So the heat is supposed to be turned down today - relief! Interesting parallel with the course, I think. We wait a long time for some nice warm days (remember January?), then we get an intense blast, a heat wave. Here we've been immersed just as intensely in our learning, piling one new thing on top of another, and doing some serious sweating at times. But relief is coming! After today, these modules will come in 3 hour sessions with a week in between them to explore as you see the need. Your blogs have often mentioned the pace of this week, and I agree with those of you who would like a bit more time to explore each new tool. Front loading the coursework this way does have this disadvantage.
So we'll slow down after Thursday. You'll be able to chase those things that interest you most in the "away" time. And you'll have these skills to help you:
- You all know how to reflect on your thinking in a way that invites conversation from classmates via your blogs. Will you invite others in by telling them about your blog when school starts? Might your kids blog before winter?
- You all know how to follow one another's blogs via RSS as well as having other bloggers' and news agencies send you current items of interest. Will you add feeds to your RSS reader as you bump into new sources of dynamic information?
- You all can store connections with great sites you find using Delicious, which makes these bookmarks available to you and to anyone you want to share them with at any computer. Do you see yourself bookmarking other sites between now and September as you surf in preparation for school's start? Can you even resist telling someone else about Delicious? (Favorites are sooooooooooo 20th Century.)
- You all have PortaPortal accounts for setting up quick webpages organized links that are easy to access by your students. Might this be the tool that launches your year with new students and their new laptops?
- By the end of the day, you'll all be using Google Docs to leave NeoOffice behind, to store your files on the Internet instead of one computer, and to work collaboratively with anyone you invite to join you. Things could get different real quick this year!
Remember how overwhelmed you've felt? There's relief in sight - or is it site?? :)
spk
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