School 2.0 in SA

Quite a few of my teachers have asked me how I get it right to twitter, bookmark, chat, engage in social media and get my work done. I do not always get it right to juggle everything as effectively as I would have liked to, but I have devised a way to slip in all the things that I feel strongly about into my workday in a way that I do not even notice that I am doing it. So I thought I will share it with you.

My main daily communication and resource tools are Twitter (microblogging tool), Delicious and Diigo (bookmarking tools), Google reader (keeping track of new posts from my network and all over) as well as Skype/gtalk (for real-time chat and support)

I check my Twitter , say, every 1/2 and hour or so. Mainly to see if my network has anything valuable for me to look at and to see if there are any @replies or direct messages for me to respond to. Twitter is an instantaneous learning tool – it is not as intrusive as e-mail and it is quick to scan. If I am passed a great resource (and my network is really brilliant, so I always have!), I look at it (click through from the tweet) and immediately store it for later reference and use. I do this …

• Using my Diigo button (installed when I downloaded the Diigo toolbar), a little window then pops up where the
  • Web address is automatically captured as well as…
    Whatever I have highlighted as a description. I always try and insert something relevant there as it makes it easier when searching for resources.
  • I can then tag the resource at the same time. This step is very important as it will make it possible to find the resource again (and that is what it is ultimately all about in the end) So I make sure that I tag it using relevant tags familiar to me.
    • I also use tags that I have set up in Diigo to perform certain actions..
      • like creating a automatic weekly blog post of all my resources tagged with that word (eg see all the weekly bookmark posts- they have been tagged with the word “school2.0” which then make Diigo create a blogpost once a week)
      • also have specific RSS feeds set up that will look for all the resources tagged with a specific word and then send it to a feed located on a different blogpost (eg ML123 tagged resources go  to my mathsliteracy blog feed, and resources marked with “mathematics” go to my mathematics social network on NING)
      • I can also decide if I want to send the bookmark (resource) to a specific list or group (eg if it is a maths literacy resource, I post it to my ML123 group or if it is a general teacher resource I post it to my Educator group)
  • The window also has a little checkbox which, if ticked, will send my resource to twitter. I love this feature as it is a quick way to share resources on the fly with those interested in the same things I am (maths, social media, teacher stuff, ICT4teaching&learning) who are following me on Twitter (instant learning).
    • All my twitters automatically go to my Facebook update, which means that in the process I educate my kids, family and Facebook friends (advocacy ) They moan bitterly about this!!!
  • I have also set up my Diigo to automatically post all my bookmarks to my Delicious bookmarking system as well
    • Diigo is like a database of resources (a very good user friendly one) and depending on how well I tag my resources, I can find anything, drilling down to the last detail, in seconds.
    • I initially started off with Delicious which is also a bookmarking system, but has a far simpler interface (I have tried both with my teachers and Delicious has been more user friendly for new computer users) It is not as social and do not have annotation and discussion features. This means that I physically have to go to it to see what my network is up to (which I do once a month and the tag back to my system). (See my Delicious learning object for teachers here)
    • The reason why am using both systems simultaneously is
      • I actually find that Delicious is an easier search engine to use
      • I have an established network on Delicious that I value and support
      • My novice teachers are on Delicious and I need to support them as well.

I check my Google reader at least once a day. Google Reader is a RSS (real simple syndication) tool that downloads (automatically) all the feeds (from articles) that I have set up for it to fetch.

• When I open it (and I always keep it open) I can see when anyone in my network/blogs/websites have updated their blog etc.
• Scanning through the heading titles quickly brings me up to date with the latest news and Edtech skinner
• and If I find something that I would like to use in future I tag it using my
  Diigo button (see above) –> database–> delicious–>twitter–>twitter replies. So this is a vital part of my daily professional development

Skype/Gtalk is my personal contact with the world and I mostly use it to support my teachers and stay in direct contact with my kids. I can talk anybody through anything using Skype. It is almost like being in the same room. I always mark myself as “away” (even if I am there) in order for me to have the choice to engage or not. This way people do not have to feel bad about bothering me, as they know that I have a choice to talk to them.

