Thing 23

I am glad that I took this class. It definately took more than 18 hours. There was a lot of interesting things, but there was too much to take it all in.

I do worry that as we have easier access to everything so do the perverts have easier access to our children. Technorati for instance could let perverts know if there was a book club blog discussing a book primarily read by young girls. As students use teachers things like rollyo and our names are on it or our school name is on it, and students use these than a search could tell perverts who used those searches and find those students by already knowing where they live. Instead of finding one innocent student, now perverts have whole groups of them.

As parents, and educators it is our duty to stay ontop of emerging technology so we can be aware of all the possibilities of good and evil. Darth commenters might destroy blog groups if allowed, but perverts destroy lives. I've experienced this with one daughter. Thankfully she only got pregnant and she is still alive. Now my ex is not protecting another daughter who is talking to a guy online. My ex says he talked on the phone to the guy and by the voice he can tell the guy is 17. Obviously he is blind or hasn't called the house where teenagers live and confused the teenager with the parent as I have many times over. But as my daughter lives with my ex I have no control and must watch as....well you get the picture. Always stay up with technology, and never forget the other side of it.

Thing 22

I think I'm in overload. Restricting membership for nings verse restricting posted comments in blogs. Other than that I really don't understand the difference. It seems a ning can be used the same way a blog is, except that comments are visible on the page without another click. There isn't a single owner per see. I guess that's another difference.

Thing 21

There were a couple of steps of down loads that weren't mentioned, but I did it. I didn't make a photostory as I didn't have suitable photos for the poem, but maybe in the future I can add pictures. It is a little weird hearing my voice on the internet. This feature is pretty limitless in its possibilities.

Thing 20

You Tube video embedded at bottom of page. It takes a long time to find videos you like. It might be nice to use in the classroom, but it might take less time to make videos yourself than to search. I searched math videos on the teachertube and got pages of them. I narrow the search to fractions. Didn't find anything interesting. I searched for proportions. There were science videos there mixed in. The videos that showed problems being worked were boring. I like the futures channel. Many of their videos are interesting and informative. They show people in real jobs using math the students are studying. I didn't try embedding them though.

Thing 19

I tried twitter. The easiest way to describe it is like a chat room where you can talk without everyone being online at the same time. The basic question is "What are you doing?" The answers are limited to 140 characters or less. With chat my ex helped my daughters do homework from other countries, but they didn't always know when he'd be online. With twitter he could post a time for a live chat. You could set one up to see how students are progressing on a multiweek project. They could post what parts they finished. Twitter will text your phone automatically with messages, so you can read on the go. It'll also send you a reminder if you haven't posted in 24 hrs. I have unlimited text messages and didn't know how I would use them. I can respond to my friends by sending a text to twitter.

Thing 18

Google Docs looked really familiar and was easy to use. However it did not have many of the features that I'm used to in Microsoft word. It did not seem to have and automatic page number. Its header and footer sections weren't connected. Page break was simply that, no option for odd page or section break. The fonts were very limited. At least at first glance it seems like this. I'm a writer and I write a lot. I'm familiar with many features of Microsoft word. If I had all the options I'm used too, this would allow me to add and edit my books from any computer. It seems secure, so my copy rights seem protected, but I'm not sure uploading my books that I've written to the internet is a step I'm ready for. I'll just carry a thumb disk.

Thing 17

I guess I'm pushing finishing down to the wire.

I like rollyo. It's very discouraging to search google and come up with 1000 or so places listed on ten or more pages. A lot of times teachers send a list of sites to use, so this will be a one stop shop for a school search for my children.

I'm a craft person and like to knit and crochet. Christmas will be here before I know it. I created a search for crafts. I used the search by typing in scarves and got a list of scarves; some patterns were even free and downloadable. Of course ads lined the side, but they were all relevant like crochet magazines. When I found scarves I also found bloggers talking about the pattern-how easy to make, how people raved, etc.

Goodbye google, hello rollyo. Well not totally we still need google to get all those address (url's).

My link to my search roll is listed in my other sites in the right column.

