My Experience With Some New Tools
In the first session of my seminar 'New Media in Foreign Language
Education' we were introduced to three internet tools which can assist
us in organizing, structuring and presenting content, when we use the
computer.
The first tool is a social bookmarking service which is called del.ici.ous. I've never heard of social bookmarking services before, but after getting to know it a little bit better, I can imagine to keep on using it even after passing the course. The advantage of a social bookmarking service is that you can store your bookmarks online on a server, which means that they can be used on every computer you are working with. Furthermore, delicious gives you the possibility to tag your bookmarks when they are stored in a databank. This simple fact guarantees that every bookmark can be relocated in case the user wants to use it. Though I really appreciate the possibility that bookmarks can be shared with all members to create networks, I don't see the point to call it 'social', because this would mean, that there is a feature to comment on bookmarks, other users stored in their archives or to have a chat function. This function does not exist. Nevertheless, I can recommend to use the delicious bookmarking service, if you need to work with different websites. On the right hand you can see my delicious rss-feed.
The first tool is a social bookmarking service which is called del.ici.ous. I've never heard of social bookmarking services before, but after getting to know it a little bit better, I can imagine to keep on using it even after passing the course. The advantage of a social bookmarking service is that you can store your bookmarks online on a server, which means that they can be used on every computer you are working with. Furthermore, delicious gives you the possibility to tag your bookmarks when they are stored in a databank. This simple fact guarantees that every bookmark can be relocated in case the user wants to use it. Though I really appreciate the possibility that bookmarks can be shared with all members to create networks, I don't see the point to call it 'social', because this would mean, that there is a feature to comment on bookmarks, other users stored in their archives or to have a chat function. This function does not exist. Nevertheless, I can recommend to use the delicious bookmarking service, if you need to work with different websites. On the right hand you can see my delicious rss-feed.
The second tool, which was also new to me, is called netvibes.
Netvibes enables you to set up your personal learning environment on
one screen. With netvibes a personal start page can be created which
provides the users with the latest news or current changes in blogs or
social networks, such as facebook. You can subscribe to rss-feeds, make
yourself a schedule or keep short notes to remind you to work on
different projects. I think netvibes might be a practical tool for users
who can overcome the temptation of spending too much time with fun
thinks on the internet. Because of the fact that netvibes offers every
user his or her favourite internet tools on one website, it might be
really hard to get your work started. At the moment, I don't consider to
use netvibes after the course has finished, because I'd would never get
my work done. Furthermore I can't see a great advantage in linking
numerous favourite internet applications on one website, because in most
cases I just need to get news from one or two channels.
The third tool, we were introduced to is weebly, on the basis of which I'm creating my E-Portfolio. I think in times of electronic communication, it is necessary that everybody is familiar with simple tools to create web content. Weebly is really simple in use, because it works without any knowledge of html, though it is possible to modify your blog in changing its html code. Weebly works like a basic picture software via drag and drop. It offers the user many possibilities for an individual design. Every user, who has the ability to use the internet, can use weebly. The web tool is extremely well structured and offers additional help for users who are not sure which things should be included in a blog or website. I consider weebly as a tool which can also be used in school. Even with younger pupils it is no problem to create a class blog or to document a field trip or a project.
Last but not least, I'd like to mention wordle which is a tool to create word clouds. The only thing that has to be done is to insert a particular text. Wordle takes out the most frequent appearing words and creates a word cloud. This tool can be used in literature classes very impressively. The teacher creates a word cloud using the text of a novel e.g., which will be read in class. It is now the pupil’s task to speculate about the content of the novel with the help of the most common words. This is a really good pre-reading task that doesn’t need a lot preparation time and can be really fun for the pupils, because they can be creative in inventing stories. Here you can see how a possible word cloud could look like. You can modify it in terms of colour, style, typeface and number of appearing words.
The third tool, we were introduced to is weebly, on the basis of which I'm creating my E-Portfolio. I think in times of electronic communication, it is necessary that everybody is familiar with simple tools to create web content. Weebly is really simple in use, because it works without any knowledge of html, though it is possible to modify your blog in changing its html code. Weebly works like a basic picture software via drag and drop. It offers the user many possibilities for an individual design. Every user, who has the ability to use the internet, can use weebly. The web tool is extremely well structured and offers additional help for users who are not sure which things should be included in a blog or website. I consider weebly as a tool which can also be used in school. Even with younger pupils it is no problem to create a class blog or to document a field trip or a project.
Last but not least, I'd like to mention wordle which is a tool to create word clouds. The only thing that has to be done is to insert a particular text. Wordle takes out the most frequent appearing words and creates a word cloud. This tool can be used in literature classes very impressively. The teacher creates a word cloud using the text of a novel e.g., which will be read in class. It is now the pupil’s task to speculate about the content of the novel with the help of the most common words. This is a really good pre-reading task that doesn’t need a lot preparation time and can be really fun for the pupils, because they can be creative in inventing stories. Here you can see how a possible word cloud could look like. You can modify it in terms of colour, style, typeface and number of appearing words.
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