A Great Blog Editor Tool

For those who use Firefox I would recommend to install the add-on extension ScribeFire. ScribeFire is an extension of Firefox ®; it enables users to easily drag and drop formatted text from the Web into their blog(s). After you have install it to your Firefox browser,it will appear on the bottom of your screen and when you are browsing through the readings, sites and assigned taks, you will be able to write your blog entries with a click of the button! Make your blogging fast and fun!

My Plurk Widget!

What an exciting tool, Plurk! More fun than twitter! I can even send messages in Russian! or German! Here is my widget - a brief image of what Plurk is all about.

Plurk.com

Class Badges with Flickr

I find this amusing to create badges for classes and blogs with the pictures of my students. It brings personality to my classes.Flickr provides this opportunity.

TinyPic or Flickr Or Photobucket

Amazing! A new day brings a new tool or a new service! I was plurking and found this new service Tinypic.It is similar to Flickr or photobucket, but of course has some new features. It allows uploading videos. I will explore it more and report later in more details.

A competitor to Twitter: PLURK

My son, Boris, has just sent me an invitation to a new Web 2.0 tool similar to Twitter, it is called Plurk.I immediately registered and started exploring the service. With 140 characters, with a unique feature -- time line -- you share/respond your feelings, favorite video, etc. You can follow some people or be followed by the fans of yours. Some users say that they get the responses to questions faster than on Twitter. I need more time to paly with it. I sent the invitations to my students. Let's see what will happen.

The Future of Education

I came across with this video-lecture of Michel Wesch, the author of several You Tube videos, like "Machine Using Us," About Weg 2.0, ""etc. This lecture is very powerful and controversial, it raises issues of the new skills, students, new learning and teaching environments, about the information in the media environment and challenges for us regarding the ways of creating the new classroom settings that involve the new media and tools that encourage active learning, active participation. I would like my students to view this video and reflect on it. I am proud to say that the tools the author mentioned in the video I know and use in my classroom when I teaching different courses in the educational program when training future teaches.

Digital Learning Experience Attributes

While preparing for my Summer II Literacy and Technology Class I found a very interesting and powerful article about Digital Students, their learning styles posted by an experienced award-winning blogger, Anastasia Goodstein.

In her article Learning Styles 2.0: Digital, Social and Always on, she emphasizes the following attributes of digital learning and learners:

• Interactive. Students expect to pick and use various types of media and create a personalized “mash-up” of content. Students also use social media as a way to express their identity and creativity through creation of user-generated content.
• Student-Centered; Authentic;
• Collaborative.Collaborative work and peer feedback supports motivation by giving
  students a sense of active involvement within the learning community.
• On-Demand. Course content should be made available "on-demand" so the learner can view course materials when, where, and how (PC, mobile or handheld device) they
  want to view the content.
  

These trends in online and lifelong learning are being fueled by changes in the characteristics of student learners and the ways in which they use new technologies to exchange information. One thing is clear: the convergence of social software technologies and a generation of web-savvy learners are rapidly changing the face of education.

In light of these socio-cultural changes, educators need to “keep abreast of change” and embrace digital learning styles through curriculum design which integrates the authentic ways that students use social media to collaborate and interact with peers as a means to achieve short and long term learning goals.