Tech Orientation

I have come to the realization that I will have to plan a tech orientation for my kids at the beginning of next year to introduce them to the tools we'll be using next year through Blackboard and through other websites. Just for my own sanity, here is what I will have to cover with them on Blackboard:

1. Basic: Announcements, Assignments, Submitting and Saving, Sending Email (including setting up an email account for those that don't have them!), TurnItIn.com
   
2. Intermediate: Forums and Blogs
   
3. Advanced: Research (Carmun and Diigo for Note-Taking, Wikipedia as a starting place)

I'm thinking that I will start with Basic and Intermediate, then hit Advanced when we get to the first research project (multi-genre Renaissance again?).

I almost feel like this is becoming a checklist of things that I want to do with my students next year, but why not? I haven't got pen and paper in front of me at the moment.

New Blackboard button: External Links.

• Librarian's Internet Index
• Academic Info: Humanities Gateway
• InfoMine

If ever any of my students are doing a research paper on a current topic, one-on-one lessons with PageFlakes might be helpful. That may be helpful for their government papers. I wouldn't mind spending an entire class period showing students how to set up a PageFlakes account for subscribing to feeds that would allow them to have the most current up-to-date information on their topics.

Now I just need to figure out how to use PageFlakes.