Thing #6 - Feed your reader: find & subscribe to feeds

Introduction
One of the key concepts of "Web 2.0" in education is the understanding that we are all becoming "networked learners." The tools connect us to an expansive, interconnected web of experts, ideas and resources, and allow us to participate and contribute. A core element of your learning network is your RSS reader (also known as a newsreader or aggregator). Fill it with quality feeds and the expert knowledge, learning and ideas come to you!



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Discovery Exercise

PART 1: Find 2-3 educational blogs of interest to you and add them to your reader

You will have to invest a little time to find the first couple of bloggers whose voices really resonate for you, but once you find a couple of folks you really like, adding others becomes easy.

Probably the best way to build your "feed library" is to find one or two bloggers you like and check out their "Blogrolls" to see whose blogs they read. In the "blogosphere," you will find that the voices you value are often connected to one another.

Read this post from The Cool Cat Teacher blog for some great suggestions on how to select good RSS feeds: How to Create Your Circle of the Wise.

A few other places to begin looking for education-themed blogs

• EduBlogs Magazine - Who are the Top Edubloggers?
  Pick someone from this list, check out their blog, then check out their blogroll to find other voices.
  
  
• Edublogs Home Page: Popular Tags and Categories
  Check out the "Tag Cloud" at the bottom of the Edublogs homepage. Click any tag (keyword) of interest to be taken to recent posts (from all Edublogs users) marked with that topic.
  
  
• Livemocha: Top 100 Technorati-Ranked Edublogs
  
  
• 2008 Edublog Award Winners and Nominees
  Check out the winners and nominees in about a dozen categories. Also includes links to winning blogs from 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007.
  
  
• TechLearning Blog: Meet the Bloggers
  If you like the postings of any of the contributors to TechLearning (one of your RSS subscriptions from Thing 5), you may want to subscribe to their personal blogs.
  
  
• Support Blogging! Links to School Bloggers -
  An un-vetted but rich list of possibilities. Many recognizable names, some hopefully serendipitous finds.
  
  
• OEDb: Top 100 Education Blogs

PART 2: Use blog search engines to find one or two blogs of interest to you and add them to your reader. These can be educational blogs or fun topics that you enjoy.

Using Blog Search Engines to Find Feeds
Use these tools as you would a "regular" search engine to search for blogs or news feeds on your particular area of interest.

• Google Blog Search
  Type your terms into the search field and click Search Blogs. Use multiple keywords and phrases just as in a regular Google web search. Adding clarifying terms such as "education" or "elementary" to your main topic may be helpful.
  
  
• Technorati
  Technorati is the recognized authority in what's happening on the "World Live Web." To learn more about Technorati, click here.
  
  To search Technorati, enter one or more keywords in the search box at the top of the page and click Search. (Search Tips: You may want to include terms such as "education" or "elementary" along with your other keyword(s); Try looking at results on both the Posts tab and the Blogs tab; Authority ranking indicates how many other blogs have linked to a blog).
  
  
• Google Reader "Discover"
  Perform a "Feed Search" from right inside your Google Reader. Click Discover, then the Browse tab, type your search terms in the Search and Browse field, then click Search for Feeds.

PART 3: Adopt two of your classmates' blogs

Subscribe to the blogs of (at least) two classmates. You can find a list of 23 Thingsters blogs on the sidebar of the Learning 2.0 - 23 Things site.

Send a Gmail to misd23things@gmail.com listing the two blogs that you are adopting. On the Google tracking spreadsheet we will make blog addresses BOLD to indicate that they have been adopted. Ideally, everyone will be adopted by at least one other participant plus the facilitators -- please try to pick people who don't have a BOLD blog address before picking those who do!

PART 4: (OPTIONAL) Add a "Fun" Feed to Your Reader

• Daily Dilbert Comic - http://feeds.feedburner.com/DilbertDailyStrip
• Movie Reviews from Rotten Tomatoes - http://www.rottentomatoes.com/help_desk/syndication_rss.php
• Flickr "Interestingness" Photos Feed - http://feeds.feedburner.com/flickr_interestingness
• Dictionary.com Word of the Day - http://dictionary.reference.com/help/linking/wordoftheday-expert.html
• Read DaVinci's Notebooks one Page at a Time: http://www.interconnected.org/home/more/davinci/
• Family Fun Feeds - http://familyfun.go.com/utilities/global/feature/content-syndication/
• Follow Your Favorite Sports Team - http://sports.yahoo.com/top/rss
• Horoscope - http://www.astrology.com/feeds/
• Weather - http://www.weather.com/weather/rss/subscription
• Answers.com Daily Feeds - http://www.answers.com/main/answers_rss.jsp
• Amazon.com Daily Gold Box Deals - http://www.amazon.com/gp/goldbox/ref=cs_top_nav_gb27/104-2450860-6665567
• Currency Exchange Rates - http://www.currencysource.com/rss_currencyexchangerates.html
• Daily Jigsaw Puzzle - http://www.flashpuzzlezone.com/
• NPR Weekend Edition Sunday Puzzle (Podcast) - http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast.php?id=4473090

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Learning Activity

1. Check your Google Reader daily or every other day for 5-7 days. Practice skimming and scanning through your feeds.

After completing the discovery exercises above, you should have about 6-10 feeds in your reader.

(NOTE: You are not required to retain the original 3-5 feeds from Thing 5 if you do not want them. Go to Manage Subscriptions in your Google Reader and click the Trash can next to the feed(s) you want to remove.)

2. Write a blog post reflecting on your experience and sharing one or more items of interest from your reader.

3. Include links to any posts you refer to.

4. Be sure to include "Thing #6" as part of your post title.

PLEASE NOTE: You will be asked to complete this same task (blog about something interesting from your Google Reader) at two other times during this course. Please continue to check your reader at least every other day throughout the course. It's the only way to actually build a reading habit. See note below.

IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT YOUR READER: The content in your reader can be overwhelming because it will continue to "pile up" endlessly. BUT -- it's not actually there -- it hurts NOTHING for you to skim and skip items and mark them as "read" just by scrolling past them. You aren't actually deleting anything. In fact, learning to quickly scan and process a lot of news items is an essential part of RSS literacy and information management -- the important ideas will always come back around, and you will also learn to pare down your subscriptions as you go. If you feel compelled to thoroughly read every item, you will remain completely overwhelmed and quickly "quit" your reader. Keep trying -- it gets easier!

Stretch Activity - Create a Custom News Feed.

One of the most powerful features of Google News is that it allows you to create a custom feed that checks 4,500 news sources for whatever keyword(s) you choose.

To set up your feed, go to Google News: http://news.google.com, enter your desired search term(s) and click "Search News" (Use advanced search features to refine your search as needed). While viewing your results, click the RSS link in the left sidebar, and copy and paste the feed URL into the Add Subscription area of your reader. After monitoring the feed for a couple of days, write a brief blog post describing the feed you created and sharing about an interesting item or two that has appeared in your reader as a result of the feed.