Thing # 11.5

1. What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?
I think tools Wordle & Wordsift are excellent for use in the classroom and have lots of ideas. I did not spend near enough time with Glogster. I found an example online (if I can find the link later, I'll add it later) from a guy in Canada. It is terrific. I need to explore Glogster some more.

Skype is a fantastic tool that I think has great uses in the classroom! I am so excited about the possibilities. I have made several contacts with teachers in the US, Canada and India so far and am planning classroom Skyping activities with teachers. And, I love the Flip camera. Creating video was way easier than it has ever been before.

2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals? Keeps me exploring and learning.

3. Were there any take-a-ways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you? No, I already knew I was going to learn a lot.

Hi!

4. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept? I think now that some of us need to spend more time with some of these tools and go a bit more indepth. I would like to to an 11.5 things for Google Apps... I think Google uses are near endless...

Thing #11

I have a big concern about teaching digital citizenship to our students. Students can learn and create easily using Web 2.0 tools for a real-world and varied audience. With that "power" comes a responsibility, one for the student and the teacher as well. We need to make sure that our students know how to find and verify accurate resources, how to be a responsible author and collaborator by responding fairly and interacting with all people respectfully, and how to stay safe by not divulging too much information about self and peers.

All of this takes time and knowledge that teachers are just learning themselves. Most of us haven't participated in a global community and yet we need to help our students do so. Do we have the tools ourselves?

I think teaching digital citizenship will take more than a lesson or two. I plan to take the district AUP and tie some mini-lessons to the bullet statements. Then, I think I will use a variety of resources to illustrate the different points and encourage discussion among the students so we will have a common language and vision for what each looks like.

There are a number of resources available, but we need to help find the time and organize the resources for our teachers.

Thing #10

OK. I finally bit the bullet and entered Second Life. I have spent the majority of my time this morning on Help Island learning how to get around and exploring a bit. I finally figured out how to go to ISTE Island. That is where I am now. I found a part of TCEA and am now in some space that has some information about NCCE's Convention in March.

I keep getting logged out for some reason. I must either click some that that overloads the system or I keep losing my connection on my wireless.

One person came up to me. we were in a "chat" or conversation one of the times I lost connectivity and then when I can back, the person was gone. Some of the people are pretty scary looking. However, I am still alive! I have played a bit with changing my appearance. that is not as easy as it looks. My skirt is a different color, but I couldn't get my hair color to change.

I will try some more later tonight.

Thing #9.5

Xtranormal

Have you seen this? I thought it was so much fun and can see it being used in classrooms that I just had to share!


http://www.xtranormal.com/watch?e=20090727113400171

Thing #9

I like these slide show tools. I think 280 slides is really cool! However, I just used Google Presentations and created a similar test show. It worked as well, saves in Google docs and uses the same tools I use for other documents. So, I think I would encourage students and teachers to stick with Google. It is truly becoming the Microsoft Office of Web 2.0!

Now, I guess you would have to invite others to share your slide show, so there is some merit to using authorSTREAM or Slideshare where the public can search and find your "stuff." I think it would also be advantageous to improve the quality of the work - since it is for a real audience. Their work would be "out there" for anyone in the world to view. Maybe we should encourage teachers and students to work in Google presentations and then publish in Slideshare. Wonder if that would work? It isn't PP... Will test it!

Thing #8

Unfortunately, I have been playing with some of these tools at work and the new filter is causing havok for me. I have used Jing Project in the past and LOVE it. For some reason, I kept getting an error message when I tried to use it yesterday. So, I uninstalled and when I try to reinstall I am blocked from downloading it. So, I have submitted an unblock request and hope to get that opened back up shortly.

In its absence, I attempted to download some of the other tools you had shared with the same results! However, freescreencasting was open. I downloaded it and voila! It works. The interface is not as impressive as Jing, but it worked. I have to convert it from a flash file to an avi in zamzar - zamzar is such a great service! Here is my 1st attempt:

Notice all the broken links in iTunes. Guess that is our new filter as well! ;-)

Thing #7

I watched the video and read (OK, skimmed through parts) of the Fair Use document. It was really helpful although still not cut and dry (as Fair Use will never be)! I do think it is a helpful resource. We need to be diligent in helping students remember to practice them (and ourselves as well)!

I had NO idea that Hula was free. I looked through some of its content and watched a few things at home last night. Blinkx was new to me also.

I chose to look for content on volcanoes. I found a terrific 50 minute video divided into chapters in the Nature portion of the PBS website and started watching it. I then searched blinkx for more volcano videos. I found a bunch but was not able to view them here at work. I couldn't cut and paste the video from PBS into my blog although it looks like I could have shared it a number of other ways. Facebook was an option. I could have purchased the video from iTunes or purchased a dvd. I will have to play around with Blinkx tonight and see. The NeoK12 site looked promising as well. I found some more volcano footage but it wouldn't load (the filter again). I will tray that one again from home and see what I can do. Here is the link to the PBS one.
http://www.pbs.org/video/video/1133372360/program/979358043