In this age of overwhelming information on the web, it is important to have a system for saving and organizing web resources so that they can be easily accessed. Web browsers have a tool for bookmarking resources and organizing them into folders as “favorites”, but this can become unwieldy as more folders and bookmarks are added. Additionally, this collection of bookmarks can only be accessed from the one computer on which they are saved.
What Social Bookmarking Does
Social bookmarking is a better solution for saving and organizing bookmarks online. Bookmarks are stored on the web, so they are accessible on any Internet-connected device, including cell phones. Social bookmarking provides the added benefit of being able to share and interact with others who are also using these tools. The most popular, among educators, of these free tools are Delicious (http://delicious.com) and Diigo (http://diigo.com).
Although Delicious is a powerful tool for sharing web resources, Diigo takes it to the next level by allowing users to highlight, annotate, and add sticky notes to any web page. This changes the way one can interact with text. The title for this presentation, New Reading, New Writing with Social Bookmarking, was inspired by a post by Will Richardson by the same name, New Reading, New Writing. Will Richardson says, "The idea that I can not just annotate a paragraph or a sentence or one idea on a webpage but that I can engage with others in sharing our thinking about that particular sentence or idea is at once powerful and daunting. I mean, imagine the meta conversations we might be able to have over different passages in the classics once they all get scanned and put online by Google (or someone else.)
In addition, Diigo users who are educators can apply for a special educator account, so they can create student accounts (without student email accounts). Students can share web resources with everyone in their class and have rich conversations around text. That is powerful!
To learn more about Diigo and all it can do, a tour is available. All the features seem like too much at first. Use just a few, and as you become more familiar with them, add some more!
For an in-depth look at how social bookmarking and Diigo's advanced features can be used in the classroom, visit Digitally Speaking/Social Bookmarking and Annotating. The author offers suggestions and many handouts to help teachers and students begin to use social bookmarking as a social learning tool.
Two Are Better than One
One nice feature of Diigo is that it allows you to save your bookmarks simultaneously on Diigo and Delicious. (You can find this Diigo feature in Tools - Save to Delicious.) It's great to have a backup of your bookmarks in two places. Occasionally, one service might be down and the other is accessible.
Janice Stearns - an Instructional Technology Facilitator for Local District 6 of the Los Angeles Unified School District. District 6 consists of 48 schools, grades K-12. I work with administrators and educators to help them use technology as a tool for learning in their schools and with their students.
Comments (0)
You don't have permission to comment on this page.