Katkin’s weBLOG

“Boy, I’m glad we didn’t have to write!”

“It is so cool to know that somebody might use what I wrote for their research!”

“I write a lot more carefully knowing the ‘world’ can read it.”

“I liked the fact that we could work together, help each other out, and link to stuff someone else wrote.”

“It’s so cool to put something ON the Internet, rather than always taking stuff OFF.”

-Wiki testimonials from Grade 6 students at the Nieman Enhanced Learning Centre, KS

-excerpt from Annette Lamb, Larry Johnson. (2007). an information skills workout: wikis and collaborative writing. Teacher Librarian, 34(5), 57-59,71. Retrieved October 26, 2008, from ProQuest Education Journals database. (Document ID: 1283156591)

I first heard the Hawaiian term “wiki” back in 1976, when my family landed at Honolulu International Airport for a vacation. When the plane landed on a runaway quite some distance from the airport terminal, a trio of conjoined tram-like buses quickly arrived to our rescue on the tarmac. These were the wiki wiki buses which have famously shuttled visitors to the islands back and forth from aircraft to the terminal for years. Who knew that Ward Cunningham would bring renewed interest to this Hawaiian word for “quick” or “hurry,” when he was looking for a descriptor for a new authoring tool that would allow users to publish content quickly and directly to the World Wide Web?

What is a wiki?

A wiki can be described as both a versatile, collaborative space or as an open-source software on the web. Wikis are web sites that can be created and edited by many users at anytime, from anywhere. They are easy to use because the they use “web-based open-editing tools” that do not require the user to have any knowledge of html coding. In web 2.0: new tools, new schools, authors Gwen Solomon and Lynne Schrum suggest that wikis are best “suited for projects in which collaborative teams write, revise, update, and contribute on a regular basis.”

Wikis are used in a variety of different learning environments by both business and educational organizations, to manage documents, track information and to collaborate on group projects (Richardson, 2007). Wikis never come to an end, but remain constantly evolving, as users continue to build on the content that has been previously created.

Popular sites where you can find out how to create your own wiki include Wikispaces, Seedwiki, and pbwiki. With a valid email account, a user ID and a password, a wiki can be created in minutes. To ensure a secure learning environment for students, educators can control access to their wiki sites by granting “members and permissions” under the settings tab.

Wikipedia

The greatest and best known example of a wiki is Wikipedia. This massive online encyclopedia is home to well over two million entries, publishing in over 200 different languages, and it continues to grow by leaps and bounds every day. As Will Richardson quotes in his book Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms, Wikipedia “attempts to store the ‘sum of human knowledge’” on all kinds of information about “people, places, things, historical events, and even today’s news almost as it happens” (Richardson, p.55). Wikipedia allows users the freedom to write and publish knowledge on any topic they wish. Users can also edit existing content whether it has been self-generated or created by others.

When students first began citing Wikipedia as a source for their research projects, classroom teachers and teacher-librarians were quick to voice their concerns and condemn it’s use for serious research. However, due to research and the testimonals of field experts, Wikipedia is gradually gaining acceptance as a legitimate and often cited resource by many reliable media sources. Experts who have put Wikipedia to the test, have surprisingly found it to be “accurate, informative, comprehensive and a great source for students” (Denver Post).

As Richardson observes, most educators advise their students “to use Wikipedia as a starting point for their work, but not as a sole resource.” I would agree that that seems to be a common approach, but I would add that this is sound advice to give anyone researching a topic, regardless of whether or not they consult Wikipedia.

Perhaps a more valuable exercise, for teachers and teacher-librarians, is to evaluate the content of Wikipedia for themselves. Since Wikipedia arrived on the scene, I have undergone my own evolution in my relationship with Wikipedia. From sceptic to advocate, I have developed a new appreciation for the collective conglomerate of knowledge that is Wikipedia. Where else could I find a well researched article, using primary source accounts, of Slovenian immigration to Manitoba in the 1950s, for a grade 5 student?

Advantages of the wiki

• Collaboration (users construct new knowledge collaboratively; user-generated content benefits from the collaborative nature of many contributors; subscribes to the “concept that everyone together is smarter than anyone alone”)
• Content (users can add original content; users can add knowledge that has not been recorded or documented)
• Negotiation (discussion tab allows users to “negotiate” the content being created; can help build consensus among a group of learners; facilitates collaborative problem-solving)
• Editorial freedom (users can correct what they know or believe to be incorrect information; users can re-write content in their own writing style)
• History (allows users to track any changes that have been made, including who made the changes and what was changed)
• Immediate publishing (users can add new content while something is taking place; content can be updated as an event unfold and more information becomes available)
• Quality control (community watchdog security; more users who want to protect the integrity of the content than not; errors usually corrected within hours; articles are weeded for bias, inaccuracy, out-of-date etc.)
• Ownership (gives editors the responsibility of maintaining the quality of their own information and managing their own site)
• Vandalism (some wiki sites use passwords and logins to restrict access to only invited guests)
• Audience (easy format to share with an audience of any size, even globally)
• Intellectual property (respect for other people’s ideas, pubic domain, community collaboration)
• Hyperlinks (ability to create a flexible, non-linear document structure)
• Reflection and Metacognition (built-in features through discussion and comments options)

