Summary

Wow, I can't believe I have completed 23 things. It has truly been a pleasure. Learning all of this stuff has opened my eyes to the use of so much technology. And to make this sound even worse, most of the things we are learning about were created by children, young adults. My favorite was blogging in general. I like the different aspects of socializing. When I was in school, we had pen pals that lived in other states and countries. It took forever for us to communicate with each other. Now it takes a matter of seconds. We have come a long way, because I am not that old!!! I really enjoyed animoto and the stikkit. Those are 2 things I will surely continue. This program has taught me that I am living like the Flintstones. The only thing that I found unexpected was the amount of time it took to do some of the things. I loved the flow of the program. There may be a couple of things that could be moved around. I would participate in another discovery program, because I love to learn on my terms. AS a teacher the things I have learned will help me tach different concepts and stay organized. I will follow my RSS feeds and continue to blog. I am a blogger now.

Thing 23

Creative Commons is a site that I will use to make sure I am not violating copyright laws. It gets kind of tricky on what you can and can't use. I must make sure i am not violating the copyright law and using someone's work without their permission. That would be stealing. I am here to shape and mold the minds of innocent children and I can not teach them what is right if I am not doing the right thing. I noticed that Learning 2.0 gave credit to Helene Bowers and they also gave credit to the California School Library Association for its adaption. It also tells us that this permission was granted under the Creative Commons License.

Thing 22

Podcasting was ok but I did not find it very useful. It may be useful for the students to be able to look up things of interest, however I could not find much of an educational need for me or a personal need. Educational podcast directory was the site I searched. It was simple to use and I did not have to register for anything (thank goodness). I feel like all of my personal business is floating around in cyberspace.

Thing 21

I enjoyed using this feature. I think this would be something we could use for our school's web site. When we have things happening at school we can take pictures and post them online to the school's web page. I will continue to use this feature at home and at school. It was easy to set up, I just wish they had more musical selections.

Thing 20

I chose the first video because I am a math teacher who is always looking for innovative ways to capture students attention. The second video I chose because I belong to the sorority Alpha Kappa Alpha. We are celebrating 100 years of existence and I was not able to attend boule. I found that it was hard for me to come up with video titles that I really wanted to see. The thing I did not like was the fact that you had to look at all of the videos to find the one that you really wanted to use. Unless it is a video that I have place on you tube, I don't think I will be using it. As far as school related, the only benefit I can see is using tags for references.

Thing 19

Visit 23 Thingsters

All of this social networking is fun, however I still can't get into it. I don't have enough time to sit and look at profiles, pictures, and find friends. I can't see how this is beneficial to me. I am not a member of any of these sites besides ning and myspace. The only thing I would like to see is a site for christian adults. I guess I need to start that one:)

Thing 18

Find me on MySpace and be my friend!
I already had a my space account. I have 2 teenage sons and several teenage nieces. During my family reunion on July 4th. they decided that I needed to be on my space. This turned out to be a good thing because they set up the account for me. Now I have got to try to figure out how to keep my students from knowing about it. There should be a place for you to only allow certain types of people to invite you to be their friend. I don't really see any reason to use this at school, other than for social networking. This is a good way for old friends to reconnect. I found out that I can see some of my friends, friend's and that allows me to invite them to be my friend.

Thing 13

I have fallen in love with Zoho Writer. I love the fact that I can view some things while offline also. This program has various uses. I am able to create appointments, create databases, share this with others and let them change things. This is extremely helpful while in a masters class. We did lots of group work, but everyone was not always able to get together to brainstorm and edit the paper. With Zoho writer this is possible without having to email the document then waiting for it to come back before you can see the changes and respond.

Thing 17

While viewing delicious, I immediately thought about web sites that my students could use for math tutorials, extra help, and homework help. I am going to set up some tags for them and their parents to use while away from school. I think I will use this with my team members to prepare lesson plans and cross curriculum plan. In our school libraries this would be a great way for librarians to help students choose books that are interesting. A student will have the option of searching tags for things that they would like to read. It can also be used for research.

