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?