I do  not use Google search much any more. I rather search through my database (Diigo and Delicious) or ask my Twitter network directly. I only go to Facebook once a week and get my friend updates in my Tweetdeck or via my Friendfeed. As I find Facebook to be very “slutty” it can be a mindless distraction and I limit it for myself.  In a next blogpost I will highlight all the other tools that I use on a daily basis.

As everybody know I have been having an on-off relationship with my Cell Phone for years. Cell phones do not like me. They break, grow legs, and mostly get alienated from their power cables. I have tried moving over to smart cell phones. They make matters even worse. They are power- hogging little devices out to cripple Eskom and I find myself (that is if I remembered to plug in /had a power cable) without any power by tea time! Also, my eyesight has now officially progressed past puberty and I am struggling to read which new reading glasses I should acquire. But I am digressing. Maybe I just want to mention that I do believe in cell phones as great learning devices and will use it more actively the moment I found my charger cable!

So how do you contact/get hold of me? As you have gathered by now, phoning me on my cell phone might not be a good way to go. In the past e-mail was a very effective way to get my attention. But since I have not been able to catch up on the 3000 e-mails that accumulated during my Christmas virtual break, I have funnelled my e-mail into folders and play eenie-meanie-minie-mo on which folder I will read every day. Those who know me, knows to mark their e-mail as high priority (I check that folder a few times a day)

So what is the best way? My current favourite way of communication is Twitter. I had to smile at my niece, who, on failure to contact me on my cell and landlines (Telkom took 2 weeks to fix it), resorted to see what I am up to on my twitter feed. Clever girl. Contacting me is as easy as sending me an @maggiev or direct message (d maggiev) at www.twitter.com/maggiev . And yes, it does get delivered to my cell phone via sms as well!

What actually inspired this blogpost is this cartoon:

Today is the start of my first online blogging workshop. I have about 23 enthusiastic local learners who are going to walk this learning pathway with me so I should not be so scared, should I?

My main aim is to see how an online un-workshop can bring together a bunch of people to learn a new skill and also to pilot my self study tutorials for my subject advisors training initiative. I have decided to create it in PowerPoint so that subject advisors (and who-ever) can just adapt it effortlessly for their own learning and training purposes and I can also just embed videos and links into it. I had some good feedback from my twitter community with hints and suggestions. For instance, I forgot to cite my cartoons and am now frantically trying to figure out sources and permissions!

I am using a NING platform for the workshop and have no idea if it is going to be intuitive for those who attend. I first started in the main network space, but then realise d that it will be very difficult to keep track of discussions in a general space, so I created a seperate group where only the people on the workshop can engage. This provided my first mess-up as I have already asked everybody to introduce themselves in the main space. I have decided to wait an see how we all cope with my brain-dead moment. Indeed a very interesting learning curve for me.

So today we will just get to know each other and find our feet in the group. I have loaded the “Why Blog” learning object for everybody to look at and start thinking about. My main aim for today is to get everybody into the separate workshop group.

The Blogging workshop is here

I am visual learner and quite enjoyed the creation of a visual image of my blog, which I found at http://www.aharef.info/static/htmlgraph and after investigating this interesting site (http://www.learning-styles-online.com) I have decided that I do not nearly enough use “learning styles” as a lens for material development and teaching!

I investigated this after reading this class blog post. (Sometimes I wish that I can remember to record the learning pathways I am taken on…..)

Note to self: Make a list of visual learning aids for teachers to use…..

• Flickr (a place to upload and share images that can then be embedded using all the lovely slideshows and widgets)
• Voicethreads (Making conversations/discussions meaningful with images and sound)
• …..feel free to add you own visual tools in the comments