Thing 16

I chose igoogle for my start page. To be honest, I already had that start page, but it did not have anything on it. I added some special interest things and rearranged the features. This will remain my permanent page.
I created the online calendar through yahoo. Again because I already use yahoo, it made it easy to add things to it and navigate through the calendar. I can use this for meetings, deadlines, and birthdays.
I chose stikkit to exlore. I needed a way to jot things down and come back to it. I use stickies all the time and I feel like this would be helpful online. I usually forget some things that I need to do or explore, so with stikkit I can leave myself a sticky note.
The tadalist was my favorite. I am planning a massive family vacation for 2009. This includes everyone in my family. I will use this to send out list of things that need to be done and we can all update it as needed. I can also assign certain things to certain people and they can complete them at will.

Thing 15

At my campus we are placed into teams. Our team has to collaborate together to come up with ideas for discipline, lessons, activities, field trips, and other things. Email is so slow, and it is hard for 5 people to collaborate together with so many emails going in and out. With the wiki I think it will create a place for us to share and collaborate without having to send and receive emails. It will allow us to change things so that it fits our plan and everyone can have an input. During taks time we very seldom get to meet face to face. Wiki will allow us to continue to meet but from a distance:)

Thing 14

Our 6th grade curriculum has now made it mandatory that we incorporate thinking maps into our lessons. I personally don't like the kid drawn thinking maps. They don't get them quite right. It also waste some time getting them drawn. Now that we have giffy.com, I can take them to the computer lab and let them do certain flow charts using this site. I also do a lesson in geometry where the children have to draw the floor plan of their house, this site would be beneficial to them so that they can get a better visual of what it should look like. The mind maps are a little different. You can't make different designs so I don't think I will be using it very much.

Thing 12

I decided that I would tour the google calendar. This tool is very useful for students who have trouble remembering when things are due. This calendar has a reminder on it and they can benefit from that. It would be exceptionally useful when they have a project that is to be done in stages. The next thing I looked into was google notebook tour. This tool is useful to me when I am putting together a lesson. I sometimes find lessons that I would like to use, however it does not fit my situation perfectly. I then go to another site to help tweek the lesson. With notebook, I can add them all to one page.

Thing 11

I am having so much fun searching for and adding feeds to my account. I have searched for every project I want to complete in my house, money saving tips, news articles, teaching ideas, and the list continues. I know I am going to have to sort through these and keep the most important one. I used Google Blog search. When I typed in misd 23 things, it brought up another class that had already completed the 23 things project. I read some of their post. It gave me hope that I could actually complete this assignment. Most of the search tools were simple enough to navigate. I do not particularly like the groupings. I would rather search for individual feeds and add them one at a time.

Thing 10

I like RSS feeds because it allows the information I am searching for to come to me. I compared this to the daily newspaper. Everything you are interested in knowing is at your door step. I will use this in the classroom to find out about current events and new things in other places. I will use this in my personal life for entertainment. School officials, especially librarians, can use this tool as a way to have important information at their fingertips. This helps to save time and also gives us other tools to utilize in the school setting.

Thing 9

This was so much fun. I teach vocabulary and this would be a fun way for students to study. I am also using the SAT words quite a bit and would lke to havethe students ue this to compose cartoon that we can display around the campus using those words and definitions. This was super easy, however you hae to be careful when putting in the definitions. If it is too long then it won't fit into the box. I played around with the font for a while and found one that could hold it all.
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Thing 8

I like the idea of being able to create puzzles and calenders. There are lotsof ways I can use this in social studies and science. Putting the visual pieces together can help students remember what they are learning about. It captures the kinesthetic side of them. I also like the mosaic maker, clockr, and spell with flickr. This is a very cool tool to use.

Thing 7

Flicker has been a headache for me. I have had the most difficult time getting the URL and the picture to post (been trying for 2 weeks). I hope this is correct. However, this is a beautiful picture of fireworks at Walt Disney World. http://www.flickr.com/photos/24020690@N07/ mattkt1108 shot this picture without a tripod. I do like fickr, but I just need the remedial version. I think this site is something I need to learn from someone else. There are lots of things that I can do with flickr once I learn to use it proficiently and get over my headache.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3089/2582369306_b1fd3f5aee_b.jpg

Thing 6

Oh my goodness.  I have had so much fun with all of these sites and the things you can do with them.  I chose hairmixer to look into further.  With this site you can create new faces of celebrities or yourself and place them on a magazine cover.  You can change the hairstyle, color, and lots of other things to make it look like you want to.  I think my students would like to use this when they have to use photographs for their projects.  If they can maniulate the images to represent them or their personal feelings, I think they would be more apt to complete the assignmnet.  

