One last THING

Ok, some of these things were tedious and hard to complete. However, the vast majority were a great deal of fun and wonderfully interesting adventures. About half way through this journey I dearly wished I could stop but I am very thankful for the things at the end. I have learned a great deal and a lot of these sites are now in use in my life. I love Animoto the most. The RSS readers were my least favorite but they are highly useful. I use Facebook and Flickr anyway but I was quite glad they were included in the 23 things as I could relax and enjoy those things a bit more. I would like to recommend dropping this for future classes because of massive amounts of time required but I can not make myself say that. These things are amazing teaching tools and incredible inspiration.

...can't believe I'm saying this but....

I would do it all over again given the chance.
Happy Blogging,
Lisa

Thing #23 ... I never thought it could be...

Copyright law is just a sticky mess reguardless if you have studied it for three years or three decades. The person who created “A Fair(y) Use Tale” is most definitely an evil genius. I can see the legal types at Disney fuming at each clip being splashed out to the world with no pennies coming in. Having said that it is incredibly important for us to be aware of license issues and copyright in the classroom. It is really easy to open the web and swipe something off the pages that we find interesting but we rarely ask ourselves if we SHOULD be able to take those things. This thing was a great reminder of what we can share and what really is off limits. I am including a link to a copyrighted photo on Flickr. This image an interesting vortex of matresses. It does include the copyright symbol and other license information.

Thing #22

Podcasts are great if you can find a reliable source. I used teachertube to find a link from Luke Corazza about why he teaches math. You can follow that link to hear his story. I found it very familiar and I think a lot of people can relate to his thoughts.

I love this podcast from two students who are explaining probability in their podcast. It is actually a video podcast and it is evident they have made their props themselves. I think that is one of the reason's I like it so much. Take a peek at Ben and Jerry doing Probability.I also enjoy reading blogs from David Warlick and I've added his blog to my RSS reader. His line of blogs under the 2cents worth are quite interesting. They do not focus on the topic of math but teaching and philosophy in general.

Thing # 21

A video of my daughter is available on Animoto. This thing is probably my favorite so far. I am having trouble getting the video to embed here so I am including a link also called Cassie.This is an amazing site and it is FREE. That is just awesome! I struggled a bit at the beginning in how to add the video to the blog but it didn't take long for me to get it. I hope you all are having as much fun with this one as I am.

Thing # 20

This was a really fun thing for me. I enjoy Youtube clips. I am including the link to a dry math constant date clip. Blind Date was very humours to me and I hope you enjoy it. The good thing about this site is that you can find almost any topic in a clip. The bad thing is the amount of horrible clips you have to sift through to find the useful information. Some of these are truly inspirational but just as many are very offensive. User be warned before relying on this site too much.

Thing #19

This was a very enjoyable thing for me. I did not know these other social networks existed. I liked the Gather site. It is more about conversation than game apps or recreational time. A wide variety of people posted in short responses and that makes the blog streams much more interesting. I found several topics about family I was going to skim and wound up reading the whole story. I did not find a strong educational blog on this site but I really enjoyed what I did find.

I found a great deal of information on the Ning Teacher Pop site. I read several entries by Dr. Wall. I was quite impressed by the way. I could easily see this site as inspirational for lesson plans and philosophies.

Thing #18

I use Facebook. I think most of us do anymore. Click HERE to link to my account. I don't really mind using my real name as its pretty mundane information your likely to see there. I use this site a great deal to keep in touch with friends and family. I see that there is potential for classroom use but I have reservations about inviting co-workers to my private social network. Teachers are in the public eye constantly. No matter where we are we will be representing our school. With so much pressure to never be rude, offensive, or distasteful there needs to be a private haven to be yourself.

I can control me. I can not control my crazy aunt Hazel who is likely to post some obscure off the wall site that will inevitably offend someone I work with. I feel a great need to have a tiny part of my world private and Facebook is where I am drawing a line for now...

