Thing Twenty-Three

Take a few moments to reflect on your journey. You've covered a lot of material over the past ten weeks. What does it all mean? How has your thinking changed between Thing 1 and Thing 23? Has this program changed how you view the Internet or how view education in the digital world? What plans have you made for using these tools in and out of the classroom? How will you continue to learn about Web 2.0 tools? What are your big "take aways" from this experience?

When I first started this course I was moderately knowledgeable about technology.  But after completing this course, I realize that I was missing a basic piece of information.  I was using Facebook, GMail, google calendar, YouTube, and many other Internet tools.  But I never knew that I was part of something called Web 2.0.  Now I know that Web 2.0 includes technology that allows users to receive, respond to, and interact on the Internet.  It allows users to be connected and collaborative.  It allows users to share thoughts, information, pictures, videos, and social interactions.  In the past I was a consumer of information on the Internet.  Now I can be a consumer, producer, and collaborator. 

I used to believe that technology had a small place in early childhood, but that most of it was not useful to my classroom, my teaching, and the learning of my students.  Now I have a broader idea of how Web 2.0 could become part of my classroom.  In fact, it was already impacting my classroom before I understood what it was.  This year I have used the Internet to find resources for teaching.  I have researched learning topics, shown learning videos, interacted with learning websites, and created a website that helps showcase student learning.  In most cases my classroom has been an Internet  consumer.  But I can now see how my classroom could interact with these same tools and become a producer as well.

My plans for the future include using these web 2.0 tools more fully.  I plan to add a blog to the website that I already have.  I hope to make this an interactive forum so that I can give information to, and gain feedback from, classroom families.  I also hope to create blogs as a whole group or small group writing activity with my students.  I would like to become involved in an EPals project next year.  I hope to become more interactive with my colleagues by using either Dropbox or Google Docs and maybe beginning a wiki that will help us collect resources around a teaching and learning topic.

The big “take aways” from this experience are that Web 2.0 is about collaborating, connecting, and expanding our learning environments beyond our physical classrooms. As teachers, our minds should be open to learning and exploring the new possibilities that we have through technology tools.