Disadvantages of the wiki

It’s interesting that the very characteristics that make wikis effective learning tools, can likewise be viewed as its detractors:

• Content (users can publish incorrect content or change correct content, creating inaccuracies; vandals can sabotage content)
• Editorial freedom (users can correct what they believe to be incorrect information, even if they are not correct; continuous editing can be cumbersome over time)
• Copyright (dilemma as to the question of who owns what and intellectual property)
• Exhausted content (concern of redundancy and repeating content if users do not evaluate the existing information carefully before adding their own)
• Vandalism (potential for vandals to erase or misrepresent content; add profanities)
• Roles (the roles of teachers and students become less defined within the collaborative environment of the wiki; the “intellectual authority” of the teacher becomes “blurred” with the students, as both can correct, edit and delete content)
• Loss of focus (In “Beyond Wikipedia, Doug Achterman states that wikis can be prone to dispersion, created content can wander off topic, out on a tangent)

Implications for teaching and learning

In considering the implication of the wiki for teaching and learning, I was immediately reminded of the podcast for Joyce Valenza’s Manifesto for the 21st Century Librarian, at the NECC, in Atlanta (2007). When asked what Web 2.0 applications she believed are the most relevant to the 21st century learner, Joyce Valenza emphatically replied that “there is no better tool for synthesis, than a wiki,” and I would have to agree. In “An information skills workout: wikis and collaborative writing,” authors Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson also describe how “wikis provide an opportunity to synthesize ideas and create a collaborative project that is broader, deeper, and more interconnected than that created in a traditional writing environment.” A real advantage for learning how to use the wiki to facilitate synthesis, is that small groups of students can work on different parts of a topic and then bring them together to create a final project. Not only do students avoid the temptation for plagiarism, they are also able to generate original content by creating new understandings that are unique to the group.

In “Beyond Wikipedia,” Doug Achterman points out that “any wiki can be designed to contain separate work spaces for individual, small group, and large group products,” making it easy for students “to move from one space to the next, taking notes, analyzing, and synthesizing information along the way.” This kind of flexibility allows students to construct real meaning from their collected data in a much shorter period of time. Teachers can also use wikis to connect their students with other classrooms around the globe to collaborate on group projects.

Will Richardson states that when teachers give students a collaborative tool such as a wiki, they provide “a very democratic process of knowledge creation” (p.61). Students learn how to create and publish content, to develop skills in collaborating with others, and how to negotiate with others to form agreement on “correctness, meaning, relevance and more” (p.61). “In essence, students begin to teach each other.” When students take ownership for their own learning in this way, it becomes important for teachers to know when students require support and where to intervene.

In “Wikis and literacy development,” author Keith McPherson identifies “two major types of wikis of interest to educators: those created in the classroom by teachers and students [classroom-based wikis] and those not created by students and teachers [public wikis].” According to McPherson, teacher-librarians who use wikis with students need to assess which information literacy skills can best be addressed in this format. When defining learning objectives, teacher-librarians should question how the wiki format can help them to teach relevant information literacy skills. For example, readability might be an issue when students are using public wikis for research, as most public wikis, such as Wikipedia, require a reading level of at least grade 7 or higher

In “Wikis in school libraries,” Dana Dukic notes that “wikis are particularly attractive for school librarians” because they are completely “user-centred” and “user-driven.” Librarians no longer have the sole responsibility of creating content on the library web page. Similarly, in “A few new things,” Joyce Valenza suggests using wikis in school libraries to create pathfinders because they are collaborative and easy to edit. Now both teachers and students can add content to a pathfinder, not just the teacher-librarian. Using a wiki, library users can collaborate with the librarian to create resources and provide new services for themselves. At Shaftsbury High School Library in Winnipeg, the teacher-librarian publishes the library home page as a wiki and invites student and staff contributions.

In Steve Hargardon’s article entitled “A little help from my friends,” the author gives examples of real teacher-librarians using Web 2.0 tools in their everyday work. For example, high school librarian, Carolyn Foote lists examples of how she uses wikis “to compile notes with classes, encourage creative writing, and create book lists for teachers.” Teacher-librarians can use wikis like Wordless Works and the ReadWriteWiki to share information on ways to use children’s literature in the classroom. Joyce Valenza uses a wiki to create a summer reading list for her students. Since a wiki can also store links and other types of files, teachers were able to add their own content such as reading guides, questions, book reviews and even video

Wikis can be used in the classroom in a variety of different ways. For example, teachers and students can create an online curriculum where they both contribute to the content. Students might also use the curriculum to create their own version of Wikipedia or their own textbook, adding their own images, links, powerpoints, videos, podcasts, links to blogs, as well as reflections and personal thoughts. Wikis can be passed on from class to class, allowing students in future classes to continue to edit and/or add to existing content. In Winnipeg, teacher Darren Kuropatwa, is renown for creating his “Applied Math 40S Wiki Solutions Manual” in the wiki environment. His students learn from each other as they generate content and essentially construct their own math textbook.

