This presentation will provide an introduction to TrackStar: A Social Bookmarking Tool built specifically for teachers.

1. Introduction to TrackStar:
Social Bookmarking for Teachers
Presented by:
Jennifer Styron
April 26, 2010

2. Overview
This presentation will provide an introduction to TrackStar: A Social Bookmarking Tool built
specifically for teachers. Before covering TrackStar, the author will briefly touch on the
following topics:
• What is Web 2.0?
• Educational Uses of Web 2.0 Tools
• Social Bookmarking
• Benefits of Social Bookmarking
• Educational Uses of Social Bookmarking
• Examples of Educational uses
• Types of Social Bookmarking Tools
• TrackStar
• Creating an Account
• Creating a Track
• Viewing/Editing a Track
• Adding a Track
• Viewing a Track
• Deleting a Track
• Search Options
• TrackStar Examples
• Other Tools

3. What is Web 2.0?
• Web 2.0 is the name given to the second generation of the
Internet.
You might ask, what’s
the difference between
Web 2.0 and Web 1.0?
Web 2.0 Web 1.0
• Interactive • Non-Interactive
• Collaborative • Static
• Information
• User-Centered
Centered
Figure 1. Web 1.0 vs Web 2.0, The Difference. Taken from
http://www.sizlopedia.com/2007/08/18/web-10-vs-web-20-the-visual-difference/

4. Web 2.0
This next video provides a visual representation of the
differences between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bc0oDIEbYFc&feature=related

5. Education Meets Web 2.0
• Web 2.0 tools and technologies provide educators with a
platform that supports collaboration and sharing among
web users (Akbulut & Kiyici, 2007).
• Web 2.0 tools include but are not limited to:
Podcasting Blogs Wikis
Social Networking Web-based Video Social Bookmarking
• These tools can provide educators with resources to make
lesson building and planning more efficient and effective
and students with an interactive learning platform that can
be accessed 24/7.

6. What is Social Bookmarking?
• Bookmarking is an example of a tool
that many people already use. This
tool, slightly modified in Web 2.0, is
called social bookmarking.
• Social bookmarking is defined as “a
method for Internet users to share,
organize, search, and manage
bookmarks of web resources” (Social
Bookmarking, 2010, para. 1).
• Social bookmarking allows for a
more interactive, flexible way to save,
store, share, and retrieve resources
available on the Internet.

7. Benefits of Using Social Bookmarking
• Serves as a resource for lessons,
activities, research topics, etc.
• Allows for interactivity between research
colleagues; teachers/students; and
teacher/school districts; etc.
• Can share any online content such
as bibliographies, reference lists,
and multimedia web resources
• Provides resources that can travel with you.
• Using a folksonomy-based tool you can take advantage of the
insights of other users to find information related to the topic you
are researching, even in areas that aren’t obviously connected to
the primary topic (Educause Learning Initiative, 2005, p. 2).

8. Associated Challenges
• Lack of standard set(s) of
keywords, structure, and/or
hierarchical relationships
• Improper use of tags (tagged
incorrectly; too personally)
(Everhart & Shelton, 2010)

9. Educational Uses
• A teacher could set up an account for each class,
tag resources and make the URL available to the
class. As the work is web-based it can be modified
and updated from any internet connected computer.
Likewise students can access the resources from
any internet connected computer.
• A specific tag (within a group of tags) could be used
to direct individual students to specific readings or
resources.
• A collaborative account could be created, the
username and password shared by a class or group
of students who could then tag and share resources.
• Library staff could maintain a list of tags specifically
relevant to their school's curriculum
Examples provided were found at Washington’s Department of Education website at http://
www.det.wa.edu.au/education/cmis/eval/curriculum/ict/socialbookmarking/index.htm#ed_uses

10. Examples of Educational Uses
This blog is publicly available and can be viewed at http://frequanq.blogspot.com/2005/02/social-bookmarking-in-education.html

11. Example Continued...
This blog is publicly available and can be viewed at http://www.diigo.com/people/feature?source=redirect_from_furl

12. Example Continued...
This blog is publicly available and can be viewed at http://www.diigo.com/user/wolffw/web2.0

13. Example Continued...
This blog is publicly available and can be viewed at http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F
%2Fmashable.com%2F2009%2F11%2F03%2Fhotseat?tab=people&uname=wolffw

14. Types of Social Bookmarking Tools
• Below are some examples of social bookmarking tools:
http://www.citeulike.org http://delicious.com http://digg.com
http://www.diigo.com http://www.getboo.com http://friendfeed.com
http://gnolia.com/ http://www.newsvine.com http://www.reddit.com
http://trackstar.4teachers.org http://www.twine.com http://twitter.com

