535 Week 5

I thought that looking at other Web 2.0 tools was the most interesting assignment this week. The one that I found to be extremely interesting was the point.

It is a website that allows group action to happen once certain requirements are met. So, if 1,000,000 people sign an online petition not to work on Election Day, everyone who signed on is notified that the million mark has been reached. Then, people will know that there are nearly one million other people who agree with them, and collectively they can take action.

I think that comes at a good time. My school has had a couple of issues that have come up recently, where it has been necessary to take collective action. The first is when the superintendent pulled the musical "Chicago," due to parental concerns. There was a student petition floating around to keep the show on.

The second issue we have had is with the administration's desire to change to a block schedule. Students also organized a petition to stop this from happening. I think that using an online forum would have better help students, parents, and community members to organize!

535 Week 4

I spent a chunk of time this week setting up a Ning for my Junior/Senior Sociology class. This course is heavy on discussion, but some students are so reluctant to participate. So, I thought that allowing them to type answers to my questions would increase participation. Many of my students are familiar with Moodle, but I think that the Ning I created is going to be a little more user friendly for my students. I introduced it to my students during class on Friday, and they seemed interested. A few of them even mentioned how "cool" it was. Lately, I feel as though it is taking quite a bit for me to impress them in their time of early onset senioritis, so I think a few "cools" is about as good as it is going to get! It will be interesting to see how the Ning is further able to engage some of my disengaged students!

535 Week 3

After a crazy weekend away at a friend's wedding out of state, I have finally begun my homework. I think that the most exciting assignment this week was to compile a list of blogs that we wanted to follow. I found some blogs that look really interesting, and I am excited to look through them in the future. I am still undecided about the creative commons assignment. I do post pictures to picassa or facebook as a way of sharing them with friends. Most of my pictures are of people, so I have never delved into the world of getting my own creative commons license. However, I am excited at the thought of creating a ning for my classes. I have used a wiki in the past, so I am looking forward to trying something different!