EDMODO

Edmodo is a free and simple web 2.0 tool. I have decided to write my contribution on it because I first heard of it during my first practicum as my tutor uses it to comunicate with the students and it is also really useful to do online exercises and to ask or share doubts both with the teacher and classmates/students at any time.

Edmodo was founded by Nicolas Borg and Jeff O'Hara, technologists working at separate schools in the Chicago area, as a secure microblogging medium for students and teachers. In 2010 Edmodo launched, "subject" and "publisher" communities, a digital media library, a help center, and a parent accounts for communicating with teachers, parents, and students.

Edmodo is a private micro-blogging platform built for use by teachers and students for use in the classroom.

The problem with traditional web 2.0 tools in a k-12 classroom environment is concerns over privacy of the students. Edmodo has been built with the privacy of students in mind.

Edmodo provides a way for teachers and students to share notes, links, and files. Teachers also have the ability to send alerts, events, and assignments to students. Edmodo also has a public component built by allowing at the teachers discretion to post any item to a public timeline at the teacher’s discretion.

Edmodo's user interface has been described as similar to Facebook. Using Edmodo, teachers can post grades and assign homework to students. Students can then submit the homework and view their grade. The transmission is fast and paper-less. Teachers eliminate crossposting through the creation of sub-groups within a course. After each course period is completed the teacher closes out the network and creates a new one for the next course.

I hope you find it useful and just in case you find diffucult to use it, there you have the link of a tutorial!!

Jennifer Tirado



COMEEKO

COMEEKO

After having been doing quite a lot of research on different web 2.0 tools on the Internet, I found a very interesting one, at least to my way of thinking. Let's see how it works. Its name is Comeeko and it is an Internet resource which offers the possiblity to create cartoons and comics out of people's own information or out of real-world-based information. It is because of this that by creating and designing comics based on real life aspects that students get familiar with the world that sorrounds them, that is to say, learning History in a non so explicit way. Apart from that, I strongly think that Comeeko can be also used as a plattform for the summary of the major and most important concepts seen in class until the moment, but a very appealing and attractive way of summarizing a subject. The use of images and photos help students identify the most important issues, at the very same time they find it easier to rememember the content dealt in a specific lesson.

On the other hand, Comeeko provides the teacher with very useful and helpful materials, due to the fact that students can deliver their own presentation via the Internet, for instance before the presentation is carried out in class, in order for the rest of the class to know what the next topic for discussion or information is going to be. 

Finally, and to sum up at the same time, all the above reasons make me reach the conclusion that Comeeko engages students in a avery funny and collaborative way of working together, and of delivering information to others. Sometimes the way the information is presented is much more relevant successful and effective than the content itself. 

 A  perfect illustration of what this inteds to to is:

http://www.pikistrips.com/

LAURA BISTUER

Voxpop

I want to share with you the Voxopop tool, a voiced-based e-learning tool that enables users to record their speaking for others to listen and to respond. Students and teachers can build discussions about any topic through audio, thus, it helps students develop their speaking skills through fun talk groups.
All the 2.0tools I haves seen are very interesting for teaching language trough technology, but I have focus my attention on Voxopop because I think is the one who deals with student’s pronunciation, something essential in a language acquisition. This toll allows for real communicative speaking and listening practice outside and inside the class. In this way, the teachers get a great amount of examples of student’s speaking that you can listen to assess any pronunciation problems and to record and assess their progress as their speaking develops.

In the link below, it is explained how to use Voxopop in class, the procedure to get an account and to start recording speech data. It also contains some usages from this tool in class, which I am going to mention because Voxopop not only is used for working on pronunciation; it is an interactive way of using the language orally. There are five basic activities we can develop with students using Voxopop:


• Discussion points - You can record a series of contentious statements and ask
Student’s to respond to each one.
• Narrative building - You can record the first sentence of a narrative and then listen to the thread and add a sentence each to the story.
• Dictations - You could record your own online dictation texts. Get the students to listen to the text, and write down what they hear and then record their own version of the text for you and other students to listen to.
• Pronunciation drills - Record some pronunciation drills and get students to listen
to them and then record themselves saying the words or sentences.
• True false statements - Record some statements about yourself and get students
to leave questions for you to find out which of the statements are true. You can
leave your answers to the questions online too. You could allow students a week to
leave questions for you to answer, then in class you can get them to tell you which
statements are true or false. You could also get students to create their own true
false statements and question each other about them.

The link I provide includes also many other 2.0 tools examples very interesting that could be useful for you. I hope they help you.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/19576895/Web-20-Tools-for-Teachers

Second Life (SL) is a virtual world developed by Linden Lab launched on June 23, 2003, and is accessible on the Internet. A free client program called the Viewer enables its users, called Residents, to interact with each other through avatars. Residents can explore, meet other residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, and create and trade virtual property and services with one another, or travel throughout the world (which residents refer to as "the grid"). Second Life is intended for people aged 16 and over, and as of 2011 has more than 20 million registered user accounts.

Built into the software is a three-dimensional modeling tool based around simple geometric shapes that allows a resident to build virtual objects. This can be used in combination with the Linden Scripting Language which can be used to add functionality to objects. More complex three-dimensional sculpted prims (colloquially known as "sculpties"), textures for clothing or other objects, and animations and gestures can be created using external software. The Second Life Terms of Service provide that users retain copyright for any content they create, and the server and client provide simple digital rights management functions.

