had any prior knowledge of a tag, I would have picked up a few of these discoveries from the tutorials.

A few other discoveries I made about social bookmarking were creating tag bundles and adding an “add to bookmarks” tab in my Safari and Firefox browser. These two things really saved time. As I researched further, I spent a lot less time going back and forth to the delicious website. I wished I had followed the directions in the set up better. I will definitely know better next time, as I continue to improve my research skills.

Along with the social bookmarking strategy, I used a blog catalog. This was a website that had many blogs on every topic listed in a catalog format. I did felt like I was shopping for blogs in a catalog. It had a pretty picture of the blog and a link to the author with a link to the blog. Also, on the blogs I found there were links to other blogs. It just went on and on. I never knew how to use these before or that they even existed. I am glad I found this resource. Below you will find an example of a blog catalog.

Resource: http://www.blogcatalog.com/explore/education+blogs/

Example blogs are everywhere when you start to look for them. I included many example blogs in my delicious account. I learned a lot about blogs by looking at other teachers' use of them. Below is a great site I found with many examples.

Resource: http://www.shambles.net/pages/staff/blogteach/

I also enjoyed sites and blogs like the one below that share a teacher’s journey with implementing technology into their classroom. A diary of how it went was interesting to read and gave great insight into troubleshooting issues that might be encountered.

Resource: http://blogs.bedfordstmartins.com/highschoolbits/teaching-with-technology/my-year-of-teaching-technologically/


I had a tendency to look at everything and was at times diverted to other interesting sites. I started looking for something and after a few clicks I was reading whole chapters of books or watching 50 minute documentaries about other educational topics I wasn’t in need of at the moment. I found the new open source materials for online courses also wonderful. I was shocked at the plethora of resources now being offered to anyone who looked.

My TechPlan consists of implementing blogs into my college courses. I will be creating a podcast for this. I was able to find a few examples of podcasts about blogging. They are very good resources for me to learn from. They were interesting and well done. Below, an example of one of these podcasts is included.

Resource: http://bodmas.org/blog/images/blogs_in_education.mp3

Also, while researching I found some power points and documents about ways to incorporate blogs with students. An example is this very simple, but helpful document.

Resource: http://warburton.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/educational_blog_uses.png

This How-to article would also be very useful when implementing blogs into my classroom. I came across many of these types of resources. This one in particular was about integrating, evaluating and managing blogging in the classroom. This article was written by Julie Meloni.

Resource: http://www.profhacker.com/2009/08/13/integrating-evaluating-and-managing-blogging-in-the-classroom/

My plan also consists of offering professional development to other teachers about Web 2.0 tools and how to use them into their classroom. I found some interesting articles about this also. The one below is titled: Realizing New Learning for All Students Through Professional Development

Resource: http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/educatrs/profdevl/pd200.htm

I am also thrilled to have found this resource. It is a lesson plan of sorts that I found very useful when educating other teachers about the blog implementation process. It is a learning module titled: Using Blogs in the Classroom. It also has a great rubric for evaluating using blogs in your classroom.

Resource: http://ebistro.org/modules/module1/index.php?module_id=55&mode=view

Another great resource I found were discussion boards about blogs and teacher issues. This one titled Blogussion has great resources. This entry is called How Bloggers can Prepare for the Future of Journalism. It is great for discussing the benefits of blogs in a professional development setting.

Resource: http://www.blogussion.com/marketing/bloggers-adapt-future-journalism/

Also, I found a few other people’s delicious accounts with resources including blogs. I felt funny using stranger’s delicious accounts, however; they do save a lot of time. The point of posting them is clear. People post them for other people to look through the resources tagged on them. It is so interesting to see the different resources and the direction other people take on the same topic. Below, is an example of Mindy McAdam's delicious account. She has written about blogs in a few place I found on the web.

Resource: http://delicious.com/macloo/blogging?page=2

Many other subject Web 2.0 related resources can be also found on my delicious account. I will be including these subject based resources in my website for other educators.

Delicious.com/heathermayernik.com

Feel free to explore any of these resources and use them if they will help. I look forward to reviewing what my team has also found for their TechQuests. I am sure I am in for a treat and a long night of reading and bookmarking. Happy Spring!

