Week 12 Promoting Digital Citizenship

At the end of this course, I noticed that my name is found on search engine. It all started from blogging, tweeting, curating and webcasting….

Search engine, (cc) Kawai Sabarillo 2013, 

Learning from blogging make me understand we should never stop learning and thinking. There so many things that are worth to explore, worth to try and worth to learn. Just like when I look back to the PLE that I created in week 1, there were only a few digital tools that I would use in my learning environment, but now I have at least six items on each category. The growth shows to me that there are many interesting things to reflect upon and utilize for changing my mind.

PLE is power tool and I can see how it fit into the self-direct learning trend.  As a lifelong learner, I need support and a solid plan that can lead me to a learning environment and learning network of my own.  

I have come a long way since the beginning of 1P32. I am inspired by what I learned and what I created in the digital world. My PLE has grown, and it will continue growing.

Final PLE, (cc) Kawai Sabarillo, 2013

My Creative Common License

Steps to Digital Contexts by Kawai Sabarillo is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at www.blogger.com.

Week 11 MORE Synthesizing, Remixing & Creating: Webcasting

Webcasting tool delivers audio and video presentation through internet. A successful webcast creation is informative, engaging, and interactive. Webcasting is beneficial to the both teacher and learner because it

•          works as an instructional technology tools
•          provides Live class.
•          allows learners to go on the same class over and over again as long as the access is available.
•          supports creation, is a fun way to invent audio and visual lectures
•          is good way to share, build and learn
•          accommodates a large amount of learners in the same time.
•         Is an effective way to learn from home, especially for  remote learner. 
  

Tools that I explored in week 11 are Muziboo, Audacity, Jing and Screenr. I found they are all useful tools and can process your creation into a professional and presentable product, however, there are some technical challenges and I can see some potential limitation for such tools if using in a younger learner group.

                                    

                                                                                                                  No author [online image], available at http://www.learningtimes.com

•       Lack of REAL-TIME interaction between students and teachers. Students won’t be able to ask question right away.
•        Hard to evaluate learner’s understanding.
•        Webcast can be easily influence by the internet signal, beside, viewer has no control on the quality of the show.

For my opinion, webcasting is a great learning and teaching source for the higher education, especially for online learners.  As part of the webcast and if you want to be a successful lifelong learner in the digital world, self-discipline is the key.

On the other hand, as a webcast provider and teacher who wants to use webcasting in his/her classroom, we have to make sure we have enough supports, such as a good follow up discussion or some relevant assignment, so students know what they learn from the source.

I think I would enjoy webcasting presentations; however, I would not be one of the providers at the moment. To make a quality video or audio can be expensive and it requires some technical skills and that can be a challenge for me. However, I will keep webcasting tools in mind and hopefully soon I can add it into my PLE.

TED Talk, Daphne Koller, What we're learning from online education.

The format of education is changing, more and more online courses are offer to people and make learning much easier. The # TED Talk, “What we’re learning from online education” from Dr. Daphne Koller, is what I want to share this week. Dr. Koller inspires and encourages people to put education in action and she shows how MOOC can really works with the support of technology nowadays and benefit to those who struggles with life and learning. Great talk.

Podcast - My Voki

I created my first speaking avatar with Voki in Week 11 and that was a fun experience.

To customise your avatar, you have to first sign up for a Voki account. There are many options for you to choose until you can find your ideal face, hair style, mouth, colour, background and more. I wrote a message and picked one of the computer voice so my avatar can speak!

For educational purposes, you can use Voki to create a lesson and post on onto your website, blog post or upload to youtube. I guess this is a cool way to present your lesson rather than just standing in front of your students and talk.

 I also got inspired by Glenda Funk, an English teacher from the United State, as she has some good ways to use Voki and I think they are interesting ideas. In a nutshell, to teach and learn nowadays… you got to be “CREATIVE”!

here are Glenda Funk's ideas to use Voki in the classroom.

1. In multigenre inquiry projects
2. As a way to promote participation in class discussions.
3. As a way for teachers to give instructions or reinforce a concept, particularly for absent students.
4. As a lecture students view in a flipped classroom setting.
5. Etc. I'm sure these ideas only begin to touch on the possibilities.

