Friday, July 13, 2012


Blog:  Clouducation by Anthony VonBank (http://clouducation.wordpress.com/)

I recently discovered this blogger, Anthony VonBank, from a tweet posted by an educator I follow on Twitter.  When reading through this blog, I became really excited to once again see  what I am learning as a pre-service educator is currently reflected in the field.  In the class for which I am maintaining my first blog (this blog to be exact) we have been discussing Twitter and social media accounts as avenues of professional learning and global collaboration.  There was a quote mentioned by Nigel Cameron on VonBank’s blog that stated, “Twitter [is] a reciprocal knowledge engine.”  I have to agree. 

I resisted and scoffed at the idea of Twitter thinking it was just a social “status” update tool for statements such as, “I’m a the grocery store picking up milk.”  I saw no value in such uses.  However, now that I have set up my own Twitter account and have started to follow others within the field of education, I can see some of its great uses within a professional network. 

I can see how the cycle of knowledge continues to be perpetuated by the sharing that takes place within this forum.  HOW FABULOUS!  I have learned and expanded my knowledge and understanding of theories immensely recently from reading the tweets of fellow educators and exploring the re-tweeted quotes, reading the referenced articles, linked blogs, online documents shared, and Live Binders ideas shared.  It is fantastic!  Twitter, I can see now, is a great avenue for staying current, which is especially important for educators. 

We have also been learning about Google apps and cloud computing and ways to encourage 21st Century skill building with our students in my computer and technology class.  Recently this week we were linked to articles about the pros and cons of PowerPoint.  On VonBank’s blog I found a post titled, “Death by PowerPoint vs. Life with Google Docs.”  This post added to the ideas I’ve been reading including how with Google Docs you avoid the overuse of reading paragraphs from the PowerPoint posts.  One commenter of this post stated how they tried the recommended Google image slides and had his students use that tool as a photo essay project.  It worked well for his class. 

In my technology class we have been talking about flipped classrooms particularly (and there is a blog post about that as well).  Other similar topics include programs such as Animoto and social bookmarking programs like Diigo.  This blogger references and provides links to these educational tools.  It was great to see these topics reinforced in the “real world.”  What I particularly find interesting are the links from this blog to other blogs and online learning resources.  This is like a “bouncing off point” from which even further discussions, learning, and potential collaboration can take place. 

I’m still new to the digital universe in the sense of a collaborative educator perspective.  I used to only use it for personal research and shopping.  But what I’m learning about is wonderful:   webinars, online training/learning/sharing, and the potential for such immense access to current knowledge.  It’s almost causing my brain to overload.  I feel like a “kid in a candy store;”  I want to access it all!   I am genuinely excited at the new possibilities this brings. 

A quote shared on this blog with which I will end my post is “Be a progressive educator and constantly improve your practice.”  With fellow bloggers, tweeters, and Diigo and Google app users, I feel like that became a little easier.   

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