Tech+Presentation+August+24

__**Introduction**__ This page will include many of the things we will mention today. For recent presentations I've given, I've created wikis. This is very bare-bones, as there are many cool features that can be added. The good thing about a wiki is that you can constantly revise it as needed. The bad thing is, you may never feel like you're done. I hope to show you snippets of many different things today; if there's something you'd like more information about, I'll be glad to sit down with you, investigate it more myself, or help you set it up for your classroom use. Another plus is that you don't have to take many notes today; just come to this wiki, and the links will be there for you.

A wiki can have many great classroom applications as well. You can use wikispaces for free, although Warren is moving toward Blackboard later this semester, so you wouldn't want to put a lot of effort into creating it. Fortunately, not much effort is needed!

These resources have come mainly from my experience at NECC (National Educational Computing Conference) this summer, and the many lasting connections and interactions that resulted. It was such a phenomenal experience that I've decided I have to figure out how to go to next year's [|conference in Denver]. (It will now be called the ISTE conference.)

You can't use it in class right now, but eventually classes will use things like []

Some of the trends in social media (or web 2.0): it seems like every type of page has friends and tabs. What we're doing is creating our own PLN (personal learning network). This is what students will creating/receiving; no two people have the same Facebook page, Twitter feed, etc. I envision a time in the not-so-distant future when kids will log into their own PLN, which will have information from all of their teachers in one spot.

__**Personal Start Page**__ One thing that you might want to do is to create your own personal start pages. People commonly use Netvibes, Pageflakes, or iGoogle.

__**Social Networking**__ [|Twitter]: For me, it's all in whom I follow. I started tweeting in January, 2008, and until I started following some of the "right" people, I didn't get much out of it. The best way to find more good people is to see whom the people you value are following. We can take a look at my twitter feed now, but my updates are protected. If you'd like to follow me, just search for shighley, and I will get a note to accept or decline. Naturally, there are now spammers on twitter. If someone requests to follow you (or your updates are not protected and they click to follow you), it is considered "common courtesy" to follow them back. (Is that an oxymoron? Common courtesy on the internet?) I have more twitter resources on a twitter page on this wiki.

We could try an experiment where you sign up for Twitter, try it for a month, then share with us what you learned.

[|Ning]: It's like Facebook that you control. You can create a ning for your class(es). I created one for Creston that you can join. First you have to **//join//** ning, then you have to //**sign in**// to a particular ning.

Facebook: How much do you use it? What are the implications for schools?