Exploring Web 2.0 For The Classroom

The first Web 2.0 tool we are encountering in TPTE 586, a education class focusing on Web 2.0, is iGoogle. iGoogle is a startup or mashup. By using a page like iGoogle you can bring in information from numerous other websites onto one page. You can get all the information you want in one place! I haven’t used iGoogle before but I have seen/heard of startpages. Since I started reading blogs and news sites, I’ve mainly used twitter to keep up to date. But, I always miss a lot of information. I think iGoogle is an amazing way to keep up to date on your favorite blogs and news sites. I also learned about RSS feeds. RSS is how the information shows up on iGoogle. I had heard about RSS before but didn’t really know what it was. Now I finally know what the little orange image is on websites!

     Above is a screenshot of my iGoogle page. I added 4 tabs: home, education, tools, and just for fun. Many of the widgets I added were news sources. I also added some games, I especially liked the trivia widget! I think I could use this in the classroom but I don’t know if I would. The only way I can really think it would be useful in a social studies class is for the students to have easy access to news sources. But I wouldn’t have them browsing the news during class time. I think it would be most useful for me to make an iGoogle page that my students could visit on their own time to check out the news. I really like iGoogle but I like it more for personal use than educational use.