The way to have teaching portfolio on line is really great way to take a first step on working on gathering and organizing my materials. I'm really glad we spend some of our class time to see how things are done in the online portfolio.
I find the social bookmarking useful, too. But I decided not to use it at the moment because it seemed a little overwhelming and because I carry my laptop everywhere all the time so I have all of my bookmarks in it. Besides, I would really like to keep things in my Google account. I wonder if Google provide similar bookmarking service. If so, I would love to start using it.
Here I would like to introduce my class blog for my elementary Japanese language class.
http://yamaguchijpns.blogspot.com/
I first started using this blog simply to make an announcement such as when is homework due and when we have a next quiz and all, just in case an email I send out is not received.
Then, I realized having a class blog is a great way to provide and keep useful learning/teaching resources such Syllabus, course calendar (with homework and other assignments due dates and tests dates. By the way we have totally 6 lesson tests besides final.), YouTube videos, and other online learning materials (online dictionaries, etc). Having a classblog helps me in that whenever I have a little idea of using, say, a YouTube video, I just make a link to it and leave it. Come back to it later and decide if I really want to use it in class or not. I just love to have everything in one place and organize materials so students and I can come back to it whenever we like, and use them many times. This also helps me as a language instructor to emphasize "repetition is the key."
What do your students think of the online blog you use for the course? How do they utilized it?
ReplyDeleteI think they like it, at least better than not having it, and they learn better, too, I think. Today one student suggested seeing a YouTube video we saw last semester again because it is related to a grammar note we are learning now. I was like "Wow, they really remember what we saw a long time ago."
ReplyDeleteI go to the blog in class when I want to show something online. Later, when students ask where they can find the stuff we share, I can just say "It's in the blog." Then, they are like "Okay!"
To answer your question, Google does have a bookmarks feature - I'm not sure about the social component. If you try it in iGoogle or on the Google toolbar, let us know how it works out!
ReplyDeleteI liked that idea of a class blog. The other day I was wondering asking about some functionality in eLC to send a message just to all my students.. anyways long story short, there was no easy fix for that in elC. For that reason, I like this blogidea :) I think I'll check th bookmarking feature of google too :)
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