Students can practise their editing skills by reviewing existing edits to a wiki, make their own changes and then follow up to see what happens to the changes they make. Similarly, students can observe those changes that others make to their work and analyze the results. The editing option gives teachers the opportunity to initiate important discussions with students as to “the difference between enhancing an article and damaging the work of a peer” (Lamb & Johnson, 2007). In Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms, Will Richardson even ponders whether or not teachers should encourage students to modify content of existing articles on Wikipedia. He asks, “Should we be looking at Wikipedia as another audience for our students to publish their work or contribute their knowledge to?” If we are looking for authentic experiences for our students, perhaps we can’t be too hasty in dismissing Richardson’s suggestion.

In “Make way for wikis,” Eric Oatman gives examples of how teachers and librarians are using the wiki environment to teach writing more effectively. One reason students are proving to write better in the wiki environment is because they know they have “an authentic audience” and “others are looking” at what they write. In English, wikis give literature studies new ways to support student learning allowing students to collect and build background information to the story by providing information for others studying the book, including interviews, author bios, setting information, and refelections on specific passages of the book.

Although the possibilities for using wikis with students may seem endless, there are numerous ways teachers can use wikis to enhance their teaching and support their own learning. For example, wikis can make it easier for teachers to share information, lesson plans, teaching strategies, best practises and learning outcomes with other educators. As a teacher, imagine using a wiki for collaborative planning with a colleague in your own school or even elsewhere, to coordinate student projects, or to connect with community members (”The virtual teacher-librarian: establishing and maintaining an effective web presence” by Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson). Teachers can also model wiki use to colleagues in an authentic activity by presenting new content from within the wiki environment.

How can I use the wiki environment?

Will Richardson notes that wikis can be used “as collaborative tools among teachers or districts to collect and share information” (p.61). In web 2.0: new tools, new schools, Gwen Solomon and Lynne Schrum also view the potential of wikis for professional development “in creating a goal, plan, or direction or to simply discuss the way a new activity is working” (p.114). I can see

From within the security of our divisional portal, the wiki is one Web 2.0 tool that I am able to use in our schools, with both staff and students. As part of my job, I am responsible for developing and facilitating professional development opportunities for both teacher-librarians and library assistants (library technicians) in our school division. In order to provide our school library personnel with PD activities that meet our varied needs, I can use the wiki format for planning the direction of our professional development. By inviting school library staff to collaborate, our Library Staff PD Plan can take on new life in the wiki format, as all the stakeholders contribute to goal setting and mapping out a course of action for our continued professional development.

Reflections

In researching the wiki this week, I found that there is already a great deal of information available about how this Web 2.0 tool can be used in both education and business. In my own work, I can see how the wiki application can be useful with both students and staff. This will certainly be one Web 2.0 tool that I can see myself returning to time and again, for a variety of different reasons.

I do struggle with learning how to navigate a new tool each week, as well as researching the appropriate content to enhance the experience. It is a challenge to present new content while modelling an unfamiliar application in which to showcase new learning. However, this week, I really felt that in creating a wiki for our divisional PD plan, I am not only completing a course requirement, I am creating something I can really use with our staff. Even though I have just begun to develop this wiki, I know that this web site will be one that I continue to build with our school library staff. This is an important opportunity for our school division to harmonize the professional development goals of both teacher-librarians and library assistants, and create a collaborative learning community that reflects our individual needs.

I think Will Richardson gives a very accurate assessment of the learning potential of the wiki when he describes its ability to build powerful sites that can “teach students much about how to work with others, how to create community, and how to operate in a world where the creation of knowledge and information is more and more a group effort” (p.69). Wikis “show our students [and our teachers] what it means to be part of [a] process” (p.69). I couldn’t agree more.

Scenario No.1
Brandon realizes that his biology research project on genetics is due tomorrow. It is Sunday evening, 6 p.m. No problem! He logs on to the Internet, opens his Web browser, does a quick Google search on genetics, prints out information from a few dot-com sites, and he is good to go.

Scenario No.2
Brandon realizes that his biology research project on genetics is due tomorrow. It is Sunday evening, 6 p.m. No problem! He logs on to the Internet, opens his Web browser, goes to his school library Web site, and clicks on the pathfinder created collaboratively by his library media specialist and classroom teacher. Using their suggestions, he finds basic information in an encyclopedia through Grolier Online, and journal articles and newsletters from the SIRS Knowledge Source and Infotrac Student Edition. Through the library’s online catalog, he reads portions of a few Follett e-books on genetics. To finish off his research, he visits a couple of the Web sites suggested in the pathfinder. Works cited? Referring to the works cited section of the school library Web site, he soon has his references listed in complete MLA format

-excerpt from Audrey P Church (2005, March). virtual SCHOOL LIBRARIES-THE TIME IS NOW! MultiMedia & Internet@Schools, 12(2), 8-12. Retrieved October 19, 2008, from ProQuest Education Journals database. (Document ID: 809417421).

