I was able to join Digg RSS stream during class last week
and I really enjoy the amount of resources available. First, I searched for middle school math
resources. The ones that I subscribed to
showed many mini lessons that pertain to my content area. I was very excited to find a movie option to
show my students in a class. Those were
very hard to come by, so it was extremely help to have a PG movie that works in
a math class. I also subscribed to a
newsfeed that included a lot of great idea for classroom management. As I explored and clicked on a few on their
blogs and articles, I discovered some interesting dos and don’ts for classroom
management. I am still exploring some of
the channels and looking for ways to improve my practices.
As for Classroom 2.0, doesn’t seem to be as convenient for
me to navigate or utilize. It definitely
has a lot more going on. I like the idea
that anyone can post blogs and other information to a specific category, but I
find it a little difficult to sort through and look for what I really
want. Dedicated Classroom 2.0 users also
attend live seminars which is not very convenient for me. I didn’t spend as much time exploring this
resource compare to Digg. I found Digg a
lot more convenient more me because I can easily search for what I am looking
for and everything seems more organized for me.
It felt like an extended Pinterest for teachers!
Lastly, I joined Edmodo couple months ago. Edmodo is very useful because there are
multiple features in one program. I am
able to set up my classroom, assign homework, give assessments, and communicate
with my students. There are also blogs,
newsfeeds, and communities to subscribe to.
I haven’t used it that often, but I do try to go on once in a while to
look for pre-made lesson plans to save me some time from planning!
Question 1: What are benefits of joining an affinity group?
Affinity groups keeps you current and up to date with
today’s practices in the teaching field.
For example, the Classroom 2.0 had a talk group about Minecraft and how
teachers can incorporate this huge gaming success into a lesson that can be
enjoyable and interesting. Students no
longer learn with straight forwards lectures the way we were brought out. Especially with the new California Standards
many educators have to create new lesson plans and learn the new way to teach
our students. I love joining these
affinity groups because it allows other educators to try out the lesson, tweak
it, and post their dos and don’ts for the lesson. Of course, I will still need to adjust the
lesson to fit my students’ needs, but it is less of a chance to mess up because
I can learn from other teachers who did the lesson before me. Educators who post on the feeds can use it as
a learning experience. It is a perfect
time and environment to test their lesson plans, reflect, and get other ideas
that can enhance the lessons for future use.
Question 2: What
happens if you don’t find what you’re looking for in an affinity group?
The awesome thing about affinity group is its
community. It is very easy to post up a
question or a category. Afterwards,
other educators can also easily post their ideas and feedback. Once more and more users continue to blog and
post, we just got what we were looking for! This is how a community gets
started.
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