social media
TRANSCRIPT
Using Social Medi@ to Extend our Reach
David Burns English Language
Fellow
5th ELTA Conference – May 2012Tirana, Albania
English Language Fellow Program
Facebook: www.facebook.com/pages/English-Language-Fellow-Program
Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/elfellowprogram
Contact information:
Name: David Burns
Email: [email protected]
Mobile: 069 549 0927
Facebook: www.facebook.com/ELFellow.Albania
Twitter: @ELFellowAlbania
Warmer Activity!
Social networking activity you can use in your classes to get your students up and moving.
Practices team-building skills, ability to follow instructions, memory skills, speaking, listening & writing, the benefits of collaboration, etc.
Lots of variations on this type of activity.
Today, I’ll divide you into groups of varying size – the largest with 8 members and the smallest with only 1 member.
Source: The Constitution of the United States of America
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
What this presentation is and is not about:
It IS an attempt to give you some useful and practical ideas on how you can use modern education technology – and specifically social networking resources – in your classrooms and to assist your professional development goals. And it’s a great chance for us to share ideas.
It is NOT an attempt to promote specific companies or insinuate that you MUST use these online resources in your classes or in order to be effective. You are all wise enough to make mature and responsible choices regarding social media related to the social, political and religious realities in your respective host countries.
A major concern when using social media:
Privacy issues…
Teacher Education and 21st Century Skills:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eGHAuV5yLo
Two key skills in today’s globalized
world:
Non-routine thinking
Complex communications
Every student in the 21st Century needs to be able
to: Critically think
Problem solve
Collaborate
Communicate
Innovate
Be globally aware
Be self-directed
And be technology literate
…Those are the new outcomes of the 21st Century
Source “Teacher Education and 21st Century Skills” (YouTube video; Pearson Foundation).
Why should we include technology in the education of our children?
Here are 10 good reasons:
Source: John Page writing for www.21stCenturyTeacher.com
Reason 1 – Expansion of Time and Place
In a typical American high school, a student has access to a teacher for about 40-50 minutes a day or about 5% of her waking day, which is shared with 25+ other students.
Technology is NO substitute for an inspiring teacher, however online materials are far more available. 20 x more available.
Using the ‘textbook + classroom’ model, the places where learning can occur are limited. Yet a wireless laptop can access the teacher’s course materials and the entire internet from almost anywhere.
Reason 2 – Depth of Understanding
Interactive simulations, video chat discussions and debate, illustrations, etc., can produce a much greater depth of understanding of a concept.
Because the students have access to the same online tools, they can reinforce the ideas by experimenting with the simulations themselves, any time, any where.
Reason 3 – Learning vs. Teaching
Technology allows the tables to be turned. Instead of teaching (push), students can be given projects that require them to learn (pull) the necessary material themselves.
Key to this is the ability to get the information anytime and from anywhere (without the need to be in the physical presence of the teacher).
This project-based pull approach makes learning far more interesting and fun for the students.
Reason 4 – New media for self-expression
In the old days, students could write in a notebook, and what they wrote was seen only by the teacher.
Using modern technology students can express themselves and their creativity in many ways: make Power Point presentations, record/edit spoken word or music, create and share digital photograph albums, make a video, run or contribute to a class newspaper, run a web-based TV or radio station, do claymation, create a blog, start a web-site, etc…..
Reason 5 – Collaboration
A vital skill in the new digital world is the ability to work collaboratively on projects with others who may not be physically close.
Many university projects are undertaken by teams spread around the world. Students need to be prepared for this.
Reason 6 – Going GlobalThe worldview of the student can be expanded
due to the very low cost (often free) of communicating with people around the globe.
One example, the internet permits free video conferencing which permits interaction in real time with sister schools in other countries.
From an educational viewpoint, what can be more important than understanding other cultures through collaboration and direct dialog?
Reason 7 – Individual pacing and sequence
Students are, of course, all very different. Information technologies can allow them to break step with the class and go at a pace and order that better suits that student.
Without disrupting class, they can repeat a difficult lessons and explore what they find interesting.
Reason 8 – Weight Three textbooks and binders can weigh over 25
lbs.
A laptop weighs about 5 lbs and new tablets even less.
A 40 Gb hard drive can hold over 2 million pages with illustrations (and all are searchable and updateable).
Reason 9 – Personal Productivity
Students need productivity tools for the same reasons we do: they need to write, read, communicate, organize and schedule.
Most of your students will ONLY be aware of technology that we were not born and raised with: for many, laptops, email, cell phones, text messaging and internet social media sites are the ONLY tools they know and use.
Reason 10 – Lower costIt is not unusual for a text to cost over $120 at
colleges and universities.
Through the use of open, free educational tools on the web, the dependence on expensive paper textbooks can be reduced.
Today a decent laptop can cost as low as $99
Free eBooks are out there and available as ‘public domain’: see Google Books and their well-stocked virtual bookshelf Classics Shelf are good examples.
