Click to Learn

Untitled

2011-04-27T06:04:00.001-03:00

http://www.sinensix.net/templates/themza_j15_20/site.html

Wikis as Porffolios

2011-02-19T17:42:00.001-02:00

ctjenglish / Bruno Yuiti and Leticia via kwout

I have just started using a wiki with my Teens 1 course. Students are between 10 to 12 years old. I have used wikis with young learners before and everytime I do it, I am always surprised at their creativity and their enthusiasm in owing a virtual space. I generally create accounts for them in Pbworks. I enter their names and the site generates usernames and passwords. They really have fun with the passwords assigned to them (always a combination of the name of an animal and a number followed by a fruit,for example, snake4mango. Everytime I do this, I get the chance to teach them English and some basic digital skills. I also try to teach them something about design. Sometimes they use pictures that are too large and I give feedback saying that smaller pictures make scrolling a bit easier and content more visible. They are just beginning and they loved when I browse their recently created pages in the data show in our class. I am realy looking forward to what will come out of this round of digital experience.

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My Photos - The Semester Begins (25)

2011-02-07T17:25:00.001-02:00

via facebook.com

Thinking about the new semester and my plans for the students I still do not know. We teachers always have the table set and lots of places in our minds and hearts, don't we?. This year, my heart and mind are set on working on more collaborative tasks. I will set work on social networking aside because the groups I will get have basic language level. Besides that, social networking websites always start as free and later start charging. This has proven to be a bit disappointing to me. So, I will do more work with blogs and wikis. I have blogs that are not updated and will revive them for my new groups. Wikis are also a good way to work with basic levels because they allow us to create pages for students and work like a portfolio to keep their work.
I will be sharing my work here using this quoting feature.

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From darkness to a sparkling connected ELT community

2010-11-05T15:09:00.005-02:00

From darkness to a sparkling connected ELT community Brasilia BRAZ-TESOL Key note by Claudio Azevedo blogger of movie segments had some knowledge about computers but was only absorbing information. He had the feeling he was a blood sucker. He wanted to learn about technology to share what he knew All of us had to adapt to technology : VCR, cassette players. Miracles do not happen. You have to take action. You cannot wait for the institution. Once you start doing something you start learning A blog about what? Blog about what you do best. You should be committed to provide information, be aware of trends, checking visitors, being responsible/accountable for your readers. Recognition
First from colleagues and later from a wider community. Recognition is what motivates us.

Sent from my iPhone

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More Discoveries

2010-08-29T04:35:00.001-03:00

Click to see the full gallery on Posterous:

http://iphone-mpxj.posterous.com/more-discoveries

Sent from my iPhone

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Serendipity

2010-08-28T21:45:00.001-03:00

This week my laptop crashed again. I really need to get a new one. This did cause some troubles because I am a bit connected and dependent on it (not addicted). When this happens, I generally engage in other activities and find a chance to unwind a bit. I always have backups of lesson plans in external drive, so I always manage to go on without a connection. However, what amazes me is how can always maintain his/her connectivity no matter what happens. I feel that we are conneted to the web and not to the gadgets we use. The web is like an entity that is everywhere. It is always available and ready. Just last week, after some futile resistance and skepticism, I finally gave myself an I-Phone. As i write this post on this very gadget, i cannot help thinking on its unintended consequences, on the it is being by people that has not being anticipated by its creators. I really the idea of antropophagy in technology (humans assimilating technology and using in a sustainable benign and less consumerist way, like cell phones that used in for making money transfers without going through the banking system). In a week i am not using I-Phone as cell phone anymore (I removed the chip and put it back on my old cellphone because my carrier was eating way my credits even i belied i was connected to a wireless network at home or at work)and

Sent from my iPhone

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Social Networking for Classroom

2010-08-01T15:57:00.001-03:00

It's been already some time I have been ruminating about using social networking in class. Since Ning start charging for its services, I have been searching around for a replacement. Right now I am using grou.ps. This one has proven to be better than ning in many ways. I have set up some communities with my groups and I have been playing around with it. Just today I found out about schoology (a nice name for a service like this) through my twitter network and decided to share their demo video with my blog readers. I am happy that there are so many free alternatives to ning. I will sure try this one with a group and see how it works.

