Thing #23

The 23 things Learning 2.0 exercise can be found at http://sjlibrary23.blogspot.com/.

Creative commons is the greatest resource an educator can take advantage of. Most educators are in the field due to the desire to make a difference in students lives. The time needed to create all original lessons would take away from the very people most educators care about. There truly is no need to reinvent the wheel. Like the idea of the 23 things exercise many learning resources are available all over the web. Using images and videos from multiple sources is essential in supplementing instruction as well as increasing time to devote to creating original learning activities to increase students interest. Due to creative commons resources  can be taken advantage of with more free reign to use information and resources as the creator intended them to be used.

Thing #22

History


What are the titles of your binders?  History, World History, and World Geography

Discuss how you might use LiveBinders in the classroom, including possible lesson ideas for students.

LiveBinders would be an excellent addition to a WebQuest activities. A binder created to be used as resources for a WebQuest would concentrate all resources in one location. Having students create a binder as a way to compile resources would also be a useful tool. Students could be assigned specific topics with subtopics that could be researched by individuals of a group with materials organized into a binder to be used for calibration in a group presentation covering the main topic.

Thing #21

Flowers

I thought Animoto was a very interesting site although it not being free was disappointing. Animoto would not upload videos from my computer which was unfortunate but for the purpose of exploring the site I used images from their library to gain a better understanding of the process. If personal images would have been available I believe this could be a useful resource both for teachers and students.

Thing #20

I frequently use you tube for videos that cover historical topics. There are many good videos from the History channel and BBC that have educational value. I selected this video not for education but for entertainment.

Thing #18

Why is it important that educators know how social networking works?  Social networking is popular among   youth. Social networking can help an educator relate to students and share school and educational information with fellow teachers.
What new insights did you gain about these popular sites? I have been using facebook for years but had not thought of it as an educational resource and am excited to be a friend of the department of education. I am fairly new to twitter and have enjoyed it as a source to follow organizations that are important to me.
What did you like or dislike about each of the sites you explored? Being a long time member of Facebook I have had the opportunity to see it evolve over time. I do not like the new format of Facebook and the amount of commercialization and advertisements that have began to plague the site. Being newer to Twitter I am still getting used to the application. Like Facebook Twitter has same downfalls in that lots of people/organizations will tweet information that is not relevant to me.
Which site had the most useful features? Facebook has more useful features than Twitter. Facebook allows its own page that centers all posts and activities in a more visually stimulating format.
Can you see a classroom or school application for any of these sites? I can see either application being useful to put out information to the masses in a short period of time.
http://www.facebook.com/je.mayfield?ref=tn_tnmn

Thing #17

Can you see the comments they added about this bookmark or the tags they used to categorize this reference? 

I looked at howstuffworks.com which was under the comment learn how everything works and had the tags reference, howto, science, technology, and education. The web page was actually very interesting and I found myself side track for quite a while. 

Can you see the potential of this tool in the classroom? Or just as an easy way to create bookmarks that can be accessed from anywhere? How can teachers take advantage of social bookmarking sites?

 I can defiantly see the usefulness of tagging and social book marking in the classroom. For instance I searched Delicious for history education and the results included several very academic sources for historical information. It could also be used as a tool to research specific historical topics or issues related to reading and writing in history which are becoming a focus in education. 

Thing #16

Which start page did you choose? Why did that one appeal to you? Will you make it your permanent home page?

I chose iGoogle because I use Google Chrome browser and have always been a fan of other Google applications. I liked that it was pre linked to let me view my Google inbox and had the options of linking to Facebook and CNN news. I will not make it as my permanent homepage because I use a family computer. I would use it as a homepage on a work computer due to the amount of related gadgets that would be useful as a teacher.

How can the online calendars be useful to you? Online calendars are useful because they can be accessed anywhere including using your smartphone. They can also be viewed by groups of people if unnecessary.

What about the to-do lists—helpful, too much work…? Very helpful for me because seeing what I need to do helps me properly manage time. I am also extremely forgetful and having a to-do list that is easily accessible is helpful. 

Did you find a tool that has some uses for you at the school or at home? Which tool(s) would you recommend to others? There were many tools that could be useful but I currently use a iPhone app/web page that is very handy and I did not see listed I would like to share. This app is called Cozi and is a family planner/organizer that is online and available as a smartphone app. It has a family calendar with text notifications and a family to-do list which includes a shopping list. I can not count the times I have been grocery shopping and had my wife add things to the list as I was looking at it. No more going back to the store because the call would not go through.