Now for my Top 20 list of social media* for
educators
Sources:
www.theedublogger.com
www.edublogs.com
www.whiteboardblog.co.uk
www.secondarysolutionsblog.com
*All logos are registered trademarks.
20. Teacher Lingo
Teacher Lingowww.teacherlingo.com
An educational community to connect teachers from every level.
Find teaching resources for your classroom or share your teacher created resources with the community and earn extra money.
Search by subject, grade level, and many categories to find Lesson Plans, Worksheets, Printables, and even eBooks.
19. Diigo
Diigo: Social Bookmarking
Online and social information management tool.
Collect and organize anything: bookmarks, highlights, notes, screenshots, pictures, audio, bibliography.
Access anywhere and easily share: PC & Mac, Android, all browsers, iPad, iPhone
Basic services are free to tryout: unlimited bookmarks, 1,000 highlights, 30 cached pages.
Premium plans: $20 a year to $40 a year.
Other popular social bookmarking sites:
http://www.reddit.com/
StumbleUpon
http://www.stumbleupon.com/
Deli.ci.ous
http://delicious.com/
18. Dropbox
Dropbox
A free service that lets you bring your photos, docs, and videos anywhere and share them easily.
Never email yourself a file again!
Share documents, PDFs, videos, photos, lesson plans, etc. from anywhere.
Free up to 18GB.
Premium service: $99 a year and beyond.
Other cloud storage options:
Box
https://www.box.com/
SugarSync
https://www.sugarsync.com/
Google cloud storage:
https://developers.google.com/storage/
Comparison chart of major cloud storage options:
http://www.bestfreecloudstorageproviders.com/
17. Email, Listserv, etc.
Class email groups; send homework; links for follow up and comprehension tasks; updates on class times and assignment deadlines, etc.
Respond directly to students’ questions (works well for shy students) who may be more willing to ask for clarification via email.
16. Dipitywww.dipity.com
Dipity: Online Timelines
Create an interactive, visually engaging timeline in minutes.
Use dynamic visualization tools to display photos, videos, news and blogs in chronological order.
Great for group student projects on any subject or research topic.
I’ve used it for U.S. Supreme Court cases and international law, and biographies of famous people.
15. Busuuwww.busuu.com
Busuu
Busuu is a free online community for learning languages.
Connect for free with native speakers worldwide.
Enhance your language learning with online social media options – translating multiple languages in an open format.
Great opportunity to have your motivated students translate texts from Albanian to English, etc.
14. Flickrwww.flickr.com
Photos
Flickr for Education http://www.flickr.com/groups/33384223@N00/
Photo essays; presentations; share with parents and school administration; group projects.
Great privacy controls.
Other options: Shutterfly, Picasa, SmugMug, Phanfare, Snapfish, Zenfolio.
Top 20 photo sharing sites:
http://web.appstorm.net/roundups/media-roundups/top-20-photo-storage-and-sharing-sites/
13. Apple
iTunes Uhttp://www.apple.com/education/itunes-u/
iTunes U
The free iTunes U app gives students access to all the materials for your course in a single place.
Right in the app, they can play video or audio lectures. Read books and view presentations. See a list of all the assignments for the course and check them off as they’re completed.
And when you send a message or create a new assignment, students receive a push notification with the new information
The iTunes U app puts complete courses — and the world’s largest online catalog of free education content — on your iPad, iPhone, or
iPod touch.
12. Soundcloudwww.soundcloud.com
Soundcloud
Create, record and share the sounds you create anywhere to friends, family and the world with SoundCloud, the world's largest community of sound creators.
Find and follow friends to share sounds with each other. Add comments and likes to everyone’s sounds too.
Share your sounds to sites and social networks. Connect SoundCloud with hundreds of apps to share everywhere.
Audacitywww.audacity.com
11. Linked in
Linked inOnline CV/resume site.
Promote yourself and your skills and experience to prospective employers.
Network with like-minded people by joining professional Linked in groups.
Use it in class to demonstrate CV-writing skills, do job searches, find tips on how to interview, etc.
10. Wikis
WikisWhere to create Wikis:
Wikispaces www.wikispaces.com (public or private)
WetPaint www.wetpaint.com (community)
PBWiki www.pbwiki.com
Editing and Viewing options (public, members only, administrator only, etc)
Wikipedia www.wikipedia Great opportunity for research, fact verification, and open source writing and publish projects for your students.
9. Moodle
MoodleModular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning
Environment
Moodle is an Open Source Course Management System (CMS), also known as a Learning Management System (LMS) or a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE).
Moodle has become very popular among educators around the world as a tool for creating web sites for their students. To work, it needs to be installed on a web server somewhere, either on one of your own computers or one at a web hosting company.
