ClassChatter.com -- Free Web Logs For the Classroom

Thanks to Teresa for this link to a "weblog" client made specially for teachers.



I haven't tried it out yet, but certainly will. This is how it is described on the site:



"Classchatter.com puts powerful management tools in the hands of the teacher while protecting students' privacy and identities. Students are added into virtual "class" by a teacher or instructor where they may keep a personal blog, interact with fellow students' blogs or react to topical blogs created by the teacher."

Comment Spam

A while ago, I turned off the commenting feature on this blog because I was hit by a lot of spam. I thought I'd give it a week or so and turn the feature on again, but I've just seen that my posts have been inundated by this junk.


Why me? It's strange - I really didn't think a blog like this would merit such attention. Or perhaps this blog comment spamming is now being done by bots? Anyway, I've turned off the commenting feature, which makes me a little sad, because it's one of the best things about blogging. It's actually ironic that I don't have a problem now with email spam - my gmail account has really worked wonders and I never get any spam.



So, my proposal is for any would-be-want-to-comment-people to send me an email and I'll attach your comments to the end of my posts. As I never get that many comments anyway, this seems like the easiest way to fix this problem. Unless any of you out there have any bright ideas...



Update 17/10/2005: Thanks for the bright ideas...




Graham, Sergei and Michael all suggested that it might be enough to turn on the word activation system in Blogger. They all suggested that this system will deal with the spam from bots at least. I've decided to try this out - if I get more spam, I'll turn the comments off though as I really don't have the time to eliminate them (I received about 60 spam comments the last time, and I still haven't erased them all).



Thanks also to Cleve, for the link to the post Turning off blog comments, which talks about why people might take the decision to turn off blog comments. It's not just about comment spam - some people turn off comments just because dealing with them take up a lot of time.

Dead Time Learning

The phrase Dead Time Learning has been used to refer "to time that you have where you're not really doing anything else and you could be learning. Commuting is probably the #1 opportunity for Dead Time Learning that most of us have. Exercising is another great time. You can even be a Dead Time Learner when you're doing chores around your house, brushing your teeth, making dinner, etc."



Of course, podcasting is one of the best ways of making use of this time for learning, and this is one of the reasons why it has attracted so much attention. Of course, this is great for me, and I have been taking advantage of the growing variety of podcasts about all manner of subjects to learn in time that previously I would have just not taken advantage of.



But, what about my students? And here comes the irony.If they were adults, I'm sure I'd be able to interest them in podcasts, but then few of them would actually have mp3 players to really take advantage of 'learning in dead time'.



The majority of my students are either young learners or university students and a high percentage of them own mp3 players, but I doubt that many of them will be interested in using their mp3 players to listen to podcasts in English. Maybe I'm wrong, but I just don't see them taking advantage of this way of mobile learning.



I am going to introduce podcasting to the, however. I've seen just how useful and interesting it can be, and I hope I'll be able to share this enthusiasm. And I hope to be able to convince at least some of them to try this idea of 'dead time learning'



Although I'm doubtful that many will take to it (especially at first), I think it is something that will appeal to a minority of students, and maybe others will come back to it when they start work and realise just how precious time is, and how lucky it is to be able to spend some of that dead time learning.

Why use technology in class?

I came across an interesting post by David Jakes, via Will Richardson, about the slow pace of uptake of technology of many educators.



Here's a quote:



"...how many teachers can even design an effective presentation in PowerPoint? How many take advantage of the professional development opportunities available to them? How many internalize technology tools as significant and mission-critical tools required to teach today’s kids. Sadly, the news is not good."




I am waiting to see how many particpants I get at my session on blogging and podcasting in Madrid this Saturday - I know the conference has generated a lot of interest, and some of the speakers are being asked to put on two sessions - I volunteered for this, but I've yet to hear. Hopefully it won't be true, but I have visions of all the classrooms being full except mine, and me standing there talking to three people, who have only come in because the other sessions are full.



Hopefully, I'm wrong about this...

Interview with Brazil's Number One Blogger

Bee, who was instrumental in raising my interest level in blogging by 200%, and who is always a source of inspiration and great ideas (especially during the EVO2005 session on weblogging that she kindly asked me to co-moderate, along with Aaron Campbell)has been featured in "An interview with Barbara Dieu" on the British Council Brazil site.



In particular, this section of the interview caught my eye:



"So, I´d say that the greatest appeal and strength of blogging lies in this openness and freedom of speech. It´s the “power to the people”, “the can do”, creative pull.



The blogging tool gives you the possibility to act, intervene, create your own content, share it with others, develop your voice and makes you believe that you as an individual, connected to others who share the same belief, can help, make your voice heard and produce change."




Bee also talked extensively about Dekita, which is just one of the many exciting projects she is involved with. Great work, Bee! You're an inspiration to all of us.

7 things you should know about...

7 things you should know about... from Educause is a series of pdf documents featuring concise information on emerging learning practices and technologies. Each pdf file "focuses on a single practice or technology and describes what it is, how it works, where it is going, and why it matters to teaching and learning."



These information sheets are great introductory leaflets that you could print and leave out in the staff room for colleagues to browse, etc.



They cover:



blogs, videoblogging,
wikis,
podcasting,
clickers,
social bookmarking



I found all but the one about clickers interesting. And I was surprised that they bothered to make an information sheet about clickers and not one on interactive whiteboards, which I think is a far more useful / interesting technology.


I have started to use an interactive whiteboard and am excited about its potential - it really does help with integrating ICT in the classroom and also affects the way you approach teaching a class. If you're using the iwb well, you can't just write on the board, but you need to use the resource in a different way, planning the way your boards will look to your students, and what you will do at various points during the lesson - in this way it is not only a presentation tool, but also an aid to lesson planning.

British Council Madrid Conference 24th September

Something Old, Something New is the title of the educational conference that is going to be held at the British Council in Madrid on the 24th September.



It's open to all teachers and I'm down to give a session on (surprise surprise) blogging.



Hope to see some of you there.




Blogging: Push Button Publishing for Students and Teachers



A ‘blog’ (short for weblog) is an easy-to-publish website which can be used by teachers and students to make themselves heard and to help form out-of-class and out-of-school communities. Although blogging as a student journal-tool is the most common use, there is so much more to blogging than this. The session will cover everything from basic blogging journals to encourage and improve process writing, to new trends exploiting photographs (photo blogs) and audio (podcasting).