Blog 5: Web 2.0

I think that Web 2.0 resources are a new wave of innovation for the modern classroom. full of rich resources for teachers. I think the most valuable aspect of these resources is the ease with which students in the classroom are able to share and communicate with each other. Gone are the days of struggling to organize meetings for frustrating group projects, as now with these Web 2.0 resources students can collaborate with ease. These social networking tools, blogs, wikis, and YouTube are just a few of the kinds of resources that teachers can utilize to collaborate with other educators. I think social bookmarking is a tool that would be especially useful to teachers. The biggest issue for teachers early on in their careers is that they get overwhelmed having to create all new material and lesson plans, and social bookmarking allows for different young teachers to assist each other in finding useful materials online for their classroom. 

One Web 2.0 tool that I'm interested in is webspiration. It's a writing and critical thinking tool that allows you to make graphics to present brainstorming ideas to students. I think that the opportunity to engage students, especially any visual learners in the classroom. are particularly worthwhile.

http://www.webspirationclassroom.com/

The technology advancement that I think holds the biggest promise to education is Cloud Computing. Cloud Computing makes sharing multiple files easy and accessible to teachers. Dropbox has become a vital every day to for me already as a way of sharing multiples documents, pdf's, and videos within minutes with large number of people. Assignments can be turned in easily, educators can use this to share lesson plans and files, and students can easily collaborate.