Chris Betcher's Presentation

Good practical information. I learned some good strategies for doing a google search. The hoax websites were interesting and could be a good teaching tool for getting students to evaluate websites- a valuable tool. I enjoyed learning more about wikipedia and how to follow the history of how an entry is constructed. Interesting discussion about the reliability of wikipedia.

Comments on Clarence's presentation

This morning before class I went to my classroom to pull out some papers to photocopy for Monday's class. After Clarence's presentation I'll put those papers away and post the task on the class wiki. Kids will plan their rice negotiations on the wiki and do their reflections on the wiki. Kids will comment on each others reflections- Much better than paper and pencil. However, will the internet be working on Monday??? Will the wiki cooperate??? Do  I remember how to embed a video on the wiki? We will need to have a plan B just in case technology doesn't work for us.

I want my students to be 'hubs'. I agree with Clarence that students need to understand that there is a big world out there and that students need to develop a global perspective. Technology can be the tool to allow that to happen.

I'm excited about having kids read current info about the environment, innovations- good and bad in science, technology. 

 Some questions- How do you sort through all the info to get the best , most accurate, reader appropriate stuff? This seems like it could potentially take A LOT of time to manage and just read all the info that could come my way. How do I keep up with all of this? I've heard of delicious and twitter. However, what are these 'tools' and what is the potential of these tools? I realize that teaching kids how to access relevant info is the key. The content that we teach today may very well be totally irrelevant  in 5 years but the skills to access, sort and evaluate info are the way to go. I know I need to 'be present in the network' to facilitate kids learning with technology and being active, productive participants in the social learning network. However, I have so much to learn to get up to speed and then I worry about keeping up with the speed at which technology is changing.