Wiki's (Week 5 Thing 12)

Actually, I have been enjoying wiki's a ton. It took a little while to really get going, but once I really realized how quick and easy it was to upload files (word documents, audible bits, etc.) I have found I am using it a ton more. As it linked now to my class website, I've made it a focal point to major assignements. Everytime I load something new for an assignment in class, I've shown my class where it is and how to get at it. It is exciting to hear the students tell me when they've been on and site, even more excitement when they get to see their own work on the site.

I loved looking at other wiki's. I have to add that Laura L.'s wiki is fabulous. I love how organized it is. It gives me motivation to continue working until my looks as clean and user friendly.

Wordle

I think sometimes I'm just too tired. After my computer stopped last night, I got on to another and all the sites I was trying to work with got "stuck". I took a break and this evening was able to figure out how to get wordle into my blog.

This got me thinking about patience. When you use a lot of technology, you have to rely on that technology and everything is not always a bed a roses. I've had those moments when you are in the middle of a lesson or the student it almost done with a project and the computer or the site or whatever QUITS and you are stuck

But this is part of the new world, isn't it and all a part of the bargain. I suppose it's just another teaching moment.

TagCrowd/Wordle (Week 4 Thing 11)

TagCrowd vs Wordle. I've decided both have merits. It was much easier to get my tagcrowd embedded into my blog but wordle is much "prettier" and visually more appealing. The problem with Wordle is that my computer wasn't capable of pasting my screen print.

ages alternately amazing becoming best burst castle conversation different em ended enemies everything exactly following friends funny given golden imaginations--one laughing live love lower made-up morning overheard play point rainbow rock seems serious singing song sung tune upgraded wanted worst zee

created at TagCrowd.com

As for use in my classroom- It would be great to enter all my students questions about a topic then print it off to see what is most prevalent. Maybe I could have the students submit two or three words that they feel represent the topic we are studying, again to see what comes up. It might be interesting to see what we notice and what we miss and how similar or different we are from each other. We study biographies every year. I think this year, I will have the students create their own wordle or tagcrowd representing the person they are studying.

delicious- yum, yum (Week 4 Thing 10)

I was reading Brittney Warner's blog post about delicious and realized I had much the same experience. At first, delicious drove me crazy. I couldn't figure out what was what and sudden;y I had all these bookmarks all over and didn't know how to organize them all. Finally, I actually sat down and read about it and followed some of the links to posts about it. Then I went back and worked with delicious some more. I was halfway through tagging everything to organize when my computer quit. (That's another problem).
So, I got onto another computer and thought I might re-sign in and try again. Only then, I realized I don't have any bookmarks on this computer. So, I kind of started over, only this time, I worked with some personal bookmarks since this was personal computer. Nice still.

As for using delicious in my classroom-- We are starting exhibition next weeks. As teachers, we never know exactly what topic our kids will be working on until the day before we need to start researching. In one night, I start looking for sites to help guide their research. I love the idea of being able to organize all these different places and have a way find them quickly.

Glogster

Just Twittering Away (Week 3 Thing 9)

Okay, so I will be honest. This was probably my least favorite activity thus far. I did not have a twitter account until this class. I set one up while downloading everything I needed for the class about three weeks ago. I did not get back on until today and found I was following 20 people and had 3 followers. I did not know any of the 23 people. And most, based on their brief descripions, really didn't want to. I deleted (asked not to follow or be followed) most of them and started over. At first I couldn't find enough and I was struggling to get 20-30 people/organizations to follow. I started thinking about what I was going to be teaching in the next few months and searched those subjects. Soon I ended up with 23 places to follow. I have to admit, I am still not exactly sure how helpful this will be in the future or how often I will be back. In the mean time, I have a week of following before before I can determine exactly how useful I will find this.

Reach Out and Touch Someone (Week 3 Thing 8)

This was fun, a learning experience and a chance to laugh with my sister.
My sister is a mommy blogger. I love reading about her life and I think she is a great writer. I am often in awe of what is able to say with mere words. In any case, earlier today when I was attempting to subscribe to her blog on my google reader, I read her current post and laughed at the imagination of my little niece and nephew. I already posted a blog commenting on this. When I continued with my Web 1.0 work, I realized I needed to comment on another blog and that this would be perfect.

Here is the link to that comment on Momma Volcano.

The comment was is two parts. I wrote the comment and uploaded the post, then realized I forgot to leave my blog's link. The directions say that most blogs have a place to paste a URL. Only my sister's blog did not. So I called her. Over the phone, we problem solved and she talked me through the process. After I returned to write this post, I realized what we did was simply type by hand the same paraphernalia that is written above by blogger when I push the link button.

Please read my post labeled Reasons for Learning for the reasons I decided to comment on that particular post.