I don't use too many Internet-based tools when teaching my English courses, so there's a plethora of new (well, "new to me") tools to explore for this assignment. I did a basic Google search for "internet teaching tools" and came across one that seemed like it would be useful. Diigo is an information management tool that allows you to (as their website says) "collect and organize anything" from docs, pictures, bookmarks, screenshots, notes, etc. A big plus is that apparently you can easily access and share this information between computers and smart phones.
You can find the link here: http://www.diigo.com/
This thing looks amazing, especially for the kind of collaborative work I'd like to be doing in my classes. It seems like it would be helpful for students to remotely work together to create presentations (sharing photos, links, bookmarking websites, and contributing to notes), and allow students to better research for their formal papers as well as some of the more creative class projects. Diigo apparently allows students to share and manage bibliographies as well. I'm not sure how useful that would be, since UST already has a darn good tool for bookmarking online research and creating bibliographies (I think I'll introduce that in another blog posting).
Still, managing information is, I think, the first step for using technology in the classroom. In fact, as instructor I could see myself using a tool like this to help me manage and share different articles, photos, websites and so forth that contribute to whatever text or topic we are discussing in class. Finally, it's my experience that students in general do not seek out information online. Or, at least they are not proactive in doing so for MY class! I'll email to my students links to useful information and websites, especially online style manuals, and find that students rarely make use of that information. I can barely get my students to use the Blackboard component of my class. I think incorporating something like Diigo into the structure of my class would compell students to go OUT there and find information for themselves, to explore, and to become more self-directed in their learning. It would be especially useful, perhaps, to get a computer classroom and spend class time collecting information and working with a management system like Diigo so I can additionally assist students in being critical selectors of information. With so much information available, how does one determine what is the BEST information to use, what is academically solid and what is biased or misleading? These are the kinds of questions that a Diigo component may help address, since this is an increasingly important skill that directly ties to the critical analysis goal of my English courses. In that way Diigo can both enhance students' critical skills as well as giving them a fun tool to complete future assignments.
I watched the Diigo tour, which gives a pretty thorough overview of how Diigo works. I'll mention some of what I feel are the most useful features within the three main functions of Diigo (research, share, and collaborate):
Research:
* You can annotate and/or highlight websites, documents, etc. and those annotations will be saved. This is a HUGE benefit, at least for me. I find myself tied to paper simply because I want my notes and highlighting. If I can do the same thing to online documents, that frees me from paper and makes it easier to share information. I think students will find it just as useful.
* You can tag and organize information you've uploaded. Again, very helpful.
* You can create reports or slideshows based on the websites, photos, documents that you've bookmarked or uploaded. I'm not entirely sure how useful this would be, but it may prove helpful during basic student presentations or if I want to share something without doing, for instance, a whole PowerPoint. It seems like it would be most useful when sharing images.
Share:
* Diigo has different privacy settings and options for sharing information. Some ways to share include an RSS feed, sharing a "collection" of material, or sharing via widgets...and I'm not sure what that means.
* Diigo has a "follow" feature that, in the demonstration, looks a great deal like Twitter, where a group of users (like a class) could follow each other and receive updates. I'm not sure if users can send each other messages this way, like questions. If so, this would be a really handy feature.
* You can also share with non-Diigo users via an annotated link.
Collaborate:
* Collaboration looks easy...you can set up groups, and group members can make comments on each others' materials and even have threaded discussions about the group materials.
Remaining questions....
*One thing I did not see was a way to determine which group members are contributing and how often. I'm assuming this is a feature...it seems like it would be necessary simply for the commentary and discussion features. However, if there is not a way to determine who is contributing what, it would be difficult for me as instructor to have an assessment based on this element of collaboration.
*I'm still curious to find out how Diigo interacts with, for instance, a wiki tool or even Power Point or some other presentation software. I'm also still thinking about how this tool could be used in the context of producing a formal research paper. There is a bibliography tool, but it was not demonstrated. Also, might this be something I could incorporate on my own into a type of "media used" bibliography? In short, how can Diigo be used to create a final project? And how can I use Diigo as a tool to increase and document students' skills in selective, critical research?
Diigo is FREE...so I just signed up. This coming week I'm going to practice using Diigo for a sample assignment in my poetry unit, and I'll post an update with my experiences and recommendations!
