Thing 12

Thing  #12 Discovery Exercise


iGoogle is great, fantastic, and so much more. I already had my iGoogle, so I added stuff to it, a to do list, weather, news, tv guide, movies, scrabble, who has the biggest brain and super cook (http://www.supercook.com/).  I'm really loving the super cook, I can do this before I leave work  to plan dinner. I added two alerts: education and entertainment.

The to do list and notebook would be great for students as planner and journal. Using tools online could be the motivating factor in getting students to reflect and keep track of assignments.

I also set up the picasa album, this would also be an asset in the classroom. Picasa can used for power point presentations, movies, and other projects.

Thing 11

Thing #11 RSS Feeds cont'd...
I added several feeds, after exploring technorati, I may add more later.  I chose the Free Technology for Teachers based on the suggestions.  I discovered Clarksville online via the google search blog, I was initially searching for something about Clarksville Montgomery County School System when I came across the Clarksville site.

Although I viewed other sites, again, I went with the google search tool.  Simply because of familiarity and saving the time of registering for another account.

The most challenging part of managing the feeds was deleting the feeds that I added in error. It was a trial and error process.

While searching for the NEA Today feed, I came across a NEA Video site, which was totally not what I though it was. I discovered my Google home page and I was able to change the theme settings.  Also the amazon widget was very interesting, I'll probably look into that further at a later date.

Thing 10

Thing #10

I chose the Google Reader because I already had a Google account.  I'm also a google addict; I google everything. Everything was pretty simple, when I logged in I saw that the people I am following were already added because my google account and blogger.com are linked.  I added some subscriptions and deleted some also.  I don't believe I'll use it as much but it's there.

Thing 9

I created this sign using the custom sign generator website, after several hours of blogging. I really, really love blogging.

http://www.customsigngenerator.com/banners/i-love.asp?text=Blogging

Gotta keep your eye on the prize.  I created this sign on the Happy Face Generator website, http://www.happyfacegenerator.com/.

I enjoyed creating signs on both sites. We could use these sites in our yearbook, web site design, excel and wordprocessing classes.  I'm forwarding the comic generator site to my son. I can use the smiley faces to spruce up my emails.

Thing 8

For my thing #8 I used mosaic maker to make a 4 tiled photo of  my family.

Created using Spell With Flikr by Erik Kastner.

Thing 7

Flickr is a great site, I like it because of the photo editing feature. I will definitely keep this site in mind for future projects. I did a tag search for Paradise Island, the picture below is one that jarred a memory. My family and I visited Paradise Island while on vacation in the Bahamas.  The picture had several tags Atlantis, Paradise, Island, Bahamas, and Nassau. The picture's author is scmikeburton.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/scmikeburton/1492622295/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/scmikeburton/1492622295/

Thing 6

I sampled several sites, I even registered for some of them.  The site that I found most useful in the classroom was esnips (http://www.esnips.com/).  This site allows you to upload your files (http://www.esnips.com/UploadAction.ns), which could be useful to students who need to save work and access it at a later time from a different location.  This could eliminate the need for a jump drive. Esnips also offers blogging, educational videos,  and game links.  As with most websites, students should be monitored when using it.

Thing 5

What is Web 2.0 and why should I care?


Web 2.0 means is a part of so many things. It is update to what was the beginning of the information highway. 2.0 is an improved version of internet. It helps us to communicate with our students, colleagues, friends and love ones. We can see each other in realtime. The new version of the web is not only for research, it's paying bills, viewing your bank account, reading books, instant messaging and many other things. Thanks to new internet we can work and attend school without ever leaving our homes. We can listen to the latest songs and watch movies.
 
I care about Web 2.0 because it will help us with our future, our students, and everyday lives. With 2.0 we can give our students access to books, pictures, music and information outside of our schools.

Thing 4

Commenting on blogs allows me to interact with fellow students outside the classroom. It also allows us to get to know each other. Commenting has helped me understand our assignments better because it requires me to thoroughly read the blogs.


Two points that I found important when reading about commenting were: invite comments and be humble. Inviting comments is good trigger mechanism for feedback. Being humble is just what it says; no one knows everything, be open to other views.

I chose to read blogs from Jerita, Tim, Debbie, Monica, Sam, Rachelle, and Chad. I selected them because most of them were previous classmates. I chose Jerita’s blog because she and I seem to have some things in common.

As I stated, Jerita’s blog caught my eye because of her bio and what she wrote in her blog. I was impressed with the results of Tim’s blog. Debbie’s blog was very informative and will be useful as a reference. Monica’s blog was very interesting because I’d never encountered anyone who uses Google Calendar, which I would be very apprehensive about using. I read Rachelle’s blog because it was about Thing 4; it gave me some understanding of what to do. Chad’s blog was very informative; it provided me with a better understanding of web 2.0.

Thing #3

Blogging can be use to reflect on the day's lesson. It can tell teachers important information about their students.

Thing #2

Creating my Avatar was fun. I enjoyed putting her together and selecting her clothing. This reminded me of the days when I played with paper dolls and Barbies. Creating an Avatar can be fun way of expressing without writing.