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#bratelsol10 Tools and Technologies for Forming Communities (Michael Coghlan)

2010-07-20T10:19:00.001-03:00

Right now, I am attending Michael Coghlan presentation at Braz- Tesol and instead of threads on twitter, I have decided to post a summary here. Hope you all like it.
The appeal of online communities is that it allows you to connect with people you already know, people you share similar interests, people you already know via a different medium, and you meet new people.
Online communities can also be used for professional development, connecting remote learners, and modeling a new way of learning for the 21st century (lifelong learning or networked learning).
A result of the constant flow of information is that you need a gang to manage it. People spread information using so many different media that at the end of this presentation there will be a flood of posts that a gang is needed to filter and manage the information.
One of Mike's gang is the Webheads in Action (a community of internet enthusiasts that uses technology for teaching and learning). The webheads is a community that exists because of technology.
Before my battery dies, I will stop here and continue updates on twitter

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Celebrating Social Media Day

2010-06-30T06:08:00.002-03:00

Mashable Meetup: Brasília, Brazil | Jun 30 - Meetup.com via kwout

Today is social media day and 500 cities around the world are celebrating it. I have just checked the list and saw that Brasilia (the city I live in) is one of them. It is for sure a day to celebrate because it has to do with the development of tools that allowed users to move from passive consumers to producers of web content. As a language teacher and a citizen, I am happy to see the possibilities it creates for my classes when my students and I have moved beyond using the web to do treasure hunts. Now we can create our own treasures and share them with the world. The media becoming social is a bit like the fall of the Bastille of official, filtered, censored web. Before blogs, you tube, social networking, and so many other possibilities of publishing content, one could only have his or her voice heard online if he or she possessed very advanced computer skills. The so called social web has democratized the cyberspace allowing anyone to share their ideas in any way they choose with the advantage of getting feedback. Social media transformed the one way approach to publishing into a multi party conversation. The reasons why we should celebrate social media are many. I myself just wish some more people join us, social media fans, to make the cyber and the real world a better place.

José Antônio

http://joseantoniook.blogspot.com

http://advanced4b.ning.com

http://advanced5b.ning.com

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To tweet or not to tweet

2010-06-26T23:16:00.004-03:00

Twitter / Home via kwout

Twitter has recently reached widespread fame and usage. It seems that everyone is twittering now. When I listen to the news on my car radio on my commute to work I hear the news anchor announcing the station's twitter url. Some banks advertise their twitter accounts as way of getting feedback from their clients. In class, I have observed that most of my students are connected to twitter. However, at the same time I see how people use twitter and I kind of understand why some object joining it and dismiss it as a useless tool, or just passing fad that will go away. They might be right, but while the hype lasts, some of us can get the best it has to offer: its capabilities for sharing, getting news, and keep connected to your friends and updated on your interests.
Twitter is for me like my daily news. The difference is that I get the news every time I turn my computer on. Besides that, I also get updates while I am working on it. Some people claim it is overwhelming and distracting, but so is everything in life. We are always filtering information whenever we read newspapers or magazines, surf TV, radio channels or the web. Twitter is just the same. Besides being a source of daily/breaking news, it is also a way of sharing things I find on the web with the people that follow me. In this sense, it is a sharing button: a good way of spreading news other than sending an e-mail with a link to your friend without the need of a reply. Moreover, it is also a way of being ubiquitous (if this is possible) due to its integration features. Even in cyberspace, we cannot be everywhere, but twitter allows us to be in many places. I myself have connected my account to my posterous blog (which is connected to my blogger blog, tumblr, wordpress, and friendly feed), to simplybox and diigo (which allows people connected to my twitter see the things I bookmark), to facebook, and other services that I cannot recall right now or may feel a bit lazy to list them all (or might not want to make it boring for my readers). I see the later features as a good way to establish a reasonable online presence. To sum it up, in my opinion, twitter can be a great tool if it is used wisely.

