Disqus - Friends of southernshade

Re: On personal branding and being a small business on two legs

Kate Foy — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 17:13:02 -0000

Michele
we used to call it serendipity didn't we? Clearly it's a key issue
right now. Your post is great as always! Lots of top resources.

Re: Organisational Change and the Power of Collegiality

Kate Foy — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 19:13:02 -0000

Thanks Colin
Oh yes ... no question is dumb in dealing with all of this, and a
savvied-up, approachable colleague is often the best mentor. They've
been there, and are doing that!
PS. I like 'teachnologies.' Time for a new word?

Re: Reader

Kate Foy — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 03:35:48 -0000

Sue, the pullquote is all my own!

Re: Comment Challenge- Day 3- Comment Tracking Service

Kate Foy — Sat, 03 May 2008 18:20:56 -0000

Is this version of CoComment in beta? Just wondering. I've picked up a couple of buggy things too. It's not the most intuitively designed of interfaces ... just a bit 'busy.' I don't care for the ads either. End of minor whinge!

Re: Back from a big dark room

Kate Foy — Sun, 11 May 2008 16:35:38 -0000

As an epilogue ... the show closed yesterday afternoon to a warm reception. After-party now over, memories to file away somewhere and the business of reflection on next time begins. This theatre business is so ephemeral and yet the memories are no less rich for the transience of the experience.

Re: How do I import comments?

Kate Foy — Thu, 15 May 2008 18:25:47 -0000

I'm a WordPress self-hosted blogger and like a lot of others here, I await the arrival of an import comments function into Disqus. Until then I keep my plug-in deactivated. I care too much about the comments I have to 'lose' them.

Great that Seesmic was integrated yesterday. I switched everything back on this morning hoping you'd provided the import functionality as well. Nope. Deactivated again.

Any idea when it's coming ... ETA or something? Love the Disqus concept and look BTW!

Re: Day 14: Turn Your Blog Over to Your Readers

Kate Foy — Fri, 16 May 2008 01:38:28 -0000

Story-boarding a live-performance script helped some of my students get from page to stage/screen. We used Keynote or Powerpoint to create individual 'frames' in the story-board.

I've also used the Comic Life application with students to create a story-line synopsis of a play for the program.

Re: Preparing a cyber-diary

Kate Foy — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 21:13:33 -0000

Update
Well nearly one year on and I find myself pondering the same ideas as this post from June 2007.

I'm travelling in a slightly different way this year. A longish sailing holiday where a large camera bag would be adding more to the luggage than I'd like. I've upgraded my point and shoot to a Nikon L16; tests so far have been very positive.

I'll probably not take the laptop, and the Nokia N95 has found another home, but will rely on my iPhone to negotiate wireless hotspots and send email, upload photos, tweets and blogposts where I can. I'm hoping that one year on there will be more and reliable (read faster) wireless hotspots in places like London and Paris. Memo to self: get a map outlining where these are before I leave.

Any ideas you'd like to leave? Would love to hear from you.

Re: An e-learning report card

Kate Foy — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 06:51:15 -0000

Sarah
thanks for your video comment. I'd respond via Seesmic if I had a bit more light here in my study right now. Apart from bad hair, looks like there's another problem with using video comments!

Look I hear what you say about the carrot/stick approach to engaging students in online learning. And like you, I was once turned off by the approach you mention i.e., ensuring students engage by making the engagement assessable. However, sometimes taking the pragmatic approach forces the issue. I keep getting the image of diving into the water to avoid the inch by inch shivering approach. It's not that bad once you're in.

BTW, I think it is possible to assess student engagement in discussions but first you've got to get them in there and doing it. There's a whole new set of challenges for us educators. You're right about time of course. I think just plugging away will do it and then suddenly it will be all happening around us. That's my hope anyway.

Re: An e-learning report card

Kate Foy — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 00:50:39 -0000

Hi Christine
Thanks for your visual note. I'm having a fine old time trying to get Seesmic to work today. Visual's fine but audio sounds like an old record playing slowly, slowly. I'm going to have to tweak this one before I can get back on camera.

