I enjoyed using Flickr and some of it's mash ups. Finding new blogs that I think will provide me with good information that will keep me on my toes about what is new in technology and learning. The RSS feeds were definitely helpful with the blogs and news sites I like to keep up with. I can definitely see myself using the collaborating documents when I become a teacher so my students can work on projects together without having to get together if it isn't possible for one or more of them. And who doesn't love YouTube for finding fun quick videos that can help get students engaged in a new lesson? This program has definitely shown me how much is out there and that I have not been keeping up with all the new technological developments on the web. I know I will have to stay more up to date, so I don't fall behind and not know what my students are talking about. There are a couple things I will take away and be sure to use like Creative Commons, this experience has been more time than I have ever been in front of a computer and it will be nice to not have to stare at a computer screen all the time anymore.
I'm not sure where I will go from here with all of the information that I have learned. I'm still processing so much of it that I;m not sure I will realize how much it has effected me for a while. I may end up maintaining this blog for personal/professional reasons, although I will not be posting nearly as much as this class has required me to do in such a short amount of time. I guess it's all a matter of how I feel about this once I've been able to take a break and it's not a required assignment. Who know where it could take me...
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Thing #23, Creative Commons
School Library 2.0 This link is one of many that I found that have similar 23 thing blog posts about Learning 2.0. I was unable to find the original exclusively, but I think finding so many blogs that have the same concepts rearranged or described differently and having the creative commons copyright at the bottom leads me to believe that this is what I needed to find.
I think Creative Commons will be a tool that will be vital for me to provide the best lesson plans and activities for my students without getting myself in trouble. Creative Commons could make the site a little more easily navigable list of sites, but maybe the more I try to use it the clearer I will be able to understand it all. This tool will allow me to know what people do and don't want me to use and for what purpose I am allowed. Also, Creative Commons will help me explain copyright to my students, so I can do my best in keeping them from making mistakes on what they can and can't use.
I think Creative Commons will be a tool that will be vital for me to provide the best lesson plans and activities for my students without getting myself in trouble. Creative Commons could make the site a little more easily navigable list of sites, but maybe the more I try to use it the clearer I will be able to understand it all. This tool will allow me to know what people do and don't want me to use and for what purpose I am allowed. Also, Creative Commons will help me explain copyright to my students, so I can do my best in keeping them from making mistakes on what they can and can't use.
Thing #22, LiveBinders and Lesson Plans
The titles of my binders are History Teaching, Geography, and Government. I made those three binders because they are they subjects I am in the process of trying to get my degree to teach in. Since my main degree is in History and I'm by far more comfortable with this subject than the other two that's the binder I chose to post. I can see how LiveBinders could be used in the classroom. A teacher could have binders for each lesson that could be for just them or something they could share with their students to either work on homework, gain more information, or help them study for a test. Using LiveBinders would allow parents to feel safer with their child going online and randomly searching for more information that the student and parent might not be sure if it is correct or not. This is a great resource for teachers, students, and parents.
Monday, August 6, 2012
Thing #21, Making video-slideshows
Make your own slideshow with music at Animoto.
Animoto was easy to use and kinda fun. I can see how making quick slideshows could jumpstart getting kids excited or engaged into a new lesson. I understand why they charge for their service because they make it very simple for those of us who are not nearly advanced enough to make these kinds of videos on our own. truly the price isn't anything outrageous and is actually quite reasonable. This is another one of those sites that I will have to bookmark and remember when I begin teaching as a wonderful resource for slideshows that takes images as opposed to just flipping through pictures.
Thing #20, YouTube all kinds of uses
Link to the video on YouTube
I like a lot of the videos on YouTube and have several times looked up music videos and helpful easily understood tutorials for classes that I have been confused during. I chose this video because I am fascinated by the American Civil War and the amount of pictures mixed with bits of the songs of the day was a great presentation of so much, I also like that included information about happenings during the war for each photo. I think this could be a good video to keep track of and possibly use later in a lesson. There are a lot of features that could be used in YouTube that could be applied to so many websites and functions of a classroom. I honestly never thought to look up anything other than music videos on YouTube before, but knowing how much additional stuff is on this site will be very helpful in the years to come. It is definitely a multi-use site that has proved it's worth.
Thing #19, More social networking!
I joined TeacherPop which I can see as a fun an interesting way to stay connected to teachers and future teachers. I looked at Bake Space because I love to bake and any new and interesting recipes are always fun to try. I like the idea of swapping ideas about baking and cooking. I'm familiar with IMDB although I didn't realize it was considered a social network. I used it simply as a way to look up movies and actors; I'm not a big commentator on other people's opinions or ideas at least not on the internet. People tend to take things way too seriously and it usually develops into petty bickering. Yelp I have never used but I know a lot of friends who do and it's a great concept to be able to look up all sorts of places and find out what people think especially if it was a place you had never tried before. Some businesses who participate with Yelp also do special offers and giveaways for loyal customers.
