Thing # 24

Woot Woot!  Things 1-24 are complete!  Yay!  I just don't know what to say.  I have (for the most part) enjoyed completing this assignment.  I have discovered many new tools that will absolutely use once I have my own classroom, and to be sure that I am equipped with a great deal of information (obviously info that has been stored in Diigo, Livebinder, Ning, and more).  I look forward to creating a blog that my students will be able to interact with me and their peers to discuss class lessons as well as their interests.  Thank you for this experience!

Thing # 23

As I was watching the videos suggested on the APSU's 23 Things for Thing # 23, I found a cute video that my future middle school students would find comical and informative.  I think that it is important for children to be aware of what they are allowed to use and share for their learning purposes.  Many of us are glad to freely share our ideas and information and others are not; copy-write laws protect the work that some persons do not want to share freely and creative commons allows others to share portions or all of their work.

Thing # 22

Livebinders is a great website that allows its users to create storage space for all of their favorite sites based on their subject or usage.  I feel that it will be a very resourceful tool for any teacher.  The three binders that I created were titled:
Special Education,
Crafty crafting!, and
Science.

I am looking forward to finding out what other sites are useful once I am in the classroom.  I know that I will have an incredible library of information in hand before I ever get into the classroom. : )

Thing # 21

Try our video maker at Animoto.
I thoroughly enjoyed creating this video with Animoto!  This is absolutely something that I would use at home and in the classroom.  I think that my students would probably enjoy seeing themselves featured in our own classroom clips.  It would be a wonderful way to celebrate school events such as field day or special olympics.  I love this site, and I will definitely be sharing info about it.

Thing # 20

YouTube is full of good stuff, but students shouldn't be allowed to search freely in the classroom, because there is no telling what they'll pull up; I'm sure there is a chance that it won't be school appropriate.  I have recently learned about TeacherTube and I am happy to know that it exists!  While I was looking for things to include on my web quest, I found the following YouTube video...


I thought that it was fun and creative, and something that students could create on their own with the use of iMovie or a similar application.  I feel that by including fun and inventive "snippets" of information will encourage students to learn more.

Thing # 19

Ning was an interesting site!  It is full of useful information that we as teachers can use.  I also tried to create a badge to include with this blog post, but my attempts were unsuccessful.  Oh well, I shall try again later...


Visit TeacherPop
(This was my second attempt on the badge, I hope it worked!)  (It did!!! Yay!!!!!!)

Any who, after all of the sites that we have had to research, I can say this... Sharing our lessons, ideas, and teaching information is an important thing that we teachers should be doing.  By holding on to our secrets of success we aren't teaching what we know.  Information is so valuable, and it desperately needs to be shared for the benefit of our students.  I see a true value in social networking sites.  My son's kindergarten teacher told me just how much she loved Pinterest, and she explained how she found lesson plans, videos, and links to valuable websites, and she uses the site on a daily basis.  At one point our school system banned Pinterest from our school network, but many of our teachers complained and voiced the fact that it is a beneficial teaching tool for our schools, and guess what??? the school board accepted their request!
I signed up for a Craftster account, and I do think that this will be a great site to find many different crafts to make.  So far, I really like what I see.  I think that there is plenty to keep my children entertained for summer break!

Thing # 18

I have recently opened a Twitter account, but I have had a Facebook account for a couple of years now.  I was pretty unaware of the usefulness of having a classroom account for Facebook or a class page for that matter.  I think that it may possibly be a good way for students to share ideas for projects and class assignments.  I feel that my students will probably be teaching me a few things about Facebook, since there is much that I still do not know about this social networking site.
I look forward to digging into Twitter and seeing what it's all about.  I know many people share a great deal of their ideas and thoughts on this site.

Thing # 17

I enjoyed playing around on Delicious!  It is a great way for teachers to share ideas; after all, we are usually at our best when we are sharing ideas about our favorite things, and what better to share than all of our favorite websites for teaching our students!  I think that it is wonderful that you can search around, tag, and sort your favorite sites according to your need.  I absolutely love the fact that your tagged information is available no matter which computer you use; internet service is the only requirement.  I do believe that this will be a site that works to my benefit once I am teaching, and as for now, I can begin building my library of resources on Delicious

Thing # 16

I created a start page on iGoogle, but I read on the home page that iGoogle will be no more on November 1, 2013.  I did like the set up of my home page; it seemed useful and reflected a bit of my interests and personality.  However, knowing that iGoogle is soon to be retired, I probably will not make it permanent (because what's the use, right?).
After reading about Jott, I would say that it would be a very useful tool, but I do not have any devices that would make use of this tool.  Although, I think that it would be wonderful assistive technology.  I did sign up and use Remember The Milk's website for creating a to-do list.  I included all of the assignments that I must complete before the semester is up (and oh-golly there's still a lot to do!).
I think that online calendars would be very handy indeed, but maybe it would be more convenient if I had one of those handy dandy smart phones.  I liked the to-do list because it's a visual aid, and that is very helpful for me.
I feel that many of these gadgets would be helpful at home as well as in the classroom.  The calendars would be a great way for you to engage your students in learning more about one another, for instance: who shares birthdays, dates of club and band meetings, sports practice and more.  As teachers I feel that we should be involved with our students, and we should recognize their interests and skills.

Thing # 15

I must admit that I have and probably will continue to use Wikipedia for inquiring about certain things, whether they be for personal inquiry or for classroom learning.  I do not take everything seriously, for I would not be a serious student/learner if I did, but I do like to use it to form a base line of info, or sometimes to get ideas on other sites or info to research.  I use it as a tool, but definitely not my only research tool!  I am not sure if I posted correctly on the APSU's 23 Thing's Sandbox Wiki, but none-the-less it's there.  It seemed like a jumbled up mess, but I'm sure once I figure out how to use it I'll form a different opinion of it.  As far as using a wiki in my class, I will never say that I won't use it, but I will say that if it would prove to be an effective classroom instrument, then I will try to put it to use.

Thing # 14

For this task I chose to use Gliffy and Bubbl.us to explore flowcharts and mind maps.  Although I liked Bubbl.us, I believe that I enjoyed creating the flowchart on Gliffy the most.  I liked the aspect of creating a flow chart that would allow my future students to use critical thinking, allowing themselves to take risks, and realizing that sometimes they must backtrack in order to find the correct answer.  To me, mistakes are learning bumps in the road.  Without our ability to look at where we may have gone wrong on a proposed answer to a question in ponder we can remain lost; if we are able to look at something from many sides it is easier to grasp that concept and understand the information being taught.  As far as using these tools for my future classroom, I think flowcharts will come in handy;  I also believe that mind maps are a great way to express shared concepts among groups and lessons and would make a great assignment for certain lesson plans.