Using del.icio.us in the Classroom
My JH students are working on their annual independent research projects. This year, I’ve set them up with a shared del.icio.us account to help manage the online sources they’ll each be using. I installed the “add to del.cio.us” buttons to the browsers on all the classroom computers, including the teacher’s laptops. When the students or the teachers add a site, we just tag it with the name of the student it’s meant for. The teachers picked it up immediately, and it’s SO easy for them to bookmark sites for students at any time, anyplace.
I added their account to my network, and I subscribe to my network feed so I can keep track of who uses what whenever I’m online, which is really handy.
When I was showing them how it worked, someone raised a hand and asked if it was also a good way to find good sites on your topic. If someone else has tagged the same site you have, they might know about more good sites, right? Of course! That’s tomorrow’s lesson, but I was so excited that she saw the potential of the “social” aspect of the site before I even mentioned it.