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The toys I play with

2010-06-06T20:45:00.002-03:00

Cristo, Rio de Janeiro, Dec 2099, Rio 033 on Flickr - Photo Sharing! via kwout

I have just got my computer back from the repair shop. I have had this one for almost two years now and I still intend to keep it for some time. It amazing how paranoid computer technicians seem to be. The repair guy reconfigured my computer and blocked almost everything. So, while I was trying to get around all the barriers I now had, I kept thinking about how web 2.0 fanatics enjoy being around computers experimenting with tools. I had a great pleasure in reinstalling my firefox browser and all the add ons I use. My nephew, who is very smart when it comes to computers, always asks me why I have so much stuff on my toolbar. I really love quoting, twittering, bookmarking, and so on. So, I spent a big part of this evening trying to get all my add ons to work. Some of my colleagues get really upset when things do not work they way they wish with their computers, I do too, but I end up enjoying all the hassle that comes along with it. I guess computers are my toys and i really love playing with them. I think once we grow up we have to find new toys. Some people enjoy fishing, others enjoy watching soccer on TV or live. I love working with computers and sharing my discoveries.

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Learning with others

2010-05-20T11:15:00.001-03:00

http://kwout.com/quote/9xjgmv7g

I have joined Diigo a couple of years ago and it has helped me a lot. With Diigo I feel more connected to my interests because I follow lots of with whom I learn every single day. I always open my Diigo e-mail updates and bookmark items my e-friends have shared. Besides that, I am always sharing whatever I discover with my network of friends. I guess that at the beginning I had the usual difficulties everyone has, but I am persistent . Just now I learned some new things when I was trying to teach Lucia how to use Diigo (I never highligh, so I had to learn how to do it to teach her) . I have learned that on the web one never knows everything and we can always learn when sharing and teaching others. I really love the idea of offloading (storing knowledge on my friends) instead of downloading knowledge. So, I take it easy and do not try to learn everything. I just learn what I can and think I need. The rest, my friends learn for me and I learn something for them in return.

I confess, I have never used Diigo in the classroom. I think the studetns I usually have are too young for bookmarking. I guess that with a group of adults, this would be more meaningful. I would teach them how to work in Diigo and would then create a group for them to share there favorites. From my experiences adults just love to discover that can get rid of the endless list of favorites they have on their pc when they bookmard things the old way.

That is all, I guess.

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Reflection of the week

2010-05-12T05:36:00.001-03:00

I guess my students learn everywhere and they do it in many ways. They learn when I give them a conversation task to do, when they do a grammar based activity. They also learn while surfing the web, when they connect to peers and with their teachers.

The curriculum does not provide much tech-richness. What we teachers need to do is to adapt our curriculum to include some tech-rich ingredients.

I have been using the internet with my students mainly to create virtual classes. I try to create spaces where they can apply what they aready know to improve their language skills. Although, I am mostly happy with my results, I still feel I need to do something extra to empower them, to connect them better, to enhance their learning with these tools. I am still looking for ways of improving what I have been doing.

I guess what I am still trying to do is to turn my 21st classroom into a learning engine . I would say that this is the philosopher's stone I have been looking for. I am sure I will find it some day.

I guess that despite the barrier of time, I am engaging my students. I keep trying and I like what I see.

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- Ethevaldo Siqueira - The Demassification of Information Society

2010-03-03T12:07:00.002-03:00

via ethevaldo.com.br

This is a podcast in Portuguese. Something I like to listen when I am arriving at work (around 5 to 7 am) on weekdays. In this podcast Etevaldo Siqueira discusses the challenges involved in demassification of society in the information age predicted by Alvin Tofler. I think it is big challenge for us educators to transform our students into creators of critical content in the digital age we are living.
I totally agree with the parallel drawn by Tofler between the industrial revolution and the digital revolution in what concerns the massification of society.
Hope you enjoy listening and reading.

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BBC News - Mobile phones become smarter in 2010

2010-02-21T19:28:00.000-03:00

BBC News - Mobile phones become smarter in 2010

Just checking out a feature in Google Chrome called blog this. It is a nice way of quoting things from the web and posting them to your blog.
This one about mobile phones becoming smarter is really nice. I do follow with great enthusiasm all the developments in mobile phones. Nonetheless the one I use is still very basic. Phone bills and smart phones are still too expensive for me.