Thing 5

School 2.0 means that children will have an extended teacher.  They can not only learn from the teacher, but they can learn from themselves also.  Te children we have today need variety in learning.  Web 2.0 offers just that.  To me this means success for all children.  Slow learners can work at their own pace without the pressures of someone knowing that they have a learning disability.  School 2.0 means progress.  As educators we are preparing children to enter the world to lead.  How can they lead if they have not been taught to use the latest technology to benefit the company?  

Schools and libraries of the future will be able to offer children a more diverse selection of learning.  They will be able to offer every child a plethora of ways to learn.  This is important for the ADHD children, emotional problem and autistic children.  This will also enable parents to be more involved in what their child is learning and become more supportive of it because they can help them at home with online learning.  

In the article Web 2.0 Is the Future of Education I feel that we have arrived from what the web use to be.  I don't think we are ahead of what children are already doing, I actually think we are behind the curve.  The world has taken technology by the hand and has made it a vital part of our daily lives. 

In the article titled New Literacies: Enrichment or Essential I think it is important to understand that things dealing with technology change continuously.  It is important to continue to study the new things that arise.  That is why I feel that these things are enriching.  Learning new things broadens the mind and makes us think. However, I also feel that technology is essential to our existence.  Imagine living without your cell phone, microwave, or even your stove.  well our ancestors did live without them but now that we have them they have become an essential part of our existence.  That is how we should look at technology.  It is here to stay just like fire.

Thing 4

As we embark on this new and fascinating journey through technology, it is evident that we still need interaction with others.  In this world we sometimes need to know whether or not our ideas are relevant to what others are thinking.  This can be achieved in conversation by others verbally.  With the online community it is important that we keep that same line of communication.  In this case by using comments.  Sometimes people believe that they have all of the answers and they are correct about the situation, however there may be other people who disagree.  This is where commenting can come in. This is also important so that we can share the knowledge that we have about a subject matter with others.  

when I read Commenting using an alias vs. your real name, I felt like I would never use my real name because of privacy issues.  Sometimes it is necessary to use your real name, but I am still weary of it.  I feel like if I use this with my students I would have them supply a number that would be included somewhere to help me identify them.  Or I would just have them register like we did and that is how I could keep up with it.  Sometimes you get a particular student who is not comfortable with speaking out in public or to a group, however they are very vocal behind the computer.  

As I read Edublogger Etiquette-Responding to comments, I had mixed feelings.  I feel like comment are very important, but I do not see the need for the blogger to send back a thank you note to every one who comments about the subject.  Sometimes it is best to let other people comment and you just listen. Blogging should get the conversation started and commenting should keep it going.   I commented on "23 Things" I loved her American Soldier Picture. She is a former soldiers wife and my husband is ex military too. I also commented on 50 year learner about the music site last.fm. I have not tried it yet but I will. Next I commented on AWMCview's blog about animoto. I loved this feature. I also commented on AMSHisteacher on making a video describing how to work math problems. Last I commented on coachd reagrding a web site she listed for a geometry lab she does. (gliffy and mindmeister).  I also commented on dave3detwo regarding Estelle Getty dying at age 84. I love the Golden Girls. The last comment I made was to mapgirl regarding an investment in wind power.

Thing 3

I am an interactive teacher.  I love to get feedback from my students about the assignments we have completed.  However, there are some students who are afraid to speak up.  I think they would be more open to blogging because they don't have to be afraid of someone thinking they are silly for thinking the way they do.  I would also like to use it as a tool for them to be able to view assignments and post their thoughts and questions.  Communication is key in the schools today, and since students are forbidden from much social interaction in some classrooms, I think blogging is the next best thing.  

Thing 1

The thing that is easiest for me to do is to begin with the end in mind.  I always look for what the outcome is going to be before I come up with a plan.  This allows me the opportunity to justify if it is worth doing.  After I justify the ends I can then work on developing a plan of action.  The thing that is my least accepted is viewing my problems as challenges.  I hate when things get mixed up and I have set backs.  I know that is part of life and learning, however I hate controversy and misfortunes.  I always seem to be able to work through most of them with no problems, however they still make me nervous.

Thing 2

I would really love to be able to teach my low socio-economic children the many tools available to them on the web.  I would like to learn about as many social networking tools as possible.  I would also like to learn to use the features like video streaming and adding sound and movie clips to documents.  I can do it, but I would like to become more proficient so that I can teach it to my students.