SchoolBlog News
|
|
|
Doug Mohney: 'Our hero is Adam Curry, one-time M-TV "VJ" and closet techno-prophet, a '90s Cassandra that saw the potential of the Internet for entertainment and media, the fight over electronic music rights, and a whole bunch of other ideas I wish I could have written down at the time.'
Great to see Adam getting some positive press. About time too :-) Working with Adam on SchoolBlogs has been nothing less than inspiring. He is a guy who can 'see' the potential of future projects without losing any grip on present realities. I like that about him. We didn't make millions on SchoolBlogs but we had some fun dreaming :-) Good luck to ya AC!
Posted by Peter Ford on 7/8/03; 1:34:07 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Florence is producing a great project weblog about Muhammad Ali. Why not post her a comment or link to her? I think it deserves a wider audience :-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 7/4/03; 11:46:40 AM
from the Student Weblogs dept.
|
|
|
|
|
North Chadderton School: 'Make no mistake, this wonderful phenomenon known as Open-Source, has enabled schools such as North Chadderton, to develop resources that would have taken years to put together, by traditional, html page-by-page, approach. It is now done by using a combination of PHP scripting and MySQL databases, again provided by the Open-Source community.'
I spent an hour trawling through this English school's superb web presence. Great quality and open-source ethos.
Posted by Peter Ford on 5/7/03; 7:44:51 AM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
I know this new Manila feature has already been pointed to and widely applauded already but, on my return from an 'internetless' holiday, I'm going to clap as well. I'm sure my 11 year old students will miss hacking that xml - NOT :-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 5/5/03; 12:56:07 PM
from the Weblogging Techniques dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Susan Smith Nash: 'The human mind evolves by arranging perceptions by means of connections. Applied to learning, this means that it is important to understand how the mind makes connections, at different moments in time, and to develop tasks and learning experiences that complement the connection patterns and preferences.'
Learning theory clearly explained and usefully applied to online learning.
Posted by Peter Ford on 5/5/03; 12:32:17 PM
from the e-Learning Theory dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Laura Gibbs: 'Writing on the web changes everything. It gives the students an audience with the possibility of immediate feedback from both the instructor and fellow students. The revision process is a natural part of how web publishing works. Plus there is ample opportunity to work not just with words but also with images, and to hyperlink one text to another.'
A subject close to my heart! I'm starting my final round of weblog projects with students here in Amsterdam before I return for good to the UK in the summer.
BTW Xplana.com is fast becoming a favourite read of mine :-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/16/03; 12:24:17 PM
from the Student Weblogs dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Rob Reynolds: 'Searching is, perhaps, the most educational aspect related to Internet technology. It is also a great community builder. The key for all of us to remember that we are both "travelers" of the systems as well s information sources for others. Playing both roles with empathy makes the system perfect for everyone.'
I like the link the article makes between searching and community. I'm going to get my students to read this piece because it contains some useful tips 'to keep in mind, both as we build out own information sources and as we connect to those belonging to others.'
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/16/03; 12:07:39 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Today I set homework to be returned to via a text message to my mobile phone. Looking at non-standard English in class led to an obvious link with text-messaging. Students had to send me a message 'designed to amuse me' in non standard English. My mobile has been going off all night. I've never been so popular ;-)
Those without cell phones? They had to resort to email or, perish the thought, pen and paper.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/15/03; 7:32:39 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Johnny Haynes is a colleague and friend of mine at the British School. He teaches Year One children who are 5 & 6 years old. He was introduced to weblogs last September and has really made good use of his class blog with his young class. He uses audioblogging techniques to record children's poetry reading. He posts pictures and commentaries to keep parents informed of what is going on. He writes down the children's ideas and comments on his blog and lets them publish their work. Look for his helpful editing annotations as well.
Anyone who says that young children cannot be exposed to publishing to the web should have a look at his site and others at our Infant School.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/14/03; 4:09:11 PM
from the Class Weblogs dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Spring is in the air and it is definitely time to set up some new links that reflects not only my current blog reading practice, but also the other areas of online educational life that interest me. For the last months I've been relying on Will Richardson's excellent navigation bar to track edublogging links. I always visit his site via the link on Lloyd's site, after a thorough read of the Free Radical and my fav Berkeley bloggers. When I've read all those blogs and any of the attractive tangents they point to, I finish with a touch of spice over at Adam's blog. Time then to plough through the stats. I never knew I was such a creature of habit ;-) Let's start with a new outline.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/13/03; 12:58:48 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
ES-Designs: 'Our basic Manila hosting package offers a custom domain name, up to 100 subsites and 500 Mb of disk space for $20/month or $200/year. We also offer discounts for educational and non-profit institutions.'
