Thing 2

As has been so often mentioned in the things we've read for Twitter, it seems to be a program that grows on you. It's also a program in which you can easily lose yourself as you chain from one site to the next, looking at postings and finding new people to follow.

On a personal level, I'm more likely (at this point, at least!) to text message my friends and family. Those who would be likely to use Twitter would have the phone access to text. The others wouldn't be online anyway.

Professionally, I see the benefit of asking for and providing help/suggestions and/or a heads up to fellow searchers. This could be very useful if I happened to be looking for specific information. Having access to all these people really could prevent re-invention! The difficulty is having social networking sites blocked at school. It could be useful, I suppose, to contact parents with some immediacy. However, a phone call could be just as quick, especially since there is no blocking.

Pedagogically, it would be interesting to follow new trends in my fields (speech path and clinical psych), without incurring the cost of multiple journals and periodicals. Save trees, and all that.

As for fun, who wouldn't follow Ashton Kucher?! LOL

Thing 3

Blogging. Turns out I love it. Of course, it's all just extemporania for the moment. After all, I don't have particularly DEEP THOUGHTS! I enjoy hearing others' comments, although there have not really been many (or any, other than Jim's -- thanks, pal). Ironically, I haven't been particularly interested in reading blogs before, mostly for the same reason I like my own: there's not always a lot there. Alas.

One concern, should anyone actually read these things, is that my comments might be misinterpreted. Writing is not the same as reading, is not the same as conversing. Paranoid, I know.

I expect I'll play at it for awhile and see how it goes. It's an interesting way to fulfill my mother's dream of me becoming a writer. What goes around, and all that.

Woo-Hoo!

I'm done, I'm done, I'm done. I learned a lot of stuff. I'm smarter than the average bear. Knowing myself, I'll probably forget a ton of it. Le Sigh. That's why I'm going to print/copy/paste/abscond with as many of the directions as possible so I can continue to improve my skills. See you in the cloud, baby!!

Thing 23

This has changed my view of education, and excited me as to what is possible. It will take more than a few of us in any particular district to implement these Web 2.0 ideas and open the rest of the staff to what is possible. There is significant reluctance, in many cases, to spend the time on these things. Too many of us feel computer illiterate and afraid to make the attempt. Those of us who have these skills will have to "evangelize" and spread the word of how terrific this stuff is.

As for personal use, I love the blog world. Even if no one else sees it, it's fun to play at. Watch this space!

Thing 4

How has learning changed since I was a child, lo, those many, many years ago. Hmmm, let's see. The only educational stuff we had on TV was "Watch Mr. Wizard". Learning communities were developed by discussing letters to Dear Abby. Students were not encouraged to "share" information with others, as this might be confused with CHEATING!!! Research involved hauling your sorry self to the library and spending hours & hours with the card catalog, stacks, and note cards. A bookmark was a stiff piece of paper stuck in a book. Okay, okay. You already know I'm old.

What's too often the same is that students schlep books from lockers, read, answer questions, take a quiz/test, and move on. Stuff they may have just learned may be forgotten as they begin work on the new unit/chapter/assignment. There is collaborative work on projects, but it's much like it was (skenkty-five) years ago. That said, it's nice to see unitedstreaming vodcasts used in some rooms, access to online info, and quick collaboration with parents.

Hooray!!

Thing 22

Obviously, the advantage to online PD is convenience. It's self-paced and no one cares what you're wearing or if you have dragon mouth or whether you scratch something inappropriate. You don't have to re-arrange schedules, prep lesson plans for a substitute, or worry about getting there on time.

The disadvantage of online PD is that you have to show up. Knowing myself as well as I do, I find it easier to watch Burn Notice (or equivalent) than to park my body at the computer for another hour or two of an evening. The result is that I procrastinate (you may have noticed that on this course!) and sweat out getting the assignments done. Hewlett Packard offers online courses for FREE. I have signed up for several of them, started with a flourish, then walked away because I couldn't make myself put in the time. Bah.

Having to show up for a live PD presentation forces you to participate. It's also time limited, which helps me enormously. You take your notes, put the handouts in a binder, and use what you remember to improve your service delivery. That's it. You're done.

I'll probably do some of both in the future. Hopefully it'll work out better!

Thing 21

Well, this has been an exercise in frustration! I'm sure that with more use, it would become easier to embed video into a blog or wiki. At least I'm hoping that would be the case for a techno-novice such as me.

