Week 9: #23

I really enjoyed this class and learned so much. The information will be useful as long as I go back and start really using it and showing other people how great these tools are. At times all the info was overwhelming so I had to tell myself that I'm getting a brief overview of everything but I don't have to start using it all at once. At least now I know it's there. I plan to just pick a couple of things right now and really get to know them.

This class was perfect for such a rainy cool summer. I felt like it was perfectly ok to sit for hours and explore all the links and different sites. I didn't feel guilty when my husband asked what I did all day and I said that I "had" to work on my class. I'm not sure that it would be as fun during the school year - I probably would have spent a lot less time exploring.

I liked getting the comments and they all seemed so positive and helpful. Ann and Katie were very responsive when I had questions and I thank them for making this class happen.

Week 9: #22

E-books are a good option if you have an i-pod and want to listen to books in the car or out walking. I guess you could also burn it onto a CD and listen to it that way. I still prefer the written version, but a good story is a good story no matter how you get it.
About free books - I was looking for books that possibly teachers could use for their students that have difficulty reading but still want the option of knowing a story. I didn't find many of the books that my teachers commonly use, but there were some of the classics like Rudyard Kipling's books, and Frank L. Baum's books.

Week 9: #21

I have used podcasts in the past for listening to my son's hockey games when I can't be at the game. Also, I like listening to some of NPR's programs when I haven't been around to hear the program on the radio.
It was interesting to look at some of the educational podcasts - there are quite a few. I added a RSS feed for TechSavvyGirlz. They are a group of school aged girls, not sure what age, that use technology to talk about different topics in school such as class trips, digital art, authors - both student authors and adult authors such as Gary Soto. It would be a fun activity to do with a group of students - I think they would really enjoy it.

Week 9: :20

I picked this particular video because I thought that would be a fun activity for students to do to create more awareness for the election coming up.
I had fun looking at all the videos on YouTube as well as Teacher Tube. Some of the librarian video clips were quite humorous - is that really how the public sees us!
I think it would be fun to put a short video on my library web page introducing myself and my library and library program.

Week 8:#19.1

I took a look at Digital Pipeline again - I took a class about it a couple of years ago. This is such a valuable tool and I bet it is very underutilized. When I took the class I thought it was a bit cumbersome, but it seems to have really improved and I had fun exploring.
I saved articles to a folder - this would good if you are gathering info about a topic and might not have time to look at them right away.
A journal alert and search alert if you are looking for new upcoming info like the election or new research on "green topics".
My favorite journal is available - School Library Journal- but I didn't see the reviews. If it had that I would not subscribe to it anymore.
I loved the consumer health databases and found pamphlets, images, but the videos wouldn't work because I didn't have something on my computer in order to run them.
All in all - a very valuable tool and everyone should be using it.

Chapter 10: Web 2.0

Chapter 10 includes some of the web tools that we have been learning about in the class plus some others that sound quite interesting. Some that I would like to try and investigate are:

Try Tux Paint which is comparable to Kid Pix - a good tool in elementary school I think.

Also, Num Sum a spreadsheet. I know there is already one in Google docs but I'm going to take a look at this one too.

Audacity sounds like fun if you're into editing sound.

Photo Story 3 for Windows is other tool for working with digital photos. It seems like there a few tools with this capability.

Class Blogmeister will come in handy if I want to set up a blog with a group of students on a topic.

Google Earth I have used and is fun and is great for studying geography.

Google Sketch Up would be a great tool for studying geometry, structures, and building models.

Chapter 9: Web 2.0

This chapter was a little far out for me - I'm visioning a future where students don't ever "see" a teacher and everything is learned online. I know that is what we are doing for this class and it is working quite well, but I would have a hard time with this as well as with a lot of my peers. Will students miss out on a spirited in class discussion and instead blog? Will students miss out on doing a hands on project with each other and just use flickr and voice thread online? Hopefully there will be balance of both. I would like to think of Web 2.0 tools as just that - tools used along with all the other tools that teacher use.
Also we need a lot more computers, probably one per student as well as people who could keep them all up and running. At my school we have someone that comes in once every two weeks or so and if you miss him/her you're out of luck.