http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/2008/08/digital-storytelling-multimodal-writing.html

information literacy - when and how to teach it

if we want our students to critically evaluate all the resources they view and to be able to address questions like who, what, why then exposure is the key. how then, can you restrict students to particular search engines and would this in fact be killing their development of critical literacy skills. obviously depending on age there needs to be some level of scaffolding, guidance and supervision of use of the internet, but perhaps simply teaching the rules of internet etiquitte, what can go wrong with research on the internet, and how to make use of certain search services will be enough to not have to supervise and scaffold too much?
i think if you stop students from using certain searches then you are stopping then your preventing them from the notion of learning through experience.

"what we have to learn we learn by doing" - aristotle.

establishing an understanding with students first about searches on the internet and using information literacy will give them the skills to be able to evaluate when they are left on their own to research. if they can ask the right questions, have a prior baseline of knowledge established by the teacher and can triangulate their research well then they shouldn't need to be confined to the walls of one search engine.

If you want your students to be creative learners then start by being creative as well

I think sometimes we can all get a bit monotonous in our approach to life, we become routine and therefore sometimes become uninspiring to others - you know you have reached this point when no one listens to you. I think its easy for this to happen as a teacher when you are faced with curriculum demands to get things done and to feed our students as much as we can. This pattern doesnt excite or engage learning. multiliteracies can bring a certain energy to the room that your voice and worksheets no longer can!
rather than making students read a chunk of factual text, show them a doco on the topic and get them note-taking. yes reading text and extracting information are important skills that need to be honed but so are listening and viewing skills. when reading a story no longer gets the kids giggling, have them look at digital storytelling or start making their own.
i think multiliteracies are a great way to engage students in their learning, they are able to broaden their skill base as they learn to be critical of these tools.

a teacher using a computer for spelling activities with younger years. great id displayed large so the whole class can work together and watch

collective intelligence clip

Collective Intelligence in a classroom

What a beautiful idea for collaborative, group work, that allows for mountains of opinions and ideas to be considered in order to make one large pool of information. Truly a fabulous idea in the classroom.
Including this formulation of ideas and producing it as some sort of wiki only adds to the benefits.
Students start with lines of questioning, as they grow they are able to add to it, chaange previous ideas and all this is done as a class, where opinions and ideas can be debated. It certainly gives a sense of purpose for students as well if they think that the information they create for their wiki may someday be accessed by another student from the other side of the world and that it may help with them with their learning as well!
love it!

using blogs in education

my first response is to see the use of blogs in an arts environment. my shcooling days were spent being told to "reflect on your drama class, what have you learnt?" a question one soon grows tired of hearing. the task actually became quite challenging at times when there was nothing inspirational about the class to write about. what was nice about the task was when we could reflect on others work. who got to read this reflection? the teacher and no one else received the positive feedback other students wrote for each other nor did they receive any suggestions for thigns to try differently to achieve greater things. blogs become therefore, a very public and open communication tool to share on a wider level ones thoughts and feelings. not only do they allow for an individual to share their thoughts but how nice if a whole class of students were to agree with the posting that a student had done a delightful performance.
i truly beleive blogs open up a whole new place for students to explore and share, where they may not feel the security to do so in a standard classroom setting.

--> this is a very traditional sense of the use of blogs, basically utilising the system of a diary. however, they do allow for this diary to be made extremely public and i think this can have its benefits in certain areas and obvisouly, with certain rules or guidlines for use put in place by students and teachers.