Do we need to keep our hands on the Twitter brake in the classroom?

Using Twitter to extend the discussion outside of the classroom can be a double-edged sword (as can many other pedagogical techniques).  Yes, I do include Twitter as a teaching tool.  The question is how to gauge the use of Twitter so that is does support the discussion of in-class topics outside of the classroom walls.  Twitter can just as easily be a distraction as a help.  Several faculty have requested we look into some way to continue a conversation, topic, exchange of thoughts even after the class period is over.  I fully realize that faculty can easily overwhelm students with outside the class "activities."  We are always working with faculty to help them appreciate how much time it takes to participate in successful online forums.  However, Twitter might be a different type of animal.

This Digital Citizenship Thing is Ever Growing

We are working on developing a comprehensive initiative on digital citizenship as it relates to teaching and learning. Several of the key folks throughout our campus are already involved in a discussion. Although there are some people in higher education (actually more than a handful) who have done work on digital scholarship and what it is to be a "citizen" of our increasingly digital world, there are not too many looking into integrating a set of core ideals/practices into all sides of the teaching/learning/support equation. I will share what we end up with.

Social Media and Publishing

Check out the following article on social media.

http://richardstacy.com/2009/05/07/the-sanctity-of-publication/

Hypothetical Mash-up for Teaching

As part of the discussion during the seminar we are teaching with a wonderful group of post-docs from the FIRST program, a question was presented about an instructor's ability to annotate (comment and mark-up) student assignments on blogs. One possible solution is to use diigo to comment on the student's blogs and then to share them with each student and with the class. This mash-up might actually work. Now all I need is for this group of instructors to use this in their classes and report back on the success (or lack thereof) of these tools.

from Knowledgeable to Knowledge-able

"Managing" technology in the classroom (mediascape). Creating students that are knowledge-able is a key to the future of learning. What about creating, or molding faculty into knowledge-able. This is a part of the presentation by
Michael Wesch, Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology, Kansas State University given at ELI 2009. You can read more excerpts at the Digital Ethnography blog from Kansas State University (http://mediatedcultures.net).

ELI 2009 Meeting Discussions

An interesting blog discussion regarding if the blog is dead? Take a look - http://eli2009.wordpress.com/. Is it true that the only "good" blog is not a Blackboard tool? Can't the CMS-based systems be used as a level (if it is the correct learning curve) to the "cool" outside open-platform systems?