Social+Bookmarking

Social bookmarking is plays a big part in the collaborative and sharing nature of the Web 2.0 world. In short, social bookmarking is the saving and storing of your favourite websites with annotations and tags to classify your sites - like an online repository - that is available from any computer with Internet access. Personally I find using a social bookmarking tool, such as [|Delicious], a more efficient way of bookmarking websites rather than saving to a browser installed on my computer within folders.

Another bonus of using social bookmarking tools is the ability for individuals to share their favourite resources and web links with the world and vice versa - "the social aspect of bookmarking" (Bradley, 2007: 82). People connect thorough shared tags and subscribe to each other's lists - thereby becoming part of your network. If you wish bookmarks can be saved privately, shared with certain groups or people, or inside particular networks. Additionally, some bookmarking sites enable you to download and install a widget to your web browser so you can add sites directly to your bookmarks.

[|7 Things you should know about social bookmarking] by Educause

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[|Delicious], which is probably the biggest social bookmarking site, is based around tagging bookmarks. It's a great place to start searching for that particular website you need for your class, research needs or personal interest.

My Delicious username is [|jasmont1] so feel free to drop by and check out my bookmarks.

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This screencast by American educator Liz Davis explains how teachers and students can use the many features of Delicious.

= **Learning and teaching ideas with Delicious or other social bookmarking tool** =
 * create a class set of resources with contributions from all students (after students' carefully evaluate the websites they've found) - like a class repository
 * teachers can create reading lists of useful resources for units of work being studied
 * rate and review bookmarks to help with students decide on the usefulness of resources based on the effectiveness of tags and description
 * share links to current news items that relate to classroom discussions
 * create and share one Delicious (or other social bookmarking tool) account between all faculty members in order for the collaboration and building up of subject-specific resources
 * during collaborative projects students can divide the topic into sub-topics. Each student responsible for searching and bookmarking sites related to their allocated subtopic

Other popular social bookmarking sites are [|Diigo], [|Stumbleupon], [|Cite U Like], [|Digg]