SUMMARY

WOW is one way to describe web 2.0.  I knew absolutely nothing about it until I started the 23 things.  I am completely amazed at how much technology is out there to use from the internet!!!  This has definitely been an eye opener for me.  I absolutely loved Animoto, Zoho, Snapfish and Flickr.  I was already familiar with Facebook and use it on a daily basis to keep up with family and friends.  The blogs, chatboards and tweets, I am still not so sure about? Many were hard for me to understand how to use and it seemed like I signed up for a gazillion things, but on the other hand I can see these being used as a great tool for your classroom by starting your own blog, chatboard, or even a classroom Facebook page just for your class, that parents and students can utilize to share and keep up with what is going on in their child's classroom and to ask questions.

I know that I will be utilizing the Web 2.0 always, it is the  now  and the future.  I used to be scared to try anything on the web, download anything and basically don't have a lot of patience for a lot of it.  I now am not scared to try stuff on the web and felt a lot of satisfaction when I finally figured out how to do one of the THINGS that frustrated me, sometimes for hours.  Then I was completely amazed at how easy some of it was, especially Animoto or maybe it was at that point my fear of the "net" had gone away??? Anyways I am glad I have completed the 23 things and look forward to exploring more sites and useful tools in the future.

Thing 23

Creative Commons is  great! How nice to find and be able to use work on the internet and know what legally you are allowed to use and how to use it.  An example for an attribution  is actually at the bottom of thing 23 it shows that this site was created from an attribution at the bottom of the page with a link to the Creative Commons site. I will definitely be using Creative Commons for many uses in the future and I will definitely share this site with my future students and encourage them to use this for their school projects.

Thing 22

First I listened to educational podcast directory it seemed silly and had to much ambiguous stuff in their pod casts and didn't seem very user friendly.  I think maybe I didn't like it because there was to much garbage at the beginning of the podcast and didn't really go straight to the subject.

Podcast Alley didn't really suit me either.  I am sure it has something to do with not navigating it correctly, but it didn't have what I wanted either.

Next I listened to one Learn Out Loud on earth and the effects cell phones can have on us from and felt these were more of what I was looking for when it came to a science podcast. I can see using this site in the future it had all kinds of subjects to choose from and I liked the format.
earth

thing 21

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

This was so easy and fun!! I was able to pull photos from my Facebook account and I used the music offered from animoto. It was nice to use a site that was so USER friendly. I have a feeling I will probably pay to make longer videos. I think this is my favorite site so far that we have used.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

I think this could be very addicting...YIKES!!

Thing 20

I chose these videos because it really does show how we as educators need to embrace technology. I am one of those who is struggling to learn more and more about all that is out there and how to use it in the classroom. Hopefully school districts will start embracing technology more and train teachers better at using it in the classroom and allow more access to the internet for students in their learning.

Thing 19

I am a member of facebook and myspace as mentioned in thing #18 and enjoy facebook alot.  I am currentely waiting on a confirmation from the APSU social network so I will get back to that? I checked out bakespace and joined it. It seems like it might be a fun site to explore and I might look more into it later.  For me belonging to all these blogs,networks and chats is just not very feasible I have a hard enough time keeping up with day to day activities  let alone online communities.  Hopefully I will find more time or interest in the future to really dig into these numerous sites and find something I really like.

I have now officially joined the social network TeacherPop for APSU....I think I added a badge, but not sure if it worked and I uploaded a couple of photos, which was very easy to do.. teacherpop.

Thing 18

I already had a facebook and myspace accounts and use my Facebook daily. I originally created both of these accounts to monitor my daughter on them and found quickly that I became addicted to Facebook.  I was able to reconnect with many people that I hadn't seen or heard from since I left home back in 1990.  I don't really use  MySpace  much or really at all.  I just check it once in awhile to check up on my teenager.  I am not sure how to create a link to my profile without letting people into my account so I am going to do a print screen for now until I figure that out?

Thing 17

I found delicious very nice and went ahead and created an account. I like the aspect of being able to sort my bookmarks easier I had a lot that I imported from my firefox bookmarks and now they all show up on the left side of my screen.  I definitely need to clean them up and organize them better and this tool will help a lot.  I like the fact that I can access this from any computer and not just my own.  I think this is advantageous for teachers because there are so many sites out there and it would be nice to see what others are finding. I can see the potential in a classroom for students to be able to access sites from school. 

Thing 16

I chose igoogle, because I already had the page I just hadn't made it my homepage yet, which I did and yes I do plan on keeping it my homepage.  I thought it was cool that it would go straight to my facebook account once I set that up so i can keep up with that as soon as get on the computer .  I went ahead and created the online calendar with google too.  Not sure if this will be useful or not, because I still use and old fashioned calendar book to write everything down so I think that and the to-do lists might just be more work for me to keep up with?  I thought the getting things done was interesting and fairly informative.  The top 25 web apps article is great and I plan on exploring more of these apps to help me in the future with my classes and with teaching in the future. I would definitely recommend the igoogle page to others.