A quick guide to interactive YouTube videos (RT @russeltarr)

2010-02-04T09:05:00.002-02:00

Check out this website I found at classtools.net

I love using videos in class. One of my goals for this semester is start making some more videos myself. I am thinking of using puppets to deal with the issue of privacy and avoid exposing children.
I was really amazed when I found out about interactive you tube videos http://preview.tinyurl.com/mbpo3p. The article I am quoting from classtoos.net not only features some videos but also has a guide teaching you how to make them.
I hope you enjoy it.

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Twiducate socialnetworking for schools

2010-01-31T14:34:00.002-02:00

I have really enjoyed using social networking websites with my students. I first started using 21 Classes and had a nice experience with it. It had some limitations, though. One thing was the difficulty to embed other things into the pages. I liked to have all students in one front page from where they could access each other's blogs and explore the features they were so used to in their out of class social networks.
Next, I discovered ning. This one I have been using till today and I am planning to continue using this year. Ning is social networking at its best. Its features include forums, chat, blogs, photos, videos, integration with twitter, and some more. It is worth exploring.
Just yesterday I found out about twiducate on twitter (actually I think I had seen it before, but just yesterday I decided to give it a try). It seems simpler than the other ones and a bit more complete than twitter for what I wanted. I will have a group of beginner students and I really did not want to use ning to avoid overwhelming them with so many features. I also did not want to use a blog because it would be very teacher centered. So twiducate seems like a tool that is not the complex and will allow all students to interact in one place.
I posted this screencast to give those who might want to use it an idea of how it works. I hope it is helpful.

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Watching TV while surfing the web

2010-01-21T08:52:00.003-02:00

http://www.viewmy.tv/Index.aspx?srcid=3790

I really love multitasking. I guess once you discover the wonders of the Internet, you just cannot help. Something I also like doing is watching TV. I know that web TV is becoming a reality in the US, but some of the services are not available to other countries. I was really happy when I found out about viewmy.tv where you can watch TV programs from many countries around the world (such as this one where a storyteller entertains children with her story),

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2010-Horizon-Report.pdf (application/pdf Object)

2010-01-16T08:34:00.002-02:00

<html><

via nmc.org

The Horizon Report is an important report released each year on emerging technologies. It discusses trends and issues related to teaching and learning. It is really worth reading.

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Another Christmas Video

2009-12-24T14:41:00.001-02:00

http://bbljoy.com/n0z95

One of my contacts in Grouply shared this video card maker with the group. I decided to test it and found it really interesting. You can record and customize a message for different occasions. A problem I see is that it generates a link only and not an embedding code. I decided to post it to my posterous blog (which is connected other blogs) and see how it works. I am keeping my fingers crossed. Merry Christmas to you all and may 2010 be a happy and successful year.

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Season Greetings with Tokbox

2009-12-16T07:06:00.002-02:00

TokBox - Free Video Chat and Video Messaging

Gone are the days we sent real Christmas cards. I used to send many. I guess I just got too busy or too addicted to the web. Besides that, we also have to save the Amazon, don't we? I am in favor of lesser and lesser paper and more interaction. So, this is my message for the holidays. Hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year.

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How to do almost anything with Posterous (Using Posterous for Quoting)

2009-12-13T09:23:00.001-02:00

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How to do almost anything with Posterous
28 comments
By Martin Bryant on August 13, 2009

Online sharing and blogging service Posterous has been getting a lot of attention recently. The development team is adding features regularly and it’s fast becoming the best way to share content with all your different social services while also keeping it all in one place too. The best bit is you can do it all via email.
With so many ways to use Posterous it can be difficult to keep track of them all. Here we’ll take you through everything you need to know about it and suggest a range of ways you can use it to make your online life easier.
The basics

via thenextweb.com

I have been using posterous for a while and I am really amazed by how simple and useful it is. I have just discovered this blog post written by Martin Bryant talking about how many ways you can use this blog host and decided to quote it using the posterous bookmarking feature. I hope it is useful.

