Thing 23

It is hard to summary a course such as this. I learned a great deal over these many weeks. It is hard to decide if I learned more about the "Things" I already knew about because I was able to expand my knowledge base or if I learned more about "Things" which I never heard of before.

I am eagerly waiting for next summer's 23 Thing's Take 2. I would love to dig deeper into some of this Thing's, even revisit the lessons, or find new Things to learn about. Tech trainings are always scarey for me because I have always felt like the only english speaking person in the room. But now at least I could hold my head up high and make eye contact:-) Thank you for that. My "Big Finds" have by far been Delicious.com and Flickr.com! I am obsessed with Delicious! I have posted it on my Facebook page to all my working peers. I just can not express enough how wonderful a tool I tool I think this is!

Thank you for the experience and the knowledge both have the promise to serve my peers, students, and families well!

Thing 22

https://wikiwishlistforlane.wikispaces.com/page/history/home

I had no trouble getting the wiki page started and making the changes but as I stating on the main "Thing" page; I was not able to see the changes right away. I am guessing there must be a wait period. Thi is a bit frustrating for me. I don't understand enough about Wiki's to "like" them yet. I have enjoy the blogs. I think I would need a full professional development class on Wiki's which had the instructor right there to help me with my concerns. These instructors have been wonderful but the feedback has been hard and not all issues have been resolved.

Thing 21

I would not spend the time creating something that someone could come along and change without my knowledge. I reviewed the wikis listed and even in the websites with a lock sign next to them, I was able to make changes. I know you are able to see the changes made in the last 30 days ... so the creator could go back and correct any "changes" made but I would not like this! I would rather use Google Docs or someother format which only allows those on my site to make changes that I allow!

Thing 20

The tool I found most useful in searching and subscribing to podcasts was iTunes. I could very easily see me using this again! I was quickly able to locate a vast amount of educational podcasts. To further limit my search I went to the top of the page and pick their podcasts of interest. There were about 20 listed, I chose to subscribe to the following 3: Project Think, 60 Seconds Civics, and 30-Day Challenge. I am not certain if I will enjoy the following podcasts but I am excited by the fact that I have not invested any money and very little time. So I have nothing to loss and a great deal to gain!

Thing 19

As is becoming habit, I added more web addressed to my Delicious account. I am so exicted to have that resource. Not to mention the six more educational websites I found useful from Thing 19.

http://nutritiondiva.quickanddirtytips.com/
http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/

I think the two podcasts I will use daily with my students are the Grammer Girl and Nutrition Diva. Grammer tips are always helpful and go without saying ... need to be supported always. Our students physical health, I feel the same way about. I try hard to teach student how and why they should make healthy choices at a young age while they are still forming their eating habits. I can see how I could very easily make these two podcasts the beginning and ending activities to my daily rounties.

Thing 18

I am still having trouble with my embedding information. I sent this wonderful slideshow on Special Education to Carol. If anyone wants to know the name of it is is titled Purpose & Promise of Special Education. I thought this would be a good one to have on file for open houses and such. It reviews the basic information about Special Education. I am not certain if there is a way for Carol to share it with you or perhaps if you would like a copy and can't find it with just the title she can share the embed code I sent to her.

Thing 17

I thought most of the sites listed were great. I tagged most of them for my Delicious account:-) I am so excited to see what list of resources I will have when the course is completed! My favorite by far is the "Remember the Milk". I will use this website persoanlly and professionally. I will have my students sign up for a free account. The student plannners we have at my school are not used by our special educational population. However, lists such as this would be a wonderful way for the student become an active part of their learning process when it comes to keeping tabs on what projects and expectations are coming due. This is something that then the parents could also view at home (via computer or prints out). I am very excited to get started on this.

Thing 16

This will be something I use professional and personally. Their templates are amazing! I spent about 20 minutes clicking through them and was very impressed at house user friendly they were and how practical they would be for people. I did not know of the Google Docs until this "Thing". I love this idea. As I explained during my Blog about Delicious too often my materials are spread out between home and school. I can really see this will helping ... at least with the paperwork!