In relating “the tale of two Brandons,” Audrey Church clearly demonstrates the importance of providing today’s learners with round-the-clock access to “quality resources and instruction in how to use these resources virtually” (Church, 2005). School libraries are evolving to extend their services beyond the parameters of their physical space and hours of operation, enabling students to access resources at any time, from anywhere.

With so many information choices available today, it is easy for students and staff to become overwhelmed by all the Internet has to offer. As the “information landscape” continues to expand, school library patrons are looking for solutions “to bring order to this glut of information” (Valenza, 2005). In “Find your path! Making research easy with virtual libraries,” Joyce Valenza argues that although young learners are often granted “near-guru status” when it comes to using new technologies, research suggests that these “learners often misunderstand the ways in which information is organized.” Valenza goes on to add that “learners need strategies to help guide them through the complicated, often overwhelming processes of accessing and using information.”

According to Joyce Valenza, if students are to be “effective seekers and users of information,” they need guidance and instructional support in each of the following:

1. information skills critical for the 21st century
2. customized, appropriate, and well-designed online learning environments

Enter… the new virtual library for 21st century learners!

What is a virtual library?

In the 21st century, a school library can create a productive learning environment in either a physical and a virtual space. Together, both physical and virtual libraries support teaching and learning, while each serves a unique purpose and addresses different client needs.

In “Virtual libraries supporting student learning,” Holly Gunn describes a virtual library as an “organized collection of digital information.” In addition to information in both audio and video formats, a virtual library collection may include online books, journals and articles available from databases or on the Internet. According to T. Saracevic, in the article “Digital library evaluation: toward an evolution of concepts,” virtual libraries are constructed “for a particular community of users, and they are designed to support the information needs of that community.” Joyce Valenza also refers to virtual libraries as “rich multi-page sites” that “customize the Web for particular groups of students” (Valenza, 2005).

Virtual school libraries are providing information to today’s techno-savvy learners “where they live, play, and work” (Valenza, 2005), twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. In addition to providing unlimited access to patrons, virtual school libraries tend to be most effective when both classroom teachers and teacher librarians collaborate and provide instruction in information literacy from within an online environment.

Characteristics of a virtual library

In visiting and evaluating a variety of virtual libraries this week (both school and public), many common characteristics can be identified, even though each one serves a unique learning community.

Perhaps the best known virtual library environment is that of “information goddess,” Joyce Valenza at Springfield Township High School. The library homepage “uses the physical library” as a metaphor to organize Web resources (Valenza, 2005). The visual representation replicates the physical library environment and each active link is illustrated in an appropriate manner. For example, catalogs and databases, online lessons and pathfinders, links for students and teachers, and email are all labelled near or on the computer bank (where they would be accessed from in a physical library). Joyce Valenza has created a comprehensive collection of online resources that provide students with instructional support both at school and at home. No wonder the Springfield Township High School Virtual Library is just as active after hours, as it is during school hours.

Virtual libraries need to be well organized for easy navigation by both students and staff. Tables and sidebars can provide users with a quick, at-a-glance overview of what resources are available. The virtual library at Miles MacDonnell Collegiate uses a simple T-chart layout to promote both the online catalogues and resources available to students. Virtual libraries are the best way to highlight electronic databases that the school subscribes to on an annual basis. Citation help and links for class projects are readily accessible to students as they require support in completing their assignments.

The Parkcrest Library Media Centre includes links to the school’s growth plans as part of its virtual library. In this case, the virtual library provides a public venue for sharing the school’s goals with students, teachers, parents and the community. For further investigation, appropriate links are provided for each of the goals.

The Bairdmore Virtual School Library creates easy access for students in a Kindergarten to Grade 6 school by using both text and colourful icons as information guides. Despite their tendency to feature online resources like databases and electronic journals, virtual libraries can actually lead students back to reading offline. The Bairdmore Library does just that by providing a list of the Manitoba Young Readers Choice Award nominees and the “Top 100 Kid’s Books” that will encourage students to seek out fiction materials in the physical library. Other examples might include summer reading lists selected by public libraries or other reading recommendations such as teacher or peer picks and favorite read alouds.

The Grandview Virtual Library is a colourful, fun and very user-friendly site. The clever layout makes class projects, research tools, blogs and wikis easy to access. In navigating the site, the message that classroom teachers and the teacher-librarian work collaboratively as instructional partners is very clear. The teacher-librarian’s site includes instructional lesson plans, a research calendar and a collaborative mapping template to use when planning with classroom teachers. In addition to posting lesson plans, virtual libraries may also post teacher-created online tools for students to use such as rubrics, handouts, organizers, and WebQuests.

The Library Support Services at the Winnipeg School Division creates “do-it-yourself research guides” called pathfinders as part of their virtual library. Teacher-librarians build pathfinders that are usually customized to meet the needs of a particular group of students, doing a particular project. Pathfinders make information more accessible to students and teachers, because they weed through all the available resources and link students to quality resources recommended by their teachers and teacher-librarians. A pathfinder might provide key words, definitions of key concepts, call numbers for reference books, articles in print magazines, best web sites, or even email addresses to experts in the field of study (Valenza, 2005). Students can also be encouraged to create their own pathfinders to guide their research. On the her virtual library site, Joyce Valenza provides students with a template to create their own pathfinders.