Thing 15

Wiki's what a great concept.  I really like the idea of a classroom Wiki.  What a great way for the teacher to communicate with the class and for students to communicate with each other and give ideas to each other on projects and assignments and to have links to websites that can help the students with assignments.  I liked the one where the teacher set it up that the public can view it but only the students from that school can join. I commented in APSU sandbox on the life long learners http://apsu23thingssandbox.pbworks.com/Lifelong+Learning.

Thing 14

Bubble.us seemed to be the easiest to use after playing around with it for awhile. I can see using it again for a project. On the other hand I found mindmeister hard to explore and in order to do more you had to pay for a better level to use more features.  It was nice that there was a tutorial to watch and it helped a little, but I was having a hard time getting it to do what I wanted, I think this was due to I was trying to use the free version? So I would choose Bubbl.us over mindmeister.com.  For flow charts gliffy was fun and seemed fairly easy to figure out and I can see using it in the future for a class project. Currently I am still waiting on an invite  from flowchart so I haven't been able to explore it yet.

Thing 13

I like this idea of having online word processor's.  It would be nice to access a document you are working on from anywhere and be able to work on it from any computer instead of having to take your laptop with you especially if you are going out of town.  This didn't seem very difficult to set up and I liked that it was easy to import any document you already have in your computer and you can save in your Zoho account.  Seems like a good way to keep important documents backed up. 

I typed the above paragraph in Zoho writer and sent it to the blog as a draft and it worked!!...How nice no copying and pasting from word.  It was very simple and easy to do.

Thing #12

I had an igoogle page already. It wasn't my home page, but it has links to news, weather and after playing around with it, I have decided to make it my homepage and see how I like it. I created a igoogle calendar. I think this could be a great tool for students to keep up with homework assignments, test dates and due dates on projects for their classes.

Thing #11

Feedster: Wasn't able to connect at first so I googled it and it came to a page that basically said feedster was a dying feeder? So I chose not to explore it anymore. Google: When I searched the school library learning 2.0, I came up with the 23 things in several different search engines. I had signed up for in the previous thing to google reader and I like how when you want to add a blog through Google blog that it asks you where you want it. This makes it very easy to subscribe to blogs. Bloglines was very easy to use and gave a variety of blogs to follow. Topix: Was probably the most confusing it required more to sign up than the others, which quite frankly I found annoying. I did like that it went straight to news about Clarksville. *What kind of useful feeds did you find in your travels? Useful feeds in my google reader that I like is that I was able to pick topics and it gave me feeds to all kinds of things. I love to cook so I subscribed to a bunch of those. There is so much out there that I can see where it would be easy to get caught up in following a massive of amounts of feeds. For me signing up for so many feeds is just a little too much information overload. I don't necessarily have the time to keep up with all of this. I understand that they keep up with what you want to keep up with, but I can also see how you could get caught up for hours reading all the feeds.

Thing #10

I chose Google Reader, it uploaded the blogs I was already following which was nice, so it will make it easier to follow them without having to click on each separately. I was able to subscribe to bundle feeds which was nice. I think it will be a good tool for the classroom if I can find feeds that integrate whatever content I am teaching. Teachers can use this by finding feeds relevant to the classroom. Personally it will keep me updated on things that I am interested in. My favorite is being able to subscribe to Seattle news and blogs, that is where my family is and it's nice to have a feed that takes me to the latest news and information. Currently I subscribed to a lot of blogs as I weed through them though (time permitting) I will be able to narrow it down so I don't have so many to look at.

Thing #9

http://www.comicstripgenerator.com/

Well after playing around for a LOOOOnnggg time. I decided I liked the comic generator best. I was able to take pictures I already had on my computer and add special effects to them, which I thought was the best part. It took me awhile to figure out how to get to the picture I wanted to use. The site saves your previous uploads, and kept going back to the first picture I uploaded. I finally figured out you had to use original for the most recent pictures that you just uploaded. It was fun once I figured it out. I think this is fun for personal use, but not sure how all this picture making is useful for a classroom. It is a little to time consuming for that and not sure how I could tie it into content that needed to be taught.

Thing #8

I used mosaic maker to create this. I used an album I already had in Facebook. It took me awhile to get it the right size for my blog. I ended up copying the image after I re posted it to Facebook to get the right size. The other mosaic was huge and I couldn't get it any smaller through the mosaic maker. I will have to go back and figure that one out? Any suggestions. I am finding all the picture stuff pretty cool. I can't wait till I have more time to play with all this and get started on making albums for my kids.

Thing #7

woods akira Originally uploaded by haileyknowlton

This is a photo of our dog Akira in the river behind our house. I found this experience with Flickr both enjoyable and very frustrating. It took me forever to figure out how to post this picture and I am still not sure I did this right, but it is there. I am very excited about the snapfish aspect of this. I am horrible about putting photo albums together of my kids and after seeing what I can do at snapfish I am very excited. I take pictures all the time with my cell phone and send them to my email and then upload them on my computer, but I never print anything just usually post it to my facebook account. I am most definitely going to use the this resource to actually get some photo albums made. How wonderful that they will do all the work and just send me photo albums already done. I have a feeling I will be taking a lot more pictures and uploading them and I can't wait till I get my first album done for me.....As I stated earlier I have only used Facebook to host my pictures, but this is so much better, because of the Snapfish aspect. I am not to concerned about the privacy, because I will make all my photos private.