Videos could be used in the classroom to present materials in different ways. For example,on Teacher Tube, I learned about a multiplication grid. It was fascinating. There was also an Abbot and Costello video on doing multiplication incorrectly. Hilarious. It could engage students easily. The same video could be used in a social studies class to discuss WWII, starting with demographics of military personnel, draft vs. volunteer military service, etc.

You Tube is blocked for student access in our district. However, it is available for teachers, so it would more likely be used in large-group instruction rather than individual access. I jumped through hoops trying to make Firefox work. When this project is completed, I'll try again. I didn't actually try either Vixy or Zamzar because it was so easy to download things to Real Player, for which I have a subscription.

Optional Thing

Thing 20

Students would be interested in listening to podcasts if it was relevant to their work and engaging. One example might be the Podcast Club (http://education.podcast.com/show/34346/Podcast-Club/), which creates history podcasts. Another is a site related to snowboarding (http://snowboarding.podcast.com/episode/20980713/29973/), which could be used in physical education, physics, or anatomy classes. Music podcasts abound.

I think students would enjoy making podcasts for several reasons: hearing their own voices broadcast, playing with the technology, and (incidentally) actually demonstrating their knowledge through another medium.

I enjoy NPR broadcasts. Yes, I know this sounds like a broken record, but that's life. Fact is, I haven't had time to do all the exploring I might for podcast sites. It's on my list. After working out, but before root canal.

uses for podcasts

Okay, I lied. So sue me.

If you happen to glance to your left, you'll see a facebook badge for Sandy Shores. In actuality, that's me, sort of. Being the paranoid nutball I am, I tend to use aliases on pages like "My Face", or give different parts of birthdates, or generally screw up the demographics on everything. Except this. Of course I wouldn't lie to 23Things, would I? Of course not. Sure.

Thing 19

I've listened to podcasts before, especially those from NPR. I particularly like "Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me", which I've reviewed on this blog. As a fan of audio books, podcasts are a natural. I can shift time to listen to programs at my convenience rather than when they're broadcast. I listened to Grammar Girl's podcast about posting blog comments, and heard a podcast from a school librarian putting forward some mysteries. Both were informative and helpful.

One of the difficulties I see with this is having students, especially young ones, maintain their attention during the podcast. Certainly, it could be used by a kindergarten teacher, for instance, to turn one of their story books into a podcast. That way they could listen from home. Students could present reports via podcast, which could then be used in different classrooms studying the same topic. At a higher level, students would presumably have a longer attention span (or at least be able to fake it better), so discussions could be captured and rebroadcast. This might be helpful when a test is looming.

Students would probably prefer vodcasts. When I was a student (lo, those many years ago), I always enjoyed slides or movies over just talk. They keep the participants focused. With podcasts, it would be too easy for them to just "half-listen" while doing something else, the much mis-named "multitasking".

Students could be made aware of podcasts by posting them on class blogs, making them feeds, or including them on a wiki. Students could compile their own list of podcasts, as part of a group projects on their wiki. Use of "Science Friday" from NPR could supplement specific topics presented in class. "Wait, Wait..." could be used during either Current Events-type class or ELA focus on humor. Social Studies classes could benefit from the many presentations on "Morning Edition" or BBC World News. Can you tell I'm a regular listener of NPR? "This American Life" could be used as a jumping-off point for journalism classes or writing memoirs. The possibilities are wonderful!

Thing 17

A wiki is a more focused instrument than a blog is. The wiki typically provides info on a particular topic of interest, whereas a blog might have that topic, but will also have other interests of the blogger.
I think a blog would be more useful for journaling activities, and reflection assignments. A wiki would be more collaborative, much as group projects are now. An assignment on planets could be put together by students as young as 3rd or 4th grade. Social studies assignments could use a wiki. The advantage is that it wouldn't necessarily be limited to in-class time, but could be a homework assignment to which each participant could contribute at their convenience.
The main problem I encountered with the wiki was getting it to look the way I wanted it to. Perhaps this could be solved in a group collaboration by each person contributing their info and then putting it together in a more stylish fashion at the end of the project.

dumpr.net

Museum by dumpr.net

Whose-ie Toes?

