bugspsu Web 2.0

Well, it seems fitting that I had my first technical problem on the last Thing. Didn’t get a record button option on the Voicethread slides, so I didn’t leave any thoughts. I’ll do so here.

Is the world of learning changing? For sure. However, I’m in the training/consulting business where my clients want results. So, it’s not so much about what you know but what you do with the knowledge. So, I see how much fun you can have and how much time you can spend learning. I think it will take a lot of focus to use these tools gainfully outside of a structured setting like education or training seminars.

I find Wikis and Blogs to be the most useful tools. Perhaps that’s because they were our first Web 2.0 tools, and the ones we’ve “exercised” the most. Also, I can see them in use with my clients because of their simplicity.

The class has been wonderful. Shelley, you’re terrific.And, everything worked. (Well, until tonight.) I know that means a lot of troubleshooting and testing directions, etc. on your part. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

This thing opened my eyes. I use LinkedIn for professional contact. (I recently refound a former colleague, and we may collaborate on a project soon. Yay! Thank you LinkedIn.

Otherwise, I have been thinking of Facebook and Twitter as ways that people tell you when they ate their peanut butter sandwich (who cares) or post messages before thinking about them, because you can. Now I see that, just like “guns don’t kill people, people do”, social networking sites aren’t trivial, just some of the people who use them. It’s very encouraging to see various uses for social (er, educational) networks.

I love Free Technology for Teachers. It’s the RSS feed I definitely check every 1-2 days. One recent item was about Tagxedo, a word cloud generator. I used it very successfully with a client, as follows.

I took two versions of a script for the audio track of an e-Learning project and ran them through Tagxedo, then put the word clouds side by side in a PowerPoint slide. (I specified that the clouds only include words mentioned three times or more in the scripts.) It was apparent that one script had a product focus, while the other featured product and customer messaging. And, one script had fewer words in the cloud – it was a less-wordy script. These conclusions were identified quickly by the client, without argument. This was a very effective way of making these points.

I can see doing something similar in the classroom. Students could do their own word clouds as a way of analyzing their writing assignments, e.g. This could even be a visual “abstract” of the paper instead of just a text abstract and a teacher could very quickly get a feel for the key points in the paper.

Okay, so I’m officially overwhelmed with Web 2.0 tools at this point.

I can, however, see an interesting application of Pageflakes when meeting new clients. This is a simple way to aggregate the various things being said about the client on the Internet, as an overview of all that information. Or, it would be a nice aggregation on any topic that might be of interest to the client. I think clients would also be impressed with my business’s technical savvy to be using these tools.

I did two things in GoogleDocs. I uploaded a table I have been working on to capture (c0ncisely) the various tools from this course, and I created within GoogleDocs a presentation version of my Podcast on Buying Carpet. I found it easy to use, but not nearly as presentation-ready as Office (e.g., no Smart tools). So, I can clearly see GoogleDocs as a collaboration tool, but it looks insufficient as an authoring tool. I also wonder about security. I create documents for clients who would probably be very nervous about security of their business documents. Or, I need to learn a lot more about security of online documents using tools like GoogleDocs.

As for uses:

1. Collaborative creating of lesson notes or study guided.

2. Salespeople from my classes contribute their own sales success stories to a “Hall of Fame” document, thereby teaching each other and reinforcing/extending the learning.

3. Use of forms to learn more about class participants before the class.

I have been a frequent viewer of YouTube, but hadn’t ever used TeacherTube.  Shelley is right – the ads and commercials on TeacherTube are maddening. But, now I know how Shelley imbeds the Common Craft videos in our Thing wikis each week!!!

Just like with Flickr, there are many videos out there for use in education, and now I know how to find and use them.

Here’s one video I find that does a recent romanticizing of my hometown, McKeesport, PA. (McKeesport is also featured in a slide show on my Wiki.)

I’m now a published Podcaster – imagine that! Like many things in life, when you have a good teacher – thanks, Shelley – the right tools and a bit of an adventurous spirit, you can do things you thought you couldn’t. I found this very easy to do, and now understand the difference between a Podcast and a sound file.

In my business, I develop training programs for clients. I am bidding on a job to do some training programs for Lowe’s associates. I’m thinking how easy it would be to add Podcasts to the curriculum, to accommodate an auditory learning style, increase access to the training, and also address the potentially-preferred learning style of younger associates.

So now I am listening to Podcasts via Google Reader and iTunes. Imagine that. There’s a very full world of information out there, and I can get what I want when I want. Amazing.

However, time for a soapbox. In America, we seem to value our entertainment more than anything else. Sports stars and actresses/actors make more money than scientists and poets (and teachers). So, are all these social vehicles mostly ways for us to entertain ourselves? Is this healthy in the long run? After all, who is creating value in our society, vs. just sharing information in an entertaining way? So, I worry a bit about all this.

One aside. The Grammar Girl site we were asked to visit via podcast is part of a larger series of Podcasts that includes The Money Girl. The Money Girl is actually a former colleague of mine. We found each other recently via LinkedIn and now may be collaborating on a project. This stuff really does work to make the world smaller and connected.

Another social connector – very interesting. I think this is a good way to find authors/books that would appeal, based on other people’s experience. As with Delicious, I can see asking students to find a book on a particular topic using LibraryThing, and then writing a report or summarizing key points from the book as an assignment. In this way, they select their own book, so maybe less griping about the assignment. Also, their research would add to my library, including having their reports/reviews from the perspective of the class I’m teaching.

Okay – I’m at the point of overload. While I see the potential value of social bookmarking, it feels like more Google overload. I guess there’s value in the fact that others have sifted through many sites and tagged the ones they find valuable, but does everyone really care what I think?

Maybe that’s the point – I can evaluate the options they give me and choose what to do with them. It’s probably better than not having those options in the first place.

I was having a hard time seeing applications for Delicious in my training business. So, I thought I’d just try something. I pretended I was running a sales training class and asked each student to find a good sales technique to overcome a sales objection, using Delicious. Sure enough, a Delicious search on “sales + objections” produced lots of resources. In this way, I could facilitate my students own learning – teach ‘em to fish – as part of the value I bring. (Now, I just hope they don’t think they no longer need me!!!!!)

Here’s my Delicious page – for this assignment, I did some investigations into Penn State football – one of my passions: http://delicious.com/bugspsu