#22 Week 9 Ebooks and audiobooks

What a great resource this was. I have used ebooks, but had no idea of the number of collections that were available. It certainly opened my eyes to another way of linking up students, staff and others with books that might not be readily available. These are definitely sites I will share. This is an area that is underutilized in my school, so I will now need to take the time to develop an action plan to reach this audience.
I often refer people to the regional library collection, and they have had great success there. So this is another resource for people to explore. I am always amazed at what one can find on the Internet.
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#21 Week 8 Podcasts

There is an amazing number of podcasts available. The site EPN Educational Podcast Network had all kinds of amazing entries. It is impressive, and makes me want to try this in the future at our school.
I happened to be reading the book The Educator's Podcast Guide by Bard Williams so I decided to try some of their sites.
One site now charges a fee. I thought that was interesting. I found two school sites that were very interesting.
www.tclauset.org/wpa/
This is the Hanes Middle School in North Carolina. Truly impressive what they have done.
I also located Mabry Online.org Podcast Central
p://mabryonline.org/podcasts/
This is a school that really understands and embraces podcasts as a learning experience for students. Another impressive site.
I wanted to look up Grammar Girl but ran out of time. Another interesting idea that will need some more exploration.
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#20 Week 8 YouTube

I was unable to access YouTube from my home computer, and was blocked at school. However, this is one area I have had some experience with, and have seen the potential. Students love video, and if done correctly making a video and posting it on YouTube could be a worthwhile experience. But it would need to be structured well, and have assessments and rubrics along the way as a class.
There is an issue that I am reading and hearing about a lot lately, and I think it's time that schools address the issue. I am also a member of our school's Tech Vertical Team, and I do think this issue will be brought up. Cell phones are everywhere, and what happens when students take a picture or create a video from things that happen in a class, and then post it on YouTube. Do schools have policies in place? What if someone posts a class video that might put others at risk? What are the guidelines, and how do we make sure that both students and staff members understand them.
There is a great new book called "Digital Citizenry" by Mike Ribble that deals with all of these issues. Whose responsibility is it to teach these ideas? I am planning to develop a curriculum this summer for students in Grades 6 and 7 in my school as I feel the issue is important. Students love video, and at the age of my students many believe everything they see. I have students in Grades 3-7. It's an important issue, and one I feel we all probably need to pay attention to.
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