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McKinsey: What Matters: Using technology to improve workforce collaboration

2009-12-12T22:11:00.003-02:00

Knowledge workers fuel innovation and growth, yet the nature of knowledge work remains poorly understood—as do the ways to improve its effectiveness. The heart of what knowledge workers do on the job is collaborate, which in the broadest terms means they interact to solve problems, serve customers, engage with partners, and nurture new ideas. Technology and workflow processes support knowledge worker success and are increasingly sources of comparative differentiation. Those able to use new technologies to reshape how they work are finding significant productivity gains. This article shares our research on how technology can improve the quality and output of knowledge workers.

via whatmatters.mckinseydigital.com

An interesting article on the changes caused by the widespread use of technology. Using a posterous bookmark.

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Stupeflix for videos

2009-12-12T06:48:00.003-02:00

Watch the Teacher Stuff channel on Stupeflix.tv.

I am always amazed by the power of communities of practice. An e-friend of ours (Gilmar) posted a querry on our virtual community ( Learning With Computers ) asking for hints on video maker site. Some members (Ana Maria and Bob Palmer) suggested Stupeflix. I tested it and loved it. I created a channel called teacher stuff and seached the tag teaching on flickr and twitter and this was what I got. Nice, isn't it?

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Posting Everywhere

2009-12-11T07:22:00.002-02:00

One thing I like about posterous is its integration with other websites such as twitter, facebook, you tube, and other blog hosts (it is called autopost). This feature allows bloggers to post to lots of places. Being a tech freak I am, it makes me happy to see that I get to be a ubiquitous entity, a dream of most bloggers.

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EVO 2010 Sessions

2009-12-10T18:56:00.005-02:00

Electronic Village Online / Call_for_Participation2010 via kwout

EVO 2010 sessions begin next January. It is a great opportunity for learning about teaching with teachers from all over the world. The sessions are held online and are free of charge. It is a great chance for those who have never experienced e-learning first hand to see how fast one can learn using the web. Besides that, it is also a chance for sharing what you know about language learning and teaching. For a list of sessions to choose from check here

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A new videoblogging tool

2009-12-04T22:59:00.005-02:00

Vacations are a great thing, aren't they. Well, after working really hard correcting tests and and filling out forms, it is good to find some free time to explore the web. Check out this new video blogging tool I have come across. It is called Wink Ball. It looks promising. What do you think?

I know I could look and sound better. Everything for the sake of testing and playing.

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Something interesting

2009-12-04T20:14:00.003-02:00

BBC - Digital Revolution (Working Title) - Digital Revolution via kwout

The BBC is working o na documentary provisorily called "The Digital Revolution." I took a pick at some of the material and it looks really promising. There are interviews with ordinary people talking about what the web represents for them. The page also features interviews with iconic figure of the web 2.0 world. It is really worth checking and bookmarking to follow updates.

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The spirit of learning

2009-12-03T23:51:00.003-02:00

<br><div style='font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: left; width: 100%;'>By joseaokc | View this Toon at ToonDoo | Create your own Toon</div>

One thing that amazes me is our capacity to learn and also our barriers to do so. Many of us cannot learn for many reasons. The one I want to focus on briefly here, is the one related to time. Above is an image of a comic strip made in toondoo . I had already subscribed for an account and had never had the chance or time to learn how to use it. Today, training a colleague in the use of ICT, we manage to explore it together. Then, I thanked her for helping me learn how to use it. So, I kept myself wondering about how many times we learn something in order to teach other. I also thought about how good it is to learn things together.

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Posting compositions to blogs

2009-11-21T16:27:00.002-02:00

After sometime using the internet to help my students learn English, there are some things I have noticed that make me move to the blended learning path. One of the things that I saw was that as students use computers to write classroom assignments, they enhance their skills in computer usage. Before blogging in English, they do not know much about how to write a paragraph or even what to indent a paragraph is. Besides that, I have also realized that many of them continue using small letters for some words that should be capitalized. Many would say that the latter mistake is not related to computer use but to the way feedback on written work has been given, however, I think using a word processor makes the mistakes more visible. Finally, I have also realized that having students posting compositions on blogs make them more aware of readership and, as a consequence, they make an extra effort to improve their writing.

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Invitation to connect on LinkedIn

2009-11-19T16:59:00.001-02:00

Jose Antonio da Silva requested to add you as a connection on LinkedIn:

Arjun,

I'd like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.

