Blog #5: Wikis

Introduction

"Hey, Mrs. Vanness, watch this." Two years ago, an elementary school student popped open a page on wikipedia and typed 'Kyle smells bad' at the end of a paragraph and saved his edit.

"Kyle smells just fine, and I don't think that's what you're supposed to be doing in computer time today," I said.

"I know, but don't worry. It will be gone in a sec. Look." He hit the refresh button and sure enough, his vandalism was gone.    

Reflections on the process of learning about wikis

Before this week, my knowledge of wikis was limited to the above experience and a fondness for wikipedia. The above experience made me wary of information on wikis, and wikipedia made me love easy access to information on a wide variety of topics. I had only ever thought about using wikis in the classroom as a launching pad or starting point for research, not as something students could create or manage. Further, I had never thought about editing other people's wikis or making a wiki myself.

Walking through this week's trailfire, I was thankful that our class had dealt with information overload in previous class discussions. I am boggled by Joyce Valenza in general and the vast amount of work she is able to do in a day, but this particular trailfire made me rest my forehead on the desk for a minute. The teacherlibrarianwiki, created by Valenza, was a gold mine of quality information for Teacher Librarians, one that would take me weeks to wade through. I kept getting sidetracked by the content, clicking on interesting links within the wiki, and would have to reign my attention in and re-examine the wiki as a tool. This also happened on webtools4u2use and their very enticing home page.

I decided the best way to learn was to jump right in and create my own wiki. From the "Wikis and Libraries" resource page on Darlene Fichter's wiki, I stumbled onto WikiMatrix. I read the chapters on wikis in our textbooks, but neither Richardson nor Davies & Merchant firmly helped me choose between wikispaces, pbwiki, and all the other free wiki hosting services available. Also, after the frustration last week of trying to create and post a podcast and having the textbook authors claim the process was easy, I wasn't too trusting of their evaluations. "Creating your wiki is as easy as filling in the form on the page linked above, a process which takes maybe 45 seconds if you're a fast typist" (Richardson, p.67). Hmmmmmmm. WikiMatrix steered me out of my dilemma with the Wiki Choice Wizard. After completing the questionnaire, I was faced with 25 potential matches to my wiki needs. I decided to go with wikispaces as it somehow looked simpler than pbwiki and both had been referred to in the texts.

Discussion of wikis for my own personal learning

With only a week in turnaround time, from first learning about wikis to creating and writing about one, I needed a wiki that would engage a variety of contributors, not be onerous for anyone to add to, and hook people into writing. The wiki also needed to be free, easy for a newbie like me to set up, observe, and control, and quick, quick, quick. 

To launch myself headfirst into the world of wikis, I wanted a topic that my friends, family, and classmates would be able to quickly sink their teeth into and have something to contribute. Coincidentally, it was also my birthday this week and the annual event of my birthday reading list. For the past couple of years, I have been asking friends and family to send me their favourite reads from the past year. I would send around an email asking for recommendations, compile a list of all their suggestions, and then send the completed list back out to anyone who responded. Although this system worked, it was more work for me than anyone else - and it was my birthday!

I signed up for my wiki - and it really was easy - and created the following message on the home page.

It's my birthday!

This wiki is for people to recommend good books for me to read. They can be old books or new books, fiction or non, kids or adults, I'm not fussy - I just like good books.

Every year on my birthday, instead of gifts, I ask my friends and family to suggest a couple good books to read. Everyone emails me with their suggestions, then I compile a list and send it back out to anyone who responded. This way, I get a list of great books to read, and so does everyone else.

This year, I'd like to try something different. This page is a wiki. You can add to it, edit it, fancy it up, whatever. It's a public space, kind of like a graffiti wall. You can get started by clicking that pencil on the top right hand side that says EDIT. When you're done making changes, hit the Save button on the bottom right.

You can visit again and again, checking out new suggestions and seeing how the page evolves. I am leaving the space completely public, so even if you're not someone I know you can leave your recommendations.

Thanks!
Lisa

Good Books

I then sent around the following email to 31 classmates, close friends, and family members on Thursday night. These would be the people most likely to respond to my request, and the number of invitations was comparable to the size of a classroom. You will notice that the content of the email and the home page are very similar. I did this on purpose to provide a small level of scaffolding to those who had no experience with wikis.

It's my birthday!