15. TrackStar
• TrackStar is a free online interface offered by The Advanced
Learning Technologies project at the University of Kansas
Center for Research on Learning (ALTEC)
• TrackStar allows the user to create and edit social bookmarks
into “Tracks” that help organize and annotate web sites into
lessons.
• In addition to the social bookmarking feature, teachers can
also:
• Make a Quiz for a Track using QuizStar
• Build a simple Web Page (Poster) for a Track

16. Creating an Account- TrackStar
• The first thing
you’ll need to
do is create a
user account.

17. Creating an Account- TrackStar
• Fill in your
personal
information
and click
“Register”

18. Creating an Account- TrackStar
• From the home page, click
“Login to Make or Edit a
Track” and then enter
your email and password
and then click “Login” on
the User Login page

19. TrackStar Homepage

20. Creating a Track
• From the home
page, click
“Make New
Track”
• Then enter your
information to
create your
Track.

21. Viewing/Editing a Track
• From the home page, click
“Make or Edit a Track”
• Then click on
the track you’d
like to edit by
clicking on the
blue Title of the
track.

22. Viewing/Editing a Track
Click on “Edit
Track” to add/
edit/delete
content.

23. Adding/Editing a Track

24. Viewing a Track- “Frame” View
This track is publicly available and can be viewed at http://trackstar.4teachers.org/trackstar/ts/viewTrackMembersFrames.do?
org.apache.struts.taglib.html.TOKEN=5b3387afcdbe148d41c7b622c2f6e78a&number=357628&password=

25. Viewing a Track- “Text” View
This track is publicly
available and can
be viewed at
http://trackstar.
4teachers.org/
trackstar/ts/
viewTrackMembers
Frames.do?
org.apache.struts.ta
glib.html.TOKEN=5
b3387afcdbe148d4
1c7b622c2f6e78a
&number=357628&
password=

26. Deleting a Track
• After a year, I notice that one of the links utilized is no longer relevant. To delete an item,
follow the viewing/editing a track steps. Once you get to the screen where you can enter
site information, simply click the “X” button to delete a site from your track.

27. Searching Options
• There are also many ways to search for information on TrackStar such as by track
number, keywords or subject. Again, this is why it is so important to provide accurate,
detailed information about your track so that users can easily find your information.

28. TrackStar Examples
• Example 1: WebQuest activity using TrackStar
This track is publicly available and can be viewed at
http://trackstar.4teachers.org/trackstar/ts/viewTrack.do?number=393032

29. TrackStar Examples
• Example 2: Animal Scavenger Hunt using TrackStar
This track is publicly available and can be viewed at
http://trackstar.4teachers.org/trackstar/ts/viewTrack.do?number=377649

30. TrackStar Examples
• Example 3: English Writing Skill Activities using TrackStar
This track is publicly available and can be viewed at
http://trackstar.4teachers.org/trackstar/ts/viewTrack.do?number=362925

31. TrackStar Examples
• Example 4: Literature Review using TrackStar
This track is publicly available and can be viewed at
http://trackstar.4teachers.org/trackstar/ts/viewTrack.do?number=402478

32. Other tools- QuizStar
QuizStar is a Web-based quiz
maker that enables you to create,
administer and automatically
grade your quizzes online!
With QuizStar you can:
• Manage classes and quizzes
• Attach multimedia files to
questions
• Make quizzes in multiple
languages
• Access from any Internet-
connected computer
• Allow students to complete and
review

33. Other tools- Web Poster Wizard
• Web Worksheet Wizard and Project Poster have combined to make Web Poster
Wizard. This FREE tool allows educators to create a lesson, worksheet, or class
page and immediately publish it online. Teachers can also set up classes and assign
projects to students. Students complete the assignments by creating their own online
projects or reports. Teachers and students can even add images and links to their
pages.
New Features:
• Centralized login for better
teacher organization.
• Student and teacher information
now in one account.
• Archive option keeps student
projects longer than one month.
• Teacher Feature option creates
one Web page of class' archived
projects.

34. References
• Akbulut, Y. & Kiyici, M. (2007). Instructional use of Weblogs. Turkish Online
Journal of Distance Education, 8(3), 6-15.
• Educause Learning Initiative (2005). Seven things you should know about social
bookmarking. Retrieved from http://www.educause.edu/ELI/
7ThingsYouShouldKnowAboutSocia/156804
• Everhart, D., & Shelton, K. (2010). From Information Literacy to Scholarly
Identity: Effective Pedagogical Strategies for Social Bookmarking. In Yang, H. H.,
& Yuen, S. C. (Eds.), Collective Intelligence and E-Learning 2.0: Implications of
Web-Based Communities and Networking (pp.167-184). Hershey, Pennsylvania:
Information Science Reference.
• Social Bookmarking. (2010, March 28). In Wikipedia. Retrieved April 25, 2010,
from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_bookmarking

35. Questions? Comments?
Feel free to contact
Jennifer Styron at
Jennifer.Styron@usm.edu
for additional
information.