Michael Moloney is doing some very impressive work in a NYC high school using blogs, wikis, and podcasts. Take a look and be awed and inspired. Here is a link to his Blog Lesson and Rubric.
Michael wrote this for me to post on the Blog:
I have a laptop cart in my classroom with the mac ibooks. My students use garageband 3 to record podcasts. They can add images to the podcasts - making them I guess what you would call "enhanced podcasts". But the garageband files are huge files - so I convert them to quicktime files by saving the garageband file to iweb, then copying and pasting the file to quicktime. I use quick time pro for this. Then I put the quicktime files (they are .mov files) on my website. I have my own website so that I can house all my work.Thanks, Michael.
The podcasts are kind of a lot of work. But I am having my honors global students make some really good ones that will go on my global review site - so hopefully other students will watch them and students can learn from students. But of course I still have to convert the files, load them on my server, and then connect them to my website. This is my Global Studies Regents Review page, which has many of the student podcasts. The entire 2-year curriculum is broken down to 50 subjects. And each category has- 1.) notes, 2.) a student made podcast, 3.) the link to the text book chapter, 4.) practice multiple choice questions from regentsprep.org. This site can help any student prepare for the global regents exam.
Concerning podcasting:
Podcasting takes tons of time - so it is hard to do if one is teaching a course loaded with regents content. I now only use podcasting with my 10th grade global honors kids. When I first introduce podcasting to a class, I give them the script - and they record it and put in the images. When they put in the images, they have to listen to the podcast over and over again - so I hope that the content sinks in.
The 2nd time my honors global kids make podcasts, I give them a topic (renaissance, plague, holocaust, etc.) - they prepare a 2-3 minute script - they email it to me. Then I check to make sure the script is ok, I delete some things and add some things. But the general flavor of the podcast is theirs. This is a lot of work. Then I email them back with the new improved script and they then record their show and get their images. You can also give kids images to use on a site like "flicker". It is better if they also use text signs (which they can make with photoshop).Here are directions to a global history podcast lesson.
I also use podcasting with my seniors for Participation in Government and Economics. Since there is no regents exam here and they are seniors, I let them make their own podcast from scratch the first time out. I encourage them to be creative, funny, unique, etc. Still this takes tons of time, two solid weeks for even talented seniors to complete a podcast about a topic. I give then a guide of what they should have on the podcast - and see what they come up with. Here is an example of the directions to a podcast lesson about "how banks work".
I learned how to make a garageband podcast by going to the Apple store in soho. they have free, hour-long seminars on how to do it. they have a couple of classes a week, usually one on saturday - go to apple store in soho website for details.
Wikis: When I started using wikis i used PBwikis - as in peanut butter wikis. But I eventually switched to wikispaces, which offers free educational upgrades. I now use wikis as a class webpage when I teach seniors. That way, I can open the site up to the whole world - and the kids can link up their blog pages and wiki pages - then I can shut the site down again after the kids hook up their stuff.
Like anything - these things take time - and any teacher willing to use blogs, wikis, or podcasts must go home and 'play' with them before they break them out in the classroom.
One great feature of blogs and wikis are that they have the time and date of the work. You can simply look at the time and date the work was submitted.
If you have any more questions - let me know. I could go on for hours about this stuff. Using tech in education has changed a lot since you were teaching us that first year.
Michael added: Here is a site from a Pennsylvania social studies teacher, Jennifer Dorman, who used tech extensively for about 8-10 years. She is no longer teaching, but is a tech director/coordinator for her region. Her site is great - she does a lot with blogs, wikis, and podcasting and has tons of resources on her site.
Michael Moloney
mmoloneyiths@yahoo.com
Dawn Hogue did a presentation for the Wisconsin State Reading Association in February, 2008. She discussed the use of these Web 2.0 tools and created a great website of the theories and links to practical applications as well as providing useful resource links.
Paul Turtola's CyberEnglish Center features a wiki.
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