Every year on my birthday, instead of gifts, I ask my friends and family to suggest a couple good books to read. Everyone emails me with their suggestions, then I compile a list and send it back out to anyone who responded. I get a list of great books to read, and so does everyone else.


This year, I'd like to try something different. I'm sending you this link to my "wiki." If you don't know what a wiki is, don't stress. You can VERY easily add to it, edit it, fancy it up, whatever. It's a public space, kind of like a graffiti wall. You click on the pencil that says EDIT, and make your suggestions. When you're done making changes, hit the Save button. That's it.


You can visit again and again, checking out new suggestions and seeing how the reading list evolves.


Thanks!
Lisa

p.s. - this is also a school assignment, as if you needed any more motivation to share with the world your good taste. And yes, it really is my birthday.


The settings on the account were left completely open so that anyone would be able to make changes to the page. I had my husband test out the page completely independently, without any prompting, to see what he would make of the process and where I needed to provide more direction. Some minor tinkering, and I was ready for the book suggestions to roll in. At the time of this writing on Sunday, the wiki has been edited by 10 people, all invitees, a total of 14 times, only 3 of which were myself. The melding of my birthday book list and a wiki was the ideal solution, so much so that I hope to repeat it next year. In October of 2010, I plan to delete all the entries from the recommended reading list and start over.

What I've learned from watching my wiki grow is that watching a wiki grow is terribly exciting. I check my wiki every day to see not only what books have been recommended, but also how people are using the page. I have noticed five things:
     1.) all contributors except my partner included their name or ID in their book suggestions
     2.) all contributors except my partner created a login
     3.) contributors did not follow the format of the first responder
     4.) there has been no vandalism or creation of new pages
     5.) one contributor linked their text to another page

From these observations, I conclude that editing wikis is a new skill for most of my contributors. As Davies & Merchant point out, "not being able to establish a specific author goes against the academic tradition of clear citation and the educational emphasis on individual contribution" (Davies & Merchant, p.93). All of the contributors have some form of post-secondary education, and some also probably want credit for giving me a gift ; )

Of the 31 people I sent an invitation to, the ten who have responded thus far are demonstrating what I will call a "Log-In Mentality." The concept of being able to edit and change a web page in the form of a wiki, a web 2.0 platform, without having to log in with a user name and password does not seem to occur to them. My instructions very clearly indicate that all one has to do is click "that pencil on the top right hand side that says EDIT. When you're done making changes, hit the Save button on the bottom right." How many other opportunities to edit and contribute on the web have been overlooked because users were not aware of the possibilities? How many times have I myself just accepted the text in front of me as static? I decided to test out my own Log-In Mentality by visiting some other wikis. Holy smokes! Who knew?!?!?

In the last year and a half of working on my Masters, I've probably wandered across a hundred wikis. Not once did it occur to me that I could contribute or correct grammar without logging in. I was shocked that even wikipedia allows you to make changes without logging in. (However, creating a wikipedia account and logging in will block your IP address from the public history.) This simple realization has shifted me from being a passive reader to an active, more analytic one. Using wikis in the classroom would have similar effects on students, changing their reading style from passive sponge to mini-excavator.


ike4014, "CIMG1103" March 26, 2009 via Flickr, Creative Commons License

Discussion of wikis in terms of teaching and learning

As an educator I am used to 'controlling the weather' in the classroom. So it was with hesitation that I left the settings on my wiki completely open. What if someone came along and messed it up? Well, then I would just go through the history and revert to a previous page.

If this were a wiki created for a classroom, the settings would be quite different. The students would have to log in to make changes, providing me with a record in the "History" tab of who has been contributing, and to what extent. To make the landing or home page consistent, I would probably restrict that particular page to only being edited by the teacher. However, I would attempt to leave as many settings open to the students as possible to see how creatively they use the online tool. Non-members, or those not in the class, would not be allowed to post directly to our wiki so that the students could assume full ownership of the content, "supporting their own learning" (Davies & Merchant, p. 99).

With the threat of H1N1 in the media and many students already ill and staying home, school districts are exploring alternative options for the delivery of education and communicating information. And, considering the immediacy of the situation, these solutions need to be quick. Enter the wiki. Steve Hargadon created a wiki in a matter of hours for educators to share information and collaborate. Now the site contains "readiness assessment questionnaires; federal and state government planning documents; actual school plans; a page for news updates; and lists of links to other resource sites, articles, discussion forums, and videos" (Hargadon, 2009). While exploring the site, I was surprised that all the pages were open, allowing me to make changes without becoming a member. I think this open setting was intentionally inclusive to encourage all educators, even those not yet comfortable with technology, to participate and share their knowledge and strategies.

