Although I ha

 

ven't been the most frequent user of blogs in classroom , I do believe that they can have an enourmous impact on the learning process.
The first time I ever used a blog in classroom was in 2004 with my advanced and low intermediate groups. At that time we worked on something called FOTOLOG, which was a kind of more dynamic blog in which pictures are posted everyday and people would basically go there and comment on the picture or just leave the person a message. The idea was not to write long posts but rather short messages and comments.
Did that work? Well, I guess it did! First because Fotolog was huge at that time and most students had one, so they knew what it was all about and were familiar with the tool! Second, because they were always curious to see  the next post and the next picture. Third, because this activity immediately increased the interaction among everyone because there was a space reserved to the fotologgers. Consequently, students coud visit the other classmates' fotologs and leave messages, see their pictures and learn a bit more about each individual's life.
What I used it most for was to practice specific language points being taught and sometimes I left room for letting them express their opinions on certain topics. It was a rather more controlled activity so students were not that free to write anything or even post on the fotolog. But, for a first contact with the virtual world that was pretty effective. Nowadays that blogs a more spread out and people understand it better I can definitely see that it allows students to have more interaction and produce more language.
One the most powerful benefits in blogs is to give some students a chance to make their voices heard. Sometimes students are very shy and don't participate that much in class so we all have this tendency to believe he/she is not very fluent or interested. But maybe the way communication is taking place is not so favorable to him/her. I've had lots of surprises by using the Fotolog because there were students who started participating in it more than in class. They were excellent at  words and were able to get their ideas across. They were very shy to talk, but not to write.
This kind of activity opened my eyes to other possibilities because as a teacher sometimes I tend to label students or underestimate their capacity. I was definitely impressed with some of the things some students wrote!
Nowadays, Fotlogs are no so huge but blogs have become more popular. The biggest challeng for me is to make students use a blog on a daily basis, because it may seem less exciting than something practical and fast like Fotolog. It's not common for teens to have blogs in which they write tons of things every single day. I'd like to give it a try in the future and see what happens!

 

 

 

 

I have to confess that's the first time I ever heard about the word " bookmarking". As I have perceived , it's a very common word in the virtual world. Moreover, that was the first time I've ever head about DIIGO.

When I first tried using and exploring DIIGO I just thought I couldn't handle it. Too much information, too many different places to click on and many new tools to learn about. So, In the beginning it was total despair, but right now I'm feeling a bit more comfortable!

One of the greatest things I liked about it was exactly the social bookmarking stuff. I mean, I'm a member of a community made up of teachers with the same interests and reality. Consequently, we're able to share ideas in a much more practical way because in Diigo, you don't need to send a link to anyone special about a site you liked. Through bookmarking you can send the link to the whole community and then each member can check the website if they find it relevant to them. Because we live in a crazy world in which time is precious, this tool is extremely helpful. I did'nt have time to click on every link members have posted but I took a look at some of them and discovered nice things. Victor, for example, mentioned using ANIMOTO and one of the links I had liked in my personal exploration was one which showed lots of sites that dealt with videos. I had seen a link to Animoto on that website; so, based on Victor's remarks learned about Animoto and even started using it! I found it so incredible that I made a video myself! If it wasn't for a tool like bookmarking I would probably not have learned about Animoto.

When I think about social bookmarking I just think about teachers in a teacher's room talking about books they reccomend, sites they find interesting to use in class, activities they can share with each other. The only difference is that it can now be made in a new different way! We're living the internet era, so we can take advantage of it to help us learn more stuff. And now we're no longer limited to the teacher's room, but we can have this kind of interaction with teachers from other institutions and from other countries as well.

I still don't know how this could be used effectively in a real class because getting students to access the internet for certain things is still difficult. I mean , they all love using it, that's for sure. The only challenge there is to make them become interested in using a new tool in a website they're no familiar with. Once I tried to have my whole class use the Orkut for class matters but I could manage to work on that with everyone. And Orkut is a very interesting and easy -to -use site, just inagine something like Diigo!

But I don't want to be pessimistic about it because I also believe in change! I myself found Diigo very weird but now that I'm learning how to use it , I'm feeling much better. If students start using it they'll certainly become familiar too and will not complain so much.

