When I first read about this assignment, I wasn’t exactly sure where to begin. I had never heard of a wiki before this class, which is surprising considering my usage of Wikipedia. As for podcasts, well, I’ve downloaded them several times, but my backlog became so great that I would usually just throw my hands in the air in frustration and delete them from my iPod. It happens pretty much like clockwork. I succumb to what sounds like a potentially interesting podcast, download all the episodes, get behind in listening, then delete them all promising never to do it again. I will admit that during the course of this assignment I found some potentially interesting podcasts and downloaded all the episodes. Hopefully I can stop the cycle of futility here. Blogging was the easy part. Of course, finding relevant blogs might prove challenging.
In the end I think I may have gotten a little carried away. Let’s start with the blogs. I found several blogs that were written by social science instructors. The reason for my interest in them is varied. For one they blog about their experiences in the classroom, relevant social science topics, and they are technology focused, which I thought was especially relevant for this class. I know it can be disheartening to hear about bad classroom experiences, but if we’re honest we know that it isn’t all roses nowadays. Here are 3 of the many I discovered . . .
The Tech-Savvy Teacher
It is written by two teachers, a social science and a science teacher, who are interested in sharing ways to use technology in the classroom. You can also follow them on Twitter @techsavvyteach. I will admit this blog focuses more on technology. It does discuss the pros and cons of using tech in the classroom and provides classroom solutions when using technology.
The Henricus
I liked this blog because as the subtitle indicates it provides "New Approaches to Teaching Social Studies." It provides interesting topics for discussion relevant to the social science teacher. For instance, can history be taught thematically? Not to mention the loads of other links it provided to social science related blogs. I'm sure you're not surprised but they can be followed on Twitter @TechWarrior.
2¢ Worth
He talks a lot about education, not just social science. Not entirely sure that makes it relevant to the assignment, but I'm including it anyway. He also does a podcast. Okay enough with the blogs. I found a dozen more besides, but I'll tag them on my my delicious account.
Next we have podcasts, I managed to restrain myself to 2. The first is the 60 Second Civics. It provides you with a daily dose of civics lesson in a compact lesson of 60 seconds. Exactly what is advertised by the title. I liked it because sometimes I find civics extremely boring because it can be very dry at times. 60 seconds would probably be just the right amount. I'm sure it would be very useful for highschool students who feel the same way as I do. You can easily subscribe via iTunes, not to mention follow them on, you guessed it @60SecondCivics. The second is Stuff You Missed in History Class. My reasons for liking this is because I've always been a fan of the untold stories in history. Paul Harvey-esque type stories as it were. It also reminded me of the book Lies My Teacher Told Me by James Loewen which I really liked.
Next are the wikis, again I found two. The first wiki is a student created wiki about Asian history. For those not in the know, I'm a huge fan of Asian history and I was interested in seeing how this one developed as it is a work in progress at the moment. Shanghai American School Asian History Wiki is being updated by 9th graders from within China. The second wiki is Classroom Google Earth. I chose this one because of my software project which is, coincidentally, Google Earth and its many uses.
As I said I may have gotten carried away. Nonetheless it has given me lots of reading material.
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I had a lot of trouble figuring which of the resources I found to post about, too. I stumbled across the Tech-Savvy Teacher blog myself, but because I chose to follow them on Twitter. Their site and Twitter are really helpful when looking for new things to use, and in new ways.
ReplyDeleteI also found an abumndance of podcasts--who knew there were so many having to do with the social sciences?
I found Tech-Savvy Teacher's twitter first as well. Honestly I wasn't having too much luck finding interesting student run blogs. I liked the few I chose though, more of an emphasis on tech and social science.
ReplyDeleteThe Stuff You Missed In History Class podcast is pretty interesting if you like anecdotal type stories.
The "stuff you missed in history class" is so cool! All this searching for these blogs, podcasts, and wikis is really making me feel bad that I missed out on this kind of stuff when I was in History class.
ReplyDeleteI really loved the Tech-Savvy Teacher blog you found. I'm always interested in ways to make technology seem less daunting not just to students but to myself as a current student and future teacher.
ReplyDeleteDiscussing questions like "How do I handle storage across multiple computers?" (Even though I have but one) or "How unique is this technology is everyone uses it?" is extremely useful as I wrap my own head around this onslaught of new technology.