Thing # 18

YouTube is an amusing adventure...I viewed several short videos about teaching writing. They all had the same woman in the same outfit and she proclaims to know everything in the world obviously! She says she is with Young Writers Wrokshop.com group, a group in India. Interesting, but not very worthwhile. I also watched a video on how to peel hard boiled eggs...fascinating!I visited teacher tube and watched a hilarious but informational video on how NOT to do a power point presentation.I truly can see some advantages to using teacher tube for education. Teachers could videotape presentations for students who were absent or needed to hear the presentation or parts of it again. And I really see potential for staff development on short topics...how to administer TPRI,teaching for fluency, etc. Now I'll just have to learn how to make one.

Thing # 7B

Well, now this class is costing me money! I read a blog about a new book called The Book Whisperer and absolutely had to have it after reading just this blog...very persuasive writing! Perhaps this topic just resonated with me because I see so many children and adults who don't know the joys of reading that I do. Even in our class, at least one friend of mine has confessed to not being a reader...at least reading for pleasure and entertainment. My goal is to get every teacher to become someone who loves reading, who feels passionatley about it as I do. Who is in a better position to convert all the students they see every day than the classroom teacher? A teacher, unfortunately is not who made me a reader. It was my mom and dad. They were constantly reading and I always got 2 new Nancy Drew mysteries for Christmas and my birthday. When I ran out of Nancy Drews I had to find other books to read and so I did. But today we have so many students who will not get that love of reading at home. So that leaves just one place-school and one person-a beloved teacher. We should never underestimate the power we have to change the lives of the next generation by modeling for them what we value.

Thing # 7A

Boy can I sympathize with Andy in this blog!He is a perfectly capable and well-informed leader, but lacks knowledge of many 2.0 tools. Sound familiar?? The point of the article is that unless we as leaders are aware of the capabilities of technology, how can we expect our teachers to use them in today's classrooms? I am really working to at least acquaint myself with the tools in this class. Some of them are very difficult for me , particularly the ones that deal with the visual images...the slideshow, the image generator and even Delicious. I need to quit whining, but some of this is really hard for me...something about an old dog and new tricks keeps running through my mind. But I'll muddle through. It is important work for me to move myself forward as a role model for facilitators and teachers.

Thing # 16

I really enjoyed playing around in Library Thing. I did join up but only with a free account. This is probably my favorite "Thing" so far. I love listing books I've read and seeing other people who share my taste in books. I went to some of the groups and explored a little. I can definitely see myself going here for book recommendations and new authors to try out. Perhaps I'll stretch into some different groups as well to broaden my reading interests. I tend to love the mystery, thriller genre because the books are so fast paced. Maybe later I can cultivate a deeper appreciation of literature, even some of the classics I need to reread or read for the first time. I laughed going to the Zeitgeist area and looking at all the statistics about Library Thing...so much trivia, so little time!

I can see some really practical applications for the classroom. We're always trying to get our students to develop the lifelong habit of reading, reading both for information and for pleasure. This could really help our kids to find like-minded individuals who might steer them toward new books or authors. I think the kids are more likely to read books recommended by peers than by teachers. Setting class challenges would also be great. Teachers could also find books to read as a class or to read aloud...that search bar allows you to enter partial titles. I didn't try entering topics. I'll have to go back and try that!

Thing #11

Sedona twilight
Originally uploaded by ga clicker

Flickr was an interesting experience for me...frustrating but very interesting. I loved exploring and looking for photos of my favorite place...Sedona, Arizona.My frustration came when I tried to get the photo out with the attribution and the link back to the picture. I learned how important it is to bookmark the exact location so you can find it again when you go back to look for it again. Trial and error is a painful way to go when you're not very adept.I can see many applications
for its use in the classroom...slide shows for content, clarifying setting, photos to represent characteristics, all kinds of things.I will definitely keep exploring. My curiosity has been peaked.

Thing # 9...at long last!

Creating a wiki page was a very stressful experience for me. My fear of hitting the wrong button really came into play. Then after I recovered and started working on my page, it got better until I tried to link it to the group page listing and I did hit the wrong button and lost my whole page!!! There probably was some way to recover it, but I just redid the whole thing. Grrrrrr! I left it for a few days and moved on to other Things. When I came back, I found it much easier to work on. I still struggled to add my wiki to the list....it turned out to be so simple, I felt idiotic. I guess I was just looking for it to be very complicated. Once I got it added to the list, I even put a link in and a photograph. It really was fun once I got the hang of it! Now, I want to see what else I can do with it. It really is simple to do. I need to keep repeating...it's not that scary. But on this assignment I really was The Terrifed Traveler!

Thing #10

I enjoyed the videos explaining the differences between Big C and little cc. I have been held hostage by Big C for a long time as I try to write curriculum and share wonderful ideas with teachers. Sometimes I have even avoided using ideas that I have seen in dozens of places because I've been afraid of the copyright police. So, the idea of places where people actually encourage the sharing of ideas is quite intriguing. I had never noticed the CC and have looked for it on several sites. I actually haven't found it too often, but maybe that's because I mostly frequent copyrighted sites!I did explore the OER Commons site and was blown away by all the stuff we could actually use for free and not get into trouble. Gator Girl challenged the content coordinators to go there and I went, though hesitantly. But I really found some top notch material. I will be using many of the ideas and images I have seen. It's really kind of freeing! I'm excited about the opportunites ahead!!