RSS

This chapter got me thinking about the difference between RSS and Social Bookmarking.  I’m not totally familiar with what RSS is and how it works, but my impression was that it was the same as social bookmarking.  The only slight difference I noticed was that it would warn you of when the site updated.  From this perspective, I thought that maybe it was more of a site that you put current event articles on because those continuously are changing.  If this is the case, it would be a great way to keep up on current events, which is particularly important in education.  It would be a lot easier and faster to have all the newspaper articles and other sites that I like all in one place to be able to read.  With this said, I also feel, in a way, that it only adds more information to keep track.  Since the sites are all at one place, one could keep track of more sites, adding more reading.  This is overwhelming because there is so much out there already the way it is that I feel like I could spend my whole life reading and still not even be close to keeping up with everything there is to know.   

                As a future teacher, I think it will be important to incorporate RSS or social bookmarking into class because that is how kids will find the majority of the information they need.  By adding sites that they know are reliable to their RSS they won’t have to worry as much about the reliability of the articles.  This would also be a good resource for students to learn about because they have to learn which information is most beneficial to them.   As technology is paving the way for digital reading, kids will have to learn how to skim through information to determine which articles aren’t valid and which ones are worth taking the time to read through more thoroughly.  Another idea that I think would be very beneficial for the students is to have them put our class website or blog onto their RSS.  This way they will know immediately of when there is a new assignment or class project due.  It would also be a good way to interact with the students.  Each student could take turns posting something we didn’t know about them or something new each day so we can relate to and become friendlier with one another.  This would be great for me as a teacher too because then I can know how the students are feeling and understand their thinking process at a deeper level.