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Being home from school these past two months has been a huge challenge, especially when it comes to trying to explain how to do software related tasks with my students. I have found "comment rights" on Google Docs to be a wonderful feature. It has allowed me to give my students feedback digitally since I am unable to do so face-to-face instruction at this point in time. I have also marked up portions of their documents suggesting that they change the structure of their project or make noted corrections, ultimately resulting in a much better end product for students.
I am in favor of having students using various forms of social media (Twitter, Pinterest, Google +, Back Channel, etc.) but with it comes an important role of teaching responsible use so that students understand the importance of treating others with respect, regardless if the person shares their point of view on topics or not. Last summer I learned that Common Sense Media is an invaluable tool for both educators and parents as well providing advice, contracts, videos, and lessons on the nine elements of Digital Citizenship.
Using Social Networking apps makes exhibiting student projects easy. In the past, my department would have to wait until May each year to display a few pieces of student work from each student in our Career Prep courses. Selecting images, printing, mounting them to large form insulation boards, adding reflective writing pieces from each student ... a huge chore and since courses run for a semester, a huge storage issue as well. I look forward to trying Pinterest this semester as a way of exhibiting student work as well as for students to become inspired to come up with project ideas for themselves.
Using Social Networking apps makes exhibiting student projects easy. In the past, my department would have to wait until May each year to display a few pieces of student work from each student in our Career Prep courses. Selecting images, printing, mounting them to large form insulation boards, adding reflective writing pieces from each student ... a huge chore and since courses run for a semester, a huge storage issue as well. I look forward to trying Pinterest this semester as a way of exhibiting student work as well as for students to become inspired to come up with project ideas for themselves.
Many forms of social media have a negative connotation to them at school due to their frequent abuse - Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler, etc. Students are constantly reminded by administration that they are not allowed to take photos of other students without their consent. Just trying to get the thousands of photos I need each year for my yearbook staff and I to create a book has become a huge battle due to how administration feels students may misuse photos that are taken. Some students inappropriately assign themselves the role of action photography as they sometimes post images or video footage of fighting to YouTube and Facebook. Last year a parent came to me for advice on how to put a stop to her son being bullied (and beat up) on a school bus. She commented that the driver had not seen the fight nor did it show up on the video from the front of the bus. She also added that her son did ot know that she was aware of him being beat up by three other students. I questions her how she knew he had been beat up and she explained that the boys who had attacked her sons had video taped it with their phone and had uploaded it to Facebook. They had tagged his name in the video. As a responsible parent, she was a "friend" on her son's Facebook page so she was immediately alerted once the video had been uploaded. I told her we needed to immediately capture the video feed so that she could show it to administrators and policy law enforcement. At that point I then brought her down to our assistant principals office where she then showed the video. Educating students (and staff) about the appropriate use of these technologies can initiate important conversations that will hopefully move things forward in a positive direction. All too often, people feel that if they decide to remove images, video, or text that they have posted on social networking sites that the evidence is gone; however, in the case of the boys from the school bus beating, they learned it's impossible to delete your trail once you post something online.
I am part of my schools Technology Committee. Last year the committee hosted a Digital Citizenship Week so that all students were taught a few of the aspects of digital safety and responsibility. This year our district has gone a lot further and is infusing it within curriculum in grades K-12 so that all content areas have partial ownership on teaching 21st Century Skills relating to this topic. Two online resources that I recently discovered include Classroom 2.0 and the Learning Revolution Project. Common Sense Media, Tech & Learning Magazine and Richard Bryne's Free Technology for Teachers website are also incredible resources as well. I am hoping to soon be sharing and learning from other instructors from these sources.
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This April, I will start my employment unit with my CCE students. If given permission by my school administrators, I would like to walk students through the use of LinkedIn as part of that unit. In addition, once I finally return to school next week, I am going to have students begin to add social networking promotion links at the bottom of their websites they create as an alternative to having their sites added to search engines.
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