Anyhow ... I think you're right about 5 years as a take up time for an organisation. We shouldn't forget we're pathfinders either and keen ones at that. I try to use modelling as a pedagogical approach and as I get things wrong, try things out and find patterns in my own usage of the many and diverse tools which arrive daily, I can see how just trying things out to be comfortable really does matter. We can't keep up with the rush of technology even if we try.

I hope that in an undergrad program I can at least get students to have a go so that by the time they're ready to enter their chosen professions they will at least be fearless on the web. That's the goal!

So ... yes let's relax about it and keep plugging away. And speaking of plugging away, I'm off to chase up my Seesmic bug.

Re: An e-learning report card

Kate Foy — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 01:38:18 -0000

'Ownership' is a great term. I think when we claim to own something, it's because we see value in it, and because that value has meaning of some kind to us.

I've found that if a student/colleague finds value in one of these tools then they will attempt to claim it and own it for their own use. BTW I think I've tossed away the idealistic notion that my students are learning for the love of it, or is that just cynical me. I think I believe deep down that they will come to love learning in time, and if they are that way disposed. It's only now that I think I can see some value in the torture I endured in school with algebra!

BTW I think introducing your team to del.icio.us in a 7 week program is a great idea. It's a five-start web tool that introduces so many of the principles of e-learning. Good luck!

Re: An e-learning report card

Kate Foy — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 18:44:02 -0000

Laurie
nice to hear from you. Yes, a busy time of year but never too busy to say hello to a colleague! We all need a bit of time out. Hope your summer so far is treating you well.

I'm happy to respond to your query and open up the discussion on the pros and pitfalls in class blogging. It's one that comes around quite a lot. Class blogging or individual blogging for class work are two areas I have some experience with, and I'll pass that on to you with a couple of references to other posts which you may or may not have met.

I guess the first thing is to find out what your school's policy is on blogging. Do this before you begin, and if there are queries raised by any authorities (from colleagues, principal through to school board members), be ready to respond. Last year an Australian colleague (who was a genuine pathfinder in his use of blogging in education with a terrific bunch of 8 year olds) ran into difficulty with a state education authority. The potential for child abuse weighs heavily on the minds of all people of good will, and bureaucratic organisations sadly have little choice but to wave over perfectly innocent projects like this one with a 'stop' sign. The issue over heavy-handedness, the use of images online, the open-ness of the blogging platform etc., were all debated strongly amongst educational bloggers. It was a good if at times emotive discussion, one that had to be had, and ended being fully supportive of the teacher in question and his approach to class blogging. You can check it out by typing in 'mini legends' or 'Al Uptom' in a search engine, and then by following some of the threads for further information and updates.

In terms of the platform for a class blog, I'd use Edublogger which has built in administrative capacity for large numbers, and which has been designed for educational use (it's bolted on to Wordpress so you know you are getting a great 'back-end.') There are built-in widgets and an online help + great community of fellow educators to help out if you get stuck.

The next thing is to sketch out how you see the blog being used by you and the class. Will it be an all-in, everyone-respond with you (or an assigned student) leading the topic discussions? If so, you are not going to need individual pages or blogs. I assume by 'class-blog' you do mean a blog that provides individual students with an opportunity to contribute to a class-focussed project or theme, so I'm writing with this in mind.

If you require each student to have his/her own page, then you could go the way I did with a reflective blog on a group project. I set up the blog, assigned an individual page to each student and they wrote their own entries as they went. Individual pages can be password protected for confidentiality and they share the password with you. I would imagine that younger children may not have a problem with this, older ones like a bit of security. This approach is a little more complex in terms of organising entries, and you will need to spend some time teaching students how to write in their 'pages' instead of 'commenting'. You are a blogger, so you will know what I mean here in terms of dating entries etc.

The third way would be for you as the admin to create individual blogs via Edublogger for each of your students, and link each of these to a class home-room page in the sidebar. Each student can then design his or her blog ... a great exercise in aesthetics/design/organisation in itself ... to suit, password-protect if s/he wishes, and they are all just a click away to read and comment. Meantime you as the class-page admin can keep the focus on the main page with posts, and general comments to everyone. They in turn, should be hotlinked back to the class page. The student blog can become the basis for an individual student portfolio over time, a bit like a precious journal/photo-album. This last choice is the way I'd go next time I set up a class blog focussing round a group project.

