I'm done!

Wow, what a whirlwind of information! I am happy to be finished and happy to have all my new tools in my teaching arsenal!

Thing #23

1. My favorite discoveries or exercises were Thing #10 & 13. Del.icio.us & Big Huge Labs are both awesome and I see many uses for these!
2. After my head stops swimming & I am able to correctly file these tools in the right place in my brain, I see myself using some of these tools often and I am so thankful for this opportunity to expand my technilogical saaviness!
3. Not really, except that I have created another blog for my son and realized that it is apparently the "hip" thing to do when you have young, growing families. I have been able to reconnect with many of my friends indirectly because of this professional development assignment. Thanks SBISD!!!
4. The only thing I noticed is that a lot of this is geared toward librarians and so many of the sites/tools indicated are not really pertinent to a regular classroom teacher.
5. I would absolutely participate in another discovery program!
6. Using the tools I explored in my 23 Things experience, will certainly enhance & jazz up my teaching!
7. Sure thing!

Thing #22

Nings are pretty cool! Having used MySpace & Facebook before and listening to my students talk, I understand how important social networking is. For teachers solely, Nings could be used to share ideas....sort of like a ListServ. A teacher could also set up a Ning for students to post information & assignments, hold online office hours, etc. I think students would be very open to this method of interaction since they are so fond of Facebook & MySpace.

Thing #21

My audio recordings are not working, but here is my podcast.

Thing #20

YouTube & TeacherTube are both very valuable tools for the classroom. The only problem I see with it is that YouTube is blocked by our computer security. I hope they change this. It is uber easy to embed videos into the blog and into presentations. Here is a video I found on TeacherTube on photosynthesis:

Thing #19

I explored a few of the links on the 2.0 awards site. Some of them I had already explored (Flikr, Technorati, Del.icio.us, Craiglist, etc) but many were new to me. I explored:

• MothersClick - it was ok as far as the social networking, but I really liked the recipes!
• LinkedIn - I found a couple of people I work with, some family members, & even a French man I used to babysit for in high school - I've been wondering how his family was.
• MyHeritage - pretty cool! You can upload a picture and see what celebrities you most look like
• HairMixer - sort of silly, but I guess that's the point
• Monster - I was familiar with this before, but I think this would be a great site to use to show the kids just how many jobs are out there that they would use their science background for and show them that most of the jobs posted require a college degree
• MySpace/Facebook - I was also already familiar with these, but I have heard of teachers creating Facebook pages for their classes as a way for students to check assignments and as questions, etc. Very cool & "with it" thing for a teacher to do - really connects with the kids!

Thing #18

I really like Open Office Writer. It is a whole lot like Word, but a cool thing I discovered is that you can choose a background (stones, rice paper, etc.) for your entire document. If that can be done in Word, I'm not aware. Open Office Impress is almost identical to PowerPoint, but there aren't many backgrounds at all...I only saw 4. It may be possible to download more, but I haven't gotten that far. Google Docs is not bad, but there don't seem to be as many options for fonts, etc as with Word. There are however, more presentation templates & backgrounds than in Open Office. I think I'll still stick with Word, but it is nice to know that both of those options are out there should I ever encounter a computer without Word.

Thing #17

Well since it didn't specify, I created a Rollyo to search for housewares & home decor. We are buying a new house and need various things so I created a search engine of my favorite sites -- Pottery Barn, PB Kids, Restoration Hardware, Crate & Barrel, Land of Nod, Company Kids, etc. So then when I typed in "area rug," it only searched those sites. I love it! This would be very useful in my classroom for both me & my students. Throughout the year, the students do a couple of research projects and could very easily tailor their searches for more efficient use of in class time. I am constantly editing my flip charts & PowerPoint presentations by adding further explanation or a diagram/picture. I will use Rollyo to expedite my searches since in th past many of my diagrams have come from a common site.

Thing #16

Ok, so I posted on the SBISD library wiki. I toyed with using a wiki when I taught AP Environmental Science. The students have to read & summarize 6 environmentally related current events each six weeks and I looked into having them do this on a wiki and then having them read & comment on each other's postings. I didn't quite understand the whole wiki thing at that point so I didn't do it, but I sure wish I had made more of an effort now to figure it out! Posting on a wiki is very easy & I can see how this would be a great communication & collaboration tool in the classroom. I especially like the idea of having students add their 2 cents about a topic as a means of collaborative note-taking. I am also a big fan of the trading card maker, so adding those to a wiki is also a great idea!