While I can brainstorm a wide variety of day-to-day uses of wikis in classrooms and for professional development, Hannah Hudson has suggested five great ways to use wikis in grades 6 through 8 (Hudson, 2009). Of "Create Your Own Math Book," "Rewrite a Classic Tale," "Go Back in Time," "Learn Spanish," and "For That Science Center," I like the concept of "Go Back in Time" as it best allows students to collaborate and make links between each others work. Students are individually responsible for their own historical figure, but can share their research and gain a deeper understanding of history by pondering how their figure and/or events are connected.

Wikis can also be used as a pre-reading tool for educators. Physical Education teachers often struggle to maximize their physical activity time. When students are lagging in the change room at the start of class, learning the ins and outs of a new game or skills, and getting organized into teams, a large chunk of class time can slip by without the students being physically active. Derrick Mears suggests that "using these technology tools more, face-to-face instructional time can be devoted to psychomotor objectives" (Mears, 2009). I found this practical use of wikis very interesting because technology is usually fingered as one of the culprits in increasingly sedentary lifestyles, not the solution.

Besides being quick and easy to create and use, wikis have many more positive attributes in classroom applications. "Technology tools (such as Blogs and Wikis) can empower students by giving them a chance to express their views. It can also help students with reading, writing, reflective, and collaborative learning skills (Leight, 2008) which benefits students by providing them positive psychological consequences, and helps organizations leverage a flexible environment that encourages collaboration and also keeps up with technology innovation (Evans & Wolf, 2005)" (Hazari, 2009).

Summary

Creating a wiki has shifted me from being a Wiki User 1.0 to a Wiki User 2.0, or from passive to active. I am much more likely to participate in wiki sites, add content, correct grammar, and read reflectively now that I know how easy wikis are to use and change. This shift can also be experienced by students - and to their great benefit.



Works Cited

Evans, P., Wolf B.. (2005, July). Collaboration Rules. Harvard Business Review, 83(7,8), 96-104. Retrieved October 24, 2009 from ABI/INFORM Global. (Document ID: 863427171).

Hargadon, Steve. (2009, October). Web Site in a Rush. School Library Journal, 55(10), 16. Retrieved October 23, 2009 from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1876033921).

Hazari, S., North, A., & Moreland, D.. (2009). Investigating Pedagogical Value of Wiki Technology. Journal of Information Systems Education, 20(2), 187-198. Retrieved October 24, 2009 from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1755224781).

Hudson, H.. (2009, September). How to Teach With Wikis. Instructor (1999), 119(2), 66-67. Retrieved October 24, 2009 from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1873816451).

Leight, J.. (2008). Lifting the Fog on Instructional Blogs. Journal of Physical Education, Recreation & Dance, 79(2), 52-55. Retrieved October 24, 2009 from ProQuest Nursing & Allied Health Source. (Document ID: 1431316341).

Mears, D.. (2009). Podcasts and Wikis: Delivering Content Information to Students Using Technology. Strategies, 23(1), 29-34. Retrieved October 23 from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1862970981).

Blog #4: Podcasting

Introduction

In our house, my husband does it all. I'm not talking about the dishes and the vacuuming, I'm talking about all the downloading. He has completely enabled me be co-dependent on him for all my podcasting needs. If I have a request, he makes it happen. Until now I've never had to worry my pretty little head about how to subscribe to podcasts and sync them up to my iPod. It all just magically happened - and it's all about to change. Thanks a lot, school!

Reflections on the process of learning about podcasting

To start, I had my husband walk me through subscribing to a podcast and syncing with my iPod. Since it was in this week's Trailfire, I started with www.justonemorebook.com. Next, without prompting, I subscribed to CBC's Spark because I find the show interesting, but am always busy working or running around town when it's on. This learning process was relatively simple, and something I probably would have learned to do years ago if not for having such a stellar partner.

Where my challenge in learning happened this week was in the creation, hosting, and incorporation of a podcast in this blog. Although I had read about podcasting, hosted a radio show in university, and assembled all the required recording equipment, I was not prepared for the affective roller coaster of learning that was about to transpire.

