Followers

Saturday, May 10, 2014

True Confessions and Live Binders

I have a confession to make.
My name is Adele and I tend to become obsessed.
When I want to achieve something and I have it in my mind that that is what I must do I do not know how to let it go. All these people say that I am so “talented” and such a “computer wiz”. The truth is: it’s obsession, not talent.
As a part of my job as a National Counselor for Digital Pedagogy in Israel,  I have been co- running a series of online sessions (we called them “meetings” since they were optional and no one got any official credit for taking them) regarding implementing digital pedagogy in the classroom. The sessions have been for leading counselors of language teachers in Israel. It has been for teachers of all the different languages not only English as I am used to doing. There were teacher-trainers for French and Russian, as well as Hebrew for Hebrew speakers, Hebrew for Arabic speakers, Arabic for Arabic speakers, Arabic for Hebrew speakers...even Chinese!  These meetings are coming to an end and I wanted to culminate them in a way that these dedicated participants would leave with something in their virtual hands. Something that they could share with the language teachers whom they counsel.
I had seen a tool called “LiveBinders” which is a curation tool, and I was interested in setting up a collaborative tool box of sorts which all of the other counselors could add to and would be a huge collection of digital tools that can be used for teaching languages, in general.
For some reason I did not pick it up as quickly as I thought I would. In fact I was on the verge of throwing up my hands and giving up. I even went so far as to try to build a similar curation site using Google Sites.  I guess the problem was that, while I was editing, it did not look like I expected it to look. And I did not understand how to see what it would look like in viewing mode, as opposed to editing mode. I had found some tutorials, but they were with an older version that looked different.

Until…. in came another counselor whom I greatly admire and who is really on top of these things. She replied to my cry for help in our Digital Pedagogy Facebook group. With her encouragement in her comments on the Facebook group I finally managed to crack it.   
That's when I became obsessed. I spent the entire vacation day of Independence Day learning and searching and building and learning and I finally figured it out. I am very pleased with what I have built and I only hope that the other language counselors with whom I work will get excited enough to jump in and join me by adding more tools and categories that will help language teachers from all over Israel.


This is what it looks like today. Hopefully, in a few months it will be even more populated and in use by language teachers all over Israel.



As my brother-in-law so delicately puts it: "Like a dog with a bone". And now… off to my next obsession……

Digitally yours,

@dele


P.S.
In order to help other language counselors understand how to collaborate with this tool, I prepared a tutorial, (however it is in Hebrew).



Here is playlist of tutorials, in English, (I wish I had seen this BEFORE I spent the whole day trying to learn it by myself ;0).



And finally, the LiveBinders Help


7 comments:

  1. well done, Adele. It takes total obsession to overcome obstacles. There are no shortcuts. And the difference between pioneers and couch potatoes is that all-possessing madness.
    So, yay, you! And the livebinder site will be invaluable for all of us.
    Thanks
    Judih

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good for you Adele! Did you know you can add it to your blog as a sidebar bookshelf, and all your livebinders will appear there?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No! What do you mean? I can add websites to the sidebar?

      Delete
  3. Adele! You should try this though- it is so much easier to use:
    http://stich.it/
    Naomi

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks, Naomi! Are you suggesting using Stitch it instead of Livebinders? I just had a look at it - it seems like it's a simple alternative to Prezi, but I do not see it as capable of fulfilling the function of Livebinders.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Adele,
    1) By all means, use livebinders.
    2) I don't know if blogspot lets you add widgets but edublogs does and you can add a livebinder widget on the sidebar of your blog, Every binder you create will show up on the sidebar virtual binder shelf. However it takes up a LOT of space. I only recently deleted mine, I felt that my sidebar was getting awfully cluttered.
    3) Stich.it nothing like prezi. It's like livebinders in that it creates a simulation of a booklet of the links you wanted. I found it quicker/easier.

    ReplyDelete