So, if I had this one very good group that can be easily involved in a virtual endeavor like this I would ask them to bookmark interesting websites they find interesting to study English. They could also bookmark websites in English that they like to access related to their personal tastes too. This way, students could have a genuine interaciton in English and bring the whole class together! The teacher could also post links related to things the students are studying in the book.

Well, it's a whole new world of opportunities and discoveries!! I guess I still don't know about all the potential Diigo has !

I have to confess that's the first time I ever heard about the word " bookmarking". As I have perceived , it's a very common word in the virtual world. Moreover, that was the first time I've ever head about DIIGO.

When I first tried using and exploring DIIGO I just thought I couldn't handle it. Too much information, too many different places to click on and many new tools to learn about. So, In the beginning it was total despair, but right now I'm feeling a bit more comfortable!

One of the greatest things I liked about it was exactly the social bookmarking stuff. I mean, I'm a member of a community made up of teachers with the same interests and reality. Consequently, we're able to share ideas in a much more practical way because in Diigo, you don't need to send a link to anyone special about a site you liked. Through bookmarking you can send the link to the whole community and then each member can check the website if they find it relevant to them. Because we live in a crazy world in which time is precious, this tool is extremely helpful. I did'nt have time to click on every link members have posted but I took a look at some of them and discovered nice things. Victor, for example, mentioned using ANIMOTO and one of the links I had liked in my personal exploration was one which showed lots of sites that dealt with videos. I had seen a link to Animoto on that website; so, based on Victor's remarks learned about Animoto and even started using it! I found it so incredible that I made a video myself! If it wasn't for a tool like bookmarking I would probably not have learned about Animoto.

When I think about social bookmarking I just think about teachers in a teacher's room talking about books they reccomend, sites they find interesting to use in class, activities they can share with each other. The only difference is that it can now be made in a new different way! We're living the internet era, so we can take advantage of it to help us learn more stuff. And now we're no longer limited to the teacher's room, but we can have this kind of interaction with teachers from other institutions and from other countries as well.

I still don't know how this could be used effectively in a real class because getting students to access the internet for certain things is still difficult. I mean , they all love using it, that's for sure. The only challenge there is to make them become interested in using a new tool in a website they're no familiar with. Once I tried to have my whole class use the Orkut for class matters but I could manage to work on that with everyone. And Orkut is a very interesting and easy -to -use site, just inagine something like Diigo!

But I don't want to be pessimistic about it because I also believe in change! I myself found Diigo very weird but now that I'm learning how to use it , I'm feeling much better. If students start using it they'll certainly become familiar too and will not complain so much.

So, if I had this one very good group that can be easily involved in a virtual endeavor like this I would ask them to bookmark interesting websites they find interesting to study English. They could also bookmark websites in English that they like to access related to their personal tastes too. This way, students could have a genuine interaciton in English and bring the whole class together! The teacher could also post links related to things the students are studying in the book.

Well, it's a whole new world of opportunities and discoveries!! I guess I still don't know about all the potential Diigo has !

  After watching the youtube videos and going on our web safari 2.0, I discovered that I knew some of the functions in some popular webtools but I didn't actually know it belonged to the Web 2.0. Ideed, I had never heard about this "wEB 2.0 "  before starting this course! I guess that little by little I'm becoming more literate about this whole new trend related to using the internet in the classroom.
  After watching the videos I realized that what I had been doing with some of my groups was not enough.In the past, I've worked with fotologs and blogs with some of my groups. The experience was awesome, but I've concluded that there's much more I can do and explore!! I truly believe that students are much more exposed to technology and internet crazes. So, if we, teachers, can take advantage of these things kids enjoy, classes can turn out to be much more interesting. Moreover, interaction and rapport between teacher and student will definitely increase, thus improving the quality of the whole learning process.
  In sum, we are living the era of technology in which changes happen at the speed of light. It is very hard for us who were not born and raised around a computer and internet to deal with all those novelties the way our students do. But, I agree that as a teacher and educator, it is our duty to work harder and try to understand their universe. In a way, just like the video mentioned, students expect us to provoke them with new things, to speak their language and to pose them with challenges that can startle their interest in what is being taught. There's no doubt that the same content can be absorbed and perceived in different ways if you compare a traditional class and a class fulfilled with innovations brought by the internet.