Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Symbaloo for Classroom Curation


One of the challenges of having online tech tools for your students is finding a way to manage them.  Do you use a tool that bookmarks them in one place, giving students easy access?  I’ve tried a number of curation tools, and always come back to Symbaloo. 

Symbaloo allows you to set up a “web mix” of tiles, each tile linking to your favorite websites.  You can colorize the tiles, add short titles, and even a small image.  You can then post the link on your class’s web page for all to access. 

Here’s what my student web-mix looks like…


I colored the tiles to separate school sites and productivity sites from informational ones.  I also keep them in alphabetical order (for my own sake).  Try to add an image that shows the name of the site, and use the title option to identify the site’s function.  Use a Google Doc (with a tile on this page) to house all the whole-class user names and passwords for the sites.

Encourage students to created their own too as a means of getting organized on the Internet.  Symbaloo is free and very easy to set up!

Other online curation tools to consider:
Pinterest - more visual, can use boards to divide tools
Pearltrees - similar to a mind-map, allows users to group like tools together
Scoop.it - create your own magazine-like collection of sites
Diigo - great for both collecting and sharing online resources.

Do you used others?  Please comment and share what you like to use!

4 comments:

Mimi Chau said...

Thank you for the Symbaloo love! You can find your blog post here: http://www.symbalooedu.com/symbaloolove/. We're glad that you enjoy using Symbaloo, and thank you for sharing your tips on how you organized your Symbaloo webmixes. They are great advices! More information about SymbalooEDU can always be found at www.SymbalooEDU.com, latest updates are posted to our blog http://bit.ly/SymbalooEDUBlog and we always appreciate feedback via email: [email protected]. Have a great day!

Sincerely,
Mimi
Social Media Manager
Team Symbaloo

Kerry Gallagher said...

These are great suggestions for content curation. I love finding new ways to gather and synthesize information, and Symbaloo is new to me. So, a big thank you!

Susan Elizabeth D'Auria said...

I love using Symbaloo for myself as a STEM and mathematics education researcher and teacher. But I never knew I could use it with my students! Another summer project on my list :)

Allintong Jacob said...

In the huge amount of curation tools Diigo is considered best for students and other learners. Similarly Symbaloo is also good for learners. All other people who want to see all the contents on single page can use curation tools which is getting popular day by day. more information