It's 8.30 Sunday night - tomorrow is the deadline for completing tasks. And I've finished!!
This whole course has been amazing, and completely worthwhile. I have felt more and more clever with each task, and do not feel like such a complete doofus head in the area of Web 2.0.
Mind you, when you say this has been a "small sampling of some of the Web 2.0 technologies", it has been such a massive learning curve for me that I doubt if I could have handled too much more information at once.
I have learnt things that I now use all the time, such as my iGoogle homepage set up with all the gadgets I use, including my RSS Google Reader.
And I'm guessing that I will be using at least half of these technologies on my new venture in a school in Hong Kong.
Thank you so much to Fiona, Natasha and Felicity for all your help and for running this course in the first place. It has been invaluable.
Ok, time for me to do this on my own. First step, setting up a brand new blog ready to keep in touch with everyone when I leave Australia in July.
Thanks heaps!
Sunday, May 23, 2010
#22 eBooks & #23 Audiobooks
Hmm I'm a bit of a fence-sitter on this subject.
I was really interested to read about Project Gutenberg. What a resource, at the hands of all those volunteers!
And I quite liked the LibriVox site. Volunteering to read is something that interests me, but not right now.
I have only downloaded one book - ever - onto my iPod. I took one of the Twilight books to listen to when on an overseas trip last year. I did listen to some when on the flights, but found myself reading REAL books more. I enjoyed listening to Twilight when I got home - when I was sewing or ironing or walking on the treadmill.
Personally, I love reading real books too much to bother downloading audiobooks.
At school it is becoming more and more of a hot topic. Our teacher librarians are talking more about the issue of having ebooks and audiobooks available for borrowing. I haven't yet entered the debate - partly because I feel so behind in technology that I have no idea how to get started.
This is step one!
I was really interested to read about Project Gutenberg. What a resource, at the hands of all those volunteers!
And I quite liked the LibriVox site. Volunteering to read is something that interests me, but not right now.
I have only downloaded one book - ever - onto my iPod. I took one of the Twilight books to listen to when on an overseas trip last year. I did listen to some when on the flights, but found myself reading REAL books more. I enjoyed listening to Twilight when I got home - when I was sewing or ironing or walking on the treadmill.
Personally, I love reading real books too much to bother downloading audiobooks.
At school it is becoming more and more of a hot topic. Our teacher librarians are talking more about the issue of having ebooks and audiobooks available for borrowing. I haven't yet entered the debate - partly because I feel so behind in technology that I have no idea how to get started.
This is step one!
#21 Teachertube
Ok, I've had a better look around now. I have had a little bit of experience with YouTube and TeacherTube, but not much. Especially since YouTube is blocked at school.
I found it easier to search and browse than the Podcasting, and I found heaps of cool videos to watch. I was going to post a Harry Potter American Idol clip - very funny!
Instead I thought I'd check out Dewey clips to find one way I could use this at school. I think I'll be trying the above clip out on my primary students, I think they'll like it!
I did find lots more - some things I'd love to show the kids just for fun, some things I would use in my lessons. I'm sure someone at school can tell me the easiest way to save and play YouTube at school.
By the way, I loved the dominoes!!
#21 Youtube
An educational video clip for my blog - well, it's set in a school, isn't it?? One of my favourite Glee clips.
More to add later when I've had a proper look around Youtube and Teachertube.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
#20 Podcasts
This is one activity I found quite frustrating. I checked out Podcastalley and Mypodcast. Although they do have general categories, it was hard to scroll through the hundreds of titles trying to find something of interest. I did listen to quite a few, but found nothing I'd be interested in subscribing to.
I almost subscribed to a Learning French podcast - I thought that might be interesting! However the ones I found weren't quite what I wanted - too hard, too American, one had a strong Irish accent hard to understand!
Then I tried to find the Hamish and Andy podcast. The one I found wouldn't work. So I ended up googling it, and ended up in a whole tangle of pages. I finally found the RSS link, but so far it hasn't appeared on my Google Reader. I give up!
The other category I looked at was a K-12 category in Education. Useless. I got bored of listening to them when the description wasn't quite enough.
So I guess I won't just be browsing through podcast directories just for something to do. But if I hear of something that would particularly interest me, then I THINK I could figure out how to subscribe to it. Maybe!
I almost subscribed to a Learning French podcast - I thought that might be interesting! However the ones I found weren't quite what I wanted - too hard, too American, one had a strong Irish accent hard to understand!
Then I tried to find the Hamish and Andy podcast. The one I found wouldn't work. So I ended up googling it, and ended up in a whole tangle of pages. I finally found the RSS link, but so far it hasn't appeared on my Google Reader. I give up!
The other category I looked at was a K-12 category in Education. Useless. I got bored of listening to them when the description wasn't quite enough.
So I guess I won't just be browsing through podcast directories just for something to do. But if I hear of something that would particularly interest me, then I THINK I could figure out how to subscribe to it. Maybe!
