This is the presentation from the April 28, 2012 NJEA Technology Integration Institute Workshop

1. Global Connections in the Classroom

3. About Bob Heinrich

5. Learn to Change, Change to Learn

6. • Online social bookmarking destination where
users can save bookmarked sites on a
personal Bookmarking Website
http://Del.icio.us

7. What you can do with del.icio.us:
• Save and access your bookmarks from any
computer
• Share your bookmarks and access other
people’s bookmarks
• Search del.icio.us to find other people who
are interested in the same topic
and check out their research

8. Diigo
• Bookmark website
• Index them with tags
• Annotate web pages with highlights,
comments, and sticky notes

11. • Help teachers find collaborative learning
partners and appropriate projects

12. Blogging – What is it?
• A blog (short for weblog) is a web-based journal that is
typically updated frequently and open for anyone to read.
• Entries are created in journal style and usually displayed in
reverse chronological order
• Blogs can be hosted by dedicated blog hosting services or
they can be run using blog software

13. How could a Blog
benefit your course?
• Personal Introductions
• Study guides and online learning and teaching (OLT) sites
for each course unit.
• A download facility where students can access PowerPoint
lecture slides, WWW links, solutions to problems, past
examination papers
• Students make contributions based on the subject matter
they students are studying
• Dissemination of Important Classroom Information beyond
the Classroom

14. Blogs in Education
• Easily Updatable Content
• RSS Feed (Bloglines)
• Tools
• Podcasting – No Downloads
– Easy to Update
• Vodcasting – Easy to Navigate
• Screencasting – Easy Linking
– Simple Design
• Homework
• Announcements

15. Podcasting – What is it?

16. How is Podcasting Relevant to
Education?
• Multimedia
• 99% free
• Can be listened to on many platforms:
• desktop, laptop, handhelds, MP3
• players, cell phones
• Mobile
• Low cost to broadcast = cheap
• publishing platform and more content

17. Opportunities for authentic
student products
• Sound-seeing tours
• Broadcast student audio plays
• Interviews with content experts
• Ongoing student produced “radio” talk shows about
content learned

18. Imagine if …
Podcasts are a new web resource to support life long learning. The WHAT,
WHEN, and WHERE
under your control.

19. RSS
• One of the great things about listening to podcasts is that
you can subscribe to what’s called an RSS feed. Once you’re
subscribed, your podcatcher will check the feed regularly
for new episodes. When a new episode is posted, the
podcatcher will automatically download the audio file for
you to listen to.
• An RSS feed is nothing more than a specially formatted text
file. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication.
• You don’t need to worry about understanding RSS or
writing out the feed file by hand. There are ways to create
it automatically.

20. • Skype is a free and easy way for teachers to open up their
classroom and their students to a world way beyond their
campus.
• With Skype, students can learn from other students, connect
with other cultures, and expand their knowledge in amazing
ways.
• Teachers and parents can also benefit from Skype in the
classroom
• http://education.skype.com/

21. Getting up and Running with Skype
• Hardware/software required:
– downloaded skype software,
– higher bandwidth connection
– web camera
– desktop microphone and earphones, or headset
– Interactive white board for display or a white wall,
and data projector if videoconferencing with a
class.

22. Wiki
• Similar to a blog; however, ownership of the
wiki is distributed to numerous individuals
who collectively add and edit web-accessible
content.

23. • A webpage that you can edit, is easy to
use and is perfect for collaborative
learning.

24. Wiki in the Classroom
• Use Wiki’s as a tool to enhance learning.
• Don’t use in isolation.
• Make it relevant to what is being taught in
class.
• They are a great motivator.
• Easy to monitor.
• Allows for creativity and innovation.
• Encourages participation.
• Promotes communication between
students.
• A new, interesting way to learn.

25. Personal Learning Network
• Twitter is a social networking and micro-
blogging site that enables users to send short,
concise messages to each other
• It is a means of disseminating information
quickly to a large amount of people; it allows
people to express their thoughts and have
their opinions heard quickly
– Follow Hashtags

26. Twitter in Plain English

27. How can Twitter be used to
improve my students’ education?
• David Perry, an assistant professor of Emerging Media
and Communications at the University of Texas at Dallas
calls Twitter a “classroom communication tool”
• He required his students to sign up for Twitter and send
a few messages with the site each week. The students
were required to subscribe to his Twitter feed, and he
updated his students several times a day on useful
web sites, or announcements throughout the day
• He felt that the use of Twitter by the class helped to
improve classroom discussions
Source: “Twitter In The Classroom”
http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2008/01/twitter-in-the-classroom.html

28. David Perry’s Benefits of Using
Twitter in the Classroom
• Twitter is a way to record thoughts and ideas
that you search – it’s a history
• Twitter connects you to a larger world outside
of the classroom and even the country
• Students can follow people who do what they
want to do or who they admire and get a sense
for their job and life
• Twitter can improve writing and punctuation

29. Step 1: In your web browser address bar, type in
http://twitter.com
Step 2: Since you are a new user, you will need to create a’
new account. Click the button on the screen labeled
“Sign up now”

30. The following screen will appear. It will ask you to type in
your full
name, the
username
you would
like to use,
the pass-
word you
would like
to use, and
your
e-mail
address.