Glenda Funk, July, 21, 2013, Creating Classroom Conversations Using Voki [Lesson Idea], available at,

http://evolvingenglishteacher.blogspot.ca/2013/07/creating-classroom-conversations-using.html

Week 10 Synthesizing, Remixing, & Creating: Images & Slideshows

In week 10, I explored 3 slideshow tools and they are Animoto, Fotobabble and Photopeach. I like Animoto the most as the website was easy to understand and start up process was fast. There are a few background designs, lots of copy written background music and photos for you to choose from and all I have to do is to upload images.

Compare to Power Point, creating a slide show with Animoto is easier and faster and the most important, the show is more visually satisfying. However, with the limit of 30 seconds for free videos, I found Animoto is suitable for presenting a concept ,as an introduction or to provide a summary in a learning environment. In addition, the limited text capabilities only allow user to give a short description on the side of your images.

Like many other digital tools that I learned in this course, the projects that created with Animoto are easy to be shared online. However, I can also see some potential risk of using Animoto. As I build my reputation of how to be a good digital citizen, I am always on the alert for ‘doing the right thing ‘with the technologies and using images legally on a slideshow tool can be a challenge.

In the past I always know to download music from a shared forum is not legally but to ‘cut and paste’ a picture?? I’m sharing with friends, not for business use, why is it a big deal?  It’s there anyway! 

                                                      International Copyright Act of 1891

The unforeseen and unintended uses of online images seem like some common mistakes that are happening in the digital world and it is difficult to stop such activities completely. But the legal aspect of being a good digital citizen should be our major concern. “The issues of intellectual property rights and copyright protection are very real, and have real consequences for violations” (Ribble,2011, p.31). “Copyright  is the system of leagal rights that protects original creative works, including text, images, videos and artworks, from unauthorised copying, distribution, alteration and other uses” (Sites2See, 2012).

As a student and a technology user, this is my responsibility to obey and follow the rules. To respect the legal rights, I learned how to use an online work properly in week 10.  Website such asMediaSmart.com, The2Learn.ca and blog posted by Creative Common have given me a lot of useful information of how to cited online images, create and protect my own work and to remix online contents.  

This is truly an informative week and I believe my PLE has evolved to the next level. Slideshow tools become an important part of my learning elements when building assignments and doing project with others. Learning what is Digital Law is urgent, especially for our next generation. "The best time to begin establishing a culture of proper use is the first day you introduce your students to technology" (Starr, L. 2003). In Canada, copyright is governed by the Copyright Act(R.S.C., 1985, c. C-42). For instance, fair use of online source protects original and fixed products and also encourages us to learn and to create meaningful work.

sources

http://animoto.com/

http://www.fotobabble.com/

http://photopeach.com/

Starr, L. (2003). Tools for Teaching CyberEthics. Education World. Available at:http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech055.shtml

Sites2See. (2012). Copyright for Students (resource page). Available at http://lrrpublic.cli.det.nsw.edu.au/lrrSecure/Sites/LRRView/8587/

MediaSmarts.com (n.d.). Fair dealing for media education. Available from http://mediasmarts.ca/intellectual-property/fair-dealing-media-education

The 2Learn.ca Educational Society. (2011-2012 ). Your Digital Presence. Available at http://www.2learn.ca/ydp/copyrightabout.aspx
Government of Canada, Justice Laws Website. Copyright Act (R.S.C., 1985,c.C-42). Available at: http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-42/index.html

My Animoto video - Digital Citizenship

It was a rewarding experience of learning Animoto in this week. I created a short slideshow to introduce the Nine Elements of Digital Citizenship and I think it was a success.

Even the video is only 30 second long, the video was presentable. I enjoy the amount of options that Animoto provided and it allows me to make changes many time. Another point of interest when using Animoto was choosing the licensed audio, I didn’t have to worry about the copyright and it actually saved me a lot of time.

Animoto may seems like an individual show case, but it can really function as a collaborative tool in the classroom.

The 30 second (free) slideshow can be used any time during the lesson, for example..

