How To Use NTN
The National Commission on Teaching and America's Future recently documented the extent of "teacher dropout" in the United States. It is not pretty, costing as much as 7.3 billion dollars a year. One of their solutions is to ensure that teachers, particularly new teachers, have an "external network" of professionals.
NTN hopes that through open-source collaboration, "new" teachers can become more connected, adept and well-informed around the various topics, issues and challenges facing them. NTN provides a site and utility, the open source crowd creates the content and connections.
To make that happen, users must acquire a level of familiarity and skill for using the tools and features of NTN.
1. Register and create a log-on name and password.
A registered user has access to a much greater level of functionality than do non-registered guests. Once you register, you have the ability to create content, like blog posts, forum discussions, classified ads and pages (like this), etc. You just have to register, then waltz around the site to "see" everything that becomes available to you. It is literally mind-boggling.
2. Drupal, the open-source platform of NTN, has been created collaboratively by programmers around the world. It has its own language and conventions, and so, a user has to acclimate themselves to finding the particular functions and applications they desire and treasure. For more information, go to www.drupal.org . But, short of that, here are a few key things:
To make a comment: click on the blog post or other content and scroll to the end. You will be given a chance to leave a comment. (Keep things civil, will 'ya?) NTN is attempting to become a community and as such, we are dependent upon your ideas, feedback and insights. Make them rich.
To post a blog: Look to the left under Topics. Click on the topic you are interested in writing about, then scroll down and on the left you will be given a chance to Create Content. Once you click on that, Blog entry will be near the top of the list. Click on that. You will need to confirm the Topic that you want to post under, and you have other options as well. But, basically, you fill the dialogue box with your content, hit Preview first, and then once you have edited, you are ready to Save. That spits it out where everyone can see it.
To establish an organic group: Contact Peter Henry at pfhenry1960 [at] hotmail [dot] com, or throught the NTN site. Groups can be customized and made totally secure. They feature everything that you currently see on the NTN site, plus some features that you can't see. Currently, there is no charge, nada, ningun peso, to set up your own organic group at NTN.
To invite others to join NTN or your organic group: Notice that one of the functions once your group is started is to invite people via email. This works well because the link in the email takes users directly to the organic group and bypasses a lot of steps for the user. Once they register, they are free to roam around to other places within the site.
We appreciate your feedback, ideas and collaboration.