There are over one hundred regions used for educational purposes covering subjects such as chemistry and English. Instructors and researchers in Second Life favor it because it is more personal than traditional distance learning. Research has uncovered development, teaching and/or learning activities which use Second Life in over 80 percent of UK universities. At least 300 universities around the world teach courses or conduct research in SL. New educational institutions have also emerged that operate exclusively within Second Life, taking advantage of the platform to deliver content to a world wide audience at low cost.

Language learning is the most widespread type of education in virtual worlds, with many universities, mainstream language institutes and private language schools using 3D virtual environments to support language learning.

Constructivist approaches

3D virtual worlds are often used for constructivist learning because of the opportunities for learners to explore, collaborate and be immersed within an environment of their choice. Some virtual worlds allow users to build objects and to change the appearance of their avatar and of their surroundings. Constructivist approaches such as task-based learning and Dogme are applied to virtual world language learning because of the scope for learners to socially co-construct knowledge, in spheres of particular relevance to the learner.

Task-based language learning

Task-based language learning (TBL) focuses on the use of authentic language and encourages students to do real life tasks using the language being learned. Tasks can be highly transactional, where the student is carrying out everyday tasks such as visiting the doctor at the Chinese island of Monash University (in Second Life). Incidental knowledge (about the medical system in China) can also be gained through such immersive TBL. Other tasks may focus on more interactional language, such as ones that involve more social activities or interviews within a virtual world.

Some useful links with tips and recommendations on how to use Second Life for educational purpose:

English Literature in Second Life: http://literaturealive.blogspot.com/

Chemistry in Second Life: http://slusage.com/chemistry.asp

Storify (not Spotify)

 http://storify.com/

Storify is a web 2.0 that can be used, as they say, to "create stories using social media". By using what people say and comment on the facts that happen every day in the world, we can compel stories and see different opinions and visions of our world. Each user may collect the best photos, videos, tweets to publish them then as simple stories that talk about every day facts around the world. People get connected to the world and are then able to know what is happening in different countries, and they get to see these situations from a new perspective.

We could use this tool in class so that students discover which the reality of the world is. They often live in their world, where they only know what is happening in their family, in their friends circle or in their school. Besides, they think that they are the person who has more problems and difficult than anyone else in the world, but they are completely wrong. With this tool they would realize that they world is full of difficulties. By reading the stories of real facts and news, they will get informed of the real world and the stories of different countries. They may also comment on the stories created by other users and write their opinion on them, so that they get engaged in a debate about new of the world. Plus, they will be able to create their own stories from the information they get from the news on TV or from pages of important newspapers in their country. So, they will get informed, but they will also inform other users about their own situation in their country.

This is a tool that should be oriented to high-level students of high school. Although the use of this tool is really easy (it may work as a facebook, or something like that) the problem is that students have to deal with news and information that may be difficult to understand because it may include names of important people in the world that they should know. And it may also include terms and situations in the world that may affect their sensitivity, so we had better to avoid showing kids situations and problems, or any images that may make them feel sad.

This tool makes students work on writing and reading skills. They have to practice on reading what people want to tell them, and they have to answer to all the information that they have received because they want to show their opinion, too. This way, the also develop their conception of the world and their critical thinking, because they have to make an opinion on what is happening around the world. It is unavoidable that they think something about a situation and they will always be in favour or against it. And finally, they will be able to communicate with the world and develop communicative skills. They will practice their practical use of English, the one they need to express their opinions and their emotions. So, I think it would be an interesting web 2.0 tool to use in our future classes.

Ariadna Salazar Roca

Scrapblog

Scrapblog is an easy and funny way to share and print photos. With Scrapblog, you can easily create stunning multimedia scrapbooks featuring your photos, videos, audio and a bunch of creative elements. Scrapblog is very easy to use; anyone can tell their stories and share them online or turn them into high-quality photo books and DVDs. Signing up with Scrapblog is free; you just need to create an account. Best of all, there is nothing to download.

Scrapblog is all about self-expression and your imagination is the only limit to your creativity. You can elaborate different types of scrapblogs and talk about your family, your holidays, your life, create stories or projects… I have found some school scrapblogs projects that were just great. Scrapblogs can be shared with friends, schoolmates and family. You can send your creation by email or share it on your blog or social networks.

If you want, you can check out in the webpage what other users are creating and what are considered the favourite scrapblogs:

http://www.scrapblog.com/explore/explore.aspx

I share with you the link of a scrapblog project about 1940’s fashion:

http://www.scrapblog.com/viewer/viewer.aspx?sbid=1581062

Museum Box

By searching on the Internet I found out a Web 2.0 tool named Museum Box that has caught my attention. It is a website that allows the users to create an argument, a description of a person or a historical period by placing items in a virtual box. To build up the box you can use any sort of files such as texts, imagines, audios and videos. It also allows you to share your work and make comments on the museum boxes done by the others.

Personally, I found out that this was a useful tool to use in CLIL sessions or even in ordinary English lessons. As it is a tool which offers similar applications to Glogster, I think it could be nice to use it so that students learn how to work with other Web 2.0 tools. I particularly like the idea of sharing and commenting the others’ work because that is something that fosters interaction between learners. Apart from having a look to the others work, Museum Box also allows the learners to present their works to the class.

If you want more information, you can find a video on the Museum Box's website!

Hope it would be useful for your current or future lessons!