Thing #23 LAST BUT NOT LEAST!

1.My favorite discoveries on 23Things were the components involving images and gadgets. I had great fun with iGoogle and all the gadgets, MashUps, and things like Image Chef. Tools, tools, tools are fun, fun fun! After great frustration and time I even enjoyed learning how to VIDcast.
2.If one of your lifelong learning goals is to keep up with technology—this course is a catalyst. It has truly opened my eyes to all that I DIDN'T know and made me aware of the ever-changing and expanding resources available on Web 2.0 and beyond.
3.One unexpected outcome is that I was surprised, again, by what I didn't know. I had always considered myself to be pretty techno-savvy--(NOT!). I was also surprised that I actually started to enjoy blogging!
4.The program's format is solid. There were a few TOO MANY things, however. Splitting it into two sections would help. The pod casting section could be a class unto itself! I would also like to see a searchable PROBLEM link (FORUM) offered where the CAPTAINS would answer questions directly all in one location.
5.If another program were offered in the future I would definitely participate!
6.Are you intimidated and sinking in a big dark pool of internet and computer technology? 23Things—Take the plunge and SWIM into a wondrous new sea of knowledge!

Thing #21 THE LONG, LONG ROAD TO VID/POD

I must say that I wish it had been noted in Thing #1 that this THING was going to take HOURS AND HOURS and we would need to acquire headphones and/or microphones and/or some narration for a picture or audio presentation. That would have given me more time to organize these things versus scrambling about while I'm out of town and attempting to complete this by the deadline time. I had pictures on my cell phone of the Snowy Range in Wyoming that I wanted to use. I had Bluetooth capability. I bought a "Dongle" which is a USB adapter that allows you to transfer pictures from your cell phone into your PC. My computer would not allow me to install because I don't have administrator privledges. I then tried downloading a free PC Suite from Nokia but had the same problem. Perhaps SBISD should let us download devices so that we can actuall USE all this technology. It would be nice to not be stymied at every turn. I ended up e-mailing myself all the pictures from my cell phone--goodness knows how much that is going to cost me since I DON'T have a media package. I have posted the BEGINNING of a photostory but it is nowhere near being done. I will come back and finish it later. Once I got the microphone to FINALLY work it became fun. It was very easy to import pictures into Photostory (which is already installed on the SBISD laptop) and the process of recording audio is also eased by a feature that allows you to write notes to refer to while you are recording. These are great tools to have explored! NOW I GET AN ERROR MESSAGE WHEN I TRY TO POST THE PHOTOSTORY DRAFT. If you see it in this post it means I prevailed! For HELP go to http://lib2pad.blogspot.com/ and ALSO see my COMMENT on the Thing #21 assignment.

Thing#22 Ring-Ring--IT'S NING!!

I like this!! I joined www.teacherlingo.com Finding other teachers of your same grade level and subject and being able to vent sounds great. I'm also interested in exploring the Lesson Plan menu and starting a teacher blog! Not much on there now but it could be grown! Get in on the "Sneaky Parent" opinion!

http://teacherlingo.com/blogs/jtspencer/archive/2008/02/28/sneaky-parent.aspx

Thing #20 THIS AIN'T NO BOOB TUBE!!

I found a funny Ma & Pa Math video and imbedded it into the blog. There is an "embed" feature that says NEW. It shows up as an "embed" choice afteryou click on the video itself on the TeacherTube web site. It is code so you can embed video but it also contains a video search to TeacherTube. See the video at the bottom of the blog!

#19 The Rewards of the 2.0 AWARDS SITES

I've used Craigslist myself. It's interesting but sometimes I wonder about selling to strangers at your home. Freecycle.com is cool for GIVING stuff away. People just come haul it away. It's great!

I looked around at other 2.0 Award tools but didn't find anything especially interesting or applicable to education other than the tools we've already explored.

I checked out:
http://www.yourminis.com/minis to find some widgets. I put a calendar on the blog (see below) but don't think you can even put your own events on it. I can get some widget HTML to post on the blog but but the "SIGN-IN" method with BLOGGER doesn't seem to work. The following did work: If you "right-click" on the widget it will let you copy the code. It's all a bit confusing. I put a countdown timer below. You could use that, perhaps, to remind students of upcoming tests, etc.

#18 FREEBIES!

OpenOffice.org has the following applications: BASE/CALC/DRAW/IMPRESS/WRITER and one that is exciting to me MATH. iT'S already installed on our SBISD laptops. I've tried WRITER and MATH and it works great. It's nice to have the ability to use symbols for MATH equations without waiting for GEEK to install Math Text or whatever it's called. It will be great to have it to use to make ACTIV BOARD flip charts.

I registered for Google Docs and can see how it would be useful to co-plan with fellow teachers.

Can't see much of a downside to it....unless there's no tech support?

#17 HO-HO-HO-ROLLYO

COOL TOOL! I registered with ROLLYO and started to build a MATH search roll. I even succeeded in putting a RollBar bookmarklet on my Links bar and SearchBox on the blog. I can see many uses for this. I use a site called ikeepbookmarks.com with a similar arrangement where I saved all the math and science sites for my students to use from home.

Check out ikeepbookmarks.com
Students could sign in as Rummel Creek
No password necessary
Go to 5th grade!! See all my bookmarks!

Now I've INCLUDED it in my Rollyo Search Engine