You should also have organised how you want students to respond in terms of style and frequency of posting: text, photos, videos etc., but I guess this is no different from the way we'd set up expectations in terms of material assignment submissions.

Lastly ... this post is getting a bit long, I'd take the students step by step through the process you have used. Show them how you went about choosing which approach to use, how the whole business of blogging works. Demystify the whole back-end thing, so that they are confident about the tools they are using as well as their content. We tend to take pencils and paper for granted, but there is still a lot of mystery and anxiety (I call it 'digi-phobia') hovering around e-learning.

And then, go to it. Enjoy!

I'm sure others will join in here with their tips. Check out also Sue Waters' great Edublogger site at http://theedublogger.edublo.... Sue is a prolific and supportive e-learning mentor, and the site is full of great information, easy to follow and practical support and a good site to get a chat going if you need assistance.

Re: An e-learning report card

Kate Foy — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 03:44:16 -0000

Correction to the above. Should be 'Upton' not 'Uptom'. That will teach me trying to proof read on a small laptop screen!

Apologies! And let's hear it for a great teacher Al Upton.

Re: An e-learning report card

Kate Foy — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 23:03:01 -0000

Further correction. The platform recommended is 'Edublogs' not 'Edublogger' and the URL is edublogs.org

Dear me! More haste and less speed.

Re: A mini challenge: the smart e-traveller

Kate Foy — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 01:37:04 -0000

Oh that's a smart idea! Thanks Sarah!

Re: Laura tumbles on the interweb

Kate Foy — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 16:59:00 -0000

Comment on Geek Girls is interesting. 'Framing within the dominant cultural paradigm' etc. Why sex to sell brains etc? True up to a point, but also very tongue in cheek and Charlie's Angels enough to make me smile. go the nerd girls!

Re: Web 2.0 Wednesday #1

Kate Foy — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 22:08:40 -0000

CoComments + Seesmic

Re: Web 2.0 Wednesday #1

Kate Foy — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 07:20:52 -0000

Right on! Aren't images powerful for the way they capture and then extend thinking? And I just knew when I saw this picture that it expressed for me the concept of Web 2.0 even before I consciously analysed the content.

Re: New Seesmic THREADED player check it out

Kate Foy — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 03:24:30 -0000

Seesmic video reply from Disqus.

Re: New Seesmic THREADED player check it out

Kate Foy — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 03:56:03 -0000

Seesmic video reply from Disqus.

Re: Commenting: challenges of another sort

Kate Foy — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 17:14:17 -0000

Yes indeed. Exciting times all round with new technologies moving fast. I think a combination of video + words would be as close to ideal as you could get for this kind of communication. Indeed over the weekend the developer was talking about inserting a 'post-it' like section near the video pane for this kind of use. He's fond of scribbling something on a yellow post-it and holding it up in front of the camera. Bingo ... a new idea emerges.
Thanks for dropping by!

Re: Commenting: challenges of another sort

Kate Foy — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 17:39:01 -0000

Sarah. There was a silly thread during the weekend on Seesmic! Called 'Black Video' it consisted of a black screen and just audio! Deliberate playing about with other possibilities in threaded comments ... and I think the bug-eyed racoon could come up with an audio-only system soon. Interesting how in this case a lighting problem led to further experimentation. This is how new discoveries are made!

Hope all goes well over there!

Re: The social in social media

Kate Foy — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:12:04 -0000

Sarah. Nice to hear from you. I'm not surprised you feel comfortable;
it's a welcoming community and it's easy to operate with a simple,
intuitive interface where you can dump and re-do to your heart's
content ... practice makes perfect. I love the various commenting
styles too, don't you? Just as in real life with different
personalities. There's a big future in Seesmic and its ilk I reckon.

Re: You’ve Gotta Like Paris Today. . . Really.

Kate Foy — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 21:55:25 -0000

Oh HER! Damn ... and here I was thinking your blogpost had some new stuff on the City of Light where I'm visiting in a week or two. Oh celebrity you heartbreak old phenomenon!

Re: Laura tumbles on the interweb

Kate Foy — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 19:21:12 -0000

mmm, better get out all my Beatles vinyl now!