Thing 15

I can not see myself using RRS. It just talkes too much time to sort through ALL that information. I become overwhelmed by the amount of information to go through. In addition there is not a quick way to delect old information ... except by going to the end of the blog and asking for information posting (withing that blog) with the last hour. Too much work for this teacher at least at this point.

Thing 14

My user name is latecomer23. I am thrilled to have discovered this amazing resource. Just thinking about the time and energy I will save using this is overwhelming. I can't wait to share this at school this fall!

Thing 13

I never knew anything like this was out there. I think this is a wonderful idea. Usually when I attend workshops or conferences the speaker provides us with a handout of useful websites. However, whenever I want that sheet of paper I always have a hard time finding it. It is either at home and I am at school or vis versa. This would solve that problem.

Tagging is something I have been doing on a very simple scale for my pictures. I am a bit nervous to try this on a larger scale. But I guess it couldn't turn out any worse that the countless handouts I have already lost.

Thing 12

I selected two widgets the clock and the count down until I go back to school neither was able to be posted to my page. I have emailed Carol for help and hope to Edit this soon to embed the widget code and complete the blog.

I belong to FaceBook and love it! I can see why so many people of ALL ages have joined these communities. I have reconnected with many long lost friends, coworkers, and highschool/college peers. I now have a daily or weekly contact with them. While the communition may be brief, it provides the same joy and heartfelt connection as a seasonal Christmas card does for others.

Thing 11

When I first received my comment I was very excited! There was a sense of acknowledgment that SOMEONE was reading my thoughts. That they were not just lost out in space. I found it has to leave comments on many of the sites I visited because if they were on lessons past Thing 11 then I did not have enough information about the "thing" to write a blog ... usually. I was able to post blog with out any problem on Things 1 - 11. I did enjoy viewing everyone's blog that I was able to visit. We are a very creative community!

Thing 10

I was not able to the embed information on my blog site as explained in the first video. My Edit Html would not accept any information.

I was use my blogger tools to add a video. With the information provided in the second educational video about how to download a video from YouTube it worked! I hope this video on Fruit and Vegetable Decompostion finds itself useful to you. Enjoy the show!

Thing 9

I am a HUGE fan of YouTube. I use at my school during my Fun Fridays. The students are allowed to ask me to search for their favorite songs and I will select a few videos to play. The students' favorite one is at: http://www.jkweddingdance.com it is wonderful! Mostly likely because all the teachers will dance to this one.

YouTube is not really used in my building at a teaching tool. We really rely on it as a reward for positive behavior. We have limited assess (15 minute blocks of time) on the site. Therefore, I could see why teachers would not want to plan lessons around a feed.

I did find some wonderful sites for teaching the one that really jumped out to me was the on "Women in Art". I just thought that would be a great introduction lesson into your art program!

Well please click on the above youtube link and let me know what you thought! Enjoy the video!

Thing 8

This was a fun lesson! The Spell with Flickr was great. The Flickr Color Pickr page at first I didn't understand the point. But then after a few minutes of playing cold see how an Art tacher could use this. The Sudoku w/ Flickr and Flikr Memory were so neat. How wonderful for students to work on as a reward for positive behavior! It was great to see a resource for students to be able to use that are non verbal! It would also be wonderful for students mainstreamed in general education for when they need a quiet in room break.

I wanted to post the spelling one because I thought if that worked I would used it with my word of the week. It would be a fun item to use at centers. I was frustrated that as fast as the Spell with Flickr was to find your work you are not able to copy the completed word. You can only cut and paste each letter. Therefore, I posted a different picture on my blog.

Thing 7

What concerns me the most is how Flickr could be abused by my students not repecting the Copyright Laws. I am not certain how I would monitor that. I guess I wonderful resource for this type of question would be a highschool language arts teacher. I know they have been faced with this type of issue for a while now.

I see this really being a wonderful tool for many struggling writers. As a mentioned in my Post on Thing 6 visual prompts to help students with their writing is a wonderful teaching aid. You could also use picture for compare and contrast articles. The students could sort through the pictures for ideas or you could tell them to develop a news paper heading based on this picture.