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
#19 Rollyo
I found Rollyo to be fairly self-explanatory, and quite fun. My first thought was that it would be a bit unnecessary for me as I really don't have all that many favourite pages or places to search. But then it hit me that I often do random searches through quilting websites so decided to turn that into my "roll".
I might also do one on Hong Kong just for fun, as I've definitely done a few searches on that lately.
Educationally I would like to have one specifically for Smartboard activities, as there are many, many sites around. I'm not sure yet though if I would use Rollyo or Delicious tagging more often. I think both applications would definitely be very useful in this case, but am not sure if one is more beneficial than the other. Perhaps it's just a case of which one I like better.
Anyway the only slightly tricky bit of Rollyo was experimenting with putting it on my blog. I guess I'll see what happens when I publish this post - I might feel very clever once again! How exciting!
Saturday, May 15, 2010
#18 Wikis
It was interesting to see how schools and libraries have been using Wikis. I already have 3 ideas if I decide to create my own wikis.
1. I could use my friends as guinea pigs while I test my wiki abilities. We are organising a group holiday overseas, and this could be a great way to add information and keep each other informed of where we are up to in the planning. It would also be a great way to experiment, and see how interesting I can make the wiki.
2. Teachers could have an Inquiry Unit wiki. In our curriculum we need to cover certain topics (or SOSE units, inquiry units, whatever you like to call it). We could set up a wiki for teachers to add information, ideas, hints, tips, feedback etc. This could be useful in the short term when a number of teachers on the same year level are all teaching the same unit. And it would be handy in the long term when the same unit is taught the following year. We could build up a database of ideas.
3. Our 5/6 classes are about to start a "book club" as a way of sharing information. A wiki would be a wonderful way to incorporate Web 2.0 into the program.
1. I could use my friends as guinea pigs while I test my wiki abilities. We are organising a group holiday overseas, and this could be a great way to add information and keep each other informed of where we are up to in the planning. It would also be a great way to experiment, and see how interesting I can make the wiki.
2. Teachers could have an Inquiry Unit wiki. In our curriculum we need to cover certain topics (or SOSE units, inquiry units, whatever you like to call it). We could set up a wiki for teachers to add information, ideas, hints, tips, feedback etc. This could be useful in the short term when a number of teachers on the same year level are all teaching the same unit. And it would be handy in the long term when the same unit is taught the following year. We could build up a database of ideas.
3. Our 5/6 classes are about to start a "book club" as a way of sharing information. A wiki would be a wonderful way to incorporate Web 2.0 into the program.
#17 Delicious
How cool. I love Delicious. It is all about keeping my inner librarian happy. I love how easy it is to tag and manage my favourite websites! I also love how my favourites will no longer be attached to just one computer. I have just updated to a new laptop, and all my favourite websites are still sitting on my old computer waiting for me to transfer them over. I can now put them all on Delicious, and I will do the same for my Favourites on my school computer!
By the way, the first website added to my Delicious account was the teachertube video that was suggested to us. I'm going to show it at a staff meeting and try and get others hooked on Delicious, so we can all share the fabulous sites that are relevant to what we are teaching.
By the way, the first website added to my Delicious account was the teachertube video that was suggested to us. I'm going to show it at a staff meeting and try and get others hooked on Delicious, so we can all share the fabulous sites that are relevant to what we are teaching.
Sunday, May 9, 2010
#15 RSS
RSS is great! It will be one of the things I check daily. Some of the exercises in this course have been great to learn about and very interesting but I won't use them often. I think this one I will.
For starters I have added Reader to my iGoogle home page. I don't have much at the moment - just a couple of blogs I follow, plus a Top Headlines news feed. This one will be especially interesting come July when I move from Australia. I will still know what is happening back home!
I also agree with other bloggers that this could be very valuable when doing units of work with kids. Imagine them getting updates so quickly and easily, without wasting valuable lesson time!
For starters I have added Reader to my iGoogle home page. I don't have much at the moment - just a couple of blogs I follow, plus a Top Headlines news feed. This one will be especially interesting come July when I move from Australia. I will still know what is happening back home!
I also agree with other bloggers that this could be very valuable when doing units of work with kids. Imagine them getting updates so quickly and easily, without wasting valuable lesson time!
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
#14 Facebook
Here I was looking forward to #14 - as a Facebook user already, I thought I could tick this one off the list, do a 1 minute blog, and move on to the next activity.
Wrong. Thanks to the Ning and Twitter links, I've just spent ages playing and exploring.
My Facebook account has no links to any professional organisations. I use it purely for social purposes. I will not be joining the Department of Education's facebook page, or any other page like it... I can't see the point. I am not curious as to what they are there for, I will just ignore them. Keep out of my social life!
Ning, on the other hand, looks excellent for joining groups that might be professionally beneficial. I've just been playing around and found a couple of groups for teacher librarians that look quite interesting. And I can see Ning can be used for fun too - some good quilting groups caught my eye.