My first step was to determine what I wanted to create a podcast about, and what kind of content would be in it. Music? Spoken words? Interviews? Educational? Or purely for fun? I kicked around a few ideas, such as a discussion about the proposed skateboard park in town mixed together with songs about skateboarding and interviews with city councillors, or something simple like a happy birthday message for my friend Jean, or reading aloud one of my previous blogs: boring! I wanted to force myself to use some of the podcast editing tools, and not just record a steady stream of narrative. I also decided that if I were creating a podcast for a classroom - modeling the process for students - or having students create their own podcasts, I would avoid the use of licensed music. Towards the end of the week when I still hadn't settled on what kind of podcast to make and was starting to panic, I decided to approach the process differently. What kind of podcast might I encourage students to make?

I might have them read aloud some of their writing, or the work of a studied author as Monica Edinger did with her students on her teaching blog. Or, I might have students "record weekly recitals or special events" (Richardson, 115). And I would probably encourage them to do their best and not worry about making everything perfect. With these three thoughts swirling around, I stumbled on the idea of making a "Disney Read-Along," a recording of myself reading a storybook aloud. This decision took the pressure off of what I was going to say and how I was going say it, and spurred me into action.

The closest storybook at hand was "Where the Wild Things Are" by Maurice Sendak. My husband and I went to see the movie on the weekend, and he had never read the book. Can you believe it? I couldn't, and marched straight to the library to pick up a copy and read it to him before we went to the film. The length of the story was perfect: long enough to demand some editing, and short enough to still seem fun.

Richardson's book, and the article by Dan Schmit, pointed me in the direction of Audacity, which I easily downloaded onto my computer. Ready to roll! Wasn't I? Uh-oh. I had no idea how to use Audacity, and Richardson, Schmit, even Eash, were of little help: "Record the podcast. Use software that generates an MP3 audio file. Following instructions that came with the software, add and mix test, music, and sound elements" (Eash, 19). Instructions? Add? Mix? Whaaaa? I was in Audacity but boggled on how to get started as the program looked totally beyond me.

After some deep breaths, I calmed myself down enough to make some practise recordings by hitting the Record button, then pressing Pause or Stop, then Undo. At this point, I was also trying out two different microphones: the one built into my laptop and one on a headset. Playing back my short snippets of recording, I couldn't tell which microphone was working, or if I had even plugged in the headset correctly. Also, any sounds created near the laptop mic were ridiculously loud, such as clicking the mouse, while my voice was too soft. I recorded and deleted some rather unprofessional, colourful language while playing with the sound input settings on my computer control panel until I had sorted things out.

After this point, my brain started to make connections between Audacity and Cool Edit, the program I had used in university to make pre-recorded radio shows for CFUV. I played around until I was comfortable enough to read the storybook in one take, knowing I could edit out any major boo-boos later on. Because I was attempting a Read-Along, I was trying to juggle page-turning and ringing a bell. This led to some pauses in the story, but I figured these pauses would let readers/listeners appreciate the illustrations.

Just for kicks, I decided to record myself playing the piano too to see how it would sound. Surprise! When I went to play back my piano recording, it played at the same time as my book reading. All the pieces fell together and I was able to record multi-track ambient music to accompany my Read-Along. If I had know this at the beginning of the recording process, I wouldn't have been juggling reading, page turning and bell ringing all at the same time, I would have recorded one perfect bell ringing and edited the sound in at the right moments afterwards. Now I know better for next time. Hurray, learning!

The production quality on my podcast is far from perfect. My husband had music playing in another room and the mic picked up some of his music as well. I was able to edit out some of this interference by cutting out the most obvious bits and pasting in some "silence." However, I figured this interference was probably similar to recording situations in schools where there are usually other people in the room, doors opening and closing, and bells ringing. If I would tell my students not to get hung up on making the perfect recording, then I shouldn't knock myself out either.

With the podcast complete and exported to my desktop as an mp3 file, I was ready to find a server to host my creation so that I could place it in this blog. Richardson recommended Ourmedia.org but the site wouldn't open for me and I had no idea on where to find an online hosting service. Luckily, I found this video which recommended four different hosting services.






