Week 14

Week 14 was a fun week where we talked about online gaming and the ethics that go along with it. The idea of having ambassadors in Second Life was an enlightening topic. Also, the use of real money makes the ideal of virtual crime more threatening.
This could be good for Journalism because of all the cool stories that could come out of the people who play this game.
Here's a link to second Life:
http://secondlife.com/?v=1.1

Week 13

Distance education and virtual learning are the cornerstones of the new educational movement of the digital age. Children are no longer tethered to classrooms and schools, but can learn from anywhere they have a computer. The implications of this are monstrous, and we'll see where this new avenue in teaching will take us.
Journalism is all about bringing things to be people who would have no contact with it otherwise, so the implications are good for that as well. Journalists' need to be aware of the latest trends and movements in education so as to stay up to date and current with new technologies.
Here's a link to a virtual school in Florida.

Week 12

Week 12 was the week where we learned how to use Google site's to create a professional web presence. This is important because you need a place for employers to see your abilities before you apply for a job. The Internet makes it very easy to create a professional looking site to do this with.
In Journalism you can display your articles or video's you've done or found interesting. Google sites can be found here.

Week 11

Week 11's activities included a discussion about open source software. Open source software means that anyone can read the and edit the code of a program. This helps work out bugs and improves functionality of a program.
In Journalism Audacity is used a lot for capturing sound recordings and doing interviews. Here's a link:
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Week 10

In week 10 we talked about using tech tools in educational circumstances. In the digital age, it's important to be able to relate to children in a way they can understand. Since most youths are good with computers, it's a good idea to use tech tools to grab the children's attention and help them learn.
The program wordle is an interesting way to take information and extract the most relevant keywords in an unusual way. In Journalism it could help you find keywords to help others fund your article or blogpost on the web.
Here's a link to wordle:
http://www.wordle.net