- Jose Antonio

View invitation from Jose Antonio da Silva

DID YOU KNOW you can conduct a more credible and powerful reference check using LinkedIn?
Enter the company name and years of employment or the prospective employee to find their colleagues that are also in your network. This provides you with a more balanced set of feedback to evaluate that new hire.

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A Simple Song

2009-07-20T07:59:00.001-03:00

I have just found this video on You Tube. This is really a nice simple song.

Some days in the life of an educator

2009-07-16T20:07:00.002-03:00

I just love seeing the creativity of my students at its best. I always ask them to draw to illustrate our blogs. Today my colleague Silvia Caldas showed me Vuvox. I decided to try to learn more about it and created this presentation to honor my students.

Social Networks and The Green Revolution

2009-06-29T08:52:00.001-03:00

Iranian Election Protest
Originally uploaded by Skept

The events unfolding after the Iranian election called the world's attention to the power of social media. Everything started with an election that is said to have been rigged. The opposition to the Iranian government protested and protestants took the streets and traditional media was censored. What followed next was a flood of news from social networks. Iranians used twitter , facebook , and youtube to post videos and text updates about the protests and the violence that the government forces used to deal with it.
Some international news commentators said some Iranians did not even know that their posts or videos were being read and watched all over the word. So, for many of them it represented the discovery of a new way of voicing their protests, of informing the outside world of what is happening in their country. The power of uncensored, unfiltered information is just huge and it is sometimes difficult to understand why some educators still resist using social media to connect their students.

Where I am, where I am not

2009-06-21T19:00:00.001-03:00

My creation
Originally uploaded by Jose Antoniobsb

This is where I am now. It is where I spent most of my time when I am at home. I have chosen the mosaic to represent the chaotic nature of online presence. I know I am here but not always here. I am here and also at many other parallel universes. I guess the missing and the visible pieces represent these many possibilities of being at many places at one time.
I live by myself, so I guess I spend a lot of time in contact with people that are physically so distant. Sometimes connected to this people online, sometimes planning lesson for people I will see only tomorrow or the day after. It is funny to think of the many ways we are connected to people.

RSS: My Customized news

2009-06-15T10:40:00.002-03:00

http://www.netvibes.com/#General " title="Jose Antonio's Webspace (912)" width="537" height="227" style="border: none;" usemap="#map_c3ztbqs2" />

remember that a text book I used to teach English some years ago predicted the advent of customized newspapers. Thinking about RSS and how it has changed my life, I realized that RSS is just that: customized news. I am really a big fan of RSS because it allows me to visit all my favorite websites in one single page. Before using in (I use Netvibes more often than Google Reader), I remember that sometimes I forgot to visit some of my favorite websites. Now, I can always with just a click be updated on my customized news.

José Antônio

Posted via email from joseantoniook's posterous

Blogging in the classroom : A window of opportunity

2009-05-28T11:01:00.002-03:00

As all my readers know, I have been blogging for sometime. However, I would like to point out that I really do not know everything about blogging. As my dear friend Carla Arena said "There is no recipe on how to blog."

My first impressions when I discovered blogging were as if a window, better a large door, had oppened in front of my eyes. I saw and still see blogging as a great opportunity to engage in meaningful conversations with my students. Better still, I see it as an opportunity for them to have conversations among themselves and with people outside the classroom walls.
Bloging in class has allowed me to see how gifted my students are in many areas. It opened my eyes to see and discover things about them that I would not have discovered otherwise. And I am sure it gave them opportunities to make discoveries and to get skills that are useful for them in the present and that will certainly be very helpful in their future.

The picture I chose also shows, in my opinion, that blogging is also challenging. There are lots of possibilities, but sometimes they are not so easy to visualize. We have to open the door and walk the blogging path with our students. It is a big challenge to keep the conversation going. We teachers have to teach our students how to comment, we have to talk about the importance of replying to comments, and so on.

Posted via email from joseantoniook's posterous

The energy of a good class

2009-05-23T23:11:00.002-03:00

I was just thinking about the feelings or the sensation you have when you are giving a good class. I think the idea of flow explains this feeling. According to Csíkszentmihály “Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity” Being in class with your students is like dancing to a contagious rhythm . So connecting flow, music, the sensation I have during and after a good class, I decided to share this song that for me, at least, translates the sensation of flow.