Thing #15

Rick Anderson's "iceberg" analogy put it into perspective. As we move further & further away from the card catalog and a librarian teaching students how to use a card catalog, students have more information at their fingertips than ever. I am sure that many of the books in that catalog have never even been opened. And then the ones that you do need are never there...arrgghhh! Now that all that can be bypassed, I think students will enjoy (or at least not mind) doing research. I do wander if all this technology that is available online will make traditional libraries obsolete. To prevent this from occuring in school libraries now that Library 2.0 has come into being, is that librarians & teachers will constantly have to utilize Library 2.0 to stay "with it." Public libraries, I believe, have a slightly different fate...lately as I have driven past these buildings with my 7 month old, I notice loads of moms toting their little ones into storytime. I remember now that my mom took us to the library every week & we had to pick out 5 books we would read that week. She refused to let us become "couch potatoes" or glued to video games. I want this for my little guy too and if public libraries continue to offer things like this, I think they will escape the fate that others face. Please pardon my random thoughts & rants, but I want my child to get those reading certificates each month & an ever-growing vocabulary during the summer rather than carpal tunnel syndrome.

Thing #14

Maybe I'm not doing it right, but if I am, I do not like Technorati. I just don't find it to be as helpful as some of the others I have explored (like Del.icio.us). I do believe tagging is a valuable tool for both research & just general surfing. It really is a time saver & at this stage of the game (well, really any stage of the game for teachers & parents), time is precious!

Thing #13

I love Del.icio.us! It is simply delicious! I wish I had known about this when I was teaching AP Environmental....I have so many sites in "favorites" & I would always have to click on a couple to find the one I was looking for. Del.icio.us would have made it soooo much easier. I love that you can access your bookmarks from any computer & aren't tied to just one. I definitely see how this would be helpful for research -- I totally plan on having my students use this when they research their assigned Animal Kingdom phyla. This would be a great tool since you can share your bookmarks with others. I love when I find materials, or in this case sites, that other people use...it is nice to know what other people find valuable. So I'm thinking that if Julie, JoAnn & I all are using Del.icio.us to bookmark biology sites, we will each find some that the other hadn't and we can share.

Thing #12

I made a few comments, but will have to revisit blogs at a later date to see if there is anything I feel compelled to comment on at that time.

I liked Cool Cat's blog about commenting and commenting nicely. That's what I haven't liked about blogging. People can be mean & not own up to it by remaining "anonymous." I also like the Darth Commentor analogy....very funny!
The 10 Commandments were also helpful, but I really don't see myself being a consistant commentor....I am most definitely a lurker!

I used Google Blog Search to find blogs on scrapbooking. Since this is a hobby, I enjoy Vicki's Scrapbook Ideas. It is a great way to showcase, share & gather ideas about your scrapbooking. My husband thinks I am an old lady, but what can you do? I also avidly read my friend's blog about her pregnancy & the birth of her daughter. I love that my family can keep up with the happenings of her's even though they live in Dallas & we live here. She posts pictures & I can comment on how cute her daughter is or that my son, Jackson loves a toy Kynli has too. In this time of our lives -- getting married, starting families, juggling work & home, etc -- we don't have the time we would like to have regular & lengthy phone conversations. Blogs are a great way to bridge the gap!

Thing #11

I added about 22 books to my library on Library Thing. I am not an avid reader, but I do enjoy some books. I have read A Separate Peace about 9 times....I love it! This is not something I would use in my biology class, but I definitely see how it would be valuable in other classes (English, History, I could have even used it in Environmental Science if I were still teaching it).

Thing #10

I loved Big Huge Labs! There are all kinds of fun things you can do there. I made an ID badge with an example of how I might use it in my classroom. (click to view larger)
We could also use the map maker to highlight the native habitat of a specific animal, etc. The students could make a comic strip about a specific topic that showed they knew the material or meaning of a new vocabulary word. There are lots of things that could be done.

Of course, I also could not resist the urge to Warholize my little boy.....

Thing #9

I found Atomic Learning to be the easiest to find RSS feeds. I had used Atomic Learning before, but this helped me see that I had not been using it to the extent of it's ability.

