You are amazing, Twitter network. Today during my presentation to staff – How do social networks empower teachers – I tweeted out the traditional ‘Please say hi and where you’re from’ to demonstrate the scope and generosity of my network, and lo and behold! many, many people took the time to respond. That really is the power of the network – people from different parts of the world, some who don’t know me at all, extending a welcoming hand for those who are new to Twitter.
Thank you to my friends, people I see face to face, and those with whom I maintain a close and collaborative contact, for your constant support. Thanks also to those whom I have now discovered, whose blogs I’ve now saved to my Google Reader, and whose shared resources I will share with my staff.
Last Friday I had the privilege of sharing some of what I’ve been doing with blogging at my schools at the SLAV conference, Celebrations! An eye for literacy. I believe SLAV hosts the most informative and inspiring conferences, deepening our understandings and broadening our horizons.
Unfortunately we were running late with this session, and at least half of my presentation had to be cut. I wasn’t able to fully develop my presentation of the topic:
Social networking: giving students an online voice. In this session you will explore the initiatives of threeschool libraries and the use of social networking to buildcommunities of readers. What worked – and why it’s worth having a go.
That’s why I’ve embedded my slideshow and accompanying text in case anyone is interested in the complete presentation.
The educators in my session were inspiring in their presentations – Tricia Sweeney and Michael Jongen (Our Lady of Mercy College, Heidelberg) talked about Twitter and Facebook to engage students, and Rachel Fidock (Mooroopna Secondary College) talked about Google Lit Trips.
Thanks to SLAV for the opportunity to share some of my work with teachers and students. Like the others, I was incredibly nervous but ended up enjoying the experience. Sharing of ideas and experiences is very satisfying.
I don’t know about you, but if someone asks me to explain the difference between Web 1.0, Web 2.0 and Web 3.0, I’m not sure if I do a great job. But this is brilliant -
Well done, Steve Wheeler, for explaining the evolution of Web 3.0. Here’s the source of this presentation in Steve’s blog post.
@ggrosseck shares some excellent links on Twitter and this is one of them.
I agree with @jennyluca who commented that this presentation is just as relevant to educators. The humour doesn’t detract from the truths expressed; I think it’s very effective. I like the way it addresses people’s attitudes to social media and in a light-hearted way before going on to all the benefits.
It also asks important questions such as Do I really want to be in a community? and supplies altruistic and selfish reasons. There’s a lot more depth to the coverage and more specific information than is often included in write ups about social media.
For a person who is trying to make sense of social media, it’s very helpful. For example, in explaining the social bookmarking site Delicious, it informs that
clicking on a link will show all the people who recommended it and under what categories (tags).
and provides a snapshot of a Delicious user’s page.
The most effective aspect of this presentation is the fact that it addresses the whys, eg. Why bother blogging?
A range of social media is covered, including Twitter, blogs, wikis, Delicious, RSS feeds and more. It really gives a good overview as well as answering specific questions people may have, finishing off with ‘So what does all this mean?’ and a list of links to further information .
I’m impressed by the depth of this presentation and would like to collaborate with somebody in producing a similar one for educators. Any takers?
Well, when I say finished, I mean that the first layer of our presentation is complete. Whitefriars College Powerful Learning Practice cohort has documented their PLP journey on a blog which is the platform for all the projects, experimentation and reflection during the course of this year.
Marie Salinger and I have spent long hours pulling the presentation together, and at the end of it we feel deeply satisfied. As I was saying to Marie earlier today, the experience reminds me of the ‘Stone soup’ story:
a tale in which strangers trick a starving town into giving them some food. It is usually told as a lesson in cooperation, especially amid scarcity. In varying traditions, the stone has been replaced with other common inedible objects, and therefore the fable is also known as button soup, wood soup, nail soup, and axe soup (from Wikipedia).
It really was exactly like that – at first we thought we didn’t have enough for the presentation but gradually we gathered things from here and there, pooling our resources and forcing reflection and evaluation, until we surprised ourselves with the result.
It has been a very positive and affirming experience to take the time to do this. Evaluating, reflecting on , summing up and consolidating the work we have been doing for the past nine months has been a very worthwhile endeavour.
Now that we have the blog as a space for sharing, we can continue to add to it as we go. I’m going to link to a new blog which follows the progress of 7M Ning, and I hope other team members will do the same. What would be even more encouraging – if the blogs inspired other members of the school community to have a go. It would be fantastic to see blogs for each faculty, documenting progress, reflecting, evaluating and celebrating.
Here is a short audiovisual reflection and summary of our journey.