Thing #6

I chose Im cooked. http://www.imcooked.com/index.php I went to this site first because I love to cook and I am addicted to watching the Food Network so I wanted to check this out. My intention at first was just to watch for personal use and not to write about it in my blog, because how does making food have anything to do with a classroom? I then realized that this could be used in a classroom. I am a special education assistant for CMCSS and my first year I worked in a Life Skills classroom, which is for the severely handicapped. One of the life skills they work on is how to prepare simple meals depending on the severity of the disabilities depends on what they can do, but I realized that this site would be a great way for them to see how the process works. Most of the recipes of course are too complicated, but I actually found one where a guy gives a complete tutorial on how to make a marshmallow and peanut butter sandwich. I also realized this could be used in High Schools that still offer cooking as an elective.

Thing #5

School 2.0 means that the internet has become a way of life for many and that we need to embrace it and use the tools available out there. I like the description used in on of the articles that web 2.0 is an attitude not a thing. I am beginning to realize how many tools are out there on the internet to be used as I go through this class. Scary, I use the net a lot, but I am leery of many aspects. I have crashed my computer a couple of times from getting virus' on the internet, so whenever I am asked to download something to make something work (like the video on web 2.0) I cringe and cross my fingers that something won't happen to my computer. I do agree that as educators we must start using the tools available. Students already use so much technology daily and to not utilize what they already know how to do is a shame, but school systems especially poor ones will have a hard time keeping up with the technology especially since it changes daily. I envision a future where students will start carrying around their own personal computer to class, a very distant future, but one that will eventually happen.

Thing #4

Commenting on blogs creates a sense of community, because then people actually know their posts are being read and getting feedback from others is nice and it is interesting to find out what others think of your opinions. I suppose if no one ever commented on someone's blog that person might just give up on their blog. I think reading about the etiquette in blogging was important, because we do need to be careful on how we respond. Differing opinions is important, but we also remember that everyone's opinions don't always match and that while we may not agree with someone's thoughts we should be respectful of them. I found the 10 techniques to get more people to leave comments very interesting, while I am still up in the air here on whether I like the whole blogging thing, it was insightful. 1. I commented on T. Chad Peterman, because I appreciate the fact that he also didn't know what web 2.0 meant and that he is like me just getting to understand all that the internet has to offer. 2. I commented on Dsmith, Thing 12. She is very innovative and I appreciate the insights that she has to offer to what she did when she works on her things. 3. I commented Xayarath 23 things. First I did to congratulate him on his new marriage and I love the fact that he could view his photos so quickly and not have to wait to see them. I really think Flickr is a great tool and I am looking forward to exploring it more. 4. I commented on JAS thing #11. I too have not used technology to it's fullest and appreciate that others struggle with all that is offered out there. 5. I commented on Brokaw Spring 2010 to congratulate her on being done with all 23 things...WOW!!!

Thing #3

How I might use a blog in the classroom. Students could be shown how to set up a blog if parents agree and use it as a tool to communicate with their classmates and teacher just as we are. Some students who wouldn't necessarily ask questions in class may be more open to do so in a blog format, especially if they made themselves anonymous. Some students are uncomfortable asking questions in a formal setting whether they are just shy or feel that their questions are dumb. By setting up a blog this would give students a tool to get questions answered on class lessons that they may just otherwise choose to not learn. I think though this would only be appropriate for middle school and high school students.

Thing #2

How I decided on my name was easy just made it simple by using my first initial and part of my last name. I also made my name the title of my blog with the class number to make it simple. My experience in creating this blog was honestly a little frustrating to get started. I felt a little overwhelmed at first setting it up, but as I go along I am learning the features and how to use them. Hopefully by the end of the semester I will be a pro at using most of them. The Avatar reflects my personality fairly well. My wink is that I usually find some kind of amusement in most things and my favorite color is black.

Thing #1

The lifelong habit that is easiest for me would be habit 2 accepting responsibility for my own learning. It has been a struggle to go back to school and I will admit I have not necessarily enjoyed the experience. I think the reason for this is that I need to improve on habit 4 and have a little more confidence in myself as a competent learner. College is a different experience when you are a single, working mother of two than it was in my twenties, but as I go along I am feeling more adept. Habit 5 creating my own toolbox is easy and hard. I am an avid reader so collecting books is not a struggle, nor is making friends or using people I work with to help mentor me through some of my classes. I struggle with the technology and hope this class will get me through the technology barrier I have, so I hope to learn a lot by playing with Web 2.0 tools, but mainly to not be afraid to use more technology. Habit 7 teaching or mentoring others is not hard either, I enjoy helping others if I can. I think most of us probably feel a sense of accomplishment if we can teach others, which is why we are becoming teachers.