For example, see the picture to the right and think of how many book titles or story starters your students could come up with. You could use it as a morning writing or a transition activity.

Thing 6

I had never heard of Flickr until Thing 6. However, after just one hour I am an addict! My son is 6 and loves Spiderman. He has been asking me for about a year how tall a skyscraper is. Try as I might I was just not able to fully discribe for him their size. While we have some tall buildings in the area, we do not have anything like the photos I was able to show him on Flickr. We were able to talk about the height of the cars, trees, people, and other buildings that were next to the skyscrapers to help him better understand the mass of skyscrapers. It was wonderful!

I did have trouble with finding out which pictures were under copyright laws. Did anybody else? I did not see the term Creative Commons. I would be very grateful for help because I plan on using this site a great deal. It is a wonderful way to provide visual prompts for so many classroom lessons!

Thing 5

I was not happy with this lesson at all. I spent way too much time flipping between my tabs, trying to cut and paste the web addresses and find information. I was unable to open my links tab anywhere than within my favorite tabs. I would have to guess that had something to do with my frustration and added to my confusion. Did anyone else have this problem?

I really did like the Technorati blog search. In addition, I found you are able to set up a blog account with them. Perhaps that would be easier for me. I am hoping everything would be simplier! But who knows.

I think blogline are wonderful idea. To be honest this was my first interaction with them. I just couldn't make them work the right way. I got the job done... but with way too much effort.

Thing 4

To be honest... right now I am not sure. When I need information about a certain topic, I do a Goggle search. With these Bloglines the information comes to you. Which is nice but then you read and sort through everything. I am worried about how I will keep up with this read when I have piles of publucations at home, in my car, and at school. I am hoping in time when I become a more skilled learner of RSS I will be able to quickly and effectly be able to search for what I need.

Thing 3

I enjoyed researching the educational blogs. I was excited to find the blogs ranging acrossing the educational field. Commonly, when in a professinal development class, the focus typically is on classroom based instruction. I can already tell that this class will not be the same. It was refreshing to quickly find resources for medica speicalists, special education, and a variety of other educators at a click of a mouse. I was able to bookmark several links which I will use on my own website on many of the blogs. Surprisingly, some links were not on the blog pages within my speciality area. I was glad the lesson assignment was to surf the links because typically I would not have chosen to look at the variety of those classroom blogs.

Due to the nature of my students impairments and educational needs. I believe blogs at this time will best be used by me gathering information to develop information that will change and further develop my teaching style. My student do some work on the computer but very little. I would encourage parents to visit my website/blog at first by posting our upcoming events. Parents would then be able to ask their questions on-line and have discussions with other families. I would also have blogs on current findings in the field of special education and parenting. For example, "How can we make IEP's more parent friendly?" and/or "Reading 10 Minutes Can Improve Your Child's Scores... Where to find the time?" My hope for this would be for the parents to find an on-line support system for themselves. However my greatest concern would be the language use and I would want everyone to be unknown! It would require time and energy but what doesn't?

Thing 1 & Thing 2

First I would like to say I am happy to FINALLY be on board! I was waiting a while for the email from RESA. After about the 3rd email from 23 Things I thought this might be something I need. I very rarely open email from senders I do not know. So while I am starting late I am very excited to be here. The only problem I have run into so far I am not able to post at the end of each "weekly lesson". I am not quite certain why. I am hoping to resolve that soon.

In the mean time, I signed up for 23 Reasons for a few reasons: it was free, I wanted to learn more about technology, and summers are a wonderful time to earn credits for a working mom;-)
I am not really sure what I am hoping to learn; anything new about how to engage my students by using digital media would be wonderful.

During Thing 1, I learned that I am not able to post on the lesson board. My posting is all set and ready to go when the problem is resolved.

You should never put anything in writing you want to read in an open courtroon in front of your mother. I read that somewhere and believe it! Of course, it is hard to remember but true.