easily save sites with Diigo
( www.diigo.com/learn_more).
edmoto ( www.edmodo.com) is a classroom blog
where students can practice tagging and teachers
can connect with each other to find resources.
the tags that are connected to the time
period. For the suffrage documents,
that would be the 1900s tag.
If I want to create a certain type
of learning experience, I can search
by the type of lesson I want because
I have tagged the documents with
PrimarySources and Inquiry.
Tagging with Students
Many educational sites offer great opportunities for your students to practice tagging. Edmodo is a classroom
blog that uses tags as a way to access
files and activities on the site. Use it to
teach your students how to effectively
identify what is important in a post.
After students write their blog posts,
respond to a question, or upload documents, they can create tags that identify the assignment, the date, or what is
significant about it. With practice, students learn how to gain control over
what they post and see how others
choose tags for their work. They can
add tags to what others post according
to what they see as significant.
Diigo allows teachers to create folders where students can share Web resources they find. After identifying an
important site, students can tag it with
the main topics of the class or a specific area of research, allowing them to
share what they saw as important with
others. They will sharpen their skills
at recognizing what is significant and
increase their understanding from the
online collaboration with their peers.
Students also use Diigo to store
their collections of websites for their
research. My students are currently
learning about spices involved in the
spice trade. They each research a spice,
its origins, and traditional and current uses. Then they tag the articles
that they find so they can share them
with their classmates. They also add
comments about the website to further
identify what information can be found
there. By tagging and commenting, my
students are helping each other with
their research and learning to become
more effective digital collaborators.
Tagging is about identifying significance for yourself and for those with
whom you are collaborating. It is a
critical tool to navigate the wealth of
information available in the Web 2.0
world. There is so much to be gained
by interacting with educators around
the world that we must learn how
to benefit from it without becoming
overwhelmed and exhausted. It is also
a critical tool for students to learn, so
that they can effectively engage and
collaborate with their teachers and
other students.
—Hadley J. Ferguson is a middle school history
teacher at Springside School in Philadelphia. She
is also the faculty representative to the Student
Technology Board. Read her blog, Middle School
Matrix, at www.hadleyjf.wordpress.com.
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