Due to the incredible popularity of twitter globally, more guides are being written every day. I have had to update my teacher twitter learning object twice, due to the twitter interface changing. I also have not began to scratch the surface as far as handy twitter applications are concerned, but then I discovered this comprehensive guide to twitter from Makeuseof which always gives a down to earth perspective and look at tools and gadgets.
As I have various alter ego’s (@maggiev@schoollibrary@hogsback@mathslitteacher- The last 3 are collaborative), this web based tool is really very handy. You do not have to install a programme on your computer as it sits in your browser. You can keep track of all your personas and create separate streams which helps if you are following a great deal of interesting people. You can create a stream group by adding followers or hashtags. For instance, you can create a stream to follow the learners in your class. Another advantage is that you can keep track of your tweet stats with detailed graphs and stats (always very interesting from a maths point of view)
My Diigo auto- bookmarkmarklet to twitter
Where twitter is the mouth of my online learning, Diigo is the heart and as it has an auto twitter tickbox, I can automatically post my bookmarks to twitter on the fly by just ticking the box. All you have to do is to install the diigo toolbar and click on bookmark. The rest is seamless. Very handy.
Is a grouping tool and comes in quite handy when you have meetings or workshops. Previously I swamped my poor following with workshop/meeting tweets. I am sure not all my social media and edtech followers are interested in mathematical literacy and the hassles we are having with assessment, so twibes makes it possible to create an interest group around a specific hashtag and use it as a seperate backchannel.
Tweets are only visible for a period of time and it is therefore very important to back it up/print it. I do this once a month and also back up my favourite tweople’s tweets! This makes for some great bedtime reading!
But let me introduce you to this great guide for a few more (very comprehensive) step by step pointers……..
Social media (web 2.0 tools) presents lots of learning and teaching opportunities for the maths/maths literacy teacher. In this workshop presentation for my workshop at the Amesa 2009 congress, on how to use web 2.0 tools in the maths/ mathsliteracy classroom, I explore some of the uses for the classroom. It has been designed as a learning journey with examples and tutorials for those who want to incorporate and learn how other maths teachers are using social media in their classes and for professional development.
I will load my learning pathways as I create them. Here is a learning pathway to learn why and how to create a blog…..
What is a blog and why should we blog?
Define blogs and contexts for use. Provide some blogs ideas depending on what kind of blog you would like to create. Take you through an action plan to focus why you should blog.
To download the Powerpoint in order to see the animations, click here
The anatomy of a blog.
Looks at how a blog is structured in order to provide familiarity. You will also decide on where you should create your blog.
To download the Powerpoint in order to see the animations, click here
Podcasting can be a powerful tool to use in the classroom. Let me “count the ways”… (just a few…please add….)
Storytelling. Let the learners record their own “stories” about whatever theme you are currently engaged with. eg instead of having to stand in front of the class to “do a speech”, they can record their speech , upload it as a podcast and the class can then go and leave comments, suggestions as peer review. (learner centred)
Homework: Instructions for doing an assignment. The learners can download the podcast to their cell phones/ipods or access it from your class blog and use it to assist them to do their homework. Let them take “your voice” with them. (teacher centred)
Interviews with specialists: Get the kids to do the interviews, edit it (using audacity) and upload it to the class blog (eg careers in LO) (learner centred)
School radio station. Now this is one that everybody can have fun with! Why not start a daily/weekly “radio station” for the school where the fun and spirit of the school can be captured in audio format and showcase some of the anecdotes? (uhmmm just make sure that their is some adult supervising) (learner centred)
Capture field trips in audio format to feature on radio station……
So how do I do it?
There are quite a few nice tools that we can use….but let me start at the beginning in a step by step way (us older folkies did not grow up in the constructivist era!)
Record the podcast (use a cell phone, which is the easiest, or a mike connected to a computer or a dictaphone)
Download the recording onto your computer (bluetooth connection or USB)
Depending on if it is in MP3 format (most podcast requires this format), first turn it into an MP3:
I tried Switch, which has a free easy to use version for download
Create an account with Gcast (http://www.gcast.com/) There are very clear tutorials on how to set it up there.
Create podcasting channel (eg, you can create a channel for each of your classes)
Hit the Upload button!
Embed you podcast in your blog/school website/Facebook/Myspace…where ever! Just copy the code given and paste it in your “code-html” on your blog.
This blogpost was inspired by a post by Wesley Fryer, where he gives other options of how to do it!
As community moderator at our mathematical literacy teacher community (www.mathsliteracy.ning.com) I see my main role as facilitator of relationships and communications as well as technical support person within the community. Within this context I have actually learn so much, in unexpected areas. One of my community members posed a question starting off with ” This must be the dumbest question…” and that lead to me having a wondeful new learning experience!
She wanted to draw a system of axes (with grid) to use in her linear programming worksheet where the learners could sketch on the grid. So I immediately jumped to the occation by uploading a ‘How to’:
We tend to want to remedy situations by offering help too fast and she then gently reminded me that she is working in the new WORD 2007. So I went to investigate if I could do it in Word 2007. I have been avoiding getting to know it as it looks so different from Word 2003 and the times that I tried to figure it out, I got quite frustrated. So I forced myself…
What a pleasant surprise! It got oodles of nice features and once you get over your innitial abhorance, I found myself getting around quite effortlessly. My only worry is that I will now have to retrain my teachers to use the new Word from scratch…
So the moral of this story is that we must not be scared to learn new stuff even if the “old stuff” were so familiar and comfortable. If we don’t we, might be missing out on wonderful new features…. I do realise that TIME is a big problem. So I have made a little tutorial to demonstrate how to do a system of axes with gridlines in Word 2007.
We will be using Edublogger to create our blog. These instructions will be good for any wordpress powered blog as well. You may also download the powerpoint, which will give you the animations in a more step by step way. Just pause the slideshow to follow the instructions…
I am here today with some wonderful Curriculum advisors from Limpopo and we are teaching one another how to draw figures in Word. In the “old days” we would just “cut and paste” (as with scizzors and glue) our maths figures into our papers, which resulted in us not really being able to use the resource effectively again. So today we will do it in our papers!
For a step by step guide on how to do this, click here
I am here today with some wonderful Curriculum advisors from Limpopo and we are teaching one another how to draw figures in Word. In the “old days” we would just “cut and paste” (as with scizzors and glue) our maths figures into our papers, which resulted in us not really being able to use the resource effectively again. So today we will do it in our papers!