1.       icebreaking activity at the beginning of the class,  

2.      visual aid of a case study and lead to group discussion

3.      summary slideshow

As a learner, I enjoy exploring and using technology as part of my learning, pictures and sound are engaged and help taking in information and this the key to education. 

Week 9 Practicing Digital Responsibility

VoiceThread has demonstrated a new way of communicating as it allows learners to response to threads via text, voice message and video. I had a very positive learning experience in learning VoiceThread and I think it support learning by promoting engagement and motivation. Especially nowadays, technology involved in almost everything in our lives, computer apps are fast and fun, when using VoivceThread, students are not limited in using text, they can speak or even act in front of the screen, and their recording can store in the thread and can be shared whenever others log in to the website.

On the other hand, digital tool such as VoiceThread has also changed the way of teaching. It changed the tradition lecture based classroom into an active learning environment. From the posting of Avery, on Apr7,2011, on the Teacher Challenge. edublogs, “We’re always looking to foster discussion and break down the barriers of the typical classroom walls”, it showed how important it is to  engage students and VoiceThread allows spaces for thinking and students gain different perspectives from each other.

Digital media has given the freedom of access on the internet; however, it creates some potential risks to user’s safety and wellbeing. “we are also one click away from making a public gaffe, mistakenly sharing information not intended for a wider audience, in the form of an email, a wall post, text or chat message.” (Levinson, 2012)

One digital citizenship that I have learned in week 9 is the Digital Literacy. “one of the most important aspects of technology is understanding how that technology works so that it  can be used in the most appropriate manner.” (Ribble, 2011, p.26). VoiceThread is easy to operate and can be a powerful learning tool but it would become a big issue if students use it with a wrong sense such as recording and posting inappropriate comments, images, audios or videos. As a cyber-learner, I wish Digital media will become a positive educational tool and I believe, it is the educator’s work to encourage such professional development, but it is also the user’s responsibility to practise the digital citizenship.  

I develop my PLE at the beginning of this course as a mean to support my individual and professional learning. Online course is a challenge for me; learning does not happen in a “click” on the mouse, but involves communicating with others. Sharing is the one of the main ideas in my PLE and VoiceThread is probably another powerful thing to make my PLE works. This new tool allows me to collaborate, develop and grow with my colleagues and I am looking forward to explore this visual rich technology with everyone again.

Sources

http://teacherchallenge.edublogs.org/2011/04/07/free-tools-challenge-13-voicethreads-multimedia-slideshows-with-videoaudio-comments/

Matt Levinson, 2012, Mau 31, Think before you click: Internet safety tips for parents. http://www.edutopia.org/blog/internet-safety-tips-parents-matt-levinson

Technology Use Scenario #14

Scenario 14

Mr. Hutchinson wants to keep his students’ parents aware of classroom activities. He remembers hearing about blogs at a technology conference. After doing some research, Mr. Hutchinson finds both positive and negative viewpoints related to using blogs in the classroom. He believes that for what he wants to do – inform parents of their child’s daily work – a blog would be appropriate. Before setting one up, however, he consults with the principal and technology support person to see if there are any legal issues. Both say that what he wants to do is perfectly okay. Mr. Hutchinson then sets up a blog and informs his students and parents about where to find the information.

Analysis 

In this case, Mr. Hutchinson expresses how he cares about his students and wants to keep his student’s parents aware of classroom activities. Using blogs is one of the effective ways of communication and I think Mr. Hutchinson demonstration good practice of digital citizenship and the way he use the technology is appropriate.

Digital Communication - Mr. Hutchinson promotes the digital communication very well by using Blogs as a media to communicate with his students’ parent. “Digital communication provides users with instant access to others on an unprecedented level.” (Ribble, 2011). 
“Blogs are great tools to use for communication purpose bothe for students but also for your parents and the global communication” (http://aceconnectors.wikispaces.com)  Blog provides a platform for teaching, parents and students to share ideas. Besides, teacher can inform the parents of any class activities.

Flexibility - parents can check on their child/children’s works in class, anytime, anywhere.

