NING as a Teaching Platform?
I have really enjoyed my experience with all of you on Classroom 2.0, and I thought I would push myself further in my thinking by using the platform to organize my resources for a graduate class I will be teaching a number of times this summer. I will be working with teachers at all levels of tech experience, but my guess is that none of them will have used anything like this. Do any of you in my Classroom 2.0 network have any bits of wisdom to share? Here is what I have used in the past, a simple website.This is what I created in a very short time, more coming as I prep for the start of class.
Tags: NING, camp, platform, socialnetworking, teaching, tech, with
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Meg Ormiston on
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LOL (laugh out loud), for all of us that are just starting to "get it", it being shortened words to communicate faster. I was reading along what Skip had posted nodding my head and agreeing, and the last line I was not sure what IMHO stood for, stop laughing I am over 40! Luckily I have my powerful tools with me and jumped to Google for the answer!
That simple act of clarifying my understanding using the powerful technology made me think about all the kids and teachers that do not have immediate access to clarify their understanding. We need to rethink so much!
Thanks Skip for your thoughts about my shift in thinking, you are right on! I am modeling the new tools, new strategies that will make a huge difference in teaching and learning. You hit a critical point about communicating after the class. We tried this through a group email last summer, but our communication fizzled after a short time. I need to shift me thinking to building a learning community with this week as just laying a foundation. I also am adding the element of Second Life to showcase their work, this will be a huge shift for many! Thanks for helping me think outside the box!
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Permalink Reply by kenrodoff on
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A haiku:
There is no right thing
blackboard, wiki, learnerblog
ask why?and what for?
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agreed, I am going for it!!
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Permalink Reply by Kevin H. on
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This makes me wonder, too, about how to use Ning with students.
Anyone tried that?
For me, that is the direction I see myself going.
But maybe that is its own topic for a forum.
Thanks for sharing your plans.
Kevin
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Maybe we should create a forum, I should be full of tales after next week, and the following week I can fix everything I did wrong with a new group!! My students will be adults, but I am excited to report back!
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Permalink Reply by Bob Sprankle on
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Kevin,
I am also investigating the possibilities of using Ning with students --- 3rd and 4th graders. I'd be interested in joining a forum to further discuss this. :)
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Hi Bob
I did create a forum to discuss this.
Check it out when you get a chance.
Thanks
Kevin
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Permalink Reply by julz on
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Hi Meg, I plan to do this as well. I used a service called Near-Time for my course Fostering Online Learning Communities but for the next go around, I think I'm going to use Ning. Maybe those of us doing this should collaborate on a research paper...
;)
~julz
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Julz,
I do like the idea of a research paper, I just replied to Hans, take a look at that, maybe we can begin to structure something. As I said, I am a little on edge, really rethinking MY role as facilitator. I know the content inside out, but I have to change my thinking and approach. I had 40 administartors in my session today and when I showcase our classroom 2.0 and talked about the rich conversations I think many of them lumped this into a "MY SPACE" nonsense. I had one woman almost jump out of her skin explaining to the group how difficult it was for her as an older learner adapting to a LMS in her first distance learning class, where the young students had no problem and they ran circles around her the first week. She talked about the relationships and the conversations, and how much she learned from the group not just the instructor. Yet I am begining to really see if you don't find a group to engage with people don't see the power! Let's keep the research going!
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Permalink Reply by Hans Feldmeier on
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Hi Meg, I´m going to work on wikispaces, blogger, some other Web 2.0 tools like podomatic ...
I also use it within European projects with students and teachers like DigiSkills.
There must be a LMS or better a CMS like Moodle or Fronter (I prefer!).
Thus, at the moment, Ning is mostly social networking.
But I think - in one year or earlier - there are more possibilities to team up with wikis et cetera
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Hans,
Thanks for the comments! I agree with you about the LMS, I have been working some with Moodle. There are a couple of reasons I am going to try NING with this class. This class is more informal, driven by teacher created projects around curriculum, so lots of people creating content. I am the facilatator, but lots of the learning is supporting each other, reflecting and responding. This participants also produce multimedia examples to share with the group, I am hoping to showcase that here and in second life (Meg Writer is my SL name). Also, one of my big goals is to keep the group connected after our face to face time is over, I will be teaching in a rural part of the state of Illinois, and I am trying to build capacity, developing these teachers as teacher leaders for the area, while I support them remotely.Lastly, I need to understand how to teach in a different way, enaging students in a different way, and recording the rich conversations for the future.
I love teaching this class, but I am a little on edge, rethinking my role and the assignments I give!
Wait! One more reason I am trying this, teachers can easily get started with NING, Moodle has issues for a classroom teacher, like installation. They do not have the tech capacity in this area or funding for hosting. Free is good, but I will find out if it is enough!
Stop back we can continue the conversation!
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Permalink Reply by Elizabeth Davis on
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I just finished teaching a 6 week, 12 hour class called "intro to Web 2.0." I created a ning network for the class. I used the forum tab for homework assignments and reflections/discussions. I also posted my agenda for the following class and requested feedback from students - this was a great way to tweak my plans in response to people's needs. I put screencasts on how to use Web 2.0 tools in the video tab and also included videos like "shift happens" and explanations of rss and wikis. I used the main page to post links to Websites and resources. Finally, I had people use their own pages to practice blogging. I also made it a private space (which is why I can't show it to you).
For the most part using ning was very successful. I do think it was helpful to keep it private - many teachers are reluctant to share ideas in a larger open forum. Creating a private space kept things safe and allowed people to write and respond within a comfort zone. The down side of a private space is you can't subscribe to the rss feeds - ning doesn't support rss feeds for private spaces. I also like the fact that using ning prepared my students to join this space, as they became very comfortable using ning tools. The only tricky part was the learning curve. There was a lot for people to take in at first, but once they got used to it, it worked really well. We are going to keep the space active for people to continue the dialogue even though the course is over.
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