One of the challenges we have noticed in our work with West Genny and JD is that it is sometimes difficult to know whether issues that crop up with Web tools are hardware, network, or tool related (or a combination of all 3). Different districts have different settings/images on their equipment and web-based tools change all the time.
Blabberize, for example, has been an issue with some hardware. If the microphone on the computer is not allowed, then recording becomes difficult, if not impossible (depending on the user rights). Blabberize may prove to be a tool we no longer recommend as it seems to be extremely glitchy lately.
Some of our class participants were unable to upload a picture of themselves to Moodle, and I am not sure which category in which to place this issue.
Another struggle we face is the constant changes the tool sites implement. Some go from free to costly, others change where they locate the features and links we need to point out, and many do a complete overhaul (often without updating their tutorials in the same time frame).
It is difficult when sites are blocked by districts, and we run into this quite a bit. I know that the federal filtering requirements are actually pretty basic so these are choice the districts are making for one reason or another, and that is a subject for a post entirely of its own.
We are learning in our first courses outside SCSD what tools seem to work and which ones we need to scrap. As usual, we have just as much to learn from the teachers who take our courses as they may learn from us! They keep us on our toes as we learn the ways their districts work.