And Twitter is something that I've been meaning to check out for ages. I'm not a twitterer (or is it tweeter??) but hearing so much about it has made me curious. So I've just been looking up some things, and finding out how twitter works. I don't think I'll join up yet, but I'm sure it won't be too far in the future when I join the twitter bandwagon.
Wrong. Thanks to the Ning and Twitter links, I've just spent ages playing and exploring.
My Facebook account has no links to any professional organisations. I use it purely for social purposes. I will not be joining the Department of Education's facebook page, or any other page like it... I can't see the point. I am not curious as to what they are there for, I will just ignore them. Keep out of my social life!
Ning, on the other hand, looks excellent for joining groups that might be professionally beneficial. I've just been playing around and found a couple of groups for teacher librarians that look quite interesting. And I can see Ning can be used for fun too - some good quilting groups caught my eye.
And Twitter is something that I've been meaning to check out for ages. I'm not a twitterer (or is it tweeter??) but hearing so much about it has made me curious. So I've just been looking up some things, and finding out how twitter works. I don't think I'll join up yet, but I'm sure it won't be too far in the future when I join the twitter bandwagon.
#13 MySpace
How did I start off looking at Public Library pages, finding out how to use MySpace professionally, and end up at Tom Hank's page? Easy - just like everything else so far in this Web 2.0 course, it is very easy to get distracted and go from link to link for hours.
This is the first time I've checked out MySpace. I had kind of guessed what it was like, and I wasn't far off the mark. Really interesting to check out people's pages, and interesting to see what the public libraries have created.
Personally I don't think I would create a MySpace page. I see my friends, email people, and have Facebook (and hopefully soon have a public Flickr "diary") . That, for the moment, is enough of communicating and sharing. I would rather allocate my spare time to other things, rather than spend more time on the computer.
Professionally, I am really impressed at what some of the public libraries have done. For a public library I think it is a fantastic tool to reach out to young people, and teach them about today's libraries.
For a primary school, I think I would give it a miss. Many primary schools these days have their own student network or learning platform that students can access, and many school libraries have their own space within these platforms. I believe that having too many access points for basically the same thing can lessen the impact. I would rather have one quality access point that my kids can really get familiar with, and get my messages through that way.
Our learning platform is currently being recreated, but I am really keen to get the library page set up, and I imagine there will be many similar features to MySpace.
This is the first time I've checked out MySpace. I had kind of guessed what it was like, and I wasn't far off the mark. Really interesting to check out people's pages, and interesting to see what the public libraries have created.
Personally I don't think I would create a MySpace page. I see my friends, email people, and have Facebook (and hopefully soon have a public Flickr "diary") . That, for the moment, is enough of communicating and sharing. I would rather allocate my spare time to other things, rather than spend more time on the computer.
Professionally, I am really impressed at what some of the public libraries have done. For a public library I think it is a fantastic tool to reach out to young people, and teach them about today's libraries.
For a primary school, I think I would give it a miss. Many primary schools these days have their own student network or learning platform that students can access, and many school libraries have their own space within these platforms. I believe that having too many access points for basically the same thing can lessen the impact. I would rather have one quality access point that my kids can really get familiar with, and get my messages through that way.
Our learning platform is currently being recreated, but I am really keen to get the library page set up, and I imagine there will be many similar features to MySpace.
Blogging my own Flickr photo
#12 Flickr
DSC_3281
Originally uploaded by HMStewartJr
Flickr is awesome! So many photos to look at it's almost intimidating. I have been really looking forward to finding out about Flickr, as I had an idea of using it as a bit of a diary when I start my job in Hong Kong. I had heard of a challenge where you post a Flickr photo every day of the year.
After playing with Flickr all morning, I'm not convinced I will still do that. There are such awesome photos from obviously very talented photographers, it seems to me more like an art gallery than a normal person's photo album.
I'll think about it. Meanwhile, I now have a flickr account, and I know how to blog other people's photos, and next I'm going to try uploading my own photos. Gosh I feel clever!!
Saturday, May 1, 2010
#11 LibraryThing
I've created a very short book shelf that I will be able to add to when I have more time. I got a feel for how LibraryThing can be used. Perhaps I'll create an account for my own library and put new books and recommendations on it for the kids.
pamelag13's books LibraryThing
pamelag13's books LibraryThing
#10 A 2nd go at image generators
Oh here we ago, I'm feeling a bit more clever now! It helped to read the instructions given in #10. This is my brother - I'm sure he will be thrilled when he sees this pic. 
And this isn't a particulary good attempt of prettying up our dogs, but just a quick muck-around with Image Chef (http://www.imagechef.com/).
As well as discovering image generators, this was the first time I've posted a picture on my blog, and I don't know what I was doing last week that made it seem so hard, but have found it is easy!
And this isn't a particulary good attempt of prettying up our dogs, but just a quick muck-around with Image Chef (http://www.imagechef.com/).
As well as discovering image generators, this was the first time I've posted a picture on my blog, and I don't know what I was doing last week that made it seem so hard, but have found it is easy!
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