A favorite example of a public virtual library is the Regina Public Library, in Regina, Saskatchewan. The layout is clean and well mapped out using both visuals (photographs and icons), as well as text to direct the patron. Like many virtual libraries, this one provides an email link under “Ask a Librarian,” for direct, personal service online. Although more common in public libraries than school libraries, this virtual service is modelled after the traditional reference desk in physical library environments.

Advantages of a virtual library

In “The virtual library,” by Joyce Valenza, the author states that “today’s school library must meet [student] needs as both a physical and virtual space. However, virtual libraries do provide new opportunities for student learning that a physical space can not replicate:

• Access (virtual libraries do not have designated hours of operation and are available any time, from anywhere, serve many users simultaneously)
• Customized learning resources (resources are selected for specific assignments and a variety of different learning styles)
• Collection development (resources are always current and more up-to-date, no lost materials)
• Web 2.0 environment (opportunities for users to become authors and publishers of information)
• Local curriculum (include locally produced resources, histories and photographs)
• Equity for all users (increased access for the visually impaired, the mobility challenged and patrons living in remote locations)

Disadvantages of a virtual library

• Connectivity (inaccessible without an Internet connection)
• Lack of information literacy skills (students who have not developed the necessary information skills, such as effective search techniques, may flounder in the virtual environment)
• Lack of professional instruction (without a teacher-librarian to provide scaffolding and quality resources, a virtual library is difficult to navigate)
• Storage of digital information (issue of long term storage and permanency of digital information)

-based on Holly Gunn (2002). Virtual libraries supporting student learning. School Libraries Worldwide, 8(2), 27-37. Retrieved October 19, 2008, from ProQuest Education Journals database. (Document ID: 355802891).

Further implications for teaching and learning

In the article “The real and the virtual: intersecting communities at the library,” technology education librarian, Kelly Czarnecki, ponders the responsibility of a library “to build community.” She views the potential of virtual libraries “to see the community grow as a result of what you’re doing with library services to create new groups of people and new ways to share and discover information.” Czarnecki muses on the intersection of physical and virtual library spaces when she suggests that libraries consider attracting teen patrons to participate in virtual collaborative projects while at the public library. To take this idea one step further, we might begin to see student-created content becoming part of the virtual library collection on a regular basis.

In terms of teaching and learning within the school library program, teacher-librarians can effectively model an inquiry-based research process (Focus on inquiry, Big6, Guided Inquiry, I-Search, Integration Station), within a virtual library space. By providing an online scaffold for the instruction of information skills at each phase of the student’s query, teacher-librarians can guide student research after hours. Virtual libraries can include ideas for research topics, techniques for generating essential questions, advice on selecting resources, strategies for note-making, information on citing sources, and tips on avoiding plagiarism.

Whether using a resource in a physical or online in a virtual library, students still need to be able to evaluate the quality of information they use, for both relevance and accurracy. In the article “Helping students use virtual libraries effectively,” authors Mary Ann Fitzgerald and Chad Galloway state that “although the quality of information found within a virtual library is certain to be generally much higher than that of the open Internet, it is still absolutely necessary that students exercise critical thinking in choosing between resources and in applying the information they find.” Students will still need to be critical of articles retrieved from databases in terms of bias and currency.

In “Digital libraries in education: promises, challenges, and issues,” Marchionini and Maurer suggest that in customizing resources for a specific group of learners, virtual libraries could, in effect, extend access to “create global communities of learners” studying a similar subject. It’s an interesting premise that definitely has Web 2.0 overtones.

Reflections

Virtual libraries can elevate the work of the school library and the teacher-librarian in powerful, new ways. I can see that the static library web pages that we once built, are no longer relevant to our 21st century learners. With Sharepoint and Gateway becoming our avenues for creating library web pages in our division, I hope that our school libraries can build interactive virtual learning libraries that support both instruction and learning on a fresh, new level.

As I navigate through the Springfield Township High School’s virtual library, I am both overwhelmed and in awe of the information that has been made available for use online. In reading the conclusion to “The virtual library,” by Joyce Valenza, I am reminded of the power of both the physical and virtual library spaces working in tandem when she states that “when people say that Springfield Township’s library is the heart and the brain of the school, they are also referring to its virtual counterpart.”

-katkin

For the first time in this course, I think I have finally been able to explain a Web 2.0 tool that I am studying to my mother. At 86 years of age, she was a child of radio, so she does have some frame of reference when it comes to understanding the popularity of podcasting today. The “Golden Age of Broadcasting” is generally considered to span from the mid 1920s through until the early 1950s. For many of our parents and grandparents, radio programming was the main form of family entertainment growing up. It’s easy to picture a Norman Rockwell-esque painting illustrating the family gathered around the radio, listening to their favorite programs.