I went with www.box.net as the hosting service is free for small users such as myself and uploaded my file. This created a URL for my podcast, which I have linked to the title of this blog. I also created an "enclosure link" for the blog, but am not sure how this will show up when I publish this post as when I go to "Preview" I cannot see the mp3 anywhere. Hopefully, this will all work the first time, but as a safety measure, here is the address for my podcast: www.box.net/shared/qakgl00dg4  


Discussion of podcasting for my own personal learning

I like how listening to podcasts means I don't have to organize my life around when favourite programs are live on air. Further, I am able to subscribe to programming that happens around the world, night and day, in incompatible time zones. I can load shows onto my iPod and listen on my walk to work or at other self-convenient times. Podcasts also connect me with the larger world in shorter sound bites than streaming radio. Regular radio variety is limited in our rural area, and podcasts let me be selective and portable with my loyalties. Even better, the majority of podcasts are free and don't subject me to incessant advertising.

As a listener, I have found that podcasts consisting of mostly spoken word require a greater amount of attention than shows blending music and discussion. Because I am only listening to podcasts that I am actually interested in, and not just passively listening to the radio in the car, I have a vested interest in catching all the material; my attention has to stay tuned in to what I'm hearing and can't wander off when an ad or song comes on as there may not be any ads or songs. Usually I'm great at multi-tasking, but the active listening required of spoken word podcasts forces me to engage in a heightened state of Listening.

Personally, I prefer podcasts made by average, random people with similar eclectic musical tastes as myself. The problem with these podcasts is that most are considered illegal because the makers are using the music without paying royalties to the artists or the artists' companies. "Copyright laws are supposed to protect property and income and are particularly important in making sure that those who create ideas, designs or works of art are remunerated for their efforts" (Davies & Merchant, p.71). The home-based basement podcaster is not creating podcasts to make a profit, they are creating out of their own response to the music. I'm not sure I see too much of a copyright difference between making a podcast to share with the world, and opening up all the windows in my house and sharing my musical tastes with passers-by outside by turning up the stereo. Cranky neighbours aside, both approaches act as free marketing for the artists, thereby increasing their likelihood of receiving financial support for their work.

However, as a professional educator, I feel that I should respect copyright law in the creation of my own podcasts. That is why I specifically chose to create a podcast using only my own sound recordings. Initially, I had intended to explore Creative Commons licensing and incorporate some music the way that CBC's Spark program does, but I had too many irons in the fire this week and knew that surfing for music would be a black hole for time.      

Discussion of podcasting in terms of teaching and learning

Now that I am more familiar with the ins and outs of creating and sharing podcasts, some potential uses for teaching and learning I have brainstormed include:

      Professional Development   Busy teachers with a lack of time and/or resources can stay in touch with new materials, best practices, and learning strategies by subscribing to educational podcasts. Teachers can listen at their convenience, from any location they chose.

      Listening Centre   Whether in an primary classroom during structured "free time" activities, or in a school library, students can listen to podcasts they, their teacher, or their schoolmates created. Teachers could also preview (pre-listen?) to suitable educational podcasts and download these for students to listen to.

      Assessing Reading Levels   In a busy classroom environment, pulling students aside for one-to-one reading assessments can be a challenge. It's hard to focus on Sam's reading when Alice is swinging from the rafters. Assessments where the teacher makes notes on paper while the student reads can be an unsettling process and distract the reader from their task. Creating a podcast to record the reading session with the student would allow the teacher to maintain order in the classroom, get an accurate snapshot of the student's reading ability, and limit the possible stress of assessment. Further, a collection of podcasts over the year would serve to document the student's progress and be another resource for discussing learning with families during parent-teacher interviews.

      Read It Like The Teacher   Students often say they are "done" reading a storybook after having read it through once. Teachers sometimes encourage students to Read It Like The Teacher, an activity where they gain fluency by practicing the text many times, then hold the book up while facing a buddy and read aloud, just as the teacher does during storytime. Making a podcast of the reading would be another way for students to Read It Like The Teacher. They could stop and re-record as many times as they wanted until they had achieved mastery of the text, thereby gaining fluency and confidence.

      Readers Theatre   Scripted readings of plays often require many class members as actors, limiting the number of audience members in the room. Also, because they usually happen during school hours, these events aren't accessible for working parents. Creating a podcast of a Readers Theatre event would extend the audience beyond the classroom, to the wider school community and to the parents of the young stars.

      Drama   One of the learning outcomes in Drama 5 in British Columbia is to "express ideas and emotions using verbal and non-verbal communication." Students could create short podcasts to explore their use of tone, voice, pitch, and character. The beauty of the podcast is real-time recording and playback so the students can focus on mastering their communications through sound.