Thing 16

I liked the video of the camping trip. VBS could've used this. We had meetings that wasted time and didn't organize well. I can see how they could've had a need list for all the voluteer position with a link to a page having a description of the position and all that it entailed. Then voluteers could move positions and placed their names beside it. Then everyone wouldn't have to drive to the church at the same time. I'm sure wikis could have many uses. I'm glad this was included because I get frustrated with wikipedia sometimes.

Thing 15

I can't image a world without books. There is something about looking at how far you've made in all those pages, but bringing a book with you on you PDA means you have when you're unexpectedly waiting in line for something so perhaps more reading time. That's a definate plus.

Ms. Shultz vision of the future reminded me of Total Recall where vacation chips could be implanted in your brain and you feel like you went where ever even when you never left home or had time off of your job. But bringing a book to life in a virtual word sounds exciting, especially for me as I'm a writer of fantasy adventure.

Thing 14

Technorati really makes you aware of how many people are watching what you do. It seems we ping them and didn't even know it, so they probably know we're there without even registering. It also means that search engines can find your blog without you giving an address. That's a little scary. On the flip side, it certainly makes it easier to search for opinions from real people on things you want to know. Of course at this point we need to remember that any thing can be posted so that doesn't make the information true or valid.

Thing 13

Del.icio.us will be an important time saver. I'm just getting in the habit of marking favorites, but I'm not always on the same computer, so this will help me even more. Tagging is important. I recently had to tag flipcharts for teachers to find. The better I did the easier for the teacher.

I like the nsfw tag. I think this will become vital as we can access "favorites" from anywhere and as we are highly scrutinized at work. An accidental off track thought could cause problems. That tag will be our red flag.

Thing 12

I think the Darth comment was very good, because while we want to be polite and allow different opinions, it is important to remember that not everyone shares that positive attitude. The second point that I feel is important is the debate of to comment or not to comment. Sometimes technology has gliches so if someone comments I would like to acknowledge that, but while I say that I don't expect to receive an overwhelming number of comments.

I found interesting blogs by clicking next blog. Each time I do that I get something different even when I start from my blog each time. I found HarrelSparrowFamily; this block had an interesting book review. I found a blog in Spanish at purpleblack15. It was hard to read the purple print on the black background. I also found Obamaformaglev which was interesting to me since recently I saw a video on the futures channel about the science of the maglev trains. Video is at www.thefutureschannel.com/dockets/science_technology/maglev_trains/ I'm not sure video will run without run time error, just click don't debug. Don't forget the sound.

Thing 11

This is great. I've wanted to organize my personal library for some time now, but have not had the time to learn Microsoft Acces to create my own database. I have 3 to 4 thousand soft backs and close to 1000 hard backs. It will take time to list them all, but it is certainly easier than starting from scratch.

I do wish it would be a little easier to list titles. I would like to click several before it jumps pages, so to add my books I kept clicking back to click another title. It's still a wonderful tool.

Thing 10

This was fun! I created two cartoons with Comic Strip Generator, and then my daughter wanted me to do another one with a cat to go with the one with a mouse, so I did. Students will like these, but I'm not sure how educational it will be. The comics are at the bottom.

Thing 9

I should've added feeds this way instead of adding bundles.

Using Google Search was the easiest and most user friendly. It also made it easy to add the feed to my reader. Edublog was not helpful to me. Tlopix.net didn't work because too many of its features were blocked on my work computer, so that was the most confusing.

I found NCTM feed which is useful for me, a math teacher.

I think word of mouth will be a useful tool to finding feeds.

Thing 8

Another google feature that is good. I think I like iGoogle better than Google Reader. What I did like about Google Reader was no adds and ease of switching catagories. I think at first this will take more time to set up and only get the feed you want, but after you clean house you'll have what you really want.

Again I'm not a libraian, but as a teacher you could have a folder with feeds from student blogs or as a mother have a folder with your children's blogs. I guess, I'm not really sure.

Thing 7

I like the iGoogle page you can set up and have different things at your fingertips. It'll be even better on my home computer where movies are blocked. The alerts will alwo be good for me as I don't watch much tv or news.

Thing 6

Well, I'm not a librarian, so won't be using this. I'm not sure how to use trading cards for math. Mosiacs could be made with pictures of shapes or some other math concepts, but it would be hard to keep students on task.