Fairness – Class Blog opens to all invited students and parents, all the activities and notes will be published and updated by Mr. Hutchinson, therefore, all students and parents should be able to view the information at the same time. Such routine will minimize confusion and strengthen school-family partnerships.

Resources

http://aceconnectors.wikispaces.com/Using+Blogs+to+Communicate+with+Parents+and+the+World

Digital Citizenship in Schools, 2nd Edition By Mike Ribble 2011 ISBN 9781564843012 Publisher: International Society for Technology in Education.

VoiceThread

It was an interesting experience of learning about VoiceThread this week. VoiceThread is an interactive multimedia slide show tool, enable users to hold conversations with images, documents and video. I didn’t create a VoiceThread of my own this week, however, I experienced how to add my comments into three of the threads that were assigned in week 9’s learning.

VoiceThread is a user friendly digital tool. I followed the instruction on the weekly guide and opened an account with my email. The topics have been set up by our facilitator and all I need is to response to the discussion. 

My comments are all in text form this time as I think this is the easiest way to express myself clearly on VoiceThread. However, I review my colleagues’ post and I found using voice or video were also an effective way to comment. To record audio in  VoiceThread you will need a microphone (build-in or add-on) and to record video, you will need a microphone and webcam.

One thing I think I really want to do next time is to design my own VoiceThread. I will need to choose a meaningful discussion topic, upload images, document, audio or video, and then invite others to comment. 

Giving and receiving responses I believe is part of the most important components of a learning process. VoiceThread allows learners to response to threads and communicate with others via text, voice message or even video, and these ways of learning can be used to promote student engagement and motivation.

Link to VoiceThread Discusion
https://voicethread.com/?#q.b4264778.i21791857
https://voicethread.com/?#q.b4264778.i21791859

week 8 Wikis & Concept

Times and technologies have changed the way we learn and also changed the tools we use for learning. “A wiki is a strongly collaborative medium that forces people to be collaborative” (Lefever, 2005). After learning and using wiki in week 8, I have to agree with the above statement.

Wiki is a free digital tool and an editable web site for users to develop and share topics with other viewers that interested them.  To master Wiki, all you need is some good ideas and basic computer skills.

By following the weekly session guide in this week, I visited http://teacherchallenge.edublogs.org/2011/05/10/free-tools-23-wikispaces/ and learned how to operate Wiki. I signed up an account and started to develop my own page via Wikispaces.

www.wikispaces.com is one of the first wiki services that educators embraced. There are thousands of Wikispaces that we can find on the internet such as http://digicitizenship.wikispaces.com/ and  http://aded1p32.wikispaces.com/1-HOME-Rights+%26+Responsibilities+Scenario. These wikis site are all to reflect wikis creator’s hard work.

Same as the other digital tools that I explored in this course, I think Wiki is also a well-developed, effective and user friendly tool, it is very similar to the word-processing programs that I usually use on my devices, after you finished writing and saved your work, the page is automatically posted online. In addition, the account creator has control on who to invite to the page and allow other users to view and edit the content anytime as long as the wiki password is shared.

Consider building my own learning or learning together with my colleagues, I think Wiki is a wonderful source for individual and professional growth.

To start a group project or open a classroom blog for example, a group of people will be able to access and edit content to the same wiki page, as a result, ongoing communication and collaborative learning is engaged. It is different from writing a personal blog, because everyone who has the rights to contribute to the same wiki content will also has to be responsible for the entire page, all members are learning and reflecting to each other and that will make Wikispaces become a great learning platform.

When I was enjoying the freedom to creating my wiki page, I noticed it is all about participating, communicating and giving out ideas through the internet. However, in the digital world, everything happens in front of a vast and often anonymous audience, I never know how other treats or feels about my work. As Clark (2012) mentioned in his article, “the impact of Wikipedia on learning is incalculable. Too often attention is drawn to the idea that it creates a ‘cut and paste’ culture of plagiarism”.  On the other hand, I don’t have full control of what would happen on the internet doesn’t mean I can get away with unethical or unacceptable behavior.

Right and wrong extend to our online life. Impart the value of becoming a good digital citizen is essential as technology can be misused but it also has the potential for being a powerful tool when handled responsibly.