Posted via email from joseantoniook's posterous

Social Bookmarking: Food for Thought

2009-05-21T23:08:00.002-03:00

- How can online social bookmarking help you?
I have been using social bookmarking for some time now. It has been helping me to deal with information overload. What I cannot read at the moment, I can always save for later. It has also helped me focus and prepare presentations I have done in teaching conferences. With social bookmarking, I always have access to what other people have bookmarked on a given suject.
- What are the advantages of having bookmarking as a social activity?
The advantages are many. One of them is having your favorites accesseble anywhere, anytime. So, social bookmarking gives you mobility. Besides that, you also draw on the power of the collective to find resources, to discover new things, and to be updated on any topic you might be interested in.
- How could Diigo be used in your classroom?
In classroom, I could create a Diigo group on a subject of common interest for students and have them share there favorites. Once favorites are shared, I could ask them to review the shared websites writing comments.
- What were your main difficulties to get started with socital bookmarking?
At the beginning, I had some problems understanding how to download the bookmarking toolbar. It also took me sometime to realize that I needed to download the toolbar in other computers if I wanted to continue bookmarking from somewhere else.
- Did you find any interesting resources shared by your peers? Please, add the link to it.
I really liked the link of a blog post shared by Carla called 6 reasons why people aren't commenting on your blog I liked it because it is really instructive to all of us bloggers. I really don't think that getting comments should be the main reason for blogging, but it is always good to know what kind of tone makes a pleasant blog.
Kindest regards

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The Power of Sharing

2009-05-17T09:16:00.001-03:00

http://kwout.com/quote/x2znpmv7

I have been using Diigo for a while. It has been helping me a lot in my attempts to discover and learn. Using social bookmarking has lots of advantages. One of the advantages of having bookmarking as a social activity is the possibility of sharing valuable resources I find online with friends. Before Diigo, whenever I found something interesting on the web I had to keep if for myself only (first because it could only be accessible from my home PC and second because I could not tell anyone about my favorites). Besides being able to share what I discover, I have the luck of having access to what my friends bookmard as they surf the web. Social bookmarking really draws on the powers of the collective and it is definetely fascinating.

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Leaping through the web

2009-04-20T20:13:00.005-03:00

I have spent this holiday giving some thought about learning on the web. In the last years, using web tools like tweeter and so many others, I feel like a frog leaping through the ecology of the web. There is always a discovery to be made, so many online conferences to attend. One has really to focus and forget ambitions of being so ubiquitous. It is not really possible to be present everywhere. However, it is always possible to leap and lurk in some of the events, the sites, the tools. This is exactly what I have been doing and this is what I wanted to say in this post.

Changing Education

2008-06-15T16:01:00.005-03:00

I was reading George Siemens blog comments on changes in education. He cites David Wiley that says that the changes needed for reform in education would require actions similar to the ones carried out by Luther against the Catholic Church. I like the image and I think it is great comparisom, but I think a softer approach might work or not. I guess, we educators are too idealistic and naïve sometimes. Let me share with you some ideas I had on the subject. I had a very interesting conversation with a friend yesterday [we have a face to face study group on Connectivism and the use of technology in education (yes face to face is cool too)]. We were talking about the needs of incorporating technology into teaching. We discussed where we thought resistance to do it stemmed from and how to overcome it (you know: the old beaten to death subject). She asked about the idea of the institution adopting a blogging platform to all the students like the one mentioned in a text we were discussing. First I said, it was a top down thing and I would not agree with it. Then we pondered the pros and cons and I agreed with her that it might give web 2.0 tools such as blogs and wikis more credibility and promote the use of tools by faculty and students. So my question is this: Is giving freedom to teachers to use web 2.0 tools enough? Shouldn’t institutions and people in position of power such as supervisors and coordinators learn about them and start using them to promote change/adoption?