      School Announcements   Were you late for school and missed the morning announcements? Was there too much noise cleaning up before lunch to hear who was called to the office for a telephone call? Or did you miss a day of school altogether and don't know where the new location for soccer practice is? School announcements could very easily be podcast and archived, allowing students, parents, and staff to access any missed announcements.

      Musical performances   Concerts and musical performance tests can be nerve wracking, especially when you haven't practised your instrument quite enough. Students could create podcasts of their playing instead of having to sit through individual music performance tests. The podcast format would allow the students to erase and re-record until they had perfected the selection, or felt it was their best possible achievement. This erasing and re-recording is another way to get students to practise their instruments more, and also reflects the real-world situation of being a recording artist. While they may not practise every day, for the podcast they would repeat a passage many times until they 'got it,' the whole goal of practise anyways. Whole ensemble podcasts could be created for special performances, or on a regular basis. Special performances could be accessed by friends and family who could not physically be at the performance, and regular podcasts would reveal the group's progress over time.

      Classroom Newsletter   Some classroom teachers send home a weekly newsletter. This format was always beyond me as I took too much time to write and layout copy. A weekly classroom podcast, on the other hand, could be a quick and easy way to communicate information and progress to parents. Unlike the paper newsletters that went missing, got soggy with snow, or were tossed in the trash unread, the podcasts would be accessible to parents 24/7 and archived for future reference.

      Reinforcing Lessons   For auditory learners, podcasts are the cat's pajamas. "The podcast is a viable alternative for delivering research content or lessons to students who need remedial or extended support" (Eash, p.17). Unlike a teacher's once-off delivery, podcasts can be listened to over and over, helping auditory learners and those who require extra support to attain success.


Summary

"As long as there are issues of legality surrounding music sharing, education has a key role in highlighting these and alerting pupils to the issues and possible dangers" (Davies & Merchant, p.72). Both teachers and students need to be aware of the legalities of using the creative works of others, even in non-commercial applications. Podcasts have many potential uses in the classroom, and a variety of positive aspects.

From my own experience I have learned that podcasts can require the audience to hone their listening skills and focus on the verbal messages. For auditory learners, podcasts play to their modality and provide a fast, easy, repeatable method for alternative delivery of instruction. And finally, in comparison to other sharing methods such as photosharing and videocasting, podcasts better protect the identity of the students as only audio tracks are available.

The process of learning how to podcast re-connected me with the affective domains of learning, and the panic and frustration that learners can experience. On the positive side, my success also reminded me how cool it feels to be creative and finish a challenging project. This is definitely a tool and learning process which lends itself to classroom practice.  

Eash, Kreider. (2006, April). PODCASTING 101 FOR K-12 LIBRARIANS. Computers in Libraries, 26 (4), 16-20. Retrieved September 9, 2009 from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1024232971).

Schmit, Dan. (2007, January). Creating a Broadcasting Empire . . . From the Corner of Your Classroom! Multimedia & Internet @ Schools, 14 (1), 13-16. Retrieved September 9, 2009 from ProQuest Education Journals. (Document ID: 1193755271).

Blog #3: Social Bookmarking

INTRODUCTION
When I first started working as a Teacher On Call, I had a box of teaching materials I kept in the trunk of my car. Each school, classroom, teacher, and set of students varied so much that I wanted to be prepared to face a variety of challenges. My box contained mostly print materials: books, strategies, templates, and resources that would handily fill in blank spots in the daybook. As I got more experience, I weeded these resources down to one file folder that worked for almost any grade level or subject. As I usually was listening to my iPod in the car, I started to use my iPod as a storage device to carry lesson plans and worksheet templates. This was great, until I forgot my iPod or USB cord. Or the teacher didn't leave me a password for the computer and/or printer.

Now, I work as an employment counsellor, coordinating a drop-in centre for job-seeking clients. I have bookmarked hundreds of useful job search engines, resume and cover letter resources, and research tools, but was limited in how I could share the best of these with clients. Copying and pasting links into emails or Word documents was onerous and time consuming. The process had to be repeated for each individual client, based on their unique job search situation. The other solution I came up with would be to export my bookmarks from my browser into a file that could be emailed to clients. The problems with this process were: 1.) Clients would have to know this type of resource existed, 2.) Clients would have to request the resource from myself or another counsellor, and 3.) The browser would export ALL my bookmarks, not just the relevant ones.

