CUIN 7376: Design of Online Educational Resources II - summer 2008

• Review of Last Week's Assignments
• Discussion of Final Semester Projects
• Video Chat with Shawn
• This Week's Class Topic: Social Bookmarking
• Additional Resources
• Assignments For Next Class

Review of Last Week's Assignments

• Who created the blog?
• What is its purpose?
• Who are the participants?
• What do you think are some of the characteristics of the blog that make it successful?
• Are there any characteristics of the blog that you feel could be used for a blog we might add to any of the websites we discussed in this week's class? Please elaborate.
• Is there anything else you would like to add about the blog (or blogs) you found?

Discussion of Final Semester Projects

We will discuss the projects that students will choose to participate in during this week's class.

1. An addition to the IT Program website that might be called "A Student's View of the IT Program" using Web 2.0 resources and adding a series of digital stories about Houston, UH, the COE and the IT Program  to the current IT Program website (http://www.coe.uh.edu/it).

2. Designing promotional CDs and DVDs for the IT Program to go along with item 1 above – and learning to use the new professional disc duplicator/printer we are buying this summer (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/459346-REG/Primera_63101_Bravo_SE_Disc_Publisher.html);

3. A plan for migrating our existing Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling website (http://coe.uh.edu/digitalstorytelling) to the new site that’s being developed (http://osx.soc.uh.edu/~ds) and adding more Web 2.0 elements to the new website.

4. A plan for reviving the Texas Journal of Distance Learning (http://www.txjdl.org), changing the name to the Texas Journal of DIGITAL Learning, and advertising the new journal to potential authors and readers.

Video Chat with Shawn

We will also try to conduct a video chat session with Shawn who is in San Francisco this week.

The video chat software we will be using is the free AIM Video IM 6.5 software from AOL.
http://www.aim.com/get_aim/win/latest_win.adp

AIM FAQ
http://www.aim.com/help_faq/using/win/video_im.adp

Video Conference Tutorial for AIM (PC) and iChat (Mac)
http://www.mvldesign.com/video_conference_tutorial.html
 

This Week's Class Topic: Social Bookmarking

Click on this link for information about Social Bookmarking
 

Additional Resources

• Social Software Timeline
  http://www.socialtext.net/m2m/index.cgi?social_software_timeline
   

• The Importance of Social Media
  http://www.socialmediaclub.org/2006/09/19/the-importance-of-social-media/
   

Beginners Guide to Social Media
http://blog.sitemost.com.au/2007/07/30/beginners-guide-to-social-media/
 

Class 2 Assignments  
 

Reading Assignment:

• We Are the Web
  http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.08/tech.html
   
• 7 things you should know about...Social Bookmarking
  http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7001.pdf
   
• The Power of Social Bookmarking
  http://www.socialmediapower.com/2008/02/10/the-power-of-social-bookmarking/
   
• Keeping Citations Straight, and Finding New Ones
  http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/01/31/citeulike
   
• Towards a Managed Social Bookmarking Environment in Higher Education
  http://blogs.open.ac.uk/Maths/ajh59/005107.html
   

Hands-On Assignment:

• For this week's assignment, we will try to evaluate several social bookmarking resources specifically designed for education. Please find the site adjacent to your name and create an account for that site and begin using it to see how it works.

1. 2collab - Amanda
   http://www.2collab.com/
    

2. CiteULike - David
   http://www.citeulike.org/
    

3. Connotea - Matt
   www.connotea.org
    

4. H20 Playlist - Sineenart
   http://h2obeta.law.harvard.edu/home.do;jsessionid=1FEE54417D18F6236032AA7BA0FF7FC6
    

5. LibraryThing - Freddie
   http://www.librarything.com/
    

6. Scholar - Shawn
   http://www.scholar.com

Once you have evaluated the site, go to the CUIN 7376 blog at http://cuin7376.blogspot.com and post a comment under the Class Two Assignment in which you discuss the following:

• Who created and maintains the site?
• Who is the intended audience?
• How does the site work? Are there any special features that make it different from the social bookmarking sites we explored in this week's class? Please elaborate.
• Does the site have useful help files, FAQs or other materials (such as videos or other tutorials) to help new users learn how the site works? And, if so, are these materials helpful?
• Do you think the site you evaluated would be useful for yourself, other students and/or instructors? Please discuss why or why not?
• Is there anything else you would like to add about this site?

Important Note: There are many other social bookmarking sites that deal with education that are not listed above. One such site is edutagger (http://www.edutagger.com) that describes itself as a "K-12 Social Bookmarking" site. You may evaluate a different site than the one that was originally assigned to you as long as you make sure that the new site was designed, or is being used within an educational context.