Thing 11

The RSS reader is a great technology tool. These feeds can provide specific information about a wide variety of topics. I have subscribed to serveal blogs including the EdTech Journeys. I located this blog using EduBlog's Award Winners 2006 which was easy to use. I tried to use Feedster, but had trouble logging on. It was not as user friendly.

For the motivated teacher, having a set of RSS feeds is like having a research staff that is constantly scouring the net for information. It can be used by students and teachers in forming a collabrative project on a topic of choice, such as the use of Mayo Clinic's RSS feed for health and fitness.

RSS feeds are easy to set up and contain good content, if carefully selected. I found www.ask.com to be an easy to use RSS feed search location. A good RSS feed can serve as a focus site for content. This allows a teacher to assign an online topic and not be concerned about students surfing to unrelated sites, provided they use the authorized RSS feed locations.