Pat has checked it out and it seems to be a significant hosting possibility for edubloggers. I would love to find out more about their setup server-side to be sure that they would be able to cope with the vast demand that could easily come their way. Cool !
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/12/03; 5:58:58 PM
from the Weblog Hosting dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Laura Gibbs: 'Those of us who are committed to computer-based course management systems need to have loftier goals than higher grades: we need to challenge ourselves as teachers to use these new tools to offer our students much more than that. We need to offer them real learning opportunities, different and better than the learning opportunities that they had before... learning opportunities that will give students the same sense of intrinsic satisfaction and self-motivated pleasure that they feel when using cell phones and video games and online chat, which students clearly enjoy despite the jibber-jabber.'
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/12/03; 7:07:34 AM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Rob Reynolds: 'The bottom line is that IM is a technology that already makes sense to our students, that is free, and that is insanely easy to use. It is precisely the type of technology we should be focusing on and trying to integrate into our teaching in a more structured manner.'
I agree! Harnessing the potential of technology that students are already familiar with is a good move. I recently used IM as a way of connecting my class in Amsterdam with Lloyd Nebres in Maui on the other side of the globe. The experience was extremely positive. It felt like 'accelerated blogging.' Students had chance to engage with the thoughts of someone else with enough time to think, but not enough time to remove the spontaneity of their responses. This is what I am encouraging my students to do on their blogs - to read others and respond with their own thoughts and ideas. If 'linkage' is the currency of the net, then we need to ensure that our students are effective in connecting and communicating with others in this digital age. Blogging and IM are great educational tools in this respect.
You can find a transcript of the class conversation here.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/11/03; 8:23:00 AM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
I was interviewed by Rob Reynolds of Xplana.com and blew the trumpet for weblogging. I also failed to spend a billion dollars on education :-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/10/03; 2:57:08 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
'Xplana is a community of technologists and educators writing about technology and education. Our goal is to provide accurate insight and valuable resources for teachers, students, and administrators. We are committed to effective learning today, but are equally dedicated to understanding and envisioning the future landscape of education as it is affected by technological advances.'
A well designed site with great potential and a fine mission statement.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/10/03; 2:51:28 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Chris Ashley of the IU at Berkeley: 'Being a full time weblog hosting service is like being 24/7 internet provider, and it's something we can only do for ourselves and our understanding friends. We keep it running, knock on wood, and implement features as we need them and as we have the time.'
Chris definitely has more than an inkling as to the problems and pitfalls on the edublog-hosting game. I agree totally with his sentiments but still, a part of me wishes that some one would drop an enormous financial grant on Berkeley, specifically to host weblogs for the wider educational community. They have bloggers of some class there who have a great track record of drawing together or contributing to edublogging community.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/3/03; 3:11:42 PM
from the Weblog Hosting dept.
|
|
|
|
|
George Siemens: 'While the societal/social impact of technology is still in its infancy, the greatest challenge facing the role of technology may well be in the creation and distribution of knowledge and information. As such, opposition to new processes and tools for sharing can be expected from organizations holding an industrial view of information (information is scarce, controlling it is power). Traditional publishers of content (video, books, music) have been reluctant to embrace the "Internet model" for distribution of information. Instead they have attempted to apply existing philosophies of content distribution to this medium.'
An interesting and highly readable piece about open source content in education and the development of a useful infrastructure for it.
Elearnspace is a real treasure trove of information and articles on e-learning. It helps me to place what I'm doing with blogs in school into the wider 'e-learning developmental context'
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/3/03; 12:27:04 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
The SchoolBlogs server went down hard last night but the 13 hours rest seems to have done it some good. It is lightning fast at the moment - at least here in Amsterdam ;-)
Sorry for the inconvenience.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/2/03; 12:23:45 PM
from the Weblog Hosting dept.
|
|
|
|
|
'Software alone will never produce a 'blogtastic' revolution in our schools. In fact, blogging software choice is not the crux of the matter. There are no fatal mistakes to be made in that area as long as we realise that all 'software sucks'.....'
All this talk of software and community reminded me of this piece I wrote last year.
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/1/03; 8:25:59 PM
from the General Weblog News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Pat Delaney: 'The community of bloggers on eBN has much more to show than Harvard at this point, with educational content and practioners from kindergarten to university level."
I hope that Harvard and eBN will be mutally inclusive. Dave Winer, I'm sure will do great work at Harvard building the elite community there and the eBN already represents, supports and encourages the excellence of the edublogging enfranchised. They will learn from each other.
