Social Searching
Such websites like www.Delicious.com are better alternatives to www.google.co.uk, as all the results are recommend by other people. This means they are reliable and generally good.However on first going on the site it is confusing and I wasn't sure where to go. Also the blue type against white background is a little garish and I found myself squinting at the screen trying to readjust my eyes. After I had got over that little hurdle I found it fairly easy to navigate my way around.
I typed into the Search bar 'Cross Curricular' and a wealth of sites came up.
I typed into the Search bar 'Cross Curricular' and a wealth of sites came up.
Screen Shot
Here is a screen shot of the search I did. I used the filter tags and clicked 'Education' and changed the date so only bookmarks from August 2011 appeared.
The top 3 websites were:
www1.teachertube.com - A website which takes the format of Youtube but contains videos relating to teaching. It ranges from advice to resources to use in the classroom. It gained 1154 bookmarks.
http://myfakewall.com - What an absolute let down. This website is about how to create fake profiles 'for fun' (quote) How this relates to cross curricular I am not sure. It gained 621 bookmarks.
http://web2011.discoveryeducation.com - This website suggests tech tools and resources for teachers and also has online videos about how to use the equipment. It is a great looking website that is clearly highly maintained. It gained 418 bookmarks.
The top 3 websites were:
www1.teachertube.com - A website which takes the format of Youtube but contains videos relating to teaching. It ranges from advice to resources to use in the classroom. It gained 1154 bookmarks.
http://myfakewall.com - What an absolute let down. This website is about how to create fake profiles 'for fun' (quote) How this relates to cross curricular I am not sure. It gained 621 bookmarks.
http://web2011.discoveryeducation.com - This website suggests tech tools and resources for teachers and also has online videos about how to use the equipment. It is a great looking website that is clearly highly maintained. It gained 418 bookmarks.
The search options are great because you can narrow the search to the date they were book marked. This means that you are able to see the most up-to-date releveant information. However unfortauntly there is no filter for Uk and USA sites and so due to America having a much bigger population than the UK it means that USA sites are in the mixture and it is often not until you have clicked on them and spotted an American spelling that you know that it is not the best site to be looking at. Therefore I think the site could be improved if it had this type of filter.
I then recommended a site, www.singup.org, so others can see the good resource. To make a recommendation it involved signing up for an account. It is a fantastic resource which provides songs to cater for many ages and any subject/occassion. It came up that 254 other people had also bookmarked this website highlighting its popularity. However the way Delicious works is, the more times the website is bookmarked the higher ranking it becomes. If there's a website you want to appear top of every list you'd best get all your friends to bookmark and recommend it. For this reason the websites at the top can often be quite biased towards the country they originate from. American websites are generally at the top of the list because there are more Americans then Britons and so it is their websites that are getting the most recommendations. So the top websites are not always relevant or reliable.
On reflection I do not think I will be using this website to do my searching as I find Google easier and more reliable as Delicious can be very biased and bring up wrong results.
Would I use Delicious with my class?
I'd have to say Yes, I probably would. The main reason being that there are filters and so you can prevent any obscene pictures/information from being accessed. Safety on the internet is the main concern and with Delicious I would be confident that all children would be safe. Therefore over the coming weeks I shall expand my knowledge of how to effectively use Delicious so that I can use it on GPP.
Added information after GPP
I did indeed use Delicious on GPP. There were times where I needed to search for resources online on the classroom computer and I was conscious that inappropriate links could be shown and so I used Delicious in front of the children. However at home I still use Google.
I then recommended a site, www.singup.org, so others can see the good resource. To make a recommendation it involved signing up for an account. It is a fantastic resource which provides songs to cater for many ages and any subject/occassion. It came up that 254 other people had also bookmarked this website highlighting its popularity. However the way Delicious works is, the more times the website is bookmarked the higher ranking it becomes. If there's a website you want to appear top of every list you'd best get all your friends to bookmark and recommend it. For this reason the websites at the top can often be quite biased towards the country they originate from. American websites are generally at the top of the list because there are more Americans then Britons and so it is their websites that are getting the most recommendations. So the top websites are not always relevant or reliable.
On reflection I do not think I will be using this website to do my searching as I find Google easier and more reliable as Delicious can be very biased and bring up wrong results.
Would I use Delicious with my class?
I'd have to say Yes, I probably would. The main reason being that there are filters and so you can prevent any obscene pictures/information from being accessed. Safety on the internet is the main concern and with Delicious I would be confident that all children would be safe. Therefore over the coming weeks I shall expand my knowledge of how to effectively use Delicious so that I can use it on GPP.
Added information after GPP
I did indeed use Delicious on GPP. There were times where I needed to search for resources online on the classroom computer and I was conscious that inappropriate links could be shown and so I used Delicious in front of the children. However at home I still use Google.