TechQuest Project Description

Project Title: Professional Development: How to Create and Use Blogs and Websites to Encourage Student Participation with Writing Assignments in the College Setting.

Project Designer: Heather Mayernik

Subject Matter: English and Technolgy

Target Audience: College Professors and K-8 Teachers and Administrators


Project Description: An Educational Need

Computers have had a place in the writing classroom for many years as a word processing tool. Word processing has been used for the purpose of typing papers to give to the teacher to be graded. When a paper is typed, it is easier for the student to revise and print out another copy to turn in. Students are often required to type their writing assignment so the audience is able to read it more clearly. In many cases, the teacher is the only audience the writing paper has. The student receives their grade and begins typing their next assignment.

In the year 2010, there are many educational ways of integrating technology into the writing classroom that extend way beyond that of a word processing tool. Technology like blogs and websites engage the learner and motivate them to share their writing pieces with interested audiences.

According to teachers and professors that I work with, many problems can be identified when thinking about adding new technologies to the classrooms. The most common issue is the lack of resources to implement new technologies into the writing classroom. Another, equally important concern is the teacher’s lack of knowledge about these new technologies. They are often unaware of how they can use these technologies to enhance student collaboration and motivation.

I was one of these teachers. I did not know what a blog was. I did not know how much fun it would be to read other blogs written by my classmates. I did not know how the quality of my work would be affected by posting assignments to a website or blog for all to see. I feel many other teachers are not aware of how to create blogs or websites with students or how useful they can be. I plan to research the best way to teach others about technology and examine what works best when sharing this information with them. I plan to focus my TechQuest on teaching other professionals along with implementing a new Web 2.0 technology, blogging, with my students.

Addressing an Educational Issue with Technology: Implementation During the Course and in the Future

The first issue I will address is the lack of resources. Today, all a student needs is an Internet connection and an email address to have access to numerous free learning technologies. Many college students have access to both. If they don’t have it at home, they will have access through their college.

During CEP 812, I intend to show two college level classes how easy it is to set up a blog page within a website using Weebly. I will focus on how little time it takes to create this website. This will be the beginning of their Student Writing Portfolio. They will be encouraged to share their work on this website and reflect on written essays on blogs that their classmates created. This portfolio will give my students a larger audience for their writing. This will create motivation because they know other people will be reflecting and reading their stories.

I will then discuss this experience with other teachers, including professors, and share resources to motivate them to do the same. In the future, after CEP 812 I plan to present my findings to educators at a conference or in a Doctoral or Master level College Course.

To address the second issue, lack of resources, I intend to create a website designed to help other teachers understand how technology can be used with students taking writing courses. I intend to work on this during CEP812 and will continue to add to it after CEP 812. Included in this resource, will be a link to my Delicious site. This site will be designed for teachers in mind. I have come across one other example of a professional having a link to a Delicious site on a educational web page. I found it very helpful to see the excellent resources she had collected and was impressed with this form of sharing. My account will contain relevant teaching resources and research for teachers to access and use as they incorporate technology with their students.

Relevant Resources:

Can be found at my Delicious Site.
Delicious.com/heathermayernik.com

Addressing the Four Common Places of Education

Someone teaching – There will be two scenarios for teaching. I will be teaching my college English class how to create a blog to post their writing assignments. I will also be teaching other professionals in one-on-one tutoring about my experience and plan to guide them through the process of creating blogs with their students.

Someone learning – The college professors and teachers will learn about new web technologies and the best ways to integrate them into their classroom. They will have an opportunity to read relevant articles and research about how to blog, how to set up a blog, portfolio assessment, the writing process, authentic audiences for student writing, classroom writing ecology and new technologies in the writing classroom. This will be done through the professional development presenter’s Delicious account.

Subject matter – The subject matter includes technology and writing.

Setting: The setting for learning is in a college classroom. The teacher will model how to create a website and blog to college students. She will model how to sign up for an account. She will demonstrate the whole process of creating a theme and how a blog functions. She will discuss the differences between these two technologies. She will post to her blog to model how a post is made. The content will be created with the students. They will then reply to the post, after creating their own site.

The setting for step two will be in the computer lab. The students will have access to individual computers where they will create their sites and blogs.

The training of teachers will take place in a college classroom or conference. This training could also be in individual offices of professors looking to implement these technologies into their courses.