This document provides instructions for setting up accounts and customizing dashboards on several web 2.0 tools including Netvibes, Tweetdeck, and Diigo. It also lists additional web 2.0 tools and resources for teachers such as Tagxedo, Glogster, Grouply, and Slideshare. The tools allow users to aggregate RSS feeds, organize social bookmarks, create digital posters and online class pages, and share presentations. The document encourages exploring the educational features of these free web-based applications.

1. CECA/CASL 2011 Annual Conference
eNGAGE!
Teaching and Learning in a Digital World
October 24, 2011 @ Connecticut Convention Center
Staying on the Cutting Edge:
Keeping up with Emerging
Technologies
Joseph Jarvis
Granby Memorial High School
jarvisj@granbyschools.org

2. www.netvibes.com
Netvibes can be used as a very personalized RSS feed aggregator. To set up your
won Netvibes page, follow the instructions below.
1.Go to Netvibes.com
2.Click on
3.Click on the button in the “Basic Free” column
4.Since you are going to be using Netvibes to import RSS feeds from blogs (to get
started anyway), you can choose to have the website set up a portal for you
designed to work best with RSS feeds. You do this by clicking on the universal
RSS symbol on the dashboard setup page. Don’t worry, you can
customize your dashboard later.
4. Play around with the interface. Everything on the page is editable. If you want
to start from scratch and only have your customized RSS feeds on your
dashboard, you can start by deleting all of the suggested widgets.
5. Watch the demonstration and take some notes to help guide you through the
process.

3. www.tweetdeck.com
Tweetdeck is a desktop aggregator for Twitter feeds. You will need a Twitter
account in order to use Tweetdeck. If you do not have an account yet, what are
you waiting for? Go to www.twitter.com and set up your free account.
1.Go to tweetdeck.com
2.Choose to download Tweetdeck to your desktop.
3.Click and follow the instructions for downloading and
installing the program.
4. Once installed, open the program. It will ask you to login. You can login using
just your Twitter account, by clicking on...
Don’t worry, Twitter just recently bought Tweetdeck and all of your login
credentials are used safely and securely.
5. The next screen will ask you to sign up for a Tweetdeck account. You don’t
need to do this, but if you want to use Tweetdeck on multiple computers (your
computer at school, your desktop and your laptop for example), then I suggest
making a Tweetdeck account. This will make sure that every change you make on
one computer will show up on the others.
6.Play around with the interface, settings and columns. Take notes below as I
walk you through customizing your Tweetdeck.

4. www.diigo.com
Diigo is a social bookmarking web service with a twist. It allows you to keep all of
your bookmarks, organized by tags, in the cloud and accessible at all times. With
a Diigo account, it does not matter which computer you are using, you will always
have access to your bookmarks. In addition, Diigo has groups that you can join to
collaboratively build bookmark libraries.
1. Go to diigo.com
2. Click on
There is an option for setting up and educator account, but a standard
account must be created first. Diigo supports educators and gives you free
upgrades and an easy interface for adding students to your account. I use
this in class as a way for my students to build annotated bibliographies and I
encourage you check out these features.
3. There are a number of options on the account creation page. You can easily set
up your account by linking it to your Gmail, Facebook, Twitter or Yahoo
accounts. This simplifies the process.
4. Once logged in, click on “My Groups” in the top navigation bar.
5. From this screen click on on the right hand side.
6. This gets you access to a search bar where you can search for educational
technology groups.
7. Once you find a group that has a good membership and appears to offer links
that you could use, join the group.
8. The next screen is what makes Diigo Groups amazing. You can choose to get
instant, daily or weekly digests emailed to you. You get an email summary of all
of the bookmarks people added to the group.

5. Additional Web2.0 Tools
These are some of the tools that are vital to the success of my classroom. I found
all of these through the services covered in this workshop.
http://www.tagxedo.com/
Turns words -- famous speeches, news articles, slogans and themes, even your
love letters -- into a visually stunning word cloud, words individually sized
appropriately to highlight the frequencies of occurrence within the body of text.
http://www.glogster.com/
“Poster yourself”. Create digital posters that can be embedded in blogs and on
websites. Education accounts allow you to add and manage student accounts.
http://nieonline.com/aaec/cftc.cfm#
Association of America Editorial Cartoonists: Editorial cartoons that can be used
in the classroom.
www.grouply.com
“Connect with a world of people who share your interests and passions!” Create
free social networking style webpages for your classes. Easy way to continue the
discussion outside of class.
http://www.slideshare.net
An easy way to share and/or embed PowerPoints and Keynotes, embed .pdf’s or
docs. You can record your voice over and sync it to a presentation in a
“Slidecast”. Great way to keep the class moving when there is a substitute.
http://www.classjump.com
The easiest way to set up a consumption type class website. Very easy to use,
customize and navigate.
http://www.plagium.com/
Copy a block of text and paste it into plagium. It will scour the web and tell you
exactly what sources were used in the creation of the text with a very easy to
read plagiarism report.

6. http://www.vizu.com/index.html
Free web polls that can be embedded into websites or blogs
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/
If you have a revolutionary project or lesson idea, uploaded here and see if you
can make some money off of it. Great resource for very cheap lesson materials.
www.grantwrangler.com
Easy way to search for grants specific to education. Got a project idea that needs
funding? Write a grant.
http://goo.gl/l2YVh
Gizmo’s resource of free tech for teachers. Great go to place for cutting edge tech.