Thing # 17

I have never used Delicious before and was happily surprised how easy it is to use the tags and read the tags to sort through junk to find the piles of treasure out there. I was reading Roxanne Ferrell's post about thing 17 to get an insight into other students experiences and I had never thought find sites specifically for my daughter. It makes perfect sense to help your family in this way and it seems PERFECT for classroom use. We know our time and budgets will be limited in the classroom. Tagging sites for a quick reference is a great time saver. By looking at how many people have tagged a certain math site I can guesstimate how reliable the source is. I would love to have hours to pour through math sites but the reality is that I still have to cook dinner and do laundry at the end of the day also. So until I hit the lottery this will be a site I subscribe to to help clear the web air a bit.
I have added a blog by David Warlick to my RSS called too Fresh to Test. I found his philosophy inspiring and his curiosity catchy. I found this blog from looking at popular tags within the recommended APSU's23things bookmarks. I feel it is wise to keep inspirational and uplifting sites for yourself as well. We will all eventually have a bad day or a bad class lesson and those uplifting sites can help us pull ourselves out of the inevitable funk and continue on in the quest to inspire.

Thing #16

I find organizers extremely important in my day to day life. I jokingly refer to my daily planner as my paper brain. So my favorite part of this thing was the exploration of sites like Remember the Milk. I really like the way the Backpack site was set up. I felt that was the most useful site for me. I can include all the information and brainstorm topics to include in the event in one location.

I've set up my IGoogle homepage to show weather, headlines, YouTube clips, and devotionals. I will definitely keep this site as my home page. It is really useful to get the highlights of my information in one location. I use my physical planner and digital calendar anyway so these aren't as much new discoveries as old and true friends. Although I like the list making sites in reality I won't use those on a consistent basis. I will use Backpack for large events that I need to coordinate like my Church's Christmas play but it uses more time than I can afford on a regular basis. If nothing else I urge you to start a calendar, check it often and remember to follow through with updates.

Thing #15

My women's group at church is actually in the process of creating a Wiki. There are so many of us and undoubtedly someone will hit reply instead of reply-all and half of the people involved will never get complete project details. I really liked the back and forth discussion prompted in Welkers Wikinomics. I've linked the name directely to the long-term vs. short-term discussion. I like that the rules are laid out before you actually get to the wiki, the author reserves the rights to remove any post that is unseemly, and you can read all old comments and entries.

I enjoyed exploring the 23 things sandbox wiki site. I created an account but I kept getting a message that PBwikis was timing out. I was most likely doing something wrong or perhaps the site was having a bad program day. :)

Thing #14

Ah, ha! These are sites that I can really get into with my left brain self. I feel that flowcharts really help math classes. If you make the process clear and the choices in that process clear for the students they may be able to pick up the information more accurately. There is nothing harder than un-teaching a incorrect concept to a student. Bubbl.us is a really easy and quick program that allows data to be placed in order. I also like that this site allows you to insert the mind maps into blogs. Below is actually a print screen I made of a very simple "this or that" option.
I also used the Gliffy flowchart site. I like the flowchart capabilities but I really liked the floor plan program I did not subscribe to their premium package but I did like the examples the site offers. I like both sites I felt that Gliffy is more professional looking and perhaps better suited for High School use whereas Bubbl.us is more suited for middle school as it has a more cartoonish look.


Alright I really did love these sites but is anyone else out there really tired of setting up new accounts?

Thing #13

After exploring the Zoho Writer possibilities I find that I'm one of the suite half empty people. Yes, the site is free and impressive but I do not trust it because it is a site. What happens to your important papers should the site have maintenance or go down for rebuild? Will the programs always be free or will Zoho eventually add fees? How secure is the site really? Will hackers find a way to slip in a virus on your file?

The site is great for what it is. A free site for people who can not afford packages. The template designer is very impressive but do I really need another way to collect sites? Didn't we just sit up RSS for that exact function? How many free email accounts can one individual remember anyway?

I get it. The whole point behind the things are to open our minds to options. This is simply one option I do not personally care for but it is nice to know it exists.

Thing #12

Google rocks. I think most of my peers reading this will completely agree that Google and its offerings have saved our skins in many papers and research projects. Having said this I was completely unaware of how wonderful the other applications from Google can make my life. The option I like best thus far is Google Calendar. The older I get the more scatterbrained I seem to become. I like having a digital location to see my schedule. Heaven knows how many daily planners I have lost in the last year. I also really liked the Picasa Web Albums. This option allows me to share family photos with relatives across country and then they can choose to make prints if they care to foot the bill.

Thank you once again to the creators of all things Google. You are indeed a college student's best friend!