I liked Technorati & Google BlogSearch the best & found them to be the most useful for finding blogs.

Well, had I been using Atomic Learning for the first time, I think I would have found it to be the most confusing, but since I had some experience with it, I found Syndic8.com to be the most confusing. In fact, it was even very slow to load everything.

I found a lot of good feeds about various biology topics....genetics, medicine, DNA, etc. I added them to my reader. My reader is getting a little out of hand, I fear!

Other people had links to different newsfeeds on their blogs, etc so I checked some of those out to see if what they were all about.

I must admit, this "Thing" was not as fun for me as the others have been.

More technology I found - Smilebox

So while working on Thing #9 I stumbled upon Smilebox. It's a online scrapbook & keepsake maker. You have the option of printing your creations or just getting a code to post to your blog, MySpace, Facebook, etc. Doesn't have a whole lot to do with biology, but the Art teachers could use it or...we could use it in biology for say an Animal Kingdom project, but I would need to hammer that out a little more...

Make a Smilebox postcard

Thing #8

Thing #8 was more of a challenge for me....not that I can't do what it was asking, but I don't typically read 5 blogs everyday, so I had to really search for some. A friend of mine, luckily, had just set up one to keep us abreast of her pregnancy. I love that with Google Reader you can scroll through it quickly & not waste time typing in URLs (or hunting for them for that matter).

Personal life use: As I said, I can keep up with my friends lives. Most of us are too busy to sit down & have a lengthy phone conversation with each of our friends, but a blog & reader help to bridge the distance.
School use: With a subscription to the Science bundles, I can see the latest in science news at a glance. I would love to be able to report relevant current events to my students as often as possible....check it in the morning & see if there is anything extraordinary to share.

Library use: Hmmmm...I'm not sure if the reader HAS to be person specific or not. If not, a librarian can set up a reader with the subscriptions that students would most frequent or need when doing research. Then, a student could scroll through those first & if what he needs was not there, then go about with the old method of searching. Tell me librarians or someone who has been doing this longer than an hour....is this possible?

Thing #7

I explored iGoogle & Google Calendar. I love how you can personalize iGoogle....I put cooking, news & entertainment on mine. The recipes are great & can be seen at a glance. Does anyone see how these could be useful in the classroom? I can see how they would be used personally, but other than lesson planning, I'm not having the vision right now.

Thing #6

I played around with the mosaic maker & made the mosaic seen here with pictures of my beautiful baby boy from my Flikr account. Super easy & great for scrapbooking, but not as

useful for the classroom as the Trading Card Maker. I envision using that for review either for the TAKS test or even unit tests. Students could be given cards with practice problems on them & once they have mastered the problem, would trade them with other students for new practice problems. Any thoughts on that? Here's kind of what I am thinking...

Thing #5

For this "thing," I searched Flikr's Creative Commons for "ecology" and found this picture by angela7dreams entitled "Lizard Dreaming." Aptly named, I'd say. Isn't the lizard cute? So content. Where was this taken?

While browsing through Flikr, I also was able to search my yahoo email address book & I found 5 people I know with Flikr accounts. I was then able to check out their photos.

Thing #4

post for thing #2 - check
post for thing #3 - check
emailed vaughn branom - check

guess that means I am official! whoohoo!

Thing #3

Well, I cheated a little....I already had an avatar from my yahoo email account so I just reused it. That's me & my little dog, Leyla. Setting up the blog & adding the avatar was easy & it's fun to make these sorts of things. I looked at a few other blogs, just to make sure I was posting the things I was supposed to. I didn't comment or ask any questions.

7 & 1/2 Habits - Part 2 (Thing #2)

The hardest of the 7 & 1/2 habits for me to implement will be view problems as challenges to learn from. This has always been one thing I need to work on. I typically approach problems in a two-fold way. At first, I freak out...get all of it out & then I begin to develop a plan of attack. Skipping that first "freak out" part will be difficult for me. I guess you could say I'm a "glass half empty" sort of person, but with a twist!

7 & 1/2 Habits - Part 1 (Thing #2)

The easiest of the 7 & 1/2 habits for me is beginning with the end in mind. Setting a goal is simple. It is the follow through that is a challenge. Without some sort of formal accountability, is our signature alone enough to ensure that there is follow through?