31. As you enter your information, you will know if the names
you have chosen are available or not. You may need to
try out different usernames until you find a unique one.

32. After you accept the terms of service and submit your information,
you will be asked to type in a couple of random words in order to
confirm your information. This is done to ensure that the user is
not creating a computer-generated account in order to send
spam messages to other Twitter users.

33. The next page makes some suggestions on how to find other Twitter
users to “follow”. You can choose catagories such as Art & Design,
Entertainment, Fashion, Music, News, Politics, Sports, and many more!
Once you
find some
interesting
tweets, you
can “follow”
the person
who posted
it. When you
“follow”
someone,
whatever
they “tweet”
will appear
on your
personal
Twitter page!

34. One way of finding people to “follow” is to search for the
names of friends or people that you personally know.
You can click the blue button labeled “Find friends” to help
you in this
process!
When
searching
for a friend
to follow,
make sure to
check that
person’s
profile and
picture to be
sure it’s the
right person!

35. On the left side of the next page, you will see a search box that allows
you to type in the name of someone you might not personally know,
but is someone you would like to follow. That person might be a
fellow teacher at another school, a public figure such as a politician
or a
celebrity, or
otherwise.
You could
also search
for a Twitter
account used
by a
company,
a television
station, or
an
organization.

36. Once again, before you follow someone, check out the
profile and picture of that person to make sure it’s the
person you want!
President Obama’s real
Twitter account
A satirical Twitter
account spotlighting
President Obama

37. To go to the Twitter page for your account, click the blue
button labeled “Next Step…You’re Done!” The page for
your Twitter account will load, and if you’ve “followed”
anyone, the most recent updates from them will appear
in the left
column In the
order they
were sent,
the most
recent
updates
appearing at
the top.
as long as
you are signed
in, you will
be continually
updated!

38. Before you start “tweeting”, you might want to update your
profile so others can find you easily. At the top right of the
screen you will see a number of different links, including the
link for your “Profile”. Click on this link to upload a picture
for your avatar, your location, the address for your website
(if you have one), and a short biography (up to 160 characters).

39. Click on the link labeled “Settings” to make changes to
details in your account, including:
•Your
username
• Your
password
• the
language
in which
you want
to “tweet”
• time zone
• tweet
location
• tweet
privacy

40. On the “Settings” page, you can upload a picture of your
choice for your personal avatar. You should upload a
personal
picture so
that you
can be
easily
identified
when
other
Twitter
users are
looking to
“follow”
you.

41. The “Design” link allows you to choose the background that will appear
behind your Twitter feed. You can choose from the designs that are
supplied, or you can load your own background image, or you can
change the
colors in the
designs.
If you are
feeling
especially
creative, you
can use the
“Themelon”
feature on the
right side of
the page to
choose from
thousands of
designs and
color palettes.

42. Once you are ready to begin “tweeting”, click the “Home” link at the top right
of the page. You will come back to the main screen for your account. At the
top of the screen on the left will be where you type in your updates.
Since Twitter is a
micro-blogging
site, you will
only be allowed
to enter short,
concise updates.
In these updates,
you can say
whatever you
want, as long as
the message
doesn’t exceed
140 characters.
This includes
spaces between
words!

43. After you tweet, it will appear at the top of your
Twitter feed!

44. When tweeting, there will be times when you want to make your followers aware
of different websites or links that you find interesting. You are able to copy and
paste the URL for a website or a website link in your Twitter update box,
as well as a short description of what the link is about.

45. After you post your tweet, the URL link that you included becomes
a hyperlink that others can click on to go that website!

46. There will be times when the URL address for a link you want to update others on is
so long that it cuts into the available number of characters in your Twitter update box.
If you run out of characters, your update will only include up to the 140th character.
In order to shorten the length of a weblink and still send along a usuable URL address,
you can use URL shortening websites such as http://bit.ly or http://tinyurl.com
These sites allow you to copy and paste a website URL into its box and create a
shorter URL that you can copy and paste back into your Twitter update box.

47. URL shortening websites such as http://bit.ly and http://tinyurl.com
convert long URL addresses into shorter URL addresses
That you can copy and paste back into Twitter. This will
Help reduce the number of characters in your “Tweet”!