What concerns me is the fact that many potential edubloggers are effectively 'disenfranchised'. They do not have access to free weblogs outside the creaking service at SchoolBlogs. They look at both the fledgling Harvard community and the more established eBN and 'press their nose upon the glass' and wonder what might have been.
Dave Winer has done free weblog hosting before. He is one of the 'movers and shakers' in this whole blogging revolution. He has momentum and could have opened the edublogging floodgates now with the click of a button and a few posts at Scripting News. The eBN would have played a crucial role in supporting and inspiring the thousands who would have been swept in to edublogging now. That is what I found frustrating about Dave's 'one step at a time' response. I want it to happen now.
However, I totally understand his thinking. Free weblog hosting is not a great deal of fun without the backup of a strong support community. Community is the key and it has to be built. Like Dave at Harvard, the eBN is building a fine edublogging community with an even richer variety of ages and subjects represented. I'm going to start pointing the enquirers about edublogs from the US to the eBN in the hope that a 'tipping point' into free edublog hosting will be reached, underpinned by the miraculous accompanying finance. I'll send the edublogless with the message - press your noses up against the eBN window - they are bound to provide you with a blog because they know what it is like to be 'blogless'. Only come back to the SchoolBlog shelter if you are turned away ;-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 4/1/03; 5:13:21 PM
from the Weblog Hosting dept.
|
|
|
|
|
I put forward the idea of Harvard weblogs for all educators to Dave Winer himself. Click the headline to see what he said.
Posted by Peter Ford on 3/29/03; 4:05:34 PM
from the Weblog Hosting dept.
|
|
|
|
|
'It is high time for instructional technologists to get serious about extending free, high quality educational opportunities to everyone. Literally. This modest manifesto lays out a context, rationale, and initial roadmap from here to there.'
A really interesting article on a really interesting blog. I'm going to dig around ;-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 3/27/03; 8:22:10 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
I am currently receiving between 5 and 10 emails every week from educators wanting to know about weblogs. At last count we have 1372 weblogs on the SchoolBlogs server. Many are examples of unused 'digital paper' but a good number really have made great use of SchoolBlogs, some even going on to set up their own weblog servers. This is satisfying :-)
The last weeks alone have seen several hundred SchoolBlogs created. The 'tipping point' for the adoption of weblogs in education is evident on the SchoolBlogs servers. (I think the inspirational Weblog Will coined this phrase) I am thrilled to see a great number of edubloggers joining together into the excellent Edubloggers Network infrastructure in the US. Dave Winer is at Harvard now evangelising the weblog gospel as well. Who though is going to throw open the doors to the weblogging fraternity a la SchoolBlogs?
Just put in a form like this and everyone can create a free weblog regardless of where they study and without any complicated initiation ceremony. I can make sure you get 40 - 80 new bloggers a month. Just give me the URL and I'll point them there. If Dave Winer was to open the Harvard blogs to the educational world then the edublogging floodgates really would open. Sound too good to be true? It's the missing link. Come join us in the creaking, flaming but ultimately cool world of edublog hosting ;-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 3/26/03; 9:14:23 PM
from the Weblog Hosting dept.
|
|
|
|
|
I offered parents at our school a basic half-day weblogging course. Fifty have already signed up, an overwhelming but exciting response. Some of my Year Seven webloggers are going to assist on the course. This is how learning should be. Exciting enough for me to record it here for posterity :-)
Posted by Peter Ford on 1/18/03; 1:48:25 PM
from the General Weblog News dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Scott Hacker: 'The professor for the class wants to avoid requiring students to type achor tags manually. Fortunately, most blogging packages today offer some sort of extended JavaScript attached to web forms which allow for easy selection of words and insertion of hyperlinks, bolding, etc. Unfortunately, all of these seem to work under Windows only, which is a disappointment.' [via Scripting]
Posted by Peter Ford on 8/26/02; 11:00:18 PM
from the Weblogging Techniques dept.
|
|
|
|
|
Greg Ritter: 'Look, people, the idea that techology is a panacea is so 1997. I don't know anybody in education (or educational technology providers) who still really believes that. Everybody knows that the technology doesn't solve education's problems and, in fact, presents some entirely new ones. Everybody except the media, that is.'
Posted by Peter Ford on 8/26/02; 6:23:45 PM
from the General News dept.
|
|
This Page was last update: Tuesday, July 8, 2003 at 1:34:07 PM
This page was originally posted: 7/8/03; 1:34:07 PM.
Copyright 2003 SchoolBlogs
This site is using the Strata (blue) 1.0 theme.
Membership : Join Now : Login
|
|