Enter Delicious. As the Delicious site claims, "Delicious greatly improves how people discover, remember and share on the Internet." In this interview from The Guardian with Delicious creator, Joshua Schachter, he describes how he built Delicious, "not with commercial intent, just to solve problems." Having explored Delicious this past week, I feel that Schachter understood my problems listed above, and created the site to help free me from specific device dependencies. Working on my home computer or my work computer, I can create and share public or private bookmarks.

Reflections on the process of learning about Delicious

Before learning about Delicious this week, I was bookmarking in my browser and using my Twitter account (@lisavanness) as a bookmark dumping ground. I wanted an internet place where I could keep track of my precious bookmarks and links, somewhere I could access from any computer or device with internet capability. Although I had heard the phrase "social bookmarking," I was thrown off by the social aspect. I already use social networking sites, I don't want social bookmarking too, whatever that is, I thought. How wrong, how wrong.

My computer-based bookmarks only appear in the browser window of the specific computer I created them in. By creating bookmark folders I was able to stay organized, but my organization was device dependent. Not only does Twitter require users to log in to see posts, I can only see the posted links of people I am following. Due to the limit of 140 characters, Twitter-posted links contain too little information about what the site is. Twitter information is random and unsorted, producing a near cacophony of noise. My humble pie is tasting very Delicious.

I created my account easily enough and added gadgets into my browser toolbar. At first, I didn't understand what the excitement was all about until I started exploring around and little lightbulbs started coming on. If I save my bookmarks on Delicious, I can access them anywhere with internet connectivity! I can tag sites for my own personal use in a way that makes sense to me, and organize them according to my own understandings and needs! I can keep my bookmarks public or private! I can see other people's accounts who also tagged the site, and snoop through all their public bookmarks - maybe they'll be into the same things! I can make notes about each site so that I'll remember why I found it so interesting in the first place! And my personal favourite, Delicious can help me stay more ORGANIZED - and less overwhelmed!!! Instead of feeling like I'm drowning - rather than surfing - the amount of information available on the internet, "[s]ocial bookmarking provides one way for users to get control of this information" (From Social Bookmarking, Teaching Today).    

Discussion of Delicious for my own personal learning

Once I created a personal account where I played around with public and private settings, I immediately wanted to create a Delicious page for the organization I work at to help clients with their job searches. I went asking for permission and was surprised to meet some resistance. This is such a great tool, why wouldn't we want to use it? Our website guru suggested that we want users to stay on OUR website as much as possible, and sending them off site to follow links is contrary to this goal. After a discussion on how beneficial Delicious could be for our clients, we decided to test out a Delicious page for a while and bring the resource to other staff members' attention at our next team meeting.

Creating The Skills Centre's Delicious page was much more focused than my personal explorations of the tool and I was happy to have a few 'I wonder' questions answered. When tagging, I found out that there is no distinction between plurals or capitals. Therefore, when I tagged something as "Job_Search_Engine" instead of  "job_search_engines," the bookmarked site was still sorted into the appropriate tag. I was also happy to see a spell checker wiggly red line, letting me know that I had spelled a word or tag wrong.

If a certain site has been socially bookmarked before, Delicious suggests the tags already used. This builds on the community's tags and helps to create folksonomies. Social bookmarking "represents the interests and judgements of a community of users" (from Social Bookmarking, net.educause.edu). As an employment counsellor, it was interesting to see that the two most-tagged Canadian job search engines, Eluta and Monster, were two that don't carry many listings for our small rural area and are thus not used very heavily by our clients or counsellors. So building this Delicious page of job search bookmarks specific to our client base was a very different process from what a job search assistance Delicious page would look like in a large urban centre with a very different 'community of users.'

