Research Findings, musings and sharing commences:


My head just keeps getting more full. Information overload; I believe I am at maximum capacity. Last night I searched the internet for several hours hunting for professional articles around the issue of blogging or media techonology and education. Some frustratin occured when some sights I had hoped to open were tagged as not found, or whatever terminology they use that puts a dead end to that hopeful connection. I did discover a number of links that often got me "off task" or "on task" depending on how you interpret the process. It is somewhat of a scavenger hunt, isn't it?

From Joomla; Creative Classrooms on line they provided several sites (blogs or websites?) that can be used in education to support online classrooms. Most of these were in connection with the arts (yeah celebrating those portions of our brain; check out the link in Nancy's blog). Here are some of those sites:



I know that we are supposed to practice "linking" them here, but I was having no success and gave up when I got over frustrated. I will keep working on adding those gadets and hopefully they will be part of my blog next time.



*http://ology.amnh.org This site offers interactive and friendly information pages for kids

*www.nga.gov/kids/kids.htm This site of the National Gallery of Art allows viewers to tour
some of their exhibits and also has project ideas for kids


*www.carnegiemuseums.org/cmnh The American Indian mineral and gem and Jurassic fossil
exhibits are available for viewing at this site.


In an article from The Journal: Transforming Education through Techonoly, July 2009, an article by Ruth Reynard talks about how blogging allows for more constant contact with students beyond the Mon-Fri, 8-5 access that kids and parents would have. This calls, however for consistent attention by instructors to making their blogs interesting and meaningful for its intended audience.

http://thejournal.com/Articles/2009/07/15/Beyond-Social-Networking-Building-Toward-Learning-Communities.aspx?Page=1



Throughout my reading of several other articles and magazines other points to ponder included:



the deabte of whether this techonology is widening the gap in educational choices between schools with money and those that do not (private vs. public; where in their our more affluent public schools and many public schools who have extremely limited resources both on site and for students at home to tap into this educational tool. While blogs are a relatively "free" resource, it assumes that all people have equal access.



There is no denial that explosion of this media technology and form of communication is upon us. According to Diana Schaffhauser, 11/2009, in the last six months twitter usage has increased by 250% and facebook by 192% with blogging and widi editing by a factor of 39. She reports these figures from a research project done by firewall vendor Palo Alto Networks.



So..... for better or worse, these forms of information sharing, communicating etc. are rapidly spreading, an epidemic of sorts. Something new will be out next year, and the next and the next. The imaginations of those that create these tools continue to push the envelope in search of the best, fastest, most effective way to communicate with our neighbors whether next door of thousands of miles away. As educators, we cannot ignore the importance of these tools and need to learn as much as we can. This last comment I say especially for myself as I have avoided this for far too long. I am on a quest to CHANGE my ways.

Last but not least; I had promised in class to provide the blog address of the teacher I am working with at my job. Here it is:

http://mscouch.blogspot.com

Happy Blogging!