Thing # 11

Finding feeds that interest me was a bit more difficult than setting up the account. Usually Google rules the world. In this case Google blog searches sent me through a LOT of blogs that just didn't interest me though I did eventually find http://mathteachermambo.blogspot.com/ by going through a link on a related blog. I really enjoyed her blog about literal equations and making her class use the old M. C. Hammer song. That is thinking outside the box and I am sure that class will understand how to isolate a variable. I didn't care for syndic8.com. I felt that there are too many categories to find anything of relevance quickly which is the whole POINT of having a blog collection. Topix.net was really useful for finding local news feeds but I probably won't use it in education.

I have found the blogs and topic feeds primarily through related links on the feeds I found interesting. I know this is not the outcome that was expected but this is where my experience searching for RSS feeds lead me.

Thing # 10

RSS stands for really simple syndication as we learned in the utube clip on the 23 thing instruction site. I really enjoy having what ammounts to a summary of my interests in one place so I don't have to waste time chasing down the new information. Organization is very important in my life because my memory stinks and the better organized I am the more likely I am to remember everything needed in a week. The area in education I see RSS apps being most useful is continuing education. As educators we need to stay up on the changes and standards in our fields. Flagging information related to your class is a great and easy way to stay up to date. I'm sure we have all had that teacher who was fifteen years behind on the information they presented and we all knew it. I do not want to be that type of educator!

Thing #9

From Imagechef.com I created a photo that says math opens doors. Lessons are just more fun with graphics. We have all sat through a lecture that consists of nothing but black text on a white piece of paper or monotoned words. Creating class specific photos would really catch the students' attention and make them feel special.
I also really liked the Word Mosaic app that allowed me to create this image. In the classroom we have to create interesting lessons with variety. These sites gives provides us with free and unlimited possibilities.

Thing #8

I chose the puzzle creator app from flicker. I used a photo of my daughter at the BBQ festival in Paducah last month. She was so excited to be at the festival and play the games. During this thing she laughed and loved that she had become a puzzle. I think the children in the classroom would love this activity. I am concerned about letting children upload their own photos. The internet is not always a safe place and I feel that there should always be adult supervision when a young person is online.

Thing #7

Flicker is a wonderful site. I have been hooked on it for a while now. Like a typical web search I go into the site looking for one specific image. Four hours later I've jumped through dozens of different groups and topics through chains of interesting photos!


I began this journey looking for math students. I found this little girl and was captured by the look of lost frustration on her sweet face. I thought of how awful it feels to be totally lost in a topic and once again this year; I am determined to make my material as clear as possible. After a while of looking at her the orange paint really caught my attention. My thoughts began to wander and I was caught up in the changing of the seasons.


The colors and contrasts of this photo captured my vision and I just stared at it for a while. I like the contrast and the colors. The lines are both hard and soft in the photo. It just feels magical to me. This led me to thoughts of my favorite spot on earth which is Bandon, Oregon. So I am ending this pictoral journey through my head with the boardwalk by the dock. Like our riverside park theirs bayside park is lined with windsocks and pinwheels. They were the hit of our last trip for my four year old daughter and to be honest almost all of my thoughts begin and end with her.


I hope you have enjoyed this trip. Quite often my thoughts wander randomly but this site has provided me with photos for every thought and topic. It really is amazing.

Thing #6

I chose Facebook as my favorite award winning site from Web 2.0. The web site is www.facebook.com. I actually did not have a facebook account prior to this class. I don't Tweet and I'm not trusting of MySpace. I really like how easy Facebook was to set up. It is meant to be a social networking site. It was not designed to be a teaching tool but it could be a useful in the classroom. It is easy to find friends and make lists to organize communication into groups. The only possible negative to using the site is that it is very easy for children to see materials that are for adults. There could be issues with material content. With the right blocks in place this could be a useful way for parents to stay connected.

Thing 5

We are at an exciting cross roads in education. School 2.0 is the next evolution in education. Our resources are virtually unlimited with the net and social networking sites increase awareness in the community. Most families have access to the internet in some form. This allows greater availability to communicate with parents and a new tool to provide class information that is available 24-7. Parents that work third shift can now have daily emails updating them on their child's progress. The students in a class room in Tennessee can be blogger pals with a school in Japan. Sick students could stay at home and still participate via web cameras.

