Thing #22

Facebook is my social network of choice. I've had a Facebook account for a while now. It has been an excellent way to find people I knew in high school and college. Here's how I feel about three particular sites: MySpace, Facebook, and LinkedIn. MySpace is the more "childish" of the three. It's target audience are teenagers who want their own personal site to goof off with friends. All the ways it can be formatted and shared have a more juvenile feel. Facebook is more adult. It was started on college campuses; therefore, it's targeting an older set of social networkers. Finally there is LinkedIn. This site is for business professionals, or grown-ups. It has little in the way of frills and is not meant to be used for endless hours of chatting and photosharing...at least as far as I can tell.

For me, the main reason I should be familiar with these is to make sure I don't end up on fabricated pages due to someone's poor practical joking skills. Even with my Facebook, I am extremely careful about what I, or my husband, post in way of photos and comments. I allow my students to be my friends with a limited profile. If there is something that might be questionable, like being at a grown up party where certain beverages end up in pictures, I limit those photos where my students cannot see them.

Most of my students due use social networks daily, and it would just show my naivete if I refused to figure out how they worked myself. Just because I ignore them, doesn't mean they would go away. Kids are going to use them, and I should be aware of that.

As mentioned above, Facebook is my site of choice. I like that I have some control over the applications, but I don't bog myself down with choosing backgrounds and music and pictures, etc. I don't need to lose all my time to social networking. It is more casual than LinkedIn and a little more adult than MySpace.

Personally, I wouldn't want to use these types of social networking sites for the classroom. It is good to know how my students spend their time online, but I don't want to take away the entertainment and relaxation behind these sites for them by tying something educational to them. 

Thing #7b

I am going to admit that I have not really added a lot to my reader recently. There are also some feeds I need to clear out because of the cancellation of Pushing Daisies. No show--no feeds. One of the feeds that I find fascinating is the New York Times one that deals with books. It has reviews about books coming out and keeps me posted on news in the literary world. Recently there was a story about how to manage a personal library. I'm a chronic book hoarder. It drives my husband crazy that I have to purchase a book in order to read it. (He is content with checking it out from the library, for free. ) Enjoy the article on Laura Miller's dilemma on cleaning out her bookshelves.

Thing #21

Google is not a new tool for me. For years I've searched in Google Images, looked for academic documents in Google Scholar, and this past school year I created a Google Calendar to post on my class blog with important due dates for my students. Believe it or not, I've never been much for discussion boards or groups. However, I did search in the Google groups only to be led to an outside group. I guess that means I used Google as a spring board into something else? My husband is trying to get me to use the new Google browser, but I am going to hold off until they really perfect it. I'm sure it has more growing to do.

Besides, this blog is something found on Google, and I will definitely be keeping up with the blog long after this class is through. Feel free to check frequently to see what kind of zany ideas are shooting through my head. Or you can just RSS feed me into your reader!

Thing #20

I love Google Docs. I've been using them for a while in my classroom, and they have actually helped me be better prepared for class. Personally, I uploaded a Power Point Presentation for my graduate class because they had Office 2007. My computer only has Office 2003. Google Docs does the conversion for me, so I just pulled it up on the class computer and was ready to go. My students are also seeing the importance of this feature because many of them are running Office 07 while the school still runs 03. 

In class I have had the students log on and take notes over different pieces of information. Then they had to upload what they found onto Google Docs to share with the rest of the class.

My favorite use for Google Docs was when I was out of town and needed to give my students reading quizzes. I created forms then put the link in my class blog. Each student was responsible for clicking the link and answering the questions. They only had fifteen minutes, the time stamp helped monitor their time, and I was able to check the answer all the way in Washington D.C. I knew immediately who did and did not read and take the quiz. This definitely cut down on cheating, and the substitute didn't have to worry about keeping up with any important documents.

Thing #19

VoiceThread is one of the more fascinating tools we've explored. For a basic use, I could post different pictures and shape TAKS like questions around the picture. Then the students could respond with various answers. I know we're not supposed to teach to a test, but it would be practice with the visual component of the test.

Currently, I am getting ready to start a unit on Edgar Allen Poe. I was thinking of a group project that imitates the opening paragraphs of "The Fall of the House of Usher." Each group will get a picture of a house and create a description that would also parallel the type of family that would live there. I could put the picture on VoiceThread and have the students tell their stories that imitate the opening of Poe's great short story.

Thing #18

You Tube is an old favorite in my house. I never really thought of it as a teaching tool because I use it for relaxing and entertainment purposes. My husband even made me look up specific videos as I was working on this particular thing.

My two videos for my subject area were those favorites "Conjunction Junction" and "The Preamble" from School House Rock. I don't care how old these videos are; the information is just as viable today as it was when I was growing up. It bothers me that current children's television doesn't have the same education focus. The "how to" video I chose to watch explained the intricacies involved in solving a Rubic's Cube. It began simply enough, but I think I'll leave that little slice of puzzle pie to someone else. The final video I searched and found was my favorite "Star Wars According to a Three Year Old."

Teacher Tube would have been the better place to search for English related videos. However, the layout for Teacher Tube doesn't seem to be as user friendly. It might also be that I am not used to navigating around it yet. I did find a cute video on the rules for comma usage.

Thing #17

The first podcast I previewed was The Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips because curiosity got the better of me. Was she really giving sound grammatical advice? Or would it be more work for me when my students stumbled upon the podcast and were misinformed. I am very impressed at the topics she covered and how accurate she was. The other choice was more personal in the Mugglecast. As big a fan of the Harry Potter books as I am, I'm not that big of a fan. It's nice that they are keeping up with so much HP news, but I just was not that interested.

