Showing posts with label social media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label social media. Show all posts
Monday, February 18, 2013
How to use Twitter for Personal Growth
I am working on a story boarding exercise to create a digital story of how to use Twitter for Personal Growth. Have I missed anything in my story boarding that would be necessary to make my story better? I updated my presentation to include @ mentions as communications tools.
Sunday, February 17, 2013
Thing 17 Professional Learning Networks
Wow,
MACUL is free! I had a friend who talked about attending the MACUL
conference and the information he was sharing was excellent and gave me
tools that I have been able to use in my classroom to improve
instruction. It is awesome that the purpose of MACUL is to keep up with
the ever changing world of educational technology, collaborate with
people who enjoy using technology in their classroom, and learn new
things from those that are members in MACUL. I can contribute to an
organization like this by my excitement to use technology to improve
instruction and support my students new learning.
LearnPort is great and it is how I learned about the Calhoun ISD courses. I like LearnPort because it leads me to webinars that I could watch to grow as an individual and get involved with groups of people who are doing technology based things like I do. I am glad places like LearnPort exist because it inspires me to connect with others to grow as a professional.
The purpose of Twitter, Facebook, and MACULspace is to connect with others who are excited about learning about what others are doing and how we can join others in doing things we find interesting. I see the greatest pro of Twitter is its linear nature. I can go through my tweetdeck with my multiple columns of hashtags and read what is important to me with #edtech or #edchat or #mathed. Tweetdeck helps me not be distracted by streams of information that are unimportant to me or totally off the topic I am interested in at the moment. Another pro of Twitter is that you can follow what another person tweets about without being a member on twitter and without them necessarily following you back. For people that are hesitant to use a social media platform, twitter allows an individual to see a stream of tweets without requiring a sign in. But that leads to a con for Twitter where if I want to communicate with someone on Twitter, I must be signed in to my account. A pro for Facebook is that many people use it personally so that a transition to professional use isn’t so daunting. However a con of Facebook is that you have little control over the stream of content that comes through your news feed and much of the content can be distracting from a professional viewpoint. Although MACUL looks like a great professional organization, MACULspace seems to have gone the way of Myspace, because there seemed to be little relevant new content there. Instead MACULspace seemed to point to twitter as the location to get up to date information. I know that I appreciate social networking sites that make my professional growth easier, not more complicated and distracted. For me Twitter has become my go to social media and networking site for its ease of use and linear stream of content.
LearnPort is great and it is how I learned about the Calhoun ISD courses. I like LearnPort because it leads me to webinars that I could watch to grow as an individual and get involved with groups of people who are doing technology based things like I do. I am glad places like LearnPort exist because it inspires me to connect with others to grow as a professional.
The purpose of Twitter, Facebook, and MACULspace is to connect with others who are excited about learning about what others are doing and how we can join others in doing things we find interesting. I see the greatest pro of Twitter is its linear nature. I can go through my tweetdeck with my multiple columns of hashtags and read what is important to me with #edtech or #edchat or #mathed. Tweetdeck helps me not be distracted by streams of information that are unimportant to me or totally off the topic I am interested in at the moment. Another pro of Twitter is that you can follow what another person tweets about without being a member on twitter and without them necessarily following you back. For people that are hesitant to use a social media platform, twitter allows an individual to see a stream of tweets without requiring a sign in. But that leads to a con for Twitter where if I want to communicate with someone on Twitter, I must be signed in to my account. A pro for Facebook is that many people use it personally so that a transition to professional use isn’t so daunting. However a con of Facebook is that you have little control over the stream of content that comes through your news feed and much of the content can be distracting from a professional viewpoint. Although MACUL looks like a great professional organization, MACULspace seems to have gone the way of Myspace, because there seemed to be little relevant new content there. Instead MACULspace seemed to point to twitter as the location to get up to date information. I know that I appreciate social networking sites that make my professional growth easier, not more complicated and distracted. For me Twitter has become my go to social media and networking site for its ease of use and linear stream of content.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
21ThingsBCK Thing 4 Reflection: Communication Tools
Communication
is so important in the classroom. Skype provides a great way to bring
in experts to talk to my students even when they can’t take off a day to
visit. The first thing I would like to do is schedule some alumni to
speak with my current seniors about what college is like and what our
seniors should consider before starting their first classes in the fall
after graduating.