Whose-ie Toes?
Originally uploaded by lead_f00t

Thing 12

Flickr is a great way to keep photos organized. It can be especially useful in grabbing just the ones you want. Tagging is terrific! My only concern is that you lose control over any photos you make public. That has the possibility of misuse. Of course, this is probably urban legand, but it makes me cautious about what I want to put out in the cloud.

Thing 11

Adding slide shows could be very helpful in a regular classroom. From a therapeutic viewpoint, it has somewhat less utility. Certainly there are plenty of slide shows available regarding language skills, especially at a secondary level. However, given that I would be working one-on-one or with small groups, it is more likely that I would just provide the content myself.

Organization? What Organization?

In "A Perfect Mess" by Eric Abrahamson and David H. Freedman, the authors challenge the assumption that neater is always better. From a purely practical standpoint (and knowing myself as I do), I embrace the idea that mess might be best. But here's the conflict: I'm an office supplies junkie. I go into Office Max/Depot for just one thing, but my eyes are scanning each and every aisle for something NEW and BETTER and MORE EFFICIENT or just plain COOLER. That way, the next time I need something, I can just stroll in for that new thing and feel perfectly justified.

Also, with as much time as I spend at work, I want stuff that will make my life easier, more convenient or just plain cooler. Get the pattern? This, of course, makes the authors' point. All that time I spend cruising Office Depot/Max negates the time I might save by being neat and organized. Not to mention all the time I spend implementing the new gadgets.

Will realizing this discrepancy between time used and neatness change my behavior. I fear not. I'll still cruise the office supply store, and play with new stuff at work/home. But I'll REALIZE that it's not really in the interest of efficiency, but just because I want to!

Thing 10

I totally love the idea of Google Docs, as it will save me printing and sending out each and every homework assignment. Now I will just need parents to access it and respond when the assignment is done. Another puzzle to solve.

One of the problems I had, though, was uploading documents. They didn't look the same as the original document, though I tried it several times. What would be the point of creating a document if it's not going to look right? Must be that thing about limited options in comparison to the original program. For example, on the spread sheet, I couldn't merge cells or upload the picture I had in the original document. On the text document, none of the lines appeared, and spacing was all off.

I did upload a new document to a colleague, and am waiting for her to respond.

Part of what we do involves confidential information, which would not be appropriate in google docs. We'll have to continue to do that in-house, which is not a problem since we have a common server.

Thing 8

Well, this is news. I often get so lost looking for particular material that I get frustrated. Or I may come across something I think is really neat, but it doesn't apply to the specific search I'm doing. Social networking looks like a terrific solution to that. Being able to put in the keywords that are meaningful to me will help, too, by eliminating some of the nutballs out there who love to take a topic to the ends of the earth and turn left. LOVE IT.

Thing 5

An amazing concept! An entire building linked by curriculum and interest. It really creates a learning community, both in and outside of the school. As a speech pathologist, it interests me because it allows me to incorporate time-sensitive vocabulary and language tasks into what I am doing with students. It is an overwhelming task to pursue these things on my own, across all academic areas, across so many grade levels. Having the ability to pick/choose which words or topics to include on a weekly basis, as they are being presented, would not only make me a more relevant part of the educational team, but would increase my effectiveness for the students with which I work.

SNOW! Uck.
Each little flake is one more stone in my shoe. Sure, it's pretty at Christmas. And it's fun for sledding. So, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow from Dec. 20 - Jan 15. Then let it go, let it go, let it go! Or if it has to stay, let it snow only on hills and in wooded areas for intrepid snow-sport people. Ah, freedom from snow plows, shovels, and boots. No more coats, mittens and hoods. No sliding around corners hoping to avoid the car waiting to pull into the intersection. No more slush on the windows as truck/SUV drivers blast past you.

Bring on spring, even the dreary, rainy days. Increase the temperature by single degrees or whole seasons' worth at a time. Thunderstorms, blustery winds, sunshine! Yes, yes, YES! Open the windows, even if it's still chilly. Bring fresh air into every corner. Let summer reign!

starting again (again, again, again)

New format, same old thing.

I have at least two dozen journals I've started. Some I bought just for the covers, some the convenience, some the price. Most are still blank. One is almost completely full -- from several years ago when things were particularly tough. I've started several, only to abandon them with fewer than a dozen pages filled. They're around somewhere. I'm hoping some day one of my children will find them and paste the entries in chronological order in order to get a better picture of who I really was.

Or maybe that's not such a good idea.....