I have made sure over the past few years to limit my social networking. For a while I was keeping up with a MySpace and a Facebook; I can't even begin to tell you how happy I was when everyone I knew stopped using MySpace so I didn't have to worry about checking it to see if any information was being given there as opposed to Facebook. When Google+ started I refused to join even though I love Google I did not want to have to worry about another social networking site. I like the idea of networking for professional reasons, but I definitely see that when I get to the point of networking for professional purposes I will most likely stop using all other forms of social networking because I think it's important to not lose too much time in front of the computer instead of participating in real life.
I have made sure over the past few years to limit my social networking. For a while I was keeping up with a MySpace and a Facebook; I can't even begin to tell you how happy I was when everyone I knew stopped using MySpace so I didn't have to worry about checking it to see if any information was being given there as opposed to Facebook. When Google+ started I refused to join even though I love Google I did not want to have to worry about another social networking site. I like the idea of networking for professional reasons, but I definitely see that when I get to the point of networking for professional purposes I will most likely stop using all other forms of social networking because I think it's important to not lose too much time in front of the computer instead of participating in real life.
Thing #18, Teachers and Social Networking
I have had a Facebook account for a few years now, it has been a way for me to communicate with friends and family that has been much simpler than email. Since I moved to Tennessee from California it seem to be one of the few ways to stay up to date with the people I care about lives and for them to stay up to date with mine. I have a really large family and circle of friends and there is no way that I would be able to talk to all of them and it's so rare that I use email anymore except for school communications that Facebook has been very easy to stay up to date, although I don't like all of the changes that the site has made such as Timeline, it seems more of an invasion of privacy and having to re go through all my privacy settings over and over gets redundant, but it's a free service and I don't have to use it if I don't want. I'm not really comfortable putting a link to my Facebook here and can't make another one because I don't have another email.
But I had to setup a Twitter account for this class already and am perfectly comfortable posting that link.
ShannaGuentert Twitter
It's important for educators to know about social networking sites because the students they will be teaching will be up to date and very aware of the functions and can use them to spread information quickly to anyone who has access. Now that cell phones are just as connected to the internet as laptops and computers, students have any new information at their fingertips. Whether it be via Facebook or Twitter, these students can spread information about tests, dances, locker searches, or anything they want. This is also another forum that can be used to bully or humiliate other students, which over recent years has become an increasing problem. I didn't gain any new insights on these sights since I already had access to them, but Twitter still seems like the bigger waste of time. I know that the shortness of the posts is specific to keep people from being long winded, but other than a few "people" who are on Twitter I just see it as a place to dump minute and seemingly inconsequential information about a person's moment to moment actions or thoughts. Sometimes it's just better to keep those kinds of things to yourself. Facebook can be just as bad depending on who you have on your friends list. I see social networking as important for teachers to know but also an avenue that can get us in trouble. Although we think it's safe to express ourselves on these sites and have an outlet for such expression, it is the internet and easily seen no matter privacy setting we place on it. So I see social networking as a potentially dangerous avenue to express ourselves.
I was told by my first ever boss that "if it's not in writing than it never happened" and recently a teacher told me "Never put anything in writing that you wouldn't want to testify in court about."
But I had to setup a Twitter account for this class already and am perfectly comfortable posting that link.
ShannaGuentert Twitter
It's important for educators to know about social networking sites because the students they will be teaching will be up to date and very aware of the functions and can use them to spread information quickly to anyone who has access. Now that cell phones are just as connected to the internet as laptops and computers, students have any new information at their fingertips. Whether it be via Facebook or Twitter, these students can spread information about tests, dances, locker searches, or anything they want. This is also another forum that can be used to bully or humiliate other students, which over recent years has become an increasing problem. I didn't gain any new insights on these sights since I already had access to them, but Twitter still seems like the bigger waste of time. I know that the shortness of the posts is specific to keep people from being long winded, but other than a few "people" who are on Twitter I just see it as a place to dump minute and seemingly inconsequential information about a person's moment to moment actions or thoughts. Sometimes it's just better to keep those kinds of things to yourself. Facebook can be just as bad depending on who you have on your friends list. I see social networking as important for teachers to know but also an avenue that can get us in trouble. Although we think it's safe to express ourselves on these sites and have an outlet for such expression, it is the internet and easily seen no matter privacy setting we place on it. So I see social networking as a potentially dangerous avenue to express ourselves.
I was told by my first ever boss that "if it's not in writing than it never happened" and recently a teacher told me "Never put anything in writing that you wouldn't want to testify in court about."
Thing #17, Social bookmarking
After joining Delicious and searching for the tag educational technology the amount of websites was amazing and the organization by tags definitely makes it so much easier to look for websites that would be helpful. I also searched for a couple other tags like cooking and photography. Being able to see the additional tags and comments people have made on particular sites helps to narrow down what I was looking for specifically. On a couple of the educational sites I think it would have been good of the people who posted them to put that the services cost money. As future teachers we will only get a small budget for resources for our students and everything else must come out of our own pockets so we will have to be careful of how much we spend and what we spend it on. Or we could end up in the poor house.
