Facebook at work!?!

I stumbled upon this article in one of my RSS feeds.

"Bosses Should Embrace Facebook" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7695716.stm

It's from the BBC, and talks about how Facebook and other social networking sites could be beneficial to people at work, and why bosses should allow their use. I know many of my friends who have full-time office jobs are on and off Facebook, or their blogs all day, but still operating under the idea that it's not appropriate for work. Could that all change? What would that mean?

Diigo

So I just downloaded the bookmarking tool Diigo and it is awesome! After exploring numerous bookmarking sites, what attracted me most to Diigo was the fact that I could highlight text and add "sticky notes" to any part of a webpage. This way, I can hone in on the key parts of webpages that are important to me. Another site, Clipmarks, allows you to take "clippings" off of pages, but to me this is too disjointed. I prefer to have the entire page and highlight the stuff I want. I thought this could be incredibly helpful especially when reading articles online for research papers, etc. In Diigo, you can make a list for a specific class or paper/project and include the highlighted articles. Another great feature is that you can search within Diigo for different topics rather than having to go through a separate search engine first.

I have found some really great groups on Diigo too. Some of personal interest, such as "Wholesale Replica Designer Handbags" and Web 2.0 Tools for Teachers. This one has great assistive/instructional technology resources!

Diggo also has a special free upgrade for teachers. Teachers can create a diigo account for each of their students. Everything is protected so "outsiders" cannot come into contact with the kids. This could be especially helpful for students as they gather information for projects and assignments. Those with organization problems, and even those without, are able to have all of their information in one place. They can even do internet-based research in different locations (i.e. school, home, library, friend's house, etc). This eliminates losing papers, or websites because they were accessed on different computers. Also, the highlighting and note feature allows student to interact with the information the way they would normally be expected to on paper.

FUNBRAIN!!

Funbrain (www.funbrain.com) is an awesome website for students of all ages. It provides games and activities for learning skills from every content area. One of the things that I like best is that it provides options for students up through grade 8. Many similar websites only deal with students up to grade 5. I played the multiplication baseball game, which my fourth graders would have loved! Many did not know their basic facts, so this would have been a fun way to practice. I also looked at some stuff for older kids. For eighth graders, there was a geography review that dealt with the U.S., different countries, or different continents, depending on the options you chose. I was having so much fun playing different games, that I hadn't even realized that I was on the site for more than an hour! Another great thing about this site is that for each game, students can choose their level. This allows the practice to be at their intellectual level, and also provides a way for students to challenge themselves with higher levels. Funbrain can be provided as an option for all students in the class to use so there is no stigma associated with it.