Programming on the radio offered something for everyone… news, drama, adventure, serials, comedy, music and children’s shows. Radio entertainment also had a great influence on the listening public. Perhaps there is no better example of how much radio could sway listeners into action than the 1938 broadcast of “The War of the Worlds” (narrated by Orson Welles) that caused thousands of people to call the police and to flee from their homes in fear of an invasion by aliens. Today, podcasting may remind us of the oldtime radio programming, but it also gives new meaning to providing both information and entertainment on demand.

What is a podcast?

Podcasting refers to a web-based broadcast that allows users to record audio (or video) content via the Internet. The term podcast is formed from the words iPod and broadcast, and is also sometimes referred to as “audio blogging.” The podcast format is useful for sharing your thoughts on a new book or discovery, relating an experience such as a trip, communicating news to others, conducting interviews, or reviewing curricular content (Podcasting for teachers & students). Content from a podcast can be easily downloaded to a computer or a portable listening device or you can subscribe to a podcast and have new episodes sent directly to you.

Broadcasting versus Podcasting

The Common Craft video entitled Podcasting in Plain English gives a neat and tidy summary of how a podcast differs from traditional broadcasting:

• requires minimal equipment (a computer, a microphone and a connection to the web
• no recording studio necessary, anyone can create a podcast and broadcast their content to the world
• no longer matters if you miss a program broadcast online because you can subscribe to podcasts and listen to them anytime and anywhere you choose. A podcatcher allows you to “capture” a program and listen to it as often as you like
• use RSS feeds to subscribe to podcasts that you may be interested in listening to at a later date. RSS also enables new content to be delivered directly to you, just as soon as it becomes available.
• download your favorite podcasts and take them with you. Portable devices like iPods and mp3 players allow you to listen to your podcasts wherever you are, not just from your home computer

Podcasting as digital storytelling

As a form of digital storytelling, podcasting requires students to become better writers and editors of their content. In her article “Sound off! The possibilities of podcasting,” Anne-Marie Gordon notes that “the writing process can be an integral part of podcasting” and that “creating a script can actually take more time than recording it.” By the time students “write a script, practise reading it, and perform it, they have actually had three chances to learn the information they’re presenting.”

In the classroom: Kid podcasts of Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! uses this Newbery award winning book as the framework for a set of class monologues. Each student has the opportunity to personalize one of the characters in the book and bring them to life in their podcast. This is a great use of podcasting and an instructional strategy that could be applied to other genres such as non-fiction texts, plays or poetry.

Just one more book is a podcast where the hosts discuss children’s books from “their favorite coffee shop.” One of my favorite features on this site is the collection of informal interviews with well known authors and illustrators. What a treat to hear their voices and feel like you are right in the room listening to them speak. Students could study these podcasts in preparation for creating their own booktalks online. A podcast can provide students with a more authentic learning experience by broadcasting student booktalks and book reviews to a much wider audience.

There are many excellent examples of how podcasting and storytelling can be used together not only for teaching and learning, but entertainment as well. Storynory provides a collection of approximately 180 high-quality, audio stories that can be downloaded for classroom or home use. Of course, these stories can also be downloaded on to an iPod or mp3 player, giving children hours of storytelling fun whenever and wherever they want to hear a story. The technique of Natasha, the narrator, is definitely worth studying if students and teachers are looking for their own recording tips from an exemplary role-model.

Implications for Teaching and Learning

In terms of using podcasting for teaching and learning, there are really two areas of use to consider: podcasts as a presentation tool to express or share your own understandings, and podcasts as a reference source that you access to learn information on a topic.

In her article “Sound off! The possibilities of podcasting,” Anne-Marie Gordon calls podcasts “a fun and effective way to reach and engage wider audiences.” A great instructional advantage to using podcasts in the classroom is that teachers can demonstrate a concept or read a story as a podcast, and post it for viewing by children and parents in their class. Students can have access to information they need, well outside school hours and parents can hear what their children are doing in class.

Podcasting is already being used in universities so that students can download a professor’s lecture in preparation for writing a term paper or as a review before a test. Podcasting can be a powerful tool in learning a second language or studying music. Solomon and Schrum state that “the ability to hear these items as often as one wishes puts the learner in control of the learning.” For students with special needs, podcasting gives them increases access to content and opportunities to re-play information as often as required

In her list of “Best sites for educational podcasts,” Joanne Troutner views podcasts “as yet another reference source” that teacher-librarians can promote for use with both students and teachers. There are a wealth of podcasts available online and unlike many traditional resources, they are free to use, anywhere and anytime. One of my favorite podcast finds is Radio Willow Web at Willowdale Elementary School in Omaha, Nebraska. Even students, as early as Grade 1, prove that it is possible for very young children to share their new understandings in a very polished and professional manner.

In addition to accessing student-created content, teacher-librarians can also subscribe to podcasts that support curricular content. For example, National Geographic offers a variety of free podcasts that are useful to students and teachers. Teacher-librarians can create an electronic collection of podcasts and include them as resources on webquests, pathfinders and bibliographies. Since anyone can produce a podcast and share its content on the Internet, students and teachers will also need to be able to evaluate the quality of these programs effectively, just as they would for any other online resource they might use.

