Web 2.0 tools are definitely making there way through classrooms. It is important to teach your students how to use them and provide examples in the class to encourage the students to use them. I believe any class could incorporate blogs, and YouTube videos, even a twitter. It is difficult if students do not have a cell phone that allows them to join a classroom twitter page, but if there is a library with computers in the school, it is possible for everyone to be involved! As stated in the podcast, their are always concerns about letting student use the internet, but there are sites like common classroom that allow the teacher to control what the students can see so there is nothing inappropriate.
One web 2.0 tool I find useful is Diigo which can be found at https://www.diigo.com/. Diigo is a tool used for personal management. With it you are able to organize and share your information, mark up text with digital highlighters and sticky notes, and build your library by saving webpages to go back and look at later.
I would definitely use Diigo in the classroom. I would show my students the website so they could use it for studying and learning on their own time, as well as using it myself. I am constantly keeping tons of tabs open in my browser. I am always scared my computer will update or shut off and I'll lose my websites but with Diigo I can make a bookmark to easily find it whenever needed. It would also be useful when students turned in assignments through the internet. I could highlight and add comments to help them improve their work. Diigo is an awesome web 2.0 tool that can help teachers and students work together.
The concept map activity was interesting. I really liked how there were templates you could choose from to make it easier. They were very organized as well, stating subjects that were more oriented for certain concept maps. I learned how to organize the map so it was easy to read, and also how to divide the slides. I had never done a concept map online before, only with pen and paper. I would definitely incorporate this in the classroom. I think it is a great approach for students and can also be used as a study guide.
When using diigo in a classroom for shared resources, one consideration is whether to have a unified list of tags. Tags are how students will retrieve their sources. For example: WWI, World War I, The war to end all wars. If students tag differently, they won't have shared resources.
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