SNC in School

SNC's in schools, which I had innitial thought of as being merely the MySpace and Facebook type pages includes much more than that. My latest reading, about uses for SNC's in schools, brings with it more ideas that can be incorporated to take advantage of the skills that the students have. From the library to the math class, the school newspaper to parental communications, there are concepts out there that are worthy of further exploration. Take a quick read of the above link and see what you think.
On another note, a colleague found out about the Blog Learning Contract from Net K-12....and found it interesting. It lead to quite a conversation, ranging from what I intended to some of the risks to the likely hood of our school OK'ing the idea. At any rate, it should be interesting. Most likely there will be more on that later.

Humans Conquering the Solar System

I just hit this article and had a mixed thoughts about it. Terraforming Mars and later other planets is the idea. The author discusses the fact that we have been terraforming here for millenia and will have to do the same, starting on Mars, which isn't too far from being somewhat habitable. The science behind this is wonderful, but the arrogance of some in the human race is a little scary. There will be issues that arise as humans become a spacefaring species. We have enough political issues over boundaries...what will we have when there are multiple planets involved. Would it be like the great days of exploration when brave men drove their men on to new things, planted flags and claimed the land for their king?
Somehow, it does sound interesting, but it's fairly obvious which countries would have an advantage in this realm. Could we be moving back to a future of colonialism?...then into a skirmishes over boundaries, taxation, and revolution? Imagine watching that develop as you compare the history of the U.S. Interesting and scary.
One can only hope that those in power will have learned from history, so it doesn't have to be repeated. BUT, imagine the possibilities...

Podcasting

I'm still looking for the best uses of podcasts and trying to find a reason to use them, when the video component is so useful, and with high speed connections, and massive storage capabilities it only makes sense.
I do like the idea of students creating their own cast and then placing the audio into a presentation, or screen casting. Or, maybe having them add a cast to the class wiki that verbalizes the events of the class that day, maybe creating an audio version of our text and trying to help some of our lower readers that way. There are some interesting uses for this technology and I have to adjust and try new things. That's really what it boils down to.

While looking for uses, I have found some pages that should be useful.
http://podcasts.yahoo.com/
-general stuff, may have uses in a variety of class settings
http://www.podcast.net/
-more general stuff
http://epnweb.org/
- more education based than the first two offerings with separate sections for the different curricula

First Wiki

Here is the START of a wiki that I'm considering trying to use with my students in the next school year. I have the basic divisions started and will see how it develops throughout the months to follow. It's really an easy thing to do so far, but I have lots to learn. Check out the Team Viking wiki.

Wikis for Me

I found a free wiki-building web page that seems easy, watch the tutorial, basic and FREE. Free is the good part. Paying a few bucks a month gets you more stuff, but for starters this seems pretty good. I'll try making one for my classes next year and see how it works. More on that later.

Fun In Space - Zero Gravity

Fun in near zero G...who says science can't be fun

More Space

I found a great weightless video on YouTube. Other than some fun with a cat, it shows a lot of what weightlessness is like. I'd been looking for some short clips to show my students about what it's like on the ISS. Some might be a little upset by the cat experiment, but I laughed any way. Should be good to use next year!
Wahoo...maybe I'll get to liking YouTube too!