In their article, “Podcasting in the school library, part 1: integrating podcasts and vodcasts into teaching and learning,” authors Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson observe that “in addition to motivating learners, podcasts are a way to convey ideas and emotions that are difficult to express in a text format.” This is good news for our auditory learners because, as a communication tool, podcasts give students another opportunity to have their voices heard or demonstrate their understanding of curriculum content. Early years students will also find it easier to explain a concept in a podcast, rather than write about it at length.

In the podcast Women of Web 2.0 (#65), Joyce Valenza comments that although our students may seem proficient in using Web 2.0 applications such as podcasting, we may have been premature in granting them “guru status” in using these new tools. I would agree that student use of Web 2.0 tools does not necessarily translate into “applying skills to real-life needs.” Students will still require guidance and “explicit teaching,” especially in the area of content creation. Joyce Valenza also tells us that teacher-librarians need to be educating students as both “content creators” and “users of content.” Planning a quality podcast takes time. In Part 2 of “Podcasting in the school library,” Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson outline how students can create more powerful podcasts by identifying their audience, working in teams, using their voices effectively and rehearsing the performance. In addition to preparing the content for a podcast, students also need to learn recording skills that include careful enunciation, speech delivery and breathing techniques. It’s not difficult for students to make a podcast, but it is a challenge to create one that is both powerful in impact and well-produced technically.

Implications for Professional Development

According to Gwen Solomon and Lynne Schrum in Web 2.0: new tools, new schools, “schools are starting to make professional development training sessions, lectures and ideas available through podcasts, which leads to individualized professional development on demand” (p.113). In our school division, I am already seeing professional development being delivered to teaching staff in this way, particularly in the area on ICT. These podcasts are available in our portal and can be accessed by our teaching staff at any time of the day. I would agree that we will probably continue to see the delivery of professional development via podcasting become even more popular because of the convenience of being able to access PD information on your own schedule and being able to revisit the content as often as you like.

In regards to the school library, a colleague of mine is embarking on a new podcasting project with the teacher-librarians in her school division. It sounds like a very interesting project that will invite teacher-librarians from different schools to discuss a variety of library related topics in a series of podcasts. The podcasts will be archived on their divisional website and made available for staff for professional development purposes. I think these podcasts will also be an excellent source of advocacy for school library programs in their division and continue to promote the role of the teacher-librarian as an instructional partner. It would also be worthwhile to create podcasts where teacher-librarians and classroom teachers could discuss ideas for collaboration that support student learning.

‘Twas the night before Thanksgiving

In “Sowing the seeds for a more creative society,” Mitchel Resnick discusses how “new technologies help students navigate the creative thinking spiral” (p.18). I agree with him when he says that “knowledge alone is not enough.” In order to be successful in this new Web 2.0 environment, it is becoming increasingly more important to “imagine” and “think and act creatively.” Podcasting encourages learners to do just that… imagine what you want to do, create original material and share your ideas with others.

I felt very comfortable using Audacity to create my podcast, but there are many other web tools and services available, with iTunes being one of the most popular options. For my first effort, I chose Audacity not only because it is free to use, but also because it is the program used by students and teachers in our schools to create podcasts. In addition to being a cross-platform software, it also allows you to edit your recording and even add audio effects such as how to fade in a musical intro which I experimented with in my podcast. I found that I was much less anxious to create a podcast which I attribute to the auditory nature of the task. I enjoyed the challenge of using the voice over the visual, to engage the listener and communicate a message.

thanksgivingpodcast

I feel like I have just been invaded by one of those professional organizers from the Life Network or the HGTV channel. You know the kind that bring order and decorum to a life drowning in clutter and chaos. Colleagues often tell me how well organized they think I am, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. Case in point… my current system of bookmarking and favoriting web sites is all over the place, both at home and at work. Some are in folders, others are in lists, some are repeated, others have been deleted. I will readily admit that I am floundering around in a world of online purgatory when it comes to organizing my electronic bookmarks… enter my new administrative assistant… del.icio.us!

What is social bookmarking?

After watching Lee LeFever’s Social Bookmarking in Plain English video, I learned that I have been managing my favorite web sites “the old way,” using my browser tab. From personal experience, I already knew that bookmaking becomes messy over time and that one’s bookmarks are tied to one computer… but when you regularly work on more than one machine, your disorganized life online is only compounded.

Social bookmarking has evolved from the need for users to be more organized in terms of managing their favorite web sites… but it has really become so much more. On TeacherTube, Lori Burch also refers to social bookmarking as “collaborative” or “shared” bookmarking. Popular online bookmarking services such as del.icio.us, Furl, Diigo, Stumbleupon and ma.gnolia, allow users to organize and store all their bookmarks in one place on the Internet, rather than on their computers. As a result, your favorite bookmarks are accessible from any computer, wherever you are… but perhaps the greatest advantage to using social bookmarking, is the potential to share your bookmarks with other users who have similar interests to your own.