Some people believe this integration of technology in the classroom means the end of teachers. I completely disagree. I feel it is an avenue for us to step up lesson plans and help prepare the individuals we are trusted to instruct with greater real world applications.

Thing #4

Commenting on our peers' posts is important. We can gain understanding from our peers and their perspectives on education. We can become more reflective educators. When I read about a fellow student's successes or challenges I feel more connected to that individual. Teaching is about teamwork. It is about helping young humans grow mentally and emotionally. There is a reason the old adage "It takes a village to raise a child" has been around for centuries. It is still true. The greater the support system people have, the more likely they are to be successful. Below are a list of some of my favorite blogs. I did not include all my favorites as this would be a horribly massive post. :)

The avatar for Alyssa Dyce is spot on. I enjoyed reading her Thing #2. Like Alyssa I use my real name in our blogs. I thought the blog was genuine. She smiles when she is nervous. I laugh when I feel overwhelmed. These facts help connect us to one another as people.

Chase Bell's Thing #3 speaks about blogging to cover missed lessons. I had not thought of posting reminders for upcoming quizzes. His avatar is spot on and his personality shines through in his posts.

I really liked Bridgett Ferguson's Thing #3 post. She has clear reasons for why blogging is important in her post. I commented because I strongly agree with her first reason which is to keep parents involved.

Wendy Matheney's (3040-08) Thing #4 post was really interesting. I really liked how she touched on etiquette for blogging. People are becoming less polite with the reduction of face to face interactions. The comparison to the living room conversation was wonderful.

Thing #7 by Rachel Morris was one of my favorite for the images she found on Flicker. The gorgeous photos of the flowers were relaxing and appreciated. I find I work more effectively with images of nature around. I asked Rachel how she liked the experience in Flicker. I have not used the site and she assured me that it is painless and enjoyable.

Matthew Nickerson's Thing #9 is very cool. My daughter and I went to sillywebcam.com and looked through the site to make silly images of her dolls. I like the Warhol image he created. I am a fan of Andy Warhol.

http://amathteachersnotebook.wordpress.com/ is a site for math teacher blogs. One of the September blogs is from a teacher who goes by irrational. The blog asks for ideas on how to get in touch with parents more effectively. I was actually pulled to this blog by the comment of the fellow teachers. Specifically Mrs. H suggests you break your phone called in two sections. She suggests calling at lunch and the end of the day. She really stresses not to procrastinate the communications.

Thing #3

There are many reasons why blogging is useful for teachers. Blogs can be used to keep students up to date on past assignments while still making them aware of upcoming events. We, as educators, can express concerns and accomplishments about the school or the students. Blogging in the classroom would provide me with more real and unbiased feedback from the students. We all realize how much easier writing critiques are compared to critiquing an individual face to face. My students could feel more at ease in a blog they could write at home. I would love to have a pen-pal blog for my students so they could expand their world and communicate with other people their ages.

Last but not least I could also receive encouragement and inspiration from the thoughts of my peers. I find comfort and inspiration from you who are reading this blog. We all experience tough days in pursuit of our goals. I wish you the best and hope you find comfort in knowing we all must tackle these challenges together.

Thing #2

I am posting blogs using my name. I have a fairly straightforward way of thinking and nothing to hide that I am aware of so I choose to use my real name. I do not mind if you google me or look me up on facebook. You will see the life of a busy mom and Math lover. I am just beginning to blog and I find it really refreshing to type out my thoughts about the days activities as I have time. I think my avatar is as close to me as I could capture within the program options. I think the avatar creation has been one of the most fun activities I've had in the class this far. I do dress in a business casual mode and coffee is the most addictive thing in my life. I hope you have a great day.

Thing #1

I am a very goal oriented person so that habit within the 7 1/2 is the easiest for me. I would say that play or rather finding time to play is the most difficult habit. Between working full time, taking classes, and having a four year old there is very little time for relaxation. I really enjoy reading the blogs of fellow students and first year teachers. I think they give us encouragement and keep our excitement high during the crunch times of the year like mid terms and finals. I am still learning about the Web 2.0 tools but they seem exciting and fun. I enjoy the reflection time we are asked to take. I believe this time is what helps me develop personally and professionally.