48. When copied and
pasted into your
tweet, you can click
on the shortened
URL that leads to
the link you want
others to view.
This shortened
URL link is only
temporary. You won’t
be able to type this
URL into an address
bar at any time, or it
won’t work.

49. It is very important
to keep up with the
Twitter usernames
of the people you
want to send updates
to. Every Twitter
Username begins
with an “@” symbol
Followed by the
Twitter username.
For example, when I
want to send a tweet
to Conan O’Brien,
I include the Twitter
address
“@ConanOBrien” in
my message…or else
it won’t be sent to him!

50. Your latest tweet will
appear in two places
on your Twitter page:
•Directly underneath the
“What’s Happening?”
box
•At the top of your
Twitter feed…at least
until tweets from
the people you follow
are posted

51. You can choose to reply
to a tweet that someone
has sent you, or you can
choose to repeat a tweet
to call attention to it.
Navigate to find the tweet
in question, and you will
see that you will have the
option to either “reply”
or “re-tweet” that
message. Replying to
the tweet will allow you
to send a tweet back to
the person who originally
sent the message.
“Re-tweeting” allows you
to repeat the message
and send it to additional
Twitter users.

52. When you reply
to a tweet, the
Twitter address of
the person who
you are replying to
automatically
appears in the
message box.
Then you can
respond to the
message that will
be directly relayed
back to the other
Tweeter!

53. When you
“re-tweet” a
message from
another Twitter
user, it will
re-post that
tweet so that
your followers
can be made
aware of it.
You are also able
to add your own
comment to
a re-tweeted
post.

54. On Twitter, you
will often see
tweets that contain
number signs (#)
followed by one or
more words
highlighted in blue.
These are called
“tags”, and are
used to help you
search for tweets
with a common
theme. Click on
the tag, and you
will see a list of
search results
of tweets
containing those
tags.

55. Along the
right side of
your Twitter
home page
you will see
the top 10
tags that are
“trending”,
or the top
searches on
Twitter at the
moment.
These
searches
often reflect
current events
in society,
politics,
or in pop culture.

56. How Twitter can be used in
different subject areas
LANGUAGE ARTS
• Have students post tweets of their reactions to the
developments in the stories they read
• Have students summarize stories in “tweet” form
• Choose a genre (fairy tale, mystery, adventure);
post the beginning of a story; have students take
turns continuing the story by “tweeting” their
additions
• Have students practice their skills using synonyms
or antonyms; one Tweeter posts a word and
students take turns posting words that are similar or
different in meaning
Source: “How to Use Twitter in the Classroom”,
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/5649046/How-To-Use-Twitter-in-the-Classroom

57. How Twitter can be used in
different subject areas
MATH
• Teachers can “Tweet” short word problems and petition
students to reply with the correct answers—1st correct
tweet wins a prize!
• Students can “tweet” their own original word problems
to the class and see if anyone can solve it
• Teachers prompt students to “tweet” the steps in solving
different types of math problems in concise words
• Students can “follow” professionals in the mathematics
education field and ask questions about their profession,
etc.

58. How Twitter can be used in
different subject areas
SOCIAL STUDIES
• Use Twitter to gather information from their followers
about their location
• Have students search Twitter for tags with terms such
as “poverty”, “disaster”, and “war” to keep up with
tweets of current events
• Have students summarize important events in
“Tweet” form
• Create a new Twitter account dedicated to a particular
social topic and have it keep track of students’ collective
tweets
Source: “How to Use Twitter in the Classroom”,
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/5649046/How-To-Use-Twitter-in-the-Classroom

59. How Twitter can be used in
different subject areas
SCIENCE
• Have students gather information from their followers
about the current temperature from where they are;
analyze information and create a graph with results
• Have students summarize different scientific processes
in “tweet” form
• Have students follow a scientist of interest and have
them write a summary of that person’s professional
activities over the course of a week
• Teachers “tweet” an unbalanced chemical equation;
students reply with their tweets of the balanced
chemical equation
Source: “How to Use Twitter in the Classroom”,
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/5649046/How-To-Use-Twitter-in-the-Classroom

60. How Twitter can be used in
different subject areas
FOREIGN LANGUAGE
• Convert the language that you view the tweets in to
your respective language (Spanish, French, etc.)
and ask students to translate what is being “tweeted”
by others
• Have students tweet sentences in your respective
language and have them reply to the tweets in that
language
PHYSICAL EDUCATION
• Have students tweet their daily progress in an exercise
regimen; for example, # of laps run, # of reps lifted, etc.

63. For more information please address all
correspondence to:
Robert R. Heinrich
Director of Academic Computing
The Richard Stockton College of NJ
609-626-6039
Email: robert.heinrich@stockton.edu