Week 2 Reflection

When I found out that I would have to make a blog and RSS feed, I have to admit that I was a little mystified.  I had no problems setting up the blog, or so I thought.  As many you found out, I didn't even submit my blog address correctly.  I didn't realize that I needed to "activate" my account so my blog didn't even save my first week's reflection.  I found this out when I went to set up the RSS feed.  Imagine my surprise to read that I had not posts!  Talk about frustration!  But in the end, I learned a lot.  When it came to the RSS feed, I had to stop and ask lots of questions.  I had never heard of an RSS feed and Wikipedia didn't do anything to change that!  But I followed instructions this time and was able to even subscribe to all of the blog available addresses for the group.  I just went to my feed again and, after a few minutes of exploring the various "tabs", I found it quite enjoyable.  Now, if only I had the time to fully utilize it!

I can see the value of blogs and RSS feeds in education.  According to Seigel, computer learning must be interesting enough to not be boring and to fully utilize internet technology.  I think that developing the RSS feed in a classroom situation would be very advantageous.  I could specifically subscribe to sites that had important information that dealt with my subject area, be it English or Spanish.  This way, the students would have up-to-date information that could be applied in classroom learning.  It could be a daily requirement, if the technology allowed it, or a weekly assessment of what they learned in the classroom.

In the RSS feed, I love that all the sites are in one place and all you have to do is click on it.  Some of it is already "feeding" and the other ones are easily accessible.  Adding subscriptions is a breeze, so it would be so easy to add to the list of sites that come to my attention daily.  I would, of course, have to learn security measures to ensure that students don't add subscriptions and only use the sites that are laid out in the syllabus.

Blogs are a great journaling tool.  I see that this is where the students can journal (with preset guidelines) about the various sites that they have been to on the RSS feed.  This way I can monitor what they are learning.  I would give each student a different site to discuss so that way they all can read and learn that much more.  I do like Dr. Horvitz's response technique and would incorporate that in the blog assignments.  In this way, the students would "grasp multiple perspectives" both with the RSS feed and the blogs.

Concerning Dale and his "Cone of Experience," I see the blog and RSS feed being used by the students at all levels of the Cone.  The internet can be used at all of the levels, but specifically, in the classroom, "directed purposeful experiences, demonstrations, and visual and verbal symbols" would be addressed.  In setting up the scenario that I want in using the RSS feed and blogs, I do believe that I still use all of what is on the Cone in some way today.  When using the internet, it may be done virtually, but it still has the same ideals behind it.