Podcasting is not a new concept for me. I do have iTunes with a collection of personal podcasts: The Flight of the Conchords, Henson Studios, and Pushing Daisies. The biggest problem I have with podcasting is that I am not an auditory learner. If there are no pictures or video, it is really hard for me to follow what is being said. However, my auditory students would benefit greatly from podcasting. They could listen to information while accomplishing other tasks. In that way it seems like a very efficient way to learn.

I always told myself that if I have to miss school when I finally have children, I could use podcast to do quick lessons. This would guarantee that my students would hear exactly what I need them to hear (not that subs are unreliable).

Thing #16

Library Thing should be one of the first things we learn! I love, love, love books and think this is the coolest site. I really like the idea of Library Thing keeping me informed of local book fairs, author signings, and such. There are so many books I adore! Where do I start to add them all? My biggest hope is that a plethora of new books will be shared with me through this site. 

I have zero plans to use this site professionally. This will be my personal dragon's hoard of literature!

The thought did cross my mind to have all the members of my book club sign up. We already share a love of reading and deciding on the next book to read is so hard for us to do. This might be a way to narrow down the search and see what else the rest of us are reading outside of the club.

Thing #15

Being honest, I'm not a fan of tagging. Mainly because I cannot always remember the certain tags I used or how I worded them. I just know that I'll end up with a tag list that is two miles long because I'll write in so many different tags. However, to be fair I will give "delicious" a chance because I do like the idea of keeping all my faves on one site. 

As far as using it for educational purposes...

There will need to be a lot more exploring because I don't have many co-workers that have caught onto the social bookmarking. My first few networks may have to be strangers, so to speak. After a little more looking into all the sites that appear when I do a search for a particular topic, I might be able to find a more appropriate use for my "delicious" site. 

For my students, it might be helpful when they have to look up information on a topic. If I look into the most appropriate sites and tag them, I can simple share that with my students. Then I don't have to worry about the sources behind the sites that my students are using.

Thing #7b

I absolutely love my Google Reader! I check it all the time and get so excited when there is a ton of stuff for me to browse through. I know we are trying to find uses for a reader in education, but I have quite a few personal sites in my reader now. Of course I have a ton about Pushing Daisies. The good news is that they will complete season two and are negotiating a season three! Keep your fingers crossed!

My favorite educational article comes from The Catholic Education Resource Center. I think the name of the site may turn some people away from looking at what it has to say. Although many articles may focus on beliefs and doctrine of the Catholic Church in current society, there is a good number that speak on universal educational issues. For example, "Self-esteem vs. self-improvement" speaks on our society's too coddling view of building a child's image of himself or herself.

Thing #14

There are so many things I still want to explore and look at, but my time is limited since I'm trying to catch up. However, there are a couple of tools I want to discuss that could be used in the classroom. Letterpop (Experimental Thing #14 Newsletter) would be a fantastic way to have a class newsletter that parents/guardians could access online. The application is very easy to use and fun to play around with.

After making my newsletter, I decided a survey would be fun to create at Poll Daddy. I would love for everyone to take my Random Survey. There's no real theme to it because I was still learning how to build one. Again, it was relatively easy to drag and drop in order to create the survey. Recently, I've been using the Forms on Google Docs for online quizzes for my kids. Poll Daddy could become a second way to quiz my students over what they read without wasting paper.

Finally, for fun I played with Wordle. I just took a quote from Emerson about books and let the application do its thing. Now, to create a custom color palette, I did have to look up the html for colors online, but that is basic copy and paste once I got there.

I could really have fun with some of these tools on my facebook or personal blogs. Creating newsletters for my friends overseas to read about what is going on with my family would save postage and time getting to them. Not to mention if I'm in a crazy mood and want to survey or poll my friends on something irrelevant but entertaining.

Thing #13

I am disappointed in the various Flickr mashups. Both the sign generator and the comic strip generator have been removed from the internet, and I really wanted to use those two. Currently, I am contemplating reading a book written by one of the mashup creators because I want to learn how he creates his Flickr photo mosaics. It seems complicated, but it might be worth it.

Both of the mashups that worked successfully were in Big Huge Labs. It seemed to be easier to use my own photos for the following because I'm still trying to figure out the best way to credit other photographers if I use one of these masups.

Right now, these kinds of mashups seem like they might be of service if my students were working on some type of marketing campaign. They could make name badges, posters, or whatever to promote something. If they wanted to support the library, they could make collages of their favorite book covers? This is still a tool I need to spend some time with before deciding exactly what my kids will use it for in class.

Thing #12

I hate wikis! I hate wikis! I hate wikis! I followed all the directions for the slideshow and the stupid myspace code DID NOT WORK in my wikispace. The only thing it did was embed the actual code. I hate wikis!

I'm going to try to post it in my blog instead:

This is a condensed version of one of my favorite Grimms Fairy Tales, "The Twelve Dancing Princesses."

Here are all the photos I used:

A Wonderful Surprise Uploaded on January 16, 2008by audreyjm529

18th Century Spanish Officers Uniform Uploaded on October 8, 2004by mharrsch

Glass of Red Uploaded on October 10, 2007by Zesmerelda

Adelitas Uploaded on October 14, 2008by Omar Eduardo

Homecoming 2008 Uploaded on October 4, 2008by DanCox_

Silver Leaves Uploaded on October 6, 2008by beccaplusmolly

petite 18k gold leaf charm Uploaded on November 1, 2008by knitsteel

Emerald, diamond bracelet Uploaded on March 14, 2008by gemteck1

Happy Heels Uploaded on March 1, 2008by talekinker

The Fairy Tale Door Uploaded on June 15, 2008by David Masters

Enchanted Tower ? Uploaded on October 10, 2007by Curnen