I realize that the amount of exploring to be done on Delicious, such as looking at other users' job search tags, could take vast quantities of time. What sites are other job seekers using that we don't know about? Are there any other employment agencies using Delicious, and if so, what are they bookmarking? In the future, our organization will need to monitor:

• how much time is spent researching 
  
• what quantity of tags create a tool for our clients, and what number feel overwhelming
  
• how much spam is sent to our "jobs" email account as a result of having a public email contact listed
• expired or moved links
• how many clients and counsellors actually use the tool and if it's worth investing maintenance time into
• what other bookmarked sites would be useful for our clients
• the best place to feature our Delicious page on our website. Right now, I've placed it in our Job Search Strategies Resource section, but we might see more users if we also used a Network Badge

Even though I only used three different tags for The Skills Centre's Delicious site (job_boards, job_search_engines, and local_employers), I found myself really thinking through which bookmark went with which tag. Although I could have used multiple tags for certain sites, I felt that our clients would get frustrated with this repetition. To assign a tag, I had to hold pre-determined criteria in my mind. For example, the difference between a job board and a job search engine: both have a variety of employer listings, but job boards are limited to the information contained within their site; they do not seek or pull 'outside' information whereas search engines do. The complexity of this process reminded my of the video by Michael Wesch which examines "the changes in the way we find, store, create, critique, and share information."




Discussion of Delicious in terms of teaching and learning

Delicious can be a more powerful research tool than Google. Google is a computer program that seeks out popular sites while Delicious is built by engaged human beings who seek out relevance and meaning. In other words, social bookmarking is quality while Google is quantity. Students and teachers can take advantage of this quality to scaffold their learning and construct their own classroom values.

Before social bookmarking, students only had to be concerned about their teacher evaluating their reference list; now the list is public and available to their peers. As Donna DesRoches writes, "Research is more collaborative and students are more diligent about evaluating resources because they know their peers will be using them" (from School Library Journal). This heightened consciousness is similar to the effects of other social sites such as YouTube and FlickR when postings are public domain.

Social Bookmarking Pros:

      Independence from specific computer or gadget As long as the teacher or student has internet access, the bookmarks can be viewed, retrieved, and added to. For students, this means they can work with their bookmarks in the classroom, in the computer lab, in the school or public library, at home, even on some cell phones. This transferability helps students stay organized and collected. For teachers, this transferability means the dog will never again eat a student's homework. Teachers can quickly see where, what, and how much their students have been researching. 
      Two brains are better than one And twenty brains are fantastic! Being one person looking for information on the internet can be overwhelming and exhausting. How can one person find it all? Social bookmarking allows people to digitally join forces, search out relevant links, and share them with one another. This eliminates a lot of reproduction of effort, such as all class members bookmarking a wikipedia entry, and allows collaborative researchers to cast a wider net of potential web resources.

       You say sweet potato, I say yam   The social tagging feature allows users to explore how others have sorted and classified information. For example, I might tag a site such as cuteoverload.com with the word "procrastination" while another user might use tags such as "cute" or "animals."

Social Bookmarking Cons:

        Different folksonomies   The tags I use in my bookmarking may be different from tags someone else might use. While this has been noted as positive in social bookmarking as it allows users to see how others interpret information, it can also mean you still don't find what you're looking for. I noticed this when different resources in our weekly class trailfire were discussing how they would tag Romeo and Juliet. One would use the tags "Hamlet," "Shakespeare," and "lessonplans" while the other would use "Shakespeare," "theatre," "plays," and "Romeo_and_Juliet." The only common tag is Shakespeare. Another difference is the use of underscores and the use of combining words to create tags. For effective searching, users must experiment with a variety of tags and phrases.
       No rules   Because social bookmarking is easy to use and accessible to many people, there are no formal taxonomies. So by using a variation on a tag, I may be missing out on opportunities to connect with the information of other users who are also interested in "blooms_taxonomy" or "bloom'staxonomy." In Delicious' defense, they do suggest tags other users have assigned to previously tagged sites.
      Cheater cheater pumpkin eater   If a class assignment involves students compiling public links on social bookmarking sites, it can be difficult to know who is responsible for what. What if Sally looked at Billy's links, and appropriated them all for herself? For a class resource list, what if one student is doing all the tagging? How does the teacher know who did the actual work of searching and evaluating information? And does any of this matter? If the point of the assignment is to demonstrate the ability to compile relevant bookmarks, Sally has demonstrated that she knows where to look for useful links: Billy's Delicious page. However, if the point of the assignment is to analyse, synthesize, and evaluate resources (the higher order thinking skills suggested by Bloom's taxonomy) then both Sally and Billy will have to demonstrate their learning in their tag notes or further assignments.


SUMMARY

Information has changed from being something you had to go looking for, to something that washes over you in a digital flood. Students and teachers require tools and strategies for dealing with this deluge. Social bookmarking is a way to organize and share information, and become less dependent on any one device.