Whitman College Technology Services Presents:
CwTI 2009
Understanding Social Software
Demistifying Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Wikis and Penetrating the Paradigm That Underlies Them All.
May 26 - 28*
What is CwTI?
The Communicating with Technology Initiative (CwTI) focuses on technology issues that impact communication and instructional skills by providing mentoring, training workshops, and development support for faculty. Many faculty have already participated in the past events.
Introducing CwTI 2009: Understanding Social Software
Are you on Facebook? Do you tweet? Read/Write blogs? Contribute to a wiki? Maybe you do some of these things, and maybe you don't. Maybe you've only heard these buzz words and wondered what they mean. Regardless of your situation, do you wonder what all these kinds of "social software" are all really about? Do you wonder what their real value is, particularly as a faculty member?
We here at Whitman find ourselves at in interesting juncture with social software. CLEo has been acting as a gateway to the use of blogs, wikis and other social software. Future releases of CLEo will likely feature more "Facebook-style" social integration into many of its tools. The vast majority of students use social software, and an increasing number of faculty members do as well. As an institution, Whitman is investigating establishing a presence on Facebook and possibly Twitter. In this climate, it's an auspicious time to learn about social software!
Due to the temporal nature of social software, CwTI 2009 will take place in three phases.
1) Hands-on Learning. (May 26th)*
In phase one, faculty participants will be introduced hands-on to Facebook and Twitter, as well as gain exposure to the underlying trends and mentality behind social software in general. Additional topics will be driven by the interests of course participants (determined prior to the workshop).
Phase 1 Schedule:
- May 26th (Tues): 9:00am - 4:00pm, lunch provided
2) Explore!
Phase two will provide informal opportunities throughout the summer for faculty to explore and develop their social software accounts.
3) Come together.
Finally, phase three will bring faculty participants together to discuss their experiences and impressions of social software. Date of the discussion will be announced at a later date, probably late summer or early fall.
Participants' prior experience with social software may be helpful, but is not required.
*Times of workshop sessions are arranged to not conflict with the Center For Teaching and Learning's "Summer Workshop on Mentoring". We encourage you to participate in both CwTI and the CTL's workshop!