Web 2.0 Tools in the Classroom
Written by Christian Fabia
The first 2.0 tool is Wordpress. You can access this blogging website at wwww.wordpress.com. I find this website to be more than just a place where you can just “blog.” It is where you can manage all your content and blogs in an organized and professional matter. Wordpress can be considered the foundation of expanding to a different and new website, not to mention most or all of its content available can be viewed by the public being called an Open Source project. Being as customizable as possible, Wordpress allows communication and easy sharing to other businesses, professionals and friends.
In education, this 2.0 tool can be great for a Professional Learning Network. Myself, I chose to use Wordpress as my PLN because of its efficiency, variety of choices and the amount of organization layouts it offers. Wordpress can be used where students post homework or assignments and can also view others as well. A barrier that Wordpress disappears is the amount of flexibility it provides. If someone who has autism spectrum disorder prefers to see only blue and red colors for example, they are able to do so with Wordpress. Another example could be precision and how if students like something very precise, Wordpress also allows for that to happen.
According to the Terms of Service, Wordpress is only available to individuals who are of 13 years of age or older.
Prezi is a website where you able to go beyond the normal PowerPoint presentation. You can access Prezi at www.prezi.com. Prezi can be seen as a visual story with dynamic and though provoking images. The words and images in Prezi work hand in hand to portray a revolutionary way in order to present an idea or ideas. Prezi uses a 3-dimensional canvas to resemble a visual story that you could be a part of. Watching a Prezi will be in your mind for a long time because it uses great metaphors to express that idea to its audience. Lastly, the Prezi zooming effects just proves that it is a far more superior tool for presenting ideas than Powerpoint.
In education, it could be a great tool to introduce a topic of unit. By doing this, you could capture the student’s interests more than using a simple PowerPoint presentation. Also, it could be an assignment where students use Prezi to present on a certain topic to the class. By understanding Prezi they will know what they like and what they don’t like within graphics. The student’s will also be more familiar with transitions from beginning to middle to end.
Prezi gives students who are shy or more kept to themselves to express themselves though pictures, videos and different transitions with the help of Prezi. One who is shy can be extremely expressive through the use of technological movement and transitions. Prezi gives the opportunity to unleash the student’s creativity and to showcase their imagination because there no limitations to it.
According to the Terms of Use provided by Prezi, only those who are 13 years of age or older are permitted to create an account on Prezi and use it.
This last 2.0 tool that will be analyzed is GoogleDocs. To access GoogleDocs you must have an email with Google – for many UAlberta students their CCID and Password is already associated to Google Email. One must need an email with Google in order to use GoogleDocs. GoogleDocs is a great 2.0 tool for collaboration and communication having easy access. It is a creating and editing cloud based system where you document is not only saved automatically every couple seconds, but all who has access to the document can alter or change it at any time. GoogleDocs doesn’t just provide access to documents, but the list continues to spreadsheets, presentations, surveys and more.
I believe GoogleDocs is great for group work in school. You can create a new document in GoogleDocs and share the link to all your group members so that each individual has equal access when changing anything and viewing anything. The physical barriers are broken down because there is no longer an excuse to why you are not able contribute your ideas on GoogleDocs. Also, when everyone is editing the document Google assigns different colours to the cursors so that you know who is editing which part.
According to Terms of Service that is provided by Google, students must be 13 years of age or older to proceed with making a Google Account and also use the Google Docs.