The social implications of sharing your favorites with others through sites like del.icio.us allow you to build “your own community of researchers that gather relevant information for you” (Richardson, p.89). In return, because your bookmarks are public (unless you specify otherwise), your bookmarks can be shared with others. This reciprocity makes social bookmarking truly unique in creating a network of users that supply and borrow content from the community as a whole. Everyone who participates in this “pay-it-forward” kind of online society benefits.

Tags are the key to making strong connections with other users. Every user has the authority to assign their own “tags” to their bookmarks, to organize and categorize their favorite web sites. Users can add as many tags as they like to each bookmark and they can also see how many others have used the same tags. Tagging can actually provide validation to a site that has been bookmarked repeatedly by users as one worth looking at. Eventually, a group of users can use particular tags as keywords to locate specific content… this type of tagging creates what is know as folksonomies. Adding other users to your network allows you to collaborate in another way because you can view and add the tags of colleagues.

Concerns

As with most Web 2.0 tools and services, there are still some concerns about using social bookmarking in our schools, as is evident in the “access denied” dialogue box that pops up on divisional computers. Foremost, is that tagging bookmarks remains a very inexact science. There is no limit as to what you can tag, so you never know where a connection might lead a user, especially if that user is a student. Even the bookmarks labelled as “popular” can be cause for concern because you can’t predict what might come up.

Student access might also tempt some users to add inappropriate web sites as bookmarks and subsequently be able to share them with others in the class and beyond. Social bookmarking could also be misused by those users who deliberately and repeatedly target a web site they wish to promote with popular tags, so that it receives a high ranking and therefore more online exposure.

Implications for teaching and learning

Even though I have only been registered with del.icio.us for less than a week, I am quickly coming to the conclusion that social bookmarking has huge potential for supporting student learning and facilitating professional collaboration among educators. Social bookmarking is perhaps most useful for sharing a collection of resources with a group (7 things you should know about social bookmarking). As the “how-to article” on social bookmarking stated on the Teaching today site, “sharing is what makes social bookmarking so powerful.” In considering that students do not have access to social bookmarking services in our schools (even though they may at home), it is perhaps teachers who can really use this service to the greatest advantage.

Since social bookmarking sites allow users to link to others, it becomes easier to find the best educational sites for classroom use because you can also view what others have found to be useful. This is handy for several reasons… you might otherwise miss quality sites that just aren’t that popular and you might also find a kindred spirit who has similar interests and needs in information collection. As well, teachers collaborating on a project can share bookmarks by grouping them together in a bundle. In our division, we are presently in the process of setting up professional learning networks with teaching staff, and I could easily see social bookmarking becoming a powerful piece in the structure that is established.

Even though our students are still bookmarking their favorites on the computers they use at school, they can still access their bookmarks on different computers because their files are on the divisional network, rather than on a particular computer. This still doesn’t solve the organizational issue of favorites lists from becoming overwhelming and it certainly doesn’t allow students to share their favorite sites with their classmates as easily as it might. I could see that a site like del.icio.us could very useful to students working on group projects, both at school and at home. Since a bookmarking service is able to store a user’s bookmarks safely and securely online, there is also far less opportunity for students to “misplace” the sites they need. This is also great for completing research assignments because “all of your relevant online materials [are found] in one place” (DesRoches, D., 2007). It makes research more collaborative and encourages students to be more critical in bookmarking resources that others will see and maybe use.

In my current assignment, I could envision using del.icio.us to share bookmarks that I think members of our library staff might find valuable. I could network collections of bookmarks with different groups and select the content for teacher-librarians, library technicians and assistant librarians. Members from each group could contribute their own bookmarks, creating a kind of custom database. As Will Richardson explains in his article Taming the Beast: social bookmarking, school divisions (or in my case school library staff), could “decide on a unique tag that everyone can use when they bookmark something of interest.” This allows for a particular group to collaboratively build a specialized online resource for their personal use.

Another part of my job includes providing direct support to schools operating without a teacher-librarian on staff… which means that I’m frequently on the road and it is not unusual for me to be in three or four schools in one day. Being able to access my bookmarks, no matter what computer I use and no matter which school I’m in, would certainly make life easier. As Donna DesRoches states in her article All together now: social bookmarking offers a new way to store and share Web sites, “librarians and teachers can tailor bookmarks to meet a classroom’s curricular and research needs.” Even though I am unable to use my del.icio.us account to do this at work, I should eventually be able to doing something similar in the “my site” area of our divisional portal.

I can see that I probably should have been tapping into the benefits of social bookmarking much sooner. Even though, del.icio.us is restoring some order to my former bookmarking system, I can see that when I registered for the service, I seem to have imported older bookmarks from my former browser into my new account… so I will have a little housecleaning to do in order to streamline my new Web 2.0 environment. So even if I haven’t got everything working perfectly yet, I am hopeful and I can see that for my personal use, the advantages to using social bookmarking far outweigh the negatives.
-katkin