I can definitely see the potential use for this in the classroom, being able to set up tags that correspond to specific lessons or classes would be a great way to keep the websites that I want to use in class handy for when I need them. The ability to access the bookmarks from any computer would definitely be the most important since I won't be carrying my home desktop with me to school everyday.
Teachers can take advantage of socially bookmarking sites by letting their co-teachers know that they are involved in this site and what kinds of tags they use. It could make for a way to collaborate and know that students no matter who's classroom they are in are getting the same amount of technology. For teachers who aren't as technologically savvy and unaware of how to find good websites being able to go to a social bookmarking site would help them narrow down their choices and find what would work best for them in a classroom setting.
I can definitely see the potential use for this in the classroom, being able to set up tags that correspond to specific lessons or classes would be a great way to keep the websites that I want to use in class handy for when I need them. The ability to access the bookmarks from any computer would definitely be the most important since I won't be carrying my home desktop with me to school everyday.
Teachers can take advantage of socially bookmarking sites by letting their co-teachers know that they are involved in this site and what kinds of tags they use. It could make for a way to collaborate and know that students no matter who's classroom they are in are getting the same amount of technology. For teachers who aren't as technologically savvy and unaware of how to find good websites being able to go to a social bookmarking site would help them narrow down their choices and find what would work best for them in a classroom setting.
Thing #16, Organizing the 2.0 way
I looked and rearranged the iGoogle tool. I can see how being able to arrange and place on an online homepage what I want to know could be very useful. I chose iGoogle because of my love of all things Google already. Unfortunately after I got my homepage all setup the way that I wanted it the site told me that iGoogle will not be a viable homepage for very much longer. I have set up homepages before and this seems to happen quite often so I chose not to go through the process again but will enjoy the iGoogle homepage while I can.
The online calenders can be very useful as a society that is on computers very often having reminders that popup on your screen and they ease with which you can organize them to have every detail of your day planned out or just major events are good features. I try to not be on the computer that often and had already setup the Google calender which is attached to my phone so the convenience of having a Google based operating system on my phone makes me find other online calenders obsolete for me.
I can see how all of the online to-do checklists seem like far too much work for me. I am very much "old school" when it come to my to-do lists and other such things. I hand write them so it is easily marked off and I don't have to be on the computer or flipping through screens to mark off what I have done and look at what still needs to be done.
I can see how all of these tools could be very helpful for some people and how to keep some people well organized. I just don't see them as web 2.0 tools that I would use.
The online calenders can be very useful as a society that is on computers very often having reminders that popup on your screen and they ease with which you can organize them to have every detail of your day planned out or just major events are good features. I try to not be on the computer that often and had already setup the Google calender which is attached to my phone so the convenience of having a Google based operating system on my phone makes me find other online calenders obsolete for me.
I can see how all of the online to-do checklists seem like far too much work for me. I am very much "old school" when it come to my to-do lists and other such things. I hand write them so it is easily marked off and I don't have to be on the computer or flipping through screens to mark off what I have done and look at what still needs to be done.
I can see how all of these tools could be very helpful for some people and how to keep some people well organized. I just don't see them as web 2.0 tools that I would use.
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Thing #15, Wikispaces
Wiki Spaces is a little difficult to navigate at first, when you aren't sure how the person who originally set it up. The only reason I can see to set up a wikispace would be as a classroom website. I liked looking through some of the wikispaces and finding some interesting information. I learned that only one person can add anything to the wiki at a time, this I can understand but was a little frustrating because I just had to wait for the other person to be done before I could work within the document. It was also not as simple as the video described it to be. Uploading files and making new pages wasn't simply done. I enjoy as much simplicity as possible with any kind of technology that I work with.
I do like the concept of wikispaces and how it could be another vital collaboration tool to use with projects for school or work. And like I had said it would be a good easy way to setup a classroom page that could be used year after year.
I do like the concept of wikispaces and how it could be another vital collaboration tool to use with projects for school or work. And like I had said it would be a good easy way to setup a classroom page that could be used year after year.
Thing #14, Flowcharts and Mind maps becoming more complex
I am not a fan of flow charts or mind maps. Throughout school I have never been good at doing them even when they were required. I like lists and I like to have things hand written when I go to type something up. I explored gliffy.com and bubbl.us. Gliffy was very easy to use and had many more functions than bubbl did. Of course this is probably because flowcharts are designed more to be for showing to others. A flowchart is something that needs to be eye-catching and easily understandable. I can see how flow charts are important tools and even mind mapping to organize ones thoughts and these sites that allow you to share your flowcharts or mind maps. You can also collaborate on gliffy with others that you designate. Flowcharts could be used in classrooms to help students understand the way things work for certain subjects, I just don't see how I would be comfortable using them to display historic ideas.
This is ridiculous flowchart that I created using gliffy.com I have to admit it was kinda fun, but meant to be humorous.
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