What is Web 2.0?
Simply put, Web 2.0 is any website that fosters sharing and collaboration amongst people. The software is completely online and is available to anyone with access to the Internet. People have been using Web 2.0 tools without really knowing that they are Web 2.0 tools. Some examples of these are blogs, wikis, podcasts, and social networking.
The term “Web 2.0” started with Tim O’Reilly of O’Reilly Media. At a Web 2.0 conference in 2004, the term was coined to describe the way that people change and use the Internet. Despite its use in everyday life, many people still disagree about what Web 2.0 really is. In response to this argument, O’Reilly Media created a page on their site that really explains what Web 2.0 is and how people are using it (http://oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html?page=1).
Blogs
A blog is a set of regularly updated entries by a group, organization, or an individual. These entries can be personal in nature, updating readers on the goings-on in that individual’s life, or they can be regular commentary updating readers about subjects important to that group or organization. Most blogs feature text as the main way to communicate to readers; however, some blogs feature music, pictures, and video.
Most bloggers start out using blog sites such as Blogger (www.blogger.com); however, these sites are probably not appropriate for classroom use (although teachers are more than welcome to use these sites if they want) because these two sites are used by all kinds of bloggers, including those who write adult material. Thus, students would have access to material that would be inappropriate for the classroom if they just happened to come across the material. Blogs have been designed for the classroom in mind, including Class Blogmeister (http://classblogmeister.com). Teachers have control over the material that students post, and the site actually requires that teachers supervise such material (Solomon and Schrum, 2007).
The possibilities for blogs in the classroom are endless. English teachers, for example, can have their students write reaction blogs to the literature that they read. A teacher can assign a poem, short story, or chapter in a novel to be read as homework. The student can write his thoughts or any questions that he may have had about the literature. The students can follow each other’s blogs and make comments, and if the blogger had questions, answer those questions and add clarification. Those students who don’t necessarily like talking in class now have the ability to share their thoughts without having to speak aloud in class. By using this technique, teachers can open up the class period for discussion rather than wasting the time by reading the literature in class.
Wikis
A wiki is a website that allows its readers to collaborate, share, edit, and revise information on that website at any time. Wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org) is probably the most well known wiki on the Internet. Readers and collaborators of Wikipedia can update the articles at any time. If one reader notices that the information is incorrect or out-of-date, he can change that information so that it is correct and/or up-to-date.
The possibilities for wikis in the classroom are endless as well. Many teachers have their students create portfolios that contain the assignments that the students have completed and perfected over the course of a semester or year. Instead of turning in a hard-copy portfolio, students can now turn in electronic portfolios with the help of wikis.
Podcasts
A podcast is a digital media file that is released through web syndication. The term is been made famous by iTunes (www.apple.com/itunes). Thousands of podcasts on thousands of different subjects are released daily through iTunes for free. Anyone who has access to a computer, a microphone, and the Internet can create a podcast.
In addition to blogs and wikis, podcasts offer endless educational possibilities. A teacher can have her students create podcasts throughout the course. For example, the English teacher can have her students create one podcast per unit of the course. This podcast can cover almost any subject within the unit. So one student could create a podcast that covers the vocabulary terms from that unit, and another student could create a podcast that covers a particular poem from that unit, and both students would receive credit for the podcast assignment.
Social Networking
Social networking sites are those websites that promote online communities and friendship through common shared interests. The most famous social networking sites are Facebook (www.facebook.com) and MySpace (www.myspace.com). Most school systems have blocked social networking sites because students tend to go to these sites and waste time when they should be working on school-related assignments.
Social networking sites may not have the educational possibilities that blogs, wikis, and podcasts have, but they do have some value. Some educators who have joined Facebook use the site to network with other educators. These teachers and administrators join groups for educators and share education-related links that their peers may use in their classrooms.
Those educators who are looking to use social networking in their classrooms will want to seek sites that are designed for the classroom, such as Imeem (http://imeem.com) or Whyville (www.whyville.com). These two sites are more responsible than more popular social networking sites (Solomon and Schrum, 2007).
Twitter (www.twitter.com) can be categorized under two Web 2.0 headings. It is both a microblogging site and a social networking site. Twitter is a microblogging site because its blog entries cannot exceed 140 characters (including spaces), and it is a social networking site because users can follow other individuals and organizations that interest them.
Like the Web 2.0 tools mentioned above, Twitter has many educational possibilities. If a teacher has one of those days where she is lecturing, she can stop her lecture every 10, 15, or 20 minutes and have her students write a few sentences about what they learned on Twitter within 5 minutes. Once those five minutes are over, the teacher can move forward with her lecture and stop again in 10, 15, or 20 minutes. The students have to compress their information, since they can only submit 140 characters. The learning becomes theirs because the students have to determine what was the most important information out of that 10-20 minute lecture and send that in within those few minutes. If the students follow any of their classmates, then they have a great study guide for an upcoming test, since they will have their tweets and the tweets of their classmates.
Many school systems have Twitter blocked for the same reasons that they have blocked other social networking sites. Most of the tweets sent in by users are of no interest to other users, anyway. A simple web search of microblogging sites at a public school may find some safer alternatives to Twitter, especially for those educators who are worried about the implications from school officials and parents. However, there are educators who find value in using Twitter in the classroom because it “promotes writing as a fun activity” and it gives students “a chance to record their cognitive trails and … use them to reflect on their work” (Grosseck and Holotescu, 2008).
References
Grosseck, G., and Holotescu, C. (2008). Can we use Twitter for educational activities? In Proceedings of The 4th Annual International Scientific Conference eLSE “eLearning and Software for Education”. Bucharest, Romania.
O’Reilly, T. (2005, September 30). What is web 2.0? Design patterns and business models for the next generation of software. Retrieved from http://oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html?page=1
Solomon, G., and Schrum, L. Web 2.0: New tools, new schools. Eugene, OR: International Society for Technology in Education.
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