      Digital Rights & Responsibilities

            Kawai Sabarillo cc. 2013

Week 8 references

Lefever, L. (2005). Wikis in Plain English. If you cannot view the video below, go to http://www.commoncraft.com/video/wikis

http://aded1p32.wikispaces.com/2-RESOURCES

http://teacherchallenge.edublogs.org/2011/05/10/free-tools-23-wikispaces/

Clark, D. (2012). Wikis - wickedly clever, underused learning tool. Available at: http://donaldclarkplanb.blogspot.ca/2012/12/wikis-wickedly-clever-underused.html

Week 7 Practicing Digital Literacy

I used Todaysmeet to creat an online meeting room in order to “meet” with and “talk” to my learning partner this week. 

I found TodaysMeet is a very easy tool to use. A private Chat Room is set up for the group by typing in a chat room name, a link will be created and all the group members can join the conversation with the link given. Linda and I were able to communicate in real time and also leave messages to each other whenever we want to. We had a nice chat and this is how we started to develop our course project. 

TodaysMeet is very similar to the Chat Room that in our Brock Isaak home page, however, I think it is always nice to have another option because I can use TodaysMeet  to "meet"people from work, create a "family room" and "chat" with friends that are outside the school, or even anyone around the world.

My other rewarding learning experience this week is to explore Google Docs, the free web-based word processor and spreadsheet.

Google drive screen shot, (cc) kawai Sabarillo, 2013

Google Docs allows user create and share online, it is a great collaborative tools.

Google Docs is not a new tools to me, although I knew I needed to learn much more so I can apply it to my class project. The activities and discussion that are related to Google Docs this week has brought me to a new learning level. My knowledge of technology and education development has increased more than I could have expected.

I especially like the offline edit function I explore on Google Docs, Google have launched offline mode for Google Docs for about two years, it benefits users who are always on the go and without a connection. As you enable the offline function, you can still view and edit the shared documents, save change and update when you reconnect.

I will be out of internet connection for 3 days, and the offline edit is going to make a different for me because I can still view and edit the file on Google Docs that I share with my learning partner.

If I have to update my PLE this week, both TodaysMeet and Google Docs will be add to the Processing category. TodaysMeet helps put all group members together which is a great discussion tool, on the other hand, Google Docs is an effective platform for people to processor the same file, make everything up-to-date, as long as you are part of the group, you’ll never miss a thing and I can learn from my group anytime, anywhere.

These collaborative tools reinvented my learning style and I would say the benefits are exponential. 

Week 6 Collaborative Notes & Documents - Working in the Cloud

Evernot,[online image]. available at www.eachweb2.wikispaces.com

My biggest challenge in this week learning is to connect group member to get the assigned project going. I researched all kinds of material included articles, scholar journals, website sources, video and images that related to the topic “Digital Health and Wellness”.

The whole idea I found for week 6 is to collect all my research materials into one easy accessible file and be able to share with others; this is where “Evernote” comes as a great help.

Evernote allows people to view, store, and write note whenever they need to, we can also create a “Shared Notebook” to let others view everything we added into the Evernote account.

At this point, Evernote helped me manage my learning materials effectively. I can even tag, seat up shortcuts and notification to make organizing sources much more easier.

I think Technology promotes and enhance lifelong learning. The other thing that I like about using E-tools is the mobile app. Most of the tools that I learned from this course has mobile app.

These apps allow me to easily capture, document and share my files from any device including my cell phone and my tablet. With technology becoming an integrated part of learning, it is convenience that I have a tool that I can carry around. However, I am 100% agree with Hilary that “there will always be new digital technologies and tools for digital citizens to learn. I can conclude that learning to become a digital citizen is a process with not specific starting point and definitely no finish line.” (quote from Hilary Pollock’s week 6 blog post. http://hilarypollockaded1p32.blogpost.ca )

In addition, I thought about how this week’s learning enhances my PLE and I would probably add Evernote under “Gather Information”, emphasis on how it helped me organizing all my learning sources. However, one thing I haven’t been able to do is to connect Evernote to my other tools, such as Twitter. I think that will be fun and the tool will make it much faster to share my up to date learning status with my learning group.

