I have stayed the course and completed the 23 “Things”. It has not been easy, and it has taken me much longer than I expected it would (Probably about 5 to 6 hours a week). Throughout the course, I believe I have gained confidence in myself as a confident effective learner. In the beginning, I tended to call others and lean on my wonderful coach and my colleagues who always seemed to be just a “thing” or 2 ahead of me, but I can honestly say that I have completed the second half of the course pretty much on my own. The course became more and more fun as I gained confidence and became less fearful. I have enjoyed learning about all of the web 2.0 tools. I could potentiallly use every tool, but I probably won’t use them all. I will however contninue to “play” with the different tools to see how they fit into my professional and personal life. I will remember that “play” is essential for learning and brain development. Thank you Shelly for a great ride.
I took the tour of Classsroom 2.0 and actually joined, thinking I would learn more and find something I am really interested in. I found that I had already seen many of the videos on youtube and teachertube. I also looked at many of the photos and found some that I really liked, but I am not sure how I would use them I will have to spend a lot more time learning about copyright before using any of them. I realize that joining a social network is joining a community where one can learn, grow, and work together, but I have always believed that I have a strong network in the people I work with. It sometimes takes me a long time to think through what I want to say or how to aska question when it has to be typed or written. I prefer face to face conversations. I work with fifth graders at the present time and I am not sure that social networking would be safe for them. I read about what schools can do to make it safe, but if we allow students to use social networking, I am not sure how well they will be monitored at home. What will happen to social skills if too much time is spent socializing on the net? I still have a lot of questions and a lot to learn about Classroon 2.0 and Ning. For the time, I will add this to my list to revisit at a later date.
One interesting item that I have read lately comes from Kathy Schrock’s Kaffeeklatch. It is titled The Networked Student and contains a Common Craft video that really made me rethink the roll of the teacher in the 21st century. This class is a good beginning for teachers.
Pageflakes – friend or foe? I created a pageflakes page using Shelly’s template. Building Pageflakes definitely takes time. I enjoyed the “PLAY” aspect of getting started; however, I will need much more time to play to build a page that is truly mine. I don’t think I am ready to go public, but I like the idea of organizing so many things in one place. A to-do list would definitely be a plus for me. I would like to create a photo flake and a collection of podcasts. I would like to build in some stories for kids and delicious links. Now that I know what Pageflakes are and how to use them I will keep playing as “Play is essential for learning and brain development.”
Google Docs is easy to use; however, I am not sure that I have spent enough time with it yet to understand all that it will do. I think I will find many uses for it in my personal and professional life. Some ideas that come to mind right away are:
Students could create a survey to collect information for a class newspaper.
Students could collaborate on a report.
I could use it to create a vocabulary quiz or practice. Students could cut and paste to match a list of definitions with vocabulary words. I would also like to try creating a crossword puzzle with vocabulary words.
Google Docs is a great tool for collaborating on meeting agendas for meetings both in my personal and professional life.
These are just a few ways I see to use Google Docs. I am sure as I continue to investgate, I will find other uses. I also liked the ready made templates and I think I will make use of them also.
I like YouTube, and I often browse for entertainment. When I searched “How to”, I was surprised to learn that there are at least 25 videos showing “How to fold a T-Shirt in 2 seconds – Perfectly”. I searched “how to simplify fractions” and found an interesting video using a Factor T. I was not familiar with this method and found it very interesting. From here I found a great math site for middle and high school online math help, Your Teacher.com. Unfortunately it is not free, but I visited and it has some great online help. Some of the lessons would work well on a Smartboard. I could not find very many teaching videos for math on Teacher Tube. Maybe I was not searching the right key words or tags. I plan to search again when I have more time. I think that I might try to create some math teaching videos to support TeacherTube. I have also browsed TeacherTube for entertainment. This video from The Letterman Show is a must see for all teachers. I have wasted hours trying to embed this video and it just doesn’t work, so I added a link. Too much time spent on this THING! Good Night.
I’ve heard about podcasts for years, but have never thought about using podcasts in the classroom until I explored some of the podcasts available for sharing. One Podcast that I explored was Radio WillowWeb which contains podcasts presented by students for students. These could be motivating. The resources certainly give opportunities to learn about a myriad of topics. I could imagine using podcasting for shared book reports, instructions which would show their understanding of math, making study guides, and reviewing grammar rules. Another site that I subscribed to is Grammar Grater. And another that I enjoyed was Wikihow. Wikihow has directions for making a variety of items, including craft ideas which could be used in the classroom. I have also added an iPod to my Christmas list.
As I was taking the Library Thing Tour, I found myself wondering how and why I would use the library catalog. Perhaps it is because this is Thing #16, I am not really interested in signing up for anything else right now. I prefer to curl up with a good book and a cup of hot chocolate when I have quiet time to veg out. Someday, maybe this summer, I might rethink my decision. The only way I feel that it would be helpful to me is maybe to organize the books I have for the classroom. I did; however, find it interesting that one can access their library catalog with a cell phone while at a book store. I don’t think it would be difficult to catalog books. The site seemed to be similar in some ways to Delicious. They both have many ways to tag, read others’ comments, and find new material with ease.
The Delicious site seems very easy to use. I have been using a similar site for about 6 years, It is called ikeepbookmarks.com. Delicious does have a few more “bells and whistles”. The best part about either site is that your bookmarks are available from anywhere you have access to the internet. Tagging will be more beneficial in the future when I add more bookmarks to delicious. Sharing other people’s tags is very interesting. I am sure I will learn about many new sites. I am not sure that I would want to share bookmarks with my students, but I will use them to quickly locate sites, when (due to my senior moments) I cannot remember the name of a site that I want to use.
