Article 3

This article discusses what some ed tech experts believed to be the best web 2.0 tools for enabling collaboration in teaching and learning.  Steve Hargadon is one of the experts highlighted in this article and he describes the effectiveness of having something as simple as a blog to be a very effective way of creating conversations on the web.  He mentions using them to communicate classroom work and activities, posting an assignment on the blog and having students reply to it, and assigning individual blogs to students as possibilities.  The next tool he liked was the idea of utilizing social networks.  He states how many people may not read a blog, but they will check out the instantaneous feedback of a social network.  He mentioned the social network ‘Ning’ as a very popular one for professionals to expand on their educational interests.  People used to only think about great ideas at conferences and now they are able to do it all the time and read different individuals input on topics.  The last tool he discussed was synchronous live platforms.  He mentions the Flat Classroom Project that allows for worldwide collaboration where students can share their work in many formats with all kinds of other students around the world. 

John Kuglin was another tech expert highlighted in the article who currently works for the US Department of Education.  He likes the idea of utilizing the cloud and how universal it is.  He highlighted using google docs in the classroom for students to easily collaborate and also be easily used as an assessment tool for teachers to communicate with their students.  The next tool Kuglin highlighted is SlideRocket which has become very popular in business presentations.  This form of presentation is easy to share and edit on the web and is very google friendly.  The last tool he discusses is School Fusion which allows students to build pages and serve as a website for students to grab their information.  It is also used as a great notification tool for parents when things are updated.

Leslie Fisher is the last tech expert in this article who was an employee at Apple.  Her first favorite tech tool was Twitter because of how it reaches the students fingers instantaneously so they can’t miss the information.  She also liked TypeWith.me, which was very similar to a google docs feature with many people collaborating on the doc at a time and also providing a time stamp of progress.  Her last tool was Ustream.  She liked how people could broadcast over the internet as long as they had a webcam. 

All of these tools seem to be very useful and I think it all comes down to what you like to use as a user.  There are almost too many tools out there to make it so complex and it can get difficult to sift through everything that is out there.  Many of these tools do similar things but just have little tweaks to them that make them different.  After thinking about all of these options I think it would be a good idea to poll my students at the beginning of the year to find out what forms of social media, and other technological communication they are most comfortable with using and use already.  It may also be a good idea to find out what they are using in their other classes to keep everything relatively uniform and much easier for the students to keep track. 

Demski, J. (2010). Ed Tech Experts Choose Top Tools. T.H.E. Journal,

   

     37(7), 32-37. Retrieved from http://thejournal.com/Articles/201

   

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