Thing 23

I made it!!!! It was very time consuming project but worth it. I learned so much that I never knew was out there in the technology world. I enjoyed many parts of this journey and will use some of them in my classroom. I thought the podcasts, Youtube videos, and slideshows were some of the bests. I found many new websites to do different things. I really like the Google Docs too. I am thankful that I had all of you to go through this journey with so that we could communicate about any problems or amazements that we had found. Now all I need to do is take some more time and go back through some of the things and spend some more time with them!

Thing 22

https://cmawiki.wikispaces.com/

I enjoyed learning about wikis and creating one. I think the difference between a wiki and a blog is that a blog is owned by one person and they are the only one that can make changes and write things. A wiki can be created and changed by many people.

Thing 21

I think Wikis are something that could be really valuable. I have never heard of these before and enjoyed exploring different ones. While watching the video about the list for a camping trip I was thinking that would be really neat to use when you have family or friend gatherings and everyone brings something. I had a lot of ideas for using that tool. I also liked the Hanalee Book Wiki. I think it would be really cool if the kids could do that in class with novels they are reading. I definitely think this would be beneficial in the upper grades. I really enjoyed this one!

Thing 20

When looking through the EPN website for podcasts it was very interesting all the different kinds I found. I thought the ones that were done by classrooms and kids were cool. I had a hard time listening to some of them.

Podcast Alley was difficult to look for things I thought. I had to preview a lot of them because the titles were very different from what I was searching for.

I downloaded iTunes onto my home computer because my laptop from school wouldn't let me download it. I wish I could have done it on my laptop because I did download Storynory which gives updates of new kid's stories that I think I would use in the classroom for the students to listen to. I also downloaded Sesame Street for my girls because they love it!

Thing 19

I really enjoyed looking through the podcasts. I found the storybook part where they read children's story books. I found this story of Cinderella.
http://storynory.com/2006/04/08/cinderella/
We read a couple different versions of Cinderella before in class to compare and contrast and this would have been really cool to have them listen to as another version. I think this tool would be great in the classroom. You could pull up various books and have the kids listen to them instead of reading them all the time. They could all use practice with their listening skills. I could see myself using this a lot!

Thing 18

Anne Geddes (1)

View more presentations from DOINA __COME HERE ONLY IF YOU LIKE THE POWERPOINT PROGRAM, IF YOU LIKE TO DREAM and IF YOU LIKE A GOOD WORK!.

Here is a slideshow of beautiful baby photos. I couldn't resist, I love looking at cute babies, especially my own :) ! I could see how you could use this website to find slideshows of various things. I could search for animals, geography items, or things we are learning about and show slides to the kids. The kids love looking at pictures. I think it is very useful how you could use this website in meetings to get certain things across.

Thing 17

I chose the Flashcarddb one and I thought it was a great tool to study with. I think the students could use their spelling words, math facts, and any subject test material to use for flashcards. Kids love to use the computer and this would be great for them study with. It does take some prep but in the long run I think it could be used in many different ways.

Thing 16

Well I couldn't find the 23 Things spreadsheet that I was supposed to preview. Looking at other people's blogs it seems some other people had problems too.

I can see how awesome this tool would be to use. I wish I knew about this in college. It would have been easy to save papers to this website and then be able to edit them in the computer lab or home. Instead of worrying that you saved it to everything and then carrying all those devices with you everywhere. Since I am teaching an elementary class I am not sure if I would have the kids use this website to save things done in class because they would need to have an email address to log in and save and edit documents. I would have to see if the kids have email addresses at home already or if their parents would allow them to have one. What if a student sends something to another student that shouldn't have been sent? The kids would have access anywhere to send and read things so supervision would be a problem. I think it would be great for high school students and college students and maybe even middle school students when they are writing papers.

Thing 15

I have to admit that I haven't checked my Bloglines account since Thing 5. It was easier but I needed to check out Thing 5 again for a refresher course. I hadn't checked my feeds till today so needless to say it isn't a habit yet. I like how you can add and delete any feeds you want. I had one feed on my account that I am not interested in so I delelted that one. I hope to keep up with checking the feeds much more digently now.

Thing 14

I had a lot of fun browsing the different websites and searching for things. My link is delicious.com/lisa2jay . I found a lot of cool educational online games for the students to play in math, spelling, and language arts. I saved quite a few so that I could pull the games up on any computer in my classroom. My students love playing math games and I am so excited to have found even more. I also found some nice websites that have free math printables. I am always looking for new things!!

Thing 13

I think tagging websites to another online website is a great idea. There have been many times that I have either had my favorites on my computer cleared out or I have saved a website to my home computer and then wanted to know what it was at school or at another computer. I would love to be able to go to a website and get all the websites in "my favorites" when using any computer.

I think the advantages would be getting access anywhere and also you could easily share with your colleagues anytime. Some disadvantages might be what one person might tag something might not be the same thing you would tag it. You would have to look carefully when you are looking at someone else's tags.

