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To Begin: Social Media for Educators:

http://lone-eagles.com/socialbegin.html

 

A good online class sets clear expectations to assure success for all participants. The minimum deliverables for each lesson required to receive a Pass for the Class, will be in a box at the top of each lesson. Four hours per lesson and a eight-hour final project are the minimum required timeframe benchmarks. Hopefully you will find the lessons engaging and be willing to invest additional time in your own learning. Extensive additional resources are available, and as you make your special interests known, options exist for individualized support and customizing the lessons.  

TIP: Please put the Course and Lesson number in the subject line when you send me required submissions: Ex:  Social- Lesson 6  (this helps me know when to record your submission in my gradebook.)  Also, some of you are taking two courses at once.

 

Optional extracurricular activities and resources will be clearly marked as such. Instead of quizzes, you’ll be asked to produce various deliverables as “authentic outcomes” and to collaboratively participate. The lessons are primarily presented in self-directed learning format, with total flexibility to suit your busy schedule.  At the same time, we’ll do our best to model weekly collaborative activities for those who are interested. You can expect to be asked to create free accounts on various social media sites.

 

The class is mastery learning, and I’m your guide on the side. Should frustration occur, don’t hesitate to email, call or skype me, and we’ll quickly get you going again.

 

Instructor contact and availability

 

1. To Start: Please Send Your Instructor Your Tentative Timeline:

This course is designed for individual self-directed learning, but social media is more interesting when working with others. But, you can start the course at anytime, as long as you complete all lessons and the final project by the date, one year from when you registered for this course.  Note, for $90 you can get an extention, see  the syllabus for details.

 

Please send me an email as to your preferred timeline for the course, noting you are welcome to change it at any time.

 

Let me know if you'd like to start NOW or choose to wait until a later time. You will not be obligated to follow a structured timeframe other than we'll attempt to do one lesson per week as a timeline for those wishing to participate in collaborative activities with peers.

 

2. Optional Technology Check – Review the following, for reference if you run into problems.

Does your school block access to the social media sites we’ll use in this course? If you are planning to use your school's internet to do this course, you'd better check on whether, as a teacher, you can override your school's blocking filter for social media sites. 

Test your ability to access the following…..

http://www.youtube.com/fodasz (Can you view the short videos without them stopping and starting?)

http://www.facebook.com

http://www.twitter.com

http://www.ning.com

 

Some satellite “broadband” systems CAN be used for 2-way video and others may restrict most interactive activities due to a time delay (latency). Experiment, and we'll learn to work with whatever limitations we have to.

 

You might like to test just how fast your interest is at http://www.speedtest.net (click on “begin test” to learn your download and upload speeds.) The first number is latency in milliseconds (ms) the second is download speed in megabytes, the third is upload speed in megabytes.


To view a link in a new window, Right click (for PC's) or do a two-finger touch on a Mac touchpad, for a menu that starts with "Open in New Window." This puts you in control.

 

3. Posting your informal introduction - Introducing yourself socially to your cohorts.

You will receive a welcome message from the class listserv, which will be used primarily for resource updates and for sharing initial introductions.

 

You will be asked to post a friendly introduction to include, what mobile devices you use (smartphones, digital tablets), social media sites you are using now, and what you want most to learn and why. Email your introduction to:  social-L@netpals.lsoft.com  You’ll know you were successful when you receive a copy of your own email with social-L in the subject line. HOWEVER, gmail users and some other email systems will NOT return your duplicate message, so I will confirm with you when I see your introduction posted. Then, you can always just CC yourself to keep copies of your postings. FYI, I keep copies of all incoming and outgoing emails as a papertrail of all our interaction.

 

Optional: You can request your own free listserv at http://netpals.lsoft.com/form.html  or explore the message archives of other listservs. See OUR archives by scrolling down to SOCIAL-L  at http://netpals.lsoft.com/archives  There are a lot of neat features that give educators great control and flexibility, explore your own subscriber controls. Explore and Experiment.

 

4. TAKE GOOD NOTES!  Plan to Start a List of Your Usernames, and Passwords for the various web sites, and social media sites we’ll be exploring.

Keep track of your Login ID's and Pswds, print this now; http://lone-eagles.com/my-web-accounts.htm to help with "remembering."

We will all be creating free accounts on many different social media sites. There are lots of free web tools being used to create sites to share baby photos, disease specific support group collaboration, managing one’s personal medical records and more. You give yourself an ID (usually just your email address) and a password, and you can set the site to be public, or private only to those you approve.  Many of the tools we’ll be exploring in this class work this same way SO plan to carefully maintain a careful and complete list of the site’s web addresses, your IDs and your Passwords. You can use the same password for multiple sites, but if you will find you really do need to keep written records.

 

5. Optional but Recommended:  Let’s meet Face-to-Face on Skype, even if only for a few minutes.

 

While optional.....I'd like to Skype with everyone in the class as a great way to establish a personal face-to-face relationship, and as a chance to hear your priorities and a bit about your background, experience, and special interests. We can limit the time to fit your schedule, just tell me what works best for you.

 

Mornings are preferred, let's schedule a time - the mountain time zone is two hours later than Alaska. I live in a ranch house near Dillon, Montana.

Skype ID: frankodasz  (Download and install the free skype 2-way video software at http://www.skype.com)

 

Required for Skyping:

Most modern laptops already have a built in webcam and microphone.

If you do not have a built in webcam and microphone, you will need to purchase a webcam with microphone.  A webcam costs from $20-$75 and can be found at Radioshack, Wal-mart, and most office supply stores. Logitech is a popular brand. Most webcams have a microphone installed but for the best audio a headset with microphone is recommended. Adequate headsets start at $10. 

 

6. The lessons may be updated at anytime, so if you need to print them, check that your printouts are current.
All Class Lessons are at:  http://lone-eagles.com/social.html

 

Keep me posted as questions arise.  Have Fun with the Lesson Explorations!!

 

Frank

frank@lone-eagles.com