Thing #21

This was alot of fun. My video really didn't have a theme, I just took some random pictures that I had. It took awhile for everything to download but other than that, this site was pretty cool. Using Animoto would be a great way of putting together videos of daily classroom activities, field trips, or even after school activities and post it for parents to view. This could come in handy when teaching and I plan on using it again.

Thing #20

 


I believe that almost everybody is familiar with youtube in some way. I love looking up different things on here as a tutorial that can help me to better understand something. I chose this video because this method of solving a math problem is a prime example of how youtube can be very beneficial. It can definitely be a great visual aid to those students that need that extra help with understanding something.

Thing #19

Thanks to ‘thing #19,’ I now have another social network besides Twitter and Facebook. I signed up for Project Playlist. I enjoy music and it is part of my everyday life. With this site, you can browse other user’s music playlist and search new old hits. With this social network you can also listen to FREE music online which is a definite plus because other sites often charge you for certain songs. I also plan to join Teacher Pop and interact with other individuals that are in the teaching field. There are also a few other social networks that I plan to join that I have never heard of until I came across this ‘thing.’

Thing #18

I have had a Facebook for many years now.

I didn't really like Facebook when I first set up my account, mainly because I was so used to MySpace, but it definitely didn't take long for me to get the hang of things. I now prefer Facebook over MySpace which just about everyone has left the MySpace scene! The one thing about Facebook, that I wish they had is a way to personalize your actual page. 
Twitter is a social networking site that is definitely growing extremely fast. In fact, most people are even starting to go away from Facebook and strictly using Twitter. I have a Twitter account but never use it. I believe that the idea of Twitter is good, but the way that it is being used to just follow random people, is what I do not like about it. 

I don't really think either of these sites should be used too much in the classroom because I think that they would cause a distraction. I'm planning to teach 7th or 8th grade math and I can just see them trying to check and see what their friends are doing all class period. Although both are a good way to stay in touch with people and also keep up with certain businesses, schools, artists, etc., I don't think either of them should be used as a way to communicate with your students. To me, there is just too much at risk with that.

 http://twitter.com/#!/Creed1031

Thing #17

I have always heard of tagging photos and things but I have never been too sure of what it meant. Ofcourse, I know how to tag my facebook friends in photos and status updates, but that is about as far as it went. I have never came across Del.icio.us but it is a wonderful way to organize classrooms or lesson plans. I feel that this will make my life so much easier when it comes to organization. Although I can't think of any ways this can be used in an Elementary classroom, I believe that it would be a great tool to use for social networking and middle and high school classrooms could definitely benefit from it!

Thing #16

I chose iGoogle for my start page and I really like the way that I could put so many different things on one page.  I believe that I will eventually make it my permanent home page. Having it as my home page will allow me to see what I have on my calendar and on my to do list for the day.
    Online calendars are a great way to stay organized by allowing you to keep track with appointments and assignments that are due. I use the internet everyday day, so it is very useful to have the calendar right in front of me when I am on the computer or browsing on my phone.
     I love the to-do-lists,  I started using this tool and it really helped me keep up with the weekly activities that I have going on between work and school.
     I would use the to-do-list and the calendar for home, work and school. I would recommend either of these tools, because they can be beneficial to anyone.

Thing #15

I have to admit that I became very interested to see that we had a 'thing' about wikipedia. I have used Wikipedia many times in my high school and college career, not necessarily as a reference, but I have used it to get a broad idea of things that I might have been studying. I explored most of the things listed as wikis, and I found that they would be helpful in the classroom. It would be great way to do group projects in my classroom. I think I will really enjoy this website once I play with it some more and really get the hang of it. I feel that they can improve both my teaching as well as my students learning. I can definitely see myself using it in my future classroom.

Thing #14

For Thing #14, I chose to explore MindMesiter and Gliffy.  I found both of them to be very confusing and somewhat frustrating! The first thing that I chose to explore was the mindmeister. This mind map was very confusing! I had  trouble figuring this one out being a college student, so I probably would not recommend this one, atleast not for elementary activities. I also used Gliffy to create a flowchart, and the program was extremely difficult to use as well. I tried to use one of their templates and still did not really figure it out. I do not see myself using either site again.

Thing #13

Before this blog, I have never heard of Zoho Writer. Exploring Zoho has been quite educating. I do not have Microsoft Word on my laptop, so this program will be a great help to me as I continue not only my educational journey, but my professional journey as well. 

   Zoho is "an online word processor that allows you to create and share documents online." You do not need to install any software in your desktop, all you need is a browser and internet connection.
   Zoho supports Internet Explorer, Firefox,and Safari, so you should be able to access it from just about any computer without installing a single thing. I really wish I would have known about this before. This is definitely a website that I will be using in the future.

Thing #12

I already have a google calendar that I use. I chose not to make it public because I have special dates that not only concern myself, but others as well. Google calendar would be very helpful when teaching to keep you organized on assignments or special trips that you plan for your students, etc. I also chose to explore Google Translate. This was very interesting to me because it allows you to translate a phrases into different languages. This would be a great help in teaching because for a lot of students, English is not their first language and this site can help you somewhat on translations. GoogleTranslate

Thing #11

This thing irritated me for a litlle while.It was quite confusing, but the one that gave me the most trouble would have to be the Syndic8.com. There was just so much stuff on it and it was difficult to navigate through. The easiest search tool for me was the Topix.net. I found some interesting teaching sites and and news sites for Clarksville that I liked. The Clarksville online feed is definitely beneficial to me right now, because I am always trying to stay informed about the community.

Thing #10

After reading the assigned articles and watching the YouTube video, I was really enthused with the idea of RSS and I can't believe that I have never heard of it before. Although I have never used Google reader before, it was very simple and easy to use from the moment of logging into my account.Whatever I decide to subscribe to is right there on my main page and instead of having to flip from one webpage to another one, you can have them on your Rss feed and be able to view them at the same time! This is of great convenience, especially for teachers, who don't always have time to spend searching all through the internet. This would be a great help for those who teach Economics Government to help them to easily keep up with some current events.  This will definitely benefit me in my personal life, when I need to go check those websites that I look at every day in a hurry. I do not have to worry about typing in the website every time .

Thing #9

I loved working with the image chef generator! The link to it is imagechef.com. This would be great to use in the classroom to post positive and inspiring messages to students. I could play with this site all day. It can also be used to post up character traits of the month which some schools have. I would use the comic strip generator for character traits. This thing was a really good one!

 

Thing #8

  I chose to create a puzzle for thing #8. I think that all of the apps were very interesting. I think that these apps could definitely be used in the classroom to bring some fun and creativity. Children should not have to sit through boring lectures all day. And I would definitely use some of these to keep the attention of students. I want to show students that learning can be fun and exciting. Flickr mashups could definitely be used in the lower grade levels, for example, I would use the "spell with flicker" app to help children learn different words. I don't have a problem at all with sharing photos online, as long as they are appropriate.
    I chose to create a puzzle for thing #8. I think that all of the apps were very interesting. I think that these apps could definitely be used in the classroom to bring some fun and creativity. Children should not have to sit through boring lectures all day. And I would definitely use some of these to keep the attention of students. I want to show students that learning can be fun and exciting. Flickr mashups could definitely be used in the lower grade levels, for example, I would use the "spell with flicker" app to help children learn different words. I don't have a problem at all with sharing photos online, as long as they are appropriate.