Thing #23

1. What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?  I liked playing with image exercises and finding new programs.
2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?  I have always liked to learn new things.  Teaching technology requires me to keep learning, and these exercises helped me see new ways of doing things that I can show my students.
3. Were there any take-a-ways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?  Just like my students, I waited until the deadline to finish the exercises.  I can use the same excuse they often do, “I had so much to do.”
4. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?  Keep adding more sites, more activities as they become available.  I also wish more of the participants would have corresponded with one another.
5. If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you choose to participate?  I would love to do more, and I like doing this during the summer, when I supposedly have more time.
6. How would you describe your learning experience in ONE WORD or in ONE SENTENCE, so we could use your words to promote Classroom Learning 2.0 learning activities?  A chance to try out new technology in an easy, non-threatening environment.

Thing #22

Ah, books on tape, sorta…I can see this is another way to do the same thing, only easier.  If I was going to commute long distances, like on the subway, then I would probably do this.  Or on a long car trip across country.  When our daughter was in college in Oregon, we would get books on tape to listen to as we went back and forth twice a year.  We enjoyed murder mysteries.

I have yet to get used to using an iPod.  My husband downloads radio programs and listens to them while mowing the lawn or vacuuming.  I just don’t like having something in my ears.

Thing #21

One of my favorite podcasts is the Stanford University Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders series.  It keeps in touch with what is going on in the “real” world, and I often use the information in my senior marketing class.

Thing #20

I have actually made a video and uploaded it to Google Videos.

I am hoping to do more of this type of work with my students this next year.

Thing #19

Finally, a way to keep track of all the books I have bought for my classroom.  Of course, this is about 5 years too late as so many of my books have taken legs and are now living in students’ bedrooms (that’s really ok, too).  I am going to share LibraryThing with my English teacher buddies who will surely have a use for it too.

Thing #18

I work in an integrated team, and one of English teachers and I have already decided to use Google docs this year with the students we share.  This is a great tool for kids who may not have an updated word processing application, or one that is compatible with the ones at school.  Many of our students will work at home, but cannot print so bring their work to school via USB drive to print.  We are hoping the Google docs application will help with some of the problems we’ve encountered in the past.

The Google Sites tutorial is very useful for my multimedia class.  The only problem will be getting around the district’s block of YouTube.  But I have some tools I picked up at the last CUE conference that can help with that.

Thing #17

I contributed to the sandbox, but I couldn’t see much of a point, except that I could.

Thing #16

I’ve looked into Wikis, even signed up for one last semester, but never did anything with one.  I’ve tried to set up a website, using iWeb, to do some of the things I see on the these wikis.  I really like Sample School Wiki that gave me some ideas for what I might do.  Time, I need more time.  I would like to set up a site that my students could go to and find out what they are doing that day, or if they missed class, what was done. Another idea would be a style book for yearbook online, whether wiki or website.

Thing #15

The YouTube video was great, and I plan to show that to my students when we study copyright law.  Last school year I was asked to try out some curriculum from Microsoft on intellectual property and I did the unit with my sophomore marketing class.  The students had a good time with the material, and some of them were still talking about the assignments at the end of the year when they had to select portfolio pieces from the work they had done during the year.

Thing #14

I registered my other blog with Technorati, and I try to use tags on all my posts.  Each day I check the stats from WordPress on my blogs and it shows where the readers have come from, how they reached my blog.  Some of the phrasing is quite funny.  I have a post on my students and their love of their hoodies.  Almost everyday someone links to my post by doing a search on wearing hoodies; but they don’t just type the word hoodies.  I’ve seen “how to wear a hoodie,” “what to wear with a hoodie,” and others.  

Another thing that WordPress does, and I don’t know if other blogging sites do this, is to list, at the end of a post, other posts that might correspond to what you have just read.  Some of the connections are very funny, and some are right on.