More Nings for Students and Educators

At the Social Networks in Education wiki, you can find dozens of Nings for particular subjects, professional development, French and Spanish, and classroom networks. Many of these Nings connect students globally and can be great tools for your middle schoolers. Or you can modify them to fit your plans and students, find some collaborators, or be inspired to change or add to some of your classroom practices.

You can find all kinds of Nings, and some non-Ning networks, on the page. Some of the Nings made expressly to connect students and teachers globally are listed below:

• FieldFindr aims to connect global volunteers with teachers and their students. Teachers can post looking for volunteers or people who have expert knowledge to enrich their classes' study of immigration, peace studies, playgrounds, and the Holocaust. Teachers can also search for other collaborators through posted comments.

• The International Classroom, a social network created specifically for students ages 12-14 to be able to safely connect and share their experiences and cultures, and The French Connection, a Ning linking sixth-grade classes in the U.S. and France for French language study, are both closed. You must be invited to participate or learn more.

• Rolling on the River is centered around the study of rivers and other bodies of water. It is a "a resource for global collaboration" where users can "[s]hare information, find global partners, and learn more about rivers, lakes, and oceans through participation and collaboration." An interdisciplinary exhibit can be seen at the Apple Learning Exchange. Teachers also share web resources and search for collaborators on specific water studies projects.

• Museums and Students offers a portal to connect students with museums, their staff, and artists. It exploits one of the great aspects of Nings--the multimedia nature of interaction. Museums and Students has videos of artists discussing their works and processes, links for a podcast from the Columbia Museum of Art and other art-related podcasts, notices of art-education events and professional development opportunities, additional groups that focus on particular museums or topics, and forums on museums' online presence and the value of virtual tours.

Most of what you'll find on the wiki are class Nings -- many private -- and social networks for teachers looking for more information or colleague interaction and support as they use or learn to integrate Web 2.0 tools into their teaching and disciplines. As we slide all too quickly into summer, this wiki can be a great resource for new ideas, new friends, and inspiration for next year and beyond.

SOURCE: "Social Networks in Education" 2008
photo courtesy of openDemocracy, used under this Creative Commons license

How to Go Global on a School Budget

The goal: to connect your middle schoolers with experts, students, teachers and citizens around the country and world. The obstacle: your school's budget. But Alexander Russo reports in Edutopia that, using the Flat Classroom Project as an example, teachers can create global education projects with on-hand and free resources.

Russo tells teachers to start close to home, in their schools and communities. Teachers can tap other teachers and students, local businesses or cultural organizations, like churches, that have some connection to another country or region. One example comes from the small, rural town of Mathis, TX, where a new international studies school "discovered that a local company was selling cattle guards to India. The business owner helped explain to the class how the relationship with an overseas buyer works, along with the logistical and cultural issues." Starting close to home not only cuts costs but also helps teachers focus on content rather than webcams, microphones and projectors. Focus on "a meaningful, skill-developing experience, not just a virtual field trip that is pleasant but not particularly deep or rigorous," Russo writes.

And there are a lot of free tools available for all kinds of global or international projects. Wikis, podcasts, and Google Earth are familiar tools for sharing and working across borders and time zones. Nings, also free and with multimedia capabilities, allow students to connect and share in a controlled space, vital for middle schoolers. Scheduling can be coordinated with AirSet, a free online program. FlashMeeting provides free videoconferencing, even for schools with low bandwidth. ePals offers free learning communities that teachers can control and monitor. Many schools are already using ePals for all kinds of learning projects and needs.

For somewhat minimal fees, depending on your school's resources, teachers can also tap iEARN and Journeys in Film. iEARN, International Education and Resource Network, coordinates collaborative projects for $100 per teacher or $400 for an entire school. As many as 20,000 educators are part of iEARN's learning communities. If your school has no online connections, Journeys in Film offers lesson plans to use with international films to bring the world to your students. Journeys in Film charges $75 per teaching guide or $250 for a set of four.

Other sites that have resources for global projects include the Global Educational Collaborative, a social-networking site for teachers; the Apple Learning Exchange, an online community maintained by Apple; and Global SchoolNet, a site that offers project learning exchanges on the Internet.

SOURCE: "Global Education On a Dime: A Low-Cost Way to Connect" 11/12/07
photo courtesy of Gaetan Lee, used under this Creative Commons license

Connecting through Web 2.0

Web 2.0 has some great tools for education in an increasingly digital and global world, but K-12 teachers have understandable concerns about security for their students and academic usefulness. No one has time to waste these days. Patrica Deubel in THE Journal provides a great round-up of helpful guides to Web 2.0 and a summary of some of the great and mostly free tools available in a format meant to help already-busy teachers at all levels and with all levels of technological expertise and experience.