Source: www.moodle.org
8. NING
Ningwww.ning.com
Ning is an online service provider that provides a set of services and technology applications that enable users to create their own Networks utilizing the “Ning Platform“.
Has a good reputation for its privacy and information gathering policies. Certified by Truste and complies with EU Safe Harbor policies (regarding the collection, use and retention of personal information).
Shaping the Way We Teach English (U.S. State Dept.)
http://shapingenglish.ning.com/
English Language Teaching in the Russian Federation
http://elt-russia.ning.com/
7. Pinteresthttp://pinterest.com/
PinterestPinterest is a vision board-styled social photo
sharing website and app where users can create and manage theme-based image collections.
Pinterest has an active and dynamic ‘education’ section that is frequently updated by educators around the world.
Fastest-growing social media site in USA.
http://pinterest.com/all/?category=education
6. Skype
Skypewww.skype.com
Great potential for aiding ESL classroom collaboration with students and teachers around the world.
Webinars with different schools in your host country, region or anywhere in the world.
Classroom and cultural exchange opportunities.
Check out Skype in the Classroom (currently listing 21,000 teachers, 1,500 projects, and 600 resources. http://education.skype.com/
5. YouTube
YouTubeYouTube for Schools initiative:
http://www.youtube.com/schools
School administration and teachers can log in and watch any video, but students cannot log in and can only watch YouTube EDU videos plus videos their school has added. All comments and related videos are disabled and search is limited to YouTube EDU videos.
Has hundreds of playlists of videos that align with common educational standards, organized by subject and grade.
http://www.teachertube.com/
4. Twitter
Twitter is a social network formed around shared interests. Twitter has LOTS of TESL and ELT-related members, many of whom are experts in their field.
Excellent professional resource for networking, research, teaching, learning, news, updates, collaborations, sharing, etc.
The ultimate guide to using Twitter in the classroom: http://edudemic.com/2011/09/twitter-in-education/
3. Blogs (edublogs, blogspot, etc)
BlogsEdublogs: 10 ways to use your edublog to teach http
://edublogs.org/10-ways-to-use-your-edublog-to-teach/
Facilitate online discussions and collaboration. Create a class publication that students can easily publish to and you can easily edit.
Anything that you post to your blog will instantly be accessible by your students from school and from home. What’s more, you can easily manage who gets to access them through passwords and privacy measures.
Share lesson plans, stay in touch with parents, integrate video, podcasts and other media, and get your students blogging (make writing tasks fun and interactive).
2. Googlewww.google.com
http://www.google.com/edu/
Google for TeachersGoogle docs
Google books
Lesson plan search
Classroom videos
Training and development
Connect with other teachers: blogs, groups, and with Google+
Competitions, scholarships, conferences, Google apps, college tips, etc.
1. Facebook
Love it or hate it, Facebook is probably where most of your students (and a majority of teachers) spend a lot of their time while online – go to where your audience is and speak to them in their language.
U.S. Embassies, RELO’s, American Corners, State Department, and most USG offices are using FB to actively and directly engage American citizens and host country citizens.
How do you use Facebook in your classes? How can you use FB? Should you use FB? Privacy? Options? Benefits?
Groups (open or closed – join group).
Fan page (like)
Friend page (add friend)
Pretty good privacy options and non-tracking options.
What else?Movie and music-making projects
Photo essays on any topic.
Social games online: Spelling bees, Jeapordy!, Trivia Pursuit, Scrabble, and most card games have online versions.
Mock trials, debates, campaigns.
Create a news broadcast with script, production and video.
Meet-ups – get together in your city with like-minded folk on any topic.
Recommendations: In the 21st Century, 1st impressions are made digitally –
electronically.
Elect a permanent member or board officer to your teachers organization or school who is in charge of 21st century marketing – VP for Social Media.
Brand your organization promising and then delivering quality – constant, relevant and quality information.
Conferences and retreats are great! But limited to only a few times a year – social media outreach is now 24/7 for students, teachers, businesses, groups, etc.
How to contact me:
www.facebook.com/ELFellow.Albania
@ELFellowAlbania
+ 355 69 549 0927
A farewell story……but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP?
At a meeting, why does a topic come UP? Why do we speak UP, and why are the candidates UP for election, and why do bad businesses go belly UP?
Why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report? We call UP our friends, brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen and put UP with things we don’t like.
We lock UP the house and fix UP the old car while giving a thumbs UP to something we like.
People stir UP trouble, line UP to buy tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses. A thief sticks UP a bank….
Up, Up and Away
To be dressed is one thing, but to be dressed UP is special!
A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP. We open UP a store in the morning but then we close it UP at night. We seem to be pretty mixed UP about the word UP!
When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP. When the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP. When it rains, the earth soaks it UP. When it does not rain for awhile, things dry UP.
If you are UP to it, you and your students might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more.
One could go on & on, but I'll wrap this UP for now because my time is UP!
Shumë Faleminderit!