Reflection for Week 2

This week we took at look at a lot of new Web 2.0 tools. We also started a Diigo group to share all of our links. I thought Thursday's class really started to hit a groove, and I'm liking all of the sharing of tools.

Edmodo: It seems that our Skype connection is getting just a little better, as it was nice to see Jeff O'Hara share his screen with us. I have to say, I have used Edmodo a little, but I was a little surprised to hear Mr. O'hara almost have trouble describing what Edmodo is. "It's like a content management, sharing, communication tool," is what Mr. O'hara described Edmodo as. I too have had trouble describing it, and that may be its greatest flaw at the moment.

Edmodo tries to do a lot of things, and like other tools like it that I've used, I'd like to see it do one thing really super well, as opposed to doing many things kind of sub-par. Right now I think sharing links and videos is its best attribute. I've used the RSS function, and it's just not robust enough for me. Plus it clogs up the stream.

Wikispaces: I'm pretty familiar with Wikispaces, so this was nothing new, although I now know why the "create users" function doesn't come up sometimes. I spent a day trying to help a fellow teacher with that one, and came up dry.

Although I've seen many of these tools before, I'm finding new ways to find tools like using http://www.go2web20.net/#tag:search That's a new one for me. Plus, I'm I'm enjoying that many of my classmates are first discovering these tools, and I like to hear their fresh take on them. Like their ideas about Twitter, or whether using technology is necessary to be an effective teacher. That's a great question that will stay with me for a long time.

DR