Week 6 PLE update

Using Evernote is the first step for me to collaborate with my learning partners. We use Evernote as a platform to share our research findings and ideas. We communicate with each other and the tool we use helped keeping up the societal trends. I would assume my digital literacy has grown this weekcause I was able to use technology to achieve some of my learning goals including organize information on the internet, communicate with others through email and twitter and most importantly, I am now comfortable and more confindent of using these E-tools as a support to my learning. 

week 5 Microblogging and Building PLN

Twitter [online image], available at www.about.twitter.com

 Twitter at first was only a social network for me and I didn’t know it could be a great tool for supporting micro-blogging. In this week, I set up my Twitter and created a ‘1p32 list’, I connected with most of my classmate and the immediacy of the messages helped me feel like more of a group. Professor light in his video “most effective classes” pointed out that learners benefit from the diversity of students in a class by sharing their assignments and insights. I think tools like Twitter should be encourage among learners, especially for online courses, it allows learners to communicate, share ideas and learn together, it changes the dynamics of the virtual classroom.

Another great feature that I think I will keep using is to share valuable internet contents via my twitter account (most of the curation tools that I learned recently also support Tweeting). Twitter is a pretty good search engine, it helps me look for sources that fit in my search, I follow them, then new information will come directly to me and then I tweet them. What I like about it is that, my followers will see the contents right away and we can always expand our discussion accordingly. Collaborative learning is powerful and Twitter is engaging learners to step out of the box and learn together.

Kawai's Twitter page, 2013

Although Twitter helps building my PLN, it also involves in my PLE. I could add Twitter under ‘gather information’ and ‘application’ in my PLE and I am sure I would make good use of it.

no author [online image]

My PLN is growing and I started to realize the ongoing changes in technology is affecting everyone who gets in touch with the cyber world every day, and that means we, as an internet user, need to know how to model a successful digital citizenship and promote responsible behaviours in the digital contexts. For example, we should respects the freedom of the speech but we have to also aware of the language, images and symbols that we use when posting, blogging, tweeting … etc. “A good digital citizen seeks out feedback from other to evaluate their use of technology, and then makes personal adjustments based on this feedback.” (Ribble, 2011), I must remind myself about contributing and promoting the values of digital citizenship when using the internet.

PLE week 5 update

week 4 Curating the Web

Bookmarking is not a new concept to me, but the idea of “Curation” has bought me to a ah-ha moment in week 4.

 “Content curation is the process of sorting through the vast amounts of content on the web and presenting it in a meaningful and organized way around a specific theme.” (Bharati Ahuja, October 31, 2012, “If you can’t be a creator, then be a curator)

I explored a few digital curation tools this week and I found Diigo is a great social bookmarking tool for search and share references like articles, journals, news and blog posts. It allows me to bookmark and highlight important sources and organize in my account. 

Personal Profile Screen Shot,
(cc) Kawai Sabarillo, 2013

The other curation tool I like is scoop.it. it works effectively by just punching in a few key words in the search box, the site will automatically suggest sources that relate to the topic that I’m interested, all I need to do is “scoop it” and the sources will be framed and on my dashboard.

Scoop.it Screen Shot, (cc) Kawai Sabarillo, 2013

There are many many great digital curation tools available on line, and what I learned in this week is why these tools are important?

We can basically bookmark anything on any web page of our choice, however, the meaning behind bookmarking I think is to share the best of our content. We have equal opportunity to be involved in a digital world but as a good digital citizen, it is also our responsibility to handle the internet assess appropriately.

Fiorelli in his blog post “Content Curation: definition and generation”) states that, “the future of the social web will be driven by these Content Curators, who take it upon themselves to collect and share the best content online for others to consume and take on the role of citizen editors, publishing highly valuable compilations of content created by others” and to be efficiently curate the web, Fiorelli suggests curator to find the best content, add value and credit it.

The internet is like an open sea, and the digital information seems endless. I started to realize that a good search result is somewhat depends on how we curate. The internet and digital tools support learning by bring resources to others attention. It is critical that we know what and where information should be curated. The curator should always review the resources and make sure it matches the topics and purpose of the curation.

