BP4_2009102_Social Bookmarking

Web 2.0 tools are helping the World Wide Web become a more interactive place rather than just pages of information to read. Users of the web can now perform tasks, play games and collaborate with anyone on a project. These tools are divided into four categories: social networking, CMS (content management systems), social and intelligent organization, as well as applications and services (mash-up) (Cannata, 2009). An example of a social networking site is www.Facebook.com. This site allows users to create online communities to network with other people. An example of CMS is RSS (Real Simply Syndication). CMS allows the web user to subscribe to certain sites and obtain updates from them within a third party web site. An example of social and intelligent organization is www.delicious.com. This site enables the user to keep all bookmarked sites within a third party web site for easy access. An example of applications and services (mash-up) is www.googlemaps.com. This site utilizes several types of technology to allow the user to search, locate and manipulate information to the user’s needs. This blog is going to focus more on the social and intelligent organization category of web 2.0 tools; specifically using social bookmarking in the field of education.

Forbes (2004) defines social bookmarking as “the process of creating a list of favorites or bookmarks and storing them on the Web…” (Para. 2). Social bookmarking is built on a foundation of tags. “Tagging is the assignment of a keyword or phrase to a bit of digital data” as defined by Library Technology Reports (2007). A group of tags, called taxonomies, are attached to the digital data and used to organize information on the web. Social bookmarking sites, like del.icio.us, display the organized data for the user. Forbes continues, explaining that social bookmarking, “allows [her] to effectively link the Internet to instruction” (Para. 2). There are many educational uses for social bookmarking. It has many of the same benefits for teachers, as well as the students.

Social bookmarking allows a place for teachers and students to keep all of their favorite sites in one place, and because the sites are kept on a third party Internet site rather than a computer’s hard drive, the list is available on any computer that has Internet access. This accessibility also “allows students to further investigate a topic after [the] class time has ended...[and] allows those students who take longer to process information to have extended time for completing Web-based assignments,” (Forbes, 2004). Using social bookmarking sites also presents a safer, quicker way to search the Internet. Teachers pre-select the sites students will visit based on relevance and appropriateness. This “increases [students’] time on task and decreases frustration among those who can’t read” as well as allowing “teachers to provide visual cues for students and present high-interest, meaningful reading material from the Internet” (Forbes, 2004). Another social bookmarking site is www.ikeepbookmarks.com. This site is great to use because it offers a visual option to provide pictures next to each bookmarked site to help non-readers navigate the page. The use of tagging can even become a lesson itself in the classroom. With younger children or children with disabilities, it can be a way for students to build vocabulary. “A teacher could show an image to the class, and the students could discuss possible terms to use to ‘tag’ the image,” (Buffington, 2008). There are many more ways social bookmarking could be utilized in the classroom beyond the scope of this blog.

Buffington, Melanie L. (2008). What is web 2.0 and how can it further art education. Art Education, 61(3) 36-41.

Cannata, Cosimo (2009). Folksonomy, tagging and taxonomy for effective learning: Perspectives of learning 2.0 in the XXI century. International Journal of Emerging Technologies in Learning, 4(2) 26-32.

Forbes, Leighann S. (2004). Using web-based bookmarks in K-8 settings: linking the internet to instruction. Reading Teacher, 58(2), 148-153.

Library Technology Reports. (2007). 43(5). 58-61.