I have enjoyed backchanneling at a couple of educational conferences this summer. It was nice to read what others were thinking as we listened to the same speaker. The backchanneling gave me ideas of how to use the new things that I was learning and helped me to connect with other educators who were thinking the same way I was. On twitter I follow several different math teachers, guidance counselors, and science teachers. I like to use my “favorites” on twitter as new entries into my diigo so I can remember the pithy things that professionals say.
As I consider how to best use skype and twitter, teaching students to use these resources in a way that they will be proud of if a future college admissions officer, future employer, or a grandparent were to read or see their interactions is key. I would really like to have a human resources person give a presentation to my students about the best uses of social media communication tools because my students don’t understand that what they post now could be used for or against them when they apply to college or to a new job. Using twitter would be an excellent teaching tool because it gives students that are afraid to talk an avenue to speak up through the typewritten word. Using skype would allow me to engage students with a experts in different areas and I could potentially meet with a group of students to go over questions on a homework assignment outside of a school day.
I have enjoyed backchanneling at a couple of educational conferences this summer. It was nice to read what others were thinking as we listened to the same speaker. The backchanneling gave me ideas of how to use the new things that I was learning and helped me to connect with other educators who were thinking the same way I was. On twitter I follow several different math teachers, guidance counselors, and science teachers. I like to use my “favorites” on twitter as new entries into my diigo so I can remember the pithy things that professionals say.
As I consider how to best use skype and twitter, teaching students to use these resources in a way that they will be proud of if a future college admissions officer, future employer, or a grandparent were to read or see their interactions is key. I would really like to have a human resources person give a presentation to my students about the best uses of social media communication tools because my students don’t understand that what they post now could be used for or against them when they apply to college or to a new job. Using twitter would be an excellent teaching tool because it gives students that are afraid to talk an avenue to speak up through the typewritten word. Using skype would allow me to engage students with a experts in different areas and I could potentially meet with a group of students to go over questions on a homework assignment outside of a school day.
21ThingsBCK Thing 2 Reflection: Web Presence
As
I reflect on Thing 2, it reminds me just how important my web presence
is to those that I work with and who may some day hire me. I have blogs
for teaching math, chemistry, or computers, for school guidance
counseling, and for personal creativity. Each of these is connected with
the same email address and my real name so if someone searched for me
online, I could be found. I use my web presence to connect with people
that need the resources and ideas I have to share. My most active
educational web presence is digalgebra2.blogspot.com where I share
videos and resources for my Algebra 2 and digcounseling.blogspot.com
where I share information and resources for school guidance counseling.
An advantage of having a web presence is the ability to point people to a specific resource that I have found so I don’t have to repeat myself as often. It also provides an excellent communication tool in conjunction with the emailing and texting to students and parents that I do.
A disadvantage is that I have to keep pertinent information posted to the blogs otherwise it becomes less useful to the students and parents that I work with. Another disadvantage is the initial time it has taken me to create these web presences. Organizing information in a pleasing way and in a logical manner takes thought and time. Another disadvantage is that I have to really consider how the written words in my blog and the spoken words in my videos are perceived by others. I don’t want to have something posted that I will later regret.
I wouldn’t give up my web presence for anything, but I do consider what I post carefully before it goes live for the world to see.
An advantage of having a web presence is the ability to point people to a specific resource that I have found so I don’t have to repeat myself as often. It also provides an excellent communication tool in conjunction with the emailing and texting to students and parents that I do.
A disadvantage is that I have to keep pertinent information posted to the blogs otherwise it becomes less useful to the students and parents that I work with. Another disadvantage is the initial time it has taken me to create these web presences. Organizing information in a pleasing way and in a logical manner takes thought and time. Another disadvantage is that I have to really consider how the written words in my blog and the spoken words in my videos are perceived by others. I don’t want to have something posted that I will later regret.
I wouldn’t give up my web presence for anything, but I do consider what I post carefully before it goes live for the world to see.
Monday, August 13, 2012
Reflections on Digital Storytelling Math? Yes Please!
http://mathcoachblog.wordpress.com/2012/08/09/digital-storytelling-in-math-yes-please/
This article references several great tools to help young people tell math stories. I want to look into using these with my students.
This article references several great tools to help young people tell math stories. I want to look into using these with my students.
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Reflections on Social Media to Improve Classroom and School Communications
http://www.speedofcreativity.org/2012/08/08/using-social-media-to-improve-classroom-and-school-communications/
Looks like a great presentation to help others learn how to use Social Media.
Looks like a great presentation to help others learn how to use Social Media.
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