If you have time, please visit my link attached below and leave me some comments.
Thanks !!

Souces
Ahuja, B. (2012, October). If you can't be a creator, then be a curator. Retrieved from http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2221068/If-You-Cant-Be-a-Creator-Then-Be-a-Curator

Diigo -- https://www.diigo.com/user/kawai1p32

Scoop.it – www.scoop.it/u/kawai-1p32

Week 3 Putting the internet to work for you

I think the major task in this week is to develop my reading habit. I believe critical reading is important to our academic success, however, the engagement and interaction with the unlimited reading material are the keys. After learning how to use RSS and attach Permalink effectively, I came up with some ideas of how to retain my reading habit.

Limit my search – we all understand how much time and energy, as a result, reading will demand from us. To start off my feedly.com account, I followed 1P32 session guide and set up less than 15 reading categories. The amount of reading was acceptable and definitely helped preparing my independent reading reputation.

Organization – after I make sure the link that I want to add to my feedly.com, I put it under a related category immediately. I think this is an important and a simple step as it helps to store and file material that I need, it is easier to scope and aim and also I know where to pull out what I want whenever I want to.

Preview – new articles and information will automatically come to my feedly.com account when there is update, however, information overload can be discouraged. So I read around the webpage or the title of the article before I really start reading the whole thing. By doing so, I know what to expect and I can grasp a few ideas from the material before reading.

Read through my own eyes – I think “reading” should be a new item that added to be part of my PLE. In addition, I think I should be reading with my own point of view and ask questions constantly. How does the essay contribute to my study? How has my thinking been changed by this reading? Are the reasons that given by the author making any sense? Points are convincing or they are breaking down? Asking questions help to identify my concerns and know importance of the text and I am sure the attitude can keep me reading.

What interested me – keeping tract with topics that interested me retain my reading habit. I can’t read everything but I can choose what I like to read. “education”, “life style”. “Health and Wellness” “Information”….are categories that in my feedly.com at the moment and I enjoy reading things that are related to these topic.

Set Reading Goal – be honest and set a realistic goal that I can follow is essential. As an independent reader, I know what is best for me, right now I read 2-4 materials daily and I think this is comfortable to me.

Ok fellows..…. Am going back to feedly.com, keep reading !!! 

My Experience with RSS Feeds

Even though RSS is over a decade old, this is really the first time I set up one for myself.

RSS, “Real Simple Syndication”, is a powerful tool for conducting research and collecting web materials such as news, blog posts, articles and more.

RSS allows me to quickly access updated content from the website that I am interested. However, the materials pile up and were over 200 feeds in a few days and that became not too readable to me.

 My feeds are about different things so I group them under specific folders and that made a lot easier for me to recognize the texts. Feeds can be marked as “read” and that removes the context from the right pane and moves the next one up. I was annoyed by this because I lost a few articles (should have saved them!!!).

I am still exploring at this point and I realized the most important thing is to learn how to organize the links that I am following. Besides, RSS is a great tool and I appreciate those developers who keep publishing quality material for us.

Thanks for feeding.

Week 2 Personal Learning Environment

The biggest project in week 2 for me is to figure out my “PLE”.

From “A bridge in the cloud” presentation, I understood PLE is a system that helps learners take control of and manage their own learning. This includes providing support for learners to

•         Set their own learning goals
•        Manage their learning
•        Communicate with others

On the other hand, Personal Learning Network (PLN) is a network of people you connect with for the specific purpose of learning”  (Tobin,1998, as cited in Lalonde, C. 2012).

Both PLE and PLN have given a very clear direction to my own learning goal. I started to ask myself, ‘where was I?’ and ‘where did I go?’

I have always been a planner, however, in week 2, I developed a personal learning environment and that gave me a better picture of how and where I can improve learning.

My PLE starts with a learning goal. I believe education will be meaningless if we don’t know what we want to achieve and where am I now? Here are my goals for this course:

·         To research and learn different kind of tools that would help me using the digital resources effectively.

·         To build my online reading habit.

