Techie Breakie Session 4

This week in Techie Breakie our focus has moved away from the tools that the teachers can use (Twitter, Blogger, Google Reader) to help them develop their own PLNs and reflect on their own teaching and learning, and we have moved onto looking at the different tools that the teachers can use with their students.

Our first question this week was: What are Web 2.0 tools and how can I use these with my students? We started with a look at the difference between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0. I had earlier found a presentation about this using Vuvox and I thought it would be appropriate to show them the differences using an actual Web 2.0 tool.

We then went on to look at the Web 2.0 tools that we have already started using at school with the different grade levels. In Kindergarten students have used VoiceThread to show their learning about materials so we went and had a look at what Emily's class had done using this tool. Grade 2 students have used several different tools this year: as well as using skype and email to connect with other students around the world, they have used VoiceThread, Glogster and ZimmerTwins. I decided to show an example of how 2 students in Susan's class used ZimmerTwins to make a short animation about the importance of getting enough rest - part of their Healthy Lifestyles unit.

Our Grade 4 students have used Glogster and VoiceThread, but one project I really wanted to show the Techie Breakie team was the Google Earth Tour made by Karen's class. Right at the beginning of the year, when all the other 4th Grade students were using PowerPoint to show their learning about different regions of Switzerland, Karen's class were doing something different: they were looking at landforms around the world and how the physical geography of a place impacts on the culture and lifestyles of the people living there. We therefore shared that tour with the team.

In Grade 5 Rebecca's class have done a lot of different projects using Web 2.0. They have used Bitstrips, blogs, wikis, netvibes, xTimeline, XtraNormal and Prezi. We therefore had a look at the animation made by 2 of Rebecca's students to show their understanding of different life phases. I loved the idea of using the work done by students to showcase what is going on in those classes and encourage teachers to have a go at using these tools themselves.

For our next session I want to get onto social bookmarking and tagging and to show the team Delicious, Diigo and Evernote, as well as to get onto looking at creative commons and using Flickr.