Thing #24

I took a moment before typing this to catch my breath. I am in complete shock that I made it this far. I was not an avid computer user prior to this course. I honestly do not have a favorite "thing" from this assignment. Looking back I view each one as a stepping stone that led me to this beautiful overlook. My long time goals are definitely changed because of this course. There will be no way for me to teach and not include the majority of what 23 Things has taught me. I would feel that I was cheating my future students by not including activities similar to these. I am surprised at how my confidence has done a complete turn around from just a few months ago. I will be taking my first online course over the summer and now, I feel prepared for it. The greatest influence on my teaching style will be that I will not allow myself to be afraid of technology anymore. I will jump in with both feet and figure it out!

 P.S. that is also why I chose this photo for this posting. I had traveled as far as I could without technology! From now on, I will be in the fast lane!

Thing # 23

This assignment asked us to search for and attribution or example of creative commons. Basically, everything we have done for the 23 things project falls into that category. We are blogging about our experiences, and commenting on our fellow classmates as well. We have created avatars using doppelme, manipulated photos with flickr, created word images with imagechef. I believe one of the concepts for this assignment is not only to get comfortable with technology, but to understand how intertwined technology is. The creators of all the applications that we use deserve credit for their hard work and even when it is given to use freely, they should be acknowledged.  In the future, it will be our responsibility to pass what we have learned on to our students. This is the only way to ensure fair use of online technology.

Thing #22

http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=872272  My first binder is a collection of sites containing information about the common core standards.

http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=872224 My second binder is a collection of sites featuring class activities and useful ideas.

http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=872248 My third binder contains several web pages of science projects.

I can see how web binders are efficient in keeping simular sites in the same folder. This could be used for different subjects and grade levels as necessary. It will be another great resourch to have at my disposal. I will be ableto plan ahead for presentations and lesson plans by having all my content for the day in one binder.

Thing #21

james' animoto

I made a sample video using some of my nieces and nephews photos and put it to a sweet song. I am going to upgrade to a premium account and make some more videos! I think that this site is great and easy to use! This could easily be used to make a year end video for my students to share with their parents. I will pass this site on to my friends as well.

Thing # 20

I have used youtube for years mostly to listen to new music or watch movie trailers. Since I have been in EDUC 3040, I have began to notice how many really good and informative posting there are. Of course, the site is full of silly and inappropriate videos. I wanted to post this video to show some of the best things that technology has to offer. I like how I can keep a saved search list for quicker recovery. I can use this site in my class room but I understand that I will have to use caution because there is plenty of content on here not intended for a elementary classroom.

Thing # 19

The only online community I am a member of is facebook. I did join the teacher pop site in order to explore it further. I found the site to be very interesting. I like facebook because it is a way to stay in contact with friends and family I dot get to see very ofter. I do limit my postings to information that I don't mind sharing with everyone. I often see postings from others that I feel are too personal to share with the entire online community. Site like teacher pop are excellent ways to build friendships and get ideas within a specific community. I think that I will learn to appreciate that site in the future. Unlike facebook, it will be filled with only relevant topics to my career.

Thing #18

https://www.facebook.com/jamesharris76?ref=tn_tnmn

I believe that it is important to understand how social networks operate because the majority of us all use them now. I plan on leaving my personal face book private for my friends and family. I would consider setting up a second account to share with fellow teachers and possibly parents of my students. I believe that most people would check face book quicker than they would a basic email account. I was not a fan of twitter, simply because I was not used to it and it seem awkward for me to navigate. Face book is set up in a very user friendly way and i can easily update, search, and view friends posts. Since for my assignment, I have chosen second grade science, I do not feel it is very appropriate to use face book in the class room setting.

Thing # 17

http://www.howstuffworks.com/

I really enjoyed the delicious site. It is extremely easy to navigate and to tag preferred links. This kind of site is like a library data base that does not require such strict search options. There is such a vast amount of information just a click away. I can certainly see using this site with my younger students as a way of getting them used to searching for data on a topic.

Thing # 16

http://www.netvibes.com/privatepage/1#science_news

For this assignment, I found the netvibes start up page to be the easiest for me to use. It is nice having so much on one page and not having so many tabs open at one time. This reminded me of the rss feed assignment we did. This is a good way to stay organized. I do not think I will make this page permanent yet. I am still accustomed to navigating around the web when I need to.

http://30boxes.com/?&tz=300&width=1902

I think the online calender can be very useful. It is similar to the dropbox account where you can access you calendar from any computer. I like the feature where once you put in a birthday, it then automatically adds it to every following year. I still use a small physical daily organizer, but i plan on going paperless very soon. I did find the to do lists to be very time consuming, in fact I needed to make a to do list about making a to do list. I will be better off sticking to a calendar for my notes.

Google docs is an excellent resource available to everyone. I have used it several times already to collaborate on group projects as well as personal documents. I have and will continue to suggest this site to my friends and fellow students.

Thing #15

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Science_and_Industry_%28Chicago%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Museum_of_Natural_History

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Chihuly

I have used wiki pages as quick references for years. I understand that they are easily edited and so you must take caution with all the facts you read. I think it is a great, free resource for quick references. I usually get a base of information from wiki sites that I then use to do further research on more reliable peer review data bases. I have added a few links to some wiki pages that I think are interesting.

Thing # 14

I first ventured onto the http://www.gliffy.com website. I played with several of the free templates. It was fairly easy to use and navigate around on. I am not sure if this style will be very appealing to my students. I believe the mind map looks more kid friendly and less official looking.

Next, I experimented on the https://bubbl.us/ website. It was even easier than the first site to navigate and use. Both, the flow chart and the mind map can be useful tools in my class room. I can use them to break down long and difficult topics/assignments into easy portions for my students to follow.