·         To share and expand my own knowledge with my friends, instructor and colleagues using various web tools.

I understand that I need supports to achieve the goals that I set up and so the next step is to gather information. Communication, references and internet resources are where I can get plenty information.

After I gather what I need, is the learning process. Take notes, brainstorming, discuss … are all common method for me to digest what I want to learn, however , I am sure there will be more to add in this part of PLE through my learning journey. Looking forward….

I believe if I can handle these digital tools, web resources, reference, and communication platform well enough, I will be able to apply and reflect on my work and also to share with other. And the most important is keep reflecting and hopefully that will being my PLE to the next level.

Achieve a learning goal is not the end point of my PLE (actually, there is no destination when it comes to learning) Growing a PLE is to make CHANGES, from DON’T KNOE to KNOW HOW, and I can imagine how much support and resources I would need to set a learning goal, achieve it and generate a new one, seems like there’s no end…By the way, this is not PLE, for me it is PLC…. Personal Learning Cycle.

Week 1 Reflection - Making connection in a Digital World

Even we have been using the internet for a long long time, learning how to be responsible with our online activities can be complicated. In week 1, we discussed the importance of building and maintaining positive footprint, examined the rules or expectations for behavior in a digital environment and discovered purpose of blogging.

My Digital Footprint

My digital footprint is everything on the internet that is about me. Talk about how I feel today, comment on facebook about friend’s status, post my meal from last night, or online shopping using my credit card…..

 I am constantly link to the internet, however, I’ve never thought of what would such connection impact my life, or why it is so important for educator and student to use the web appropriately.

With all of the attention on privacy in the media nowadays, it’s not just our own online actions that we need to worry about but others (even someone you don’t know) comments sould contributes to our digital footprint. So…who would actually want to leave their footprints all over the web? Digital footprint is a trail of information, and what is mine look like? What information about me can be found and where is it found?

By doing the activity ‘Seek you Digital Footprint Scavenger Hunt’, I have some of my questions answered. I ran a Google search using “Kawai Sabarillo” and got 311 search results. Well… not much about me and I think this showed I did a great job in removing tags and my privacy settings. But on the other side, the internet is a great platform to reach the world so why not take advantage?? As Ainslie (2009) mentioned, we should have a digital footprint and keep track of it.  I believe there are many ways to shape our online presence safely and effectively, “take the bull by the horns”, and I am looking forward to learn more of how to own and control my Digital Footprint in this course.

Behavior in a Digital World 

Have you ever at one time been guilty of sharing too much information on facebook? Have you ever posted a comment that later makes you cringe?? Reflecting on my behavior in a digital world is the most interesting learning process in week1.

Most of us have an active profile on at least one social networking site, we can message, chat or email to anyone, anywhere with a digital device. And what interesting is, we can also show others our emotions and behaviors even they can’t see you face.

We can always tape in nice words when communicate with others on the web, but to complicate matters further, good netiquette is not only using nice manner but also about right actions. Hacking others computer, downloading illegally, plagiarism and using bad language on the internet are serious issues that we should be aware of and the digital etiquette is a basic set of rules that everybody should follow in order to make internet better for the world.

Blogging

Many internet tools and website have facilitated the exchange of information and expanded access to our learning environment, “Blogging” is one of them.

Blogging is …

·       *   a website that managed by an individual

·         * with regular contents like post, pictures, graphics or video

·         * to share ideas, reflections, comments, discoveries and more

I believe blogging enhances great learning opportunity, with constantly writing, reading, reflecting, researching and most importantly, connecting to others and the world; we build a collaboration space of learning.

To sum up learning in week 1, “Make Positive Connection” to the digital world is what we have to prepare before we start any online activities. We understand that internet is vast and seemingly anonymous, and we should learn how to be a responsible, careful and considerable user. “Both students and teachers need to find a common ground. They all need to become members of digital citizentry” (Ribble, 2012, p.2)

References

1. Ainslie  , D. J. (2009). Yes, you should have a digital footprint. . . and keep track of it
2. Digital Citizenship in Schools, 2nd Edition By Mike Ribble 2011 ISBN 9781564843012 Publisher: International Society for Technology in Education