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Wow -- so much to say, but I will try to be concise. My favorite discoveries were:- Image creators -- I had so much fun with those. Can't wait to introduce my friends to it!
- Learning about "readers" and subscribing to several RSS feeds. Right now most of them are purely recreational, but I plan to subscribe to more educational ones as I discover things at work I want more info on.
- Finding the educational advantages of YouTube. I've already embedded a couple of videos onto my Facebook profile. I also sent some to one of the science teachers at my school who loved them! It gave him a link to yet another website for more ideas.
- Google Docs -- as much trouble as I had trying to create my ideal calender ;-), I eventually figured out a way to do it and am still revising and tweeking it. I think it will be a great organizational tool for my school come August.
I think just about everything from this program was an unexpected outcome. Really, the only thing I knew about of all the Things was MySpace and Facebook. There is so much out there that i knew nothing about. It makes me wonder how much/little my colleagues know, and how much more we could be doing with our students.
I would definitely participate in another course like this. I hope one comes available. I will keep an eye out for it.
I would like to say one final Thank-you to all of you who put this course together and helped us along the way. I greatly appreciate this opportunity.
As with many of the Things, I was overwhelmed by the wealth of information on the Ning and Classroom 2.0 websites. It didn't take me long, though, to find the "Search" bar and narrow my topics.
The first thing I thought of when reading Thing 23 was, "I wonder if there's a group out there that discusses ideas on and about teaching students of another ethnicity [than the teacher's]?" I searched, but didn't really find anything. I'll admit I may not have entered the right phrase (and couldn't find an advanced search option), and that the results were so numerous I couldn't look through all of them. But it seems to me someone has to have something out there about this topic. Given that the vast majority of teachers are white, and a large portion of our students are not, there needs to be some discussion/training on this topic. I believe that the lack of knowledge (and/or appreciation) of other ethnic groups is what causes a great deal of discipline problems in classrooms today.
In my search of "classroom management", I came across this link, in which the Dean of a Bronx middle school is asking for suggestions for several of her teachers that are having difficulties with their classroom discipline. My first thought was, "What ethnicity is she, and what ethnicities are they?" I realize this may sound a bit controversial, but we all tend to view things from our own upbringing and experiences, which, across ethnic groups, are vastly different. If a teacher has no idea "where his/her students are coming from", they have no idea or tools with which to relate to them. This, in turn, increases the "distance" between them and creates an environment in which the students mentally "check out" and no longer care whether or not they learn or get in trouble.
I will now get off of my soapbox and say this: Maybe I'll start a discussion on Classroom 2.0 that deals with this very topic.
For this revisiting of my reader, I decided to check out an article from The Frugal Traveler (Matt Gross), Hunting for Treasure in Paris’s Marchés aux Puces. Matt travels all over, blogging as he goes, and for this particular block of blogs he just so happens to be in Paris and France. His goal is to find the "off-the-beaten-path" activities/hotels/restaurants that will give you the essence of a place, without breaking your budget. This post was his journey through one of Paris's many flea markets, and his search for that special something for just the right price.
I didn't know there was so much out there on Google. Of course I knew it was a search engine, but the other tools available are quite advantageous. I started off with Google Alerts . However, I couldn't think of anything I wanted to be alerted about. I sat there for quite a while, and nothing came to mind. I am sure something will dawn on me eventually, so it's good to know that Google Alerts is available.
My second stop on my tour was Google Notebook . I really just wanted to see what it looked like, but alas, it no longer exists for new users. The website suggested that you use Google Docs
So, on to the next: Google Calendar . I like the idea of being able to share it. However, already having an old-fashioned, paper calendar AND my Outlook calendar, I'm not sure I would use it.
Lastly, in my quest to find something I could use, I decided to stop by iGoogle . I LOVED it. It's like most home pages, but I liked the gadgets and information that was available to use. Of all the tools, I think this one was my favorite, and most useful to me at this point. instead, but stated that current users would still have access to their notebooks.
Aha! Finally, a "Thing" I already know how to do! I have both a MySpace and a Facebook account, although I must admit I like Facebook much more. MySpace seems much more youth-oriented, whereas Facebook appeals more to the more mature audience. Here is my Facebook page, and here is my MySpace page. I'm not sure if those links will work without logging in, though. Honestly, I check my Facebook everyday. I've reconnected with so many friends from high school and college. I hesitated for quite a while about getting an account on either MySpace or Facebook, but I'm so glad now that I did. I even found a student I had my first year of teaching -- he's in med school! I believe all educators should take a look at these sites, whether they set up their own account or not, just so they'll be aware of what students have access to. Also, so they'll understand what kids are talking about. When I set up my MySpace account, I had a former student help me -- the classic "teachers learn from their students" scenario! Seriously, though, they know WAY more than we do when it comes to social networking, and it's like the assignment page for this "Thing" said: ". . . if we don't model productive, responsible uses of social networking tools for our students, how will they learn to be productive, responsible users of these tools?"
Google Docs . . . I was really excited to try this application. The idea of creating something and being able to collaborate with others at my school was really exciting. The very first thing that popped into my head was "SCHOOL CALENDAR"!!! I thought I could create something that everyone could contribute to, then Voila!, everyone would know what was going on all year.
Alas, that did not happen. I found a couple of calendar templates that I really liked, but they were monthly, and I want something that shows six weeks at a time. So then I decided to try and "edit" the existing calendar, and that worked to a point, except that when I tried to change the dates, it wouldn't let me. Whenever I entered a number in the date box and pushed tab, the program/computer/evil cyberspace demons would subtract 1 from it (ex: I put in 17, move to the next cell, and the number would automatically change to 16). Okay . . . I can deal with that . . . I'll just put one MORE than the number I want. This worked, but was just a pain in the backside.
So . . . I decided to export it to Excel and edit it there, where I'm more familiar with the commands and formatting. Nope. Didn't work.
Needless to say, this was a bit of a let-down. I'm pretty sure that it's me and not the program, but it's still frustrating. It did inspire me, however, to create something on Excel, and then import it to Google Docs . Having one centralized calendar for our school would keep everyone updated and in-the-loop. I will succeed . . .
I would also like to create a menu planner for my family. That's in the works, but again, the formatting tools are unfamiliar to me and not as easy to use.
I'm unsure how I would use Voicethread in my professional life, but my first idea is to use it for training purposes. Training teachers for a standardized test is at BEST very, very dry, but what if there was some way for me to create a voicethread for it? Because the idea is new to me, I'm not sure how I would do it, but seriously, this might just be the best thing yet. I could make it comical, relevant, and ONE TIME, and teachers could view it at their convenience. The problem lies in assessing whether or not they did it. A quiz of some sort? Perhaps I'll find something in Thing #20 that would allow me to track their progress . . . I wonder if TEA would approve?
I think a math teacher could use it to explain the steps to a problem so that students could access it at home for homework help, much like Measuring Volume of Weird Objects.
On a personal note, it might be a fun way to digitally scrapbook. I STINK at scrapbooking, and most of my pictures are stashed in a box. I do, however, have a CD, and could upload pictures to the site with comments. The more I think about it, the more I like Voicethread.
