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Getting Interactive with Posterous

Today, we'll leverage some 21st Century tools to enable you to instantly and (almost) effortlessly communicate with your stakeholders.

How many of you in the room today have a class or school web page? 

How many times do you update it in a school year? Daily? Weekly? Monthly?

Never, because someone else made the page for you?

Why don't you keep it up-to-date?

Let me introduce you to Joe. Pay close attention to how he tries to access information.

If it isn't online, it does not exist to a kid like Joe.

You can easily keep a kid like Joe happy by creating a new Web site from Posterous.

Posterous is simply THE EASIEST way to keep a Web site current. It is so easy, in fact, that you already know how to use it...

Ever heard of email?

THAT is how you add updates to a Posterous site.

Here's what you have to do:

  • Create an account... Er, skip that. You don't need to do this.
  • Email your thoughts and attach any photos, audio & videos along with any Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or PDF files to post@posterous.com
  • That's it. You've just created a new web site and made your first entry.

Posterous will email you back telling you that your new site has been created with links to view the post or your site, and to set up a password.

Anytime you want to add something to your site, you simply send an email to post@posterous.com, and it's done.

It's even smart enough to figure out what you are attaching and will automatically add audio and video players, links to download your files - it's all automatic.

Here's the mind-blowing part... With a little setup, twitter and Facebook Fan Page updates are AUTOMATIC.

Post it once, and it's everywhere.

(oh, yeah, one-click will post Poll Everywhere voting to Posterous)

We will set all of this up today before you leave this class.

It's easy, but if you want to take it further, you can use themes, use tags to categorize posts, create static pages, have private and public blogs tied to the same address, allow other contributors to post, allow moderated posts from students... Pretty much anything you need.

By a show of hands, how many of you here have heard of 'clickers' for instant classroom polling and feedback?

By a show of hands, how many of you here are lucky enough to have a set for your classroom already?

By a show of hands, how many of you here would like to have YOUR STUDENTS

provide the 'clickers' for formative assessment in the classroom?

Want the good news?

Many already are!

Poll Everywhere is a service that you can use during class discussion to get instant feedback by polling your students using text messages, the Web, or even twitter.

The results are instantly and visually updated on the website, or you can download a PowerPoint slide (or Keynote slide on the Mac) that will display the results of each poll question.

A basic K-12 account will allow for 40 responses for an unlimited number of questions.

Make sure to sign up for the K-12 and not a business account!

http://www.polleverywhere.com/plans/classroom_response_system_k12

Questions can be either multiple choice or open-ended in nature.

Students LOVE the instant and anonymous feedback that they get, and the teacher can know at a glance what the students are understanding, and what they still have questions about.

Let's try it out!

To add a PollEverywhere question to your Posterous site, just paste the link to a Poll Everywhere poll into the email to get a simple, good looking web polling widget

http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

The next poll question I should ask is, "If you do have a Facebook account, how many times a day to you check in?"

On average, those 750 million people check the status updates of their friends 7 times a day.

Do you think these numbers compare to visits to your district, school, or your personal teacher Web site (if you have one)?

Yeah, me neither...

Instead of relying on them to come to you, why not try to reach your students where they spend a LOT of their time already?

DISCLAIMER: I'M NOT ADVOCATING THAT YOU BECOME FACEBOOK FRIENDS WITH YOUR STUDENTS.

Teachers can create a Fan Page on Facebook pretty quickly. Your students can become a "Fan" of that page.

When they do, all of the updates made on that page will be 'pushed' to their own Facebook page.

It's linked to the Facebook account that you have already, but only 'fans' of the page see the updates posted there. Your current friends will not.

Like to seen an example? Check out my

Fan Page and become a fan!

http://www.facebook.com/sedcclint

So... What's the BIG deal?

Twitter is a 'Micro Blog', meaning that users can post their thoughts in 140 characters or less.

Who cares what I had for breakfast, right?

Twitter can be much more than that. First, some background...

Each update is referred to as a 'tweet'

These tweets are automatically posted or 'pushed' to the tweeter's followers

Anyone with an account can follow anyone else, and receive their tweets.

There are tags or attributes that enable a more rich, interactive experience...

...Re-tweets will pass on a post from a person you follow to those that follow you, so information can spread rapidly.

...@username, or 'At Replies' are like a direct line to a user. They send a direct message to a user along with your post or retweet.

...#keyword, or 'Hash Tags' allow you, and anyone else using the tag, to view all tweets that include it. Twitter and search engines can search for these tags as well.

Can't fit it all in? You can include links to web pages, videos, anything online.

Can it be used in a different way? Can it have more meaning?

You build your own experience by who you follow, and what you tweet.

Follow smart people, and you will learn from them. A LOT.

Say smart things, and smart people will follow you.

Ask your smart followers questions, and you will get good answers.

It's also a quick and easy way to 'push' updates about what you are doing in class to parents...

...and easily remind students what happened in class that day, and where they can get the resources used.

Instead of 'What are you doing?' encourage your students to tweet 'What are you learning?' or 'What questions are you having?'

Students could even answer each others questions - perish the thought!

Answer questions and instruct your students anytime, anywhere - virtual office hours!

Can twitter be an effective tool?

Yes

Now, let's get to work!

To start, log into your email at http://g.ironmail.org

Now, compose a message to post@posterous.com

The subject of your email becomes the title of your post.

The message body becomes the post content.

Hit 'Send' when you are

ready to enter the future.

Once your site is set up, we will work on the look or theme of the site, using the Bookmarklet, discuss email posting tips, and set up Autoposting to Twitter and Facebook Fan Pages: http://is.gd/Q1Zl5v

First off, thank you Dr. Tim Tyson for covering most of the items we'll discuss today...

presentation available at http://sedcclint.com- Posterous tag

http://sedcclint.com

Well, actually Facebook Fan Pages

Choose the 'Public Figure' option, then Teacher.

Questions?

Clint Stephens

Southwest Educational Development Center

clint@sedck12.org

(435) 590-8149

http://sedcclint.com-Posterous Tag

http://twitter.com/sedcclint

What did they cost?

http://pollev.com/clint

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