The Power of Collaboration

2008-06-05T23:05:00.004-03:00

I have been busy these days taking a course for E-tutors with the British Council. The idea of the project is to train E-tutors to teach EFL teachers from public schools in Brazil. In the beginning, I thought I would not have time to take the course because I am almost at the end of the semester and have lots to do.
I took the plunge and I am glad I did it. It has been fantastic to see the amount of experience being exchanged and the interesting converstions we are having in the course.
One thing I have noticed in the course is how collaboration can make learning effective and how it can make group work easier and fun.Collaboration made it possible for me. It was collaboration that allowed to defy the laws of physics and strecht the time line. My group is using a wiki to discuss ideas and some other groups are doing the same. Our wiki work developed in a way that I had not predicted. I suggested the wiki and we started adding our ideas. Wikis a re really good for asynchronous collaboration. I started labeling posts with group participants' names. Then someone start using the highlight feature everytime he/she posted and the rest of the group followed suit. The result is colorful and reflect the power and diversity of collaboration. I think that when you give people the power to create content, to contribute the results are always impressive.

Astronauts and Hermit Crabs

2008-05-18T20:25:00.008-03:00

I was thinking a little about a presentation I am planning on mobile learning. Reading literature on the topic, I felt comfortable with the idea that mobility is less about tools and more about the learner. As a learner I am trying to think about how much paraphernalia I can leave behind. Long are gone the days I believed I needed to buy the latest technology to allow me to go ahead on my learning. The analogy of astronauts and hermit crabs (that I used to illustrate this post) was one I found while reading the article Nomads at Last published in The Economist. Thinking about my learning, I am more of a hermit crab now. I sill do not have a laptop and all I carry is my pen drive or my MP3 player wherever I go. I am now starting to upload some of my files to the net, so I do not have to rely so much on my home PC. Therefore the hermit crab figure fits me perfectly because although I am not carrying much, I cannot yet afford to be away from my desk top for too long. I still have to go back to the comfort of my old shell or have to stop to get connected to desk top PCs in other places. I see all this as kind of really anthropophagic in the way people adapt to their surroundings. I am lucky to have a PC available wherever I go, so being a hermit crab is not that bad and is the way I found to adapt to my ecological surroundings.I am also curious to discover what the next step to evolution beyond the hermit crab morphology should be.

The Power of Networks for Learning

2008-05-11T06:25:00.006-03:00

I have just finished reading an article on how networking can be important for a manager´s career. This article made me think about the importance of networking for educator´s professional development as George Siemens suggested. As a teacher I have learned a great deal from my networks, from being conneted. My network keeps me current of new tools, trends, courses, and events. The list is endless if one stops to think about all the information we get through Facebbok, Yahoo groups, aggregators, blogs, wikis, and so on. As educators, we sometimes get really busy teaching and planning our classes and neglect network building and connecting to our peers in the teaching field. By doing this, we many times stop learning. This last realization made me ask myself a very relevant question: If as educators we do not continue learning, what kind of message are we sending to our students?

Why do I blog?

2008-05-10T21:14:00.002-03:00

I started this pst inspired by Carla Arena's post with the same title. I guess I blog for conversations. First for a conversation with myself, next to promote conversation among my students. this conversation withmyself happens at the moment I am posting and then later when I look back at what I have said. I confess that after being a blogger for two and half years, I am sometimes amazed to discover how I used to think about blogging and other things just six months ago. I guess somehow, I am learning with myself, getting rid of preconceived ideas about learning and teaching. I am also learning with my students about diversity. I am always surprised to find out how creative they arel, how different from me and from one another. I would say, I really blog for conversations, for personal development, for insights.

Hello everyone

2008-05-04T17:25:00.004-03:00

My name is José Antônio da Silva (a very common name in Brazil). I am a Brazilian EFL teacher. I have been teaching for quite some time. I love teaching and being with my students is a great pleasure for me. I guess I was born to teach. I am not a perfect teacher, though. This is the reason why I love learning. Teaching and learning are my great passions. I have others, but they are too many to enumerate here. I am passionate about life and the discoveries we make while living. One of my passions is e-learning, online learning, etc. I know there are many names for it. I love using blogs and taking part in online events, such as chats, forums, blogs, conferences.
I will try to share in this blog some of the discoveries I will make in my learning journey.