So, this came across my tweetdeck today:
http://sites.google.com/site/goomoodleikiog/Home
It outlines in very specific terms one way of integrating Google Docs,
Moodle, Wikis and Blogs. I say very specific because one of the
general hallmarks of the 2.0 version of teachers is that we tend to
all be pretty good at explaining things in vague terms for others and
specific terms for our students. We tend to be able to project a
vision to the outside world and not be able to back it up with the
specific ways of getting there, the ways that we got there in our own
situations.
The videos at this space are concrete (in-progress examples of just
how a classroom can run). The pedagogy page is a brilliant explanation
of how all of these tools should fit together, and it may be one of
the first coherent things I have seen that isn’t just a list of tools.
However the real reason for this post is not to talk about the site
itself, but rather the name. Goomoodlewikiog, although a mouthful, is
specific in terms of its purpose. It projects exactly what it aims to:
a collection of interrelated tools.
I believe that we should always be intentional in naming things that
we want to be associated with. We should always frame our
conversations in the terms that we want to be speaking about on a
daily basis. And although I’m not sure that I’m going to be using
Goomoodleikiog on a daily basis from now on, I am glad that someone
is.
My question is: what other terms do I need to make more concrete? When
is it time to drop Web 2.0 and start talking with language that
actually means something?
Goomoodleikiog: Naming things is important
Author: Ben Wilkoff
Ben, Thank you so much for your kind words. Heidi and I had a lot of fun working on the videos and the site. I think you ask a good question about making terms concrete. We chose our name because it was a mouthful, caught your attention and was made up of what we wanted to say. One of my frustrations is just what you mentioned “We tend to be able to project a vision to the outside world and not be able to back it up with the
specific ways of getting there, the ways that we got there in our own situations.” I think seeing how others got to their final product is part of making things concrete. When I know someone’s process I can look at it and more easily see how I can adapt it to my classroom or my students.
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This is great! It’s often hard to find examples of how someone has “put it all together”. Will Richardson also recently posted a great concrete example of a school in Australia using online social learning. I plan on looking at both of these resources more in depth to put something together that will work for my class next year.