Easier said than done

Picture of my classroom one week before the start of school.

It's easy for me to practice Twitter, blogging, hyperlink writing and
podcasting. It's easy for me to get excited about the paperless
classroom, personal learning networks and iGoogle.
I have most of the tools in my classroom to make that happen.
(and the students do too - in their pockets)

Adjust Facebook Settings

This is a really good screencast about adjusting the privacy settings in Facebook.  The screencast itself, is enabled through a web-based recorder called Screenr.  Screenr also works hand in hand with Twitter.
For example, once you create a screencast with the Screenr recorder you can immediately post that final screen recording up on Twitter or post it later if you choose. 



Thanks to my colleague, Ed Bujak for telling me about Screenr.  He appreciates a good screencast and I know he's been looking for a decent screen capture recorder.



H Songhai
8/29/09

Everybody Loves The Sunshine (State)

I just spent an awesome week in Florida, visiting colleges and universities with eleven high school students from the Delaware Futures College Prep and Academic Enrichment program. While in Florida we visited the University of Central Florida, Rollins College, University of Tampa, University of South Florida and Bethune-Cookman University.

The students were outstanding. They were focused, inquisitive and get this, they all used their electronic devices (cell phones, and digital cameras) to document and archive their five days in the Sunshine State.

As we made our way around the state, I too got a chance to snap dozens of pictures of the students, the campuses and the many attractions that make Florida such a favorite destination spot for visitors world-wide.

During our stay, I got a chance to experiment with Loopt, a really cool application that turns your cell phone into a social compass. Loopt allowed me to update my physical location (through my cell phone) and to post that map information to Twitter and to FaceBook. It also allowed me to create an RSS journal feed of all of my notes, photos and updates, wherever I was in the state.



H Songhai
8/12/09

What would Cecil B. Moore have said?

CLICK ABOVE TO ENLARGE IMAGE

Thanks to Philly talk show host, Michael Smerconish for this extremely clever example of Twitter usage over the last 90 years. The original piece first appeared in the June 28, 2009 edition of the Philadelphia Sunday Inquirer.

I was so impressed with the thoughtfulness behind Twitter-delphia that I e-mailed Mr. Smerconish and told him that I would like to use his model as a class project for my digital archiving students. He e-mailed me back and asked that I keep him posted...

So with the "big talker's" blessings, my students will re-create a similar Twitter-delphia model that spans 90 years of Philadelphia history. The students have until Friday of this week to submit their final lists. For this project though, my students will do something Michael Smerconish could not do in the newspaper: the students must include at least two hyperlinks per tweet and one link must be a multimedia link. We'll see how that all plays out. I will keep you posted.

H Songhai
8/10/09