When you are assigning names to your tags be careful of the spelling and what you are tagging under that name. Other people may look at your tags so choose your websites carefully.

Thing 12

I have to admit that I had a brain lapse when I was told to embed a widget, I did have to go to thing 10 and look again but then after the 1st minute I remembered. It was easy to embed the cluster map I have on my blog and I want to go through and choose more widgets that I can add. It is very interesting, I never knew all this was out there.

I am on Facebook and I rarely use it. I don't have the time to sit on the computer and write about what I am doing all the time, nor do I have the time to read daily updates from every friend on there. I can see how people use online tools to communicate more than face to face. I think it's sad, I love talking to people and seeing them. It is so funny how things get around online and how fast!!

Thing 11

I think leaving comments on blogs is a great way for people to communicate with each other on what they are thinking. I liked receiving my first comment because it is great to get another idea or advice from a colleague on what you are doing. What one person perceives something to be may be totally different than another. I think students would like to hear feedback about their writing on their blogs. Sometimes when you get another perspective on a certain topic it sparks another idea that the writer may have.

Thing 10

Here is a short clip about never giving up when we are teaching. It really gets to the point. Sometimes we need to be reminded how much we mean to the kids.




I wasn't able to download a video from YouTube yet. I tried Keepvid and pwn and had problems with both. I plan to try Zamzar next although it takes longer.

Thing 9

I have to admit this was my first time on YouTube. I guess I never had the desire to check it out or the time. It was very interesting how much was on there. I enjoyed looking for various videos. I was looking of different children's programs that my kids like and found a lot of clips. I could see using this by showing clips of videos to kids of how to do certain things or an area that we were studying. I beleive it would be necessary though to view it defintely before showing it.

Thing 8

I loved this one! I spent a lot of time playing with the 2 websites and seeing what I could create with photos. I could totally have fun with pictures of my girls and creating borders and special effects. I loved the scrapbooking one too! As a class it could be fun creating a scrapbooking from field trips, class parties, assemblies, etc. throughout the year. The only thing that scares me at times is that you have to be careful what you put out there online. It seems through all the websites your pictures could "float" around in cyber space!

Thing 7

Uploading photos wasn't a problem at all. It is just like uploading to any site for photos and the video was very good once again. I think using this would be great for storing photos in the classroom especially if you are not using the same computer all the time. You then have a place to store them and you can access them any time or any place.

Thing 6

Flickr was very fun to explore with. I loved many of the photos and could easily spend a long time going through it. I chose this picture of a koala because koalas are one of my favorite animals and there was something about this koala's eyes that brought me to upload it. Many of the photos I saw of koalas were just beautiful as was this one.

Thing 5

RSS wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be after talking to some of you. I actually had a links folder, I don't know how but I did and it was easy to add blogs using that way. I thought all 3 ways were quite easy actually considering the videos were so self explanatory. I could using this in many ways. I like how you could add any kind of blogs, for example if there was something on the news you wanted to follow or if you were following a famous person's story. I think many people would could use it to keep on top of what is happening around them.

Thing 4

Well I just finished adding my folders to my new Bloglines account and it was pretty easy to do with the great tutorial videos. I have to admit I never even heard of RSS until now and I am sure I will learn even more in the next thing or two. I do like the idea of something to help manage all there is with blogging. I now understand what the subscribe button on some blogs means. When I was looking at different blogs I saw some had that button and had no clue what it meant or why I couldn't subscribe to it. I am sure in Thing 5 I will become much more familiar with it. As everyone I am always looking for ways to make things much easier to manage, as I am quite on the run with 2 little muchkins at home too! In fact nap time is over so I must be off now....

Thing 3

I really enjoyed looking at all the different blogs from different classrooms and countries. I really liked the one from Australia, they said mum instead mom and I got a kick out of it.

I think I would use the blog in my classroom for various things. I saw that one teacher had a book report form on her blog and students could fill it out on the blog and send it to the teacher. I like that,, we do a lot of book reports in class and I think the kids would love doing it on the computer and they could also do them at home when they read a book. I also think I would use by posting pictures from field trips, parties, special assemblies, etc. The idea of keeping notes to parents, various forms (field trip, lunch orders, etc.) and sign up sheets for volunteer drivers or for treats in the classroom online would really help parents out too. I have some parents that I rarely see because they work and their kids go to latchkey so I think they would love seeing the blog to see what we are doing.

I think the students would have to be taught how to search for things online and be responsible and respectful as they are searching. I also would want to approve everything that is posted to the blog in case there are comments that want to be posted from parents or others that are unsuitable.

Thing 1 and 2

Finally just finishing Thing 1 and 2! I have to say that after reading the article and watching the videos I never realized how much there is out there that I never knew about in the techonolgy world (podcasting, wikis, etc.). I am glad I will be learning about all these things and how to implement them in my classroom or personal life. I also never realized that cell phones played such an important role in technology or did that much for that fact.

I can't wait to learn more and get feedback from all of you. This seems like it will be an interesting journey!