Week One -- Welcome!

I'm so glad to welcome you all to the inaugural "Pierce Learning 2.0" program! I'm going to be finding more about what drew you to this program but my basic assumption is that you're interested in knowing more about the new technologies out there -- both for your own information and because you're curious about implications they might have for education and your teaching.


Here's what I'm planning/promising to offer with this program:

1. A fun exploration of the different technology tools. Because these many of these things are social in nature (that's why they're called "social networking" tools) I promise to internact in all of the tools I introduce and any others you find and want to try out.


2. Support as you work through the exercises. We're not going to meet as a group in person but I'll absoutely make house calls or talk you through something on the phone. I also want this group to help each other out.
   
3. To try and offer balance and options. You'll notice that we'll be playing a LOT with different Google products. They're doing a lot of cool stuff. But there's usually another (or many) other freely available technologies that will do the same or similar things. I don't care which things you use -- just that you try!

Here's what I can't promise:

1. A linear experience -- I'm going to do my best to create clear activities but there isn't exactly a logical progression so at times it might be MESSY. That's okay -- that's kind of what some of this stuff is about anyway -- slightly organized chaos.
   
2. Same experience for everyone -- You will bring different experiences to this program. Some of you may be used to reading blogs and others may still be fuzzy on what a blog is. Some of you will LOVE the photo sharing tools and others will find wikis more exciting. You might think some of things we try have no immediate application to your life. That's REALLY okay. You might never find a use for certain things -- sometimes it really is enough to "get it" even if it doesn't rock your world. Other things you won't need until some 6 months later and you find something we played with fits some new need perfectly. You might think some of it DUMB (i.e. Twitter boggles my mind). But that's all good.


3. To be an expert. I'm an enthusiast. But we're not trying to become experts - just active amateurs.

Here's what I want from you:

1. Spirit of Adventure - jump in and try it all


2. Interact with me and the other participants -- that's the fun of "social technologies".


3. Keep up -- I'm going to try and keep the activities realistic to our busy lives. I'll probably have an activity or two that I'd like everyone to try as well as some "extra credit" activities for people with the time and interest to go further. It will be more fun if we're all kind of doing the same stuff at the same time.


4. Keep in mind that we are using very social tools and think about how much personal information will be appropriate to share when you create a blog or upload photos. One of the perks will be creating this learning community and getting to know each other better but beware of sharing "too much information".


5. Give me lots and lots of feedback - you guys are the guinea pigs of this program. Tell me along of the way if I'm giving you too much or too little to do. Tell me if I make too many assumptions about what I'm asking you to do (i.e. I ask you to send me a screen shot and you have no idea what that means). This way, it will be a successful program for you and an even better program this Spring!

Whew!!! That's almost it for now!

Your First Task:

Make a "Comment" at the end of this post. Tell us why you're interested in participating in this program -- what you want to get out of this -- or something fun you did over the break.

• To do this you're going to need to sign up for a Google account (it will prompt you). That will lead perfectly into our next activity!
• If you don't already have a non-Pierce email account, think about getting one. Most things we'll play with will require logging in with an email address. You might find it easier to manage this stuff with a different account. If you don't have one, there are many places to get free ones. Hotmail, Gmail (Google's) and Yahoo's free accounts would all be swell.