Deubel points out several online videos and quick start guides that explain terminology, such as what RSS feeds and aggregators are, and provide links for free online web applications for "bookmarking managers, file storage/transfer, productivity, collaboration, and internet/network tools like Web-based e-mail, online fax, online chat, and more." There are lists for open source software and guides for using Web 2.0 tools in your classroom. Some tools that seem most useful for middle school teachers trying to connect students to the world outside the classroom (and also to some homeschoolers looking to connect) include the following:

• For a fee, teachers can sign up for Ed.VoiceThread, a more secure and safe version of VoiceThread. Ed.VoiceThread is private and made "for creating digital stories and documentaries, practicing language skills, exploring geography and culture, solving math problems, collaborating with other students, or simply finding and honing student voices." Student work can be made public to share and make assignments more meaningful. (We know how publishing work can alter student effort and motivation.)
  


• Elgg is free, open-source software for creating social networks that comes with "blogging, networking, community, collecting of news using feeds aggregation and file sharing features." Access controls allow work to be shared and tags make it easier to categorize and search for work. If security is still a concern, Elgg can be installed on a school server and controlled by a system administrator or a teacher.
  


• Ning is also a great, free social networking tool. (Classroom 2.0 is a fabulous Ning group page for teachers wanting more information or feedback on using collaborative technology.)
  


• Think.com is also free and has password-protected online environments for K-12 students and teachers. At Think.com, students can collaborate with others on projects, create Web pages and hold online discussions. Teachers can monitor the spaces they create for student work and collaboration. Think.com is also ad-free and has spam filters.
  


• TIGed from TakingITGlobal has free teacher-controlled online environments for project-based learning and collaboration, safe social networking and galleries, podcasts, blogs and an online magazine for student publishing. Membership at TIGed is free but there are fees to create virtual classrooms and to access activity databases and teacher discussion groups.

At the end of the article, Deubel provides a link to a booklet by Terry Freedman that has advice for using Web 2.0 applications effectively and purposefully in education. There's also a list of links for all the resources mentioned in the article ranging from AltaVista's Babel Fish translator to Engrade (a free online grading package) to Scratch (student art-sharing on the Web) to Whyville (a virtual world for ages 8-16).

SOURCE: "A Taste of Web 2.0" 03/2008
photo courtesy of kevindooley, used under this Creative Commons license

WebEx? Ning? More on Getting Connected

How can teachers safely, easily and cheaply set up sessions with remote authors, scientists, performers, instructors and other experts? Instant messaging has the real-time contact teachers and students want, but comes with vulnerabilities. And many school networks block or don't allow instant messaging programs. Using one on the Internet that doesn't require installation poses its own problems, mostly that of security. For example, Yahoo! Messenger on the Web is just as vulnerable to spam as Yahoo! Mail. Teachers need to get students in real-time discussions without the fear of intruders or the hassle of sometimes vulgar spam.

WebEx offers "secure instant messaging" with AIM Pro Secure Instant Messaging. The application is geared toward businesses which need to connect workers without going public on the Web. It offers chat, audio and video in a tool that can be managed by an administrator to include or exclude anyone from a group or discussion. WebEx promises full security with "comprehensive end-to-end encryption, user authentication, and configurable content and URL filters." All of this comes at a price. You can try it for free, but it is a subscription service with a monthly fee. But because it is web-based, there is nothing to download or install and it can be accessed from any browser.

Ning allows members to create social networks that can be used for intra-group communication. The creator of a group or network controls who is in the group and messages can only be received from and sent to members of the group. The platform for Ning is programmable and can be adjusted for different uses, according to the About Ning page. When you create a group or network, you can select a public or private setting, discussion forums, photo or video sharing or other options. Group discussions or forums can be initiated by clicking "Start New Discussion" on the group or network's home page. Ning is free. Ad revenue supports the site and that may be something to consider. Do you want a network or group page with ads that are beyond your control? (In looking at sample groups and networks, I did not see any ads on the group homepages.) It is supported by Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari which also eliminates any need for downloading or installing on a school network. Samples of established networks can be accessed on the Ning homepage.

Has anyone used Ning? Or subscribed to WebEx? Is WebEx a possibility? Are there secure options offered by Internet providers? Or created by a school system for its schools? Or is videoconferencing easier for bringing an author, researcher or teacher from another school into the classroom? Ning seems to be a good tool for group discussion but how well does it work? As LIVEbrary on Demand prepares for Season 2, your comments will really help get our authors into classrooms.

SOURCE: "WebEx AIM® Pro Business Edition" 2008
SOURCE: "About Ning" 2008
SOURCE: "Ning Features" 2008

photo courtesy of Aaron Jacobs, used under this Creative Commons license