One Last Thing....

Whew! What a ride! What a ride! Thank you Dr. Wall for showing me some really cool applications. I think that my favorites were Animoto, Delicious (it's late, don't ask me to get this right) and Creative Commons. As far as my learning goals, I had never set any type of goals other than to finish what I had set out to do almost 40 years ago. I have seen some of these things and often wondered how it was done. Now I am almost an expert at some of these things. This class has rekindled my creative juices, almost to the point where I may sometimes get too carried away. I never really knew that there was a whole different set of applications available that would enhance my use of computers the way this program has. The only thing that I could see as an improvement would be to possibly look at combining the You Tube into the social networking "thing", since both are forms of social networking (but what do I know?). I can definetly see some of these "things" working their way into my classroom, especially Animoto and Creative Commons. I am not sure which way I will keep up with the developments. Between RSS feeds, Delicious and Google updates it won't be too difficult. I have thoroughly enjoyed this class, although I have less hair than when we started and few less brain cells that may have oozed out of my ears. Good Luck to everyone in their respective endeavors. Terrell and Johnnie, I really have enjoyed your friendship and company in the classes that we have shared. Take care.

Thing #23

I found another web site that is uncannily similar to this 23 Things. It is called School Library Learning 2.0. It was created by the California School Library Association (CSLA) 2.0 Team to help students learn about the many tools of the new Internet: Web 2.0 that are be offered to students such as social networking, wikis, video, podcasting, and gaming sites. When I saw the list of 23 Things, I was blown away. It is extremely similar to ours with a few differences. The biggest difference that I noticed was that there was no link to Creative Commons. Creative Commons is a must for our students today with the many applications that are available for use. It can direct students to those sites where they can find the information that they need and not worry about copyright violations. One thing for certain is that in my classroom we will spend a least one class period discussing these pitfalls and how Creative Commons can help to avoid stiffling their creativity in the classroom.

Thing #22

I chose a podcast from the Educational Podcast Directory entitled The Midnight Ride. Of the directories that I check looked at, this one had the easiest and less complicated downloads. The others were a real pain. I suppose that if I had a few hours to play around with them, the others would offer just a much. With the proper equipment, creating a podcast would be a great project for my students. I went ahead and subscribed to The Midnight Ride. These guys are crazy. I could not find an RSS feed for them.

Thing #21

Well, I have finally made my first documentary! Heck, it may even win the Oscar for short-animated film. OK, a guy can dream, can't he? This is a tool that I have been looking for. Although it took some doing, I finally got my photos in order. My biggest drawback was the music. I could not upload the music that I wanted, so I used one from the list of options from Animoto. I chose to use the photos from the last event at the Clarksville Jaycees Activity Center which is soon to be demolished to make way for the new marina. It has served this community for 25 years. The Cookin' Colonels decided that we would send it off in style with one more social, a BBQ dinner for both active and old Jaycee and Jaycette members who aged out of the organization. This film is a tribute to those members. Many fond memories of during those last 25 years.

The End of an Era

Thing #20

I have been familiar with You Tube for some time now. I have many friends who send me email with videos attached or links to them. Some are informative, some humorous and a few risque. I have conducted a search on World War II and General Patton. I found a series of vignettes on Patton and the accuracy of the screenplay from the movie. The series is entitled History Through the Lens: Patton-A Rebel Revisited. The link that I chose is Part 5 which discusses Patton's North Africa campaign and his rivalry with General Bernard Montgomery.

http://http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnN5OUV5MEw

Unfortunately, the embedded code was disabled by the author, which prevented me from adding the actual video.

Thing #19

As mentioned in previous postings, I now belong to Facebook and to Teacher Pop. There were several communities that I found appealing. The two food communities would really appeal to my wife. I like them for the possibilities of new grilling recipes. We are always looking for new ideas for the grill. I also like the movie and music communities. I mentioned in a previous post about fm.com that I was impressed with being able to locate a song and the album or disc on which it is recorded. Again, most of this is new to me so anything that I discover will probably be of use to me in some form or fashion.

Thing #18

I have not been one to join any of these social networking sites. However, I can see the importance of understanding the innerworkings of these sites. While students view these as a manner of posting the fun things that they have done, educators must teach their students that they must update their sites with care. One wrong posting or publishing can land them more trouble than they can imagine. The development of social skills is important, but they must understand that social responsibility is also important. I joined Facebook because of its ease of moving about. However, I am having trouble with a portion of it; and still awaiting a responsef from them to correct it. It is amazing that you can add photos, text, video, etc to your site. This could be a useful tool for contacting students regarding missed assignments, or posting additional information regarding current assignments. Overall, I can see some benefits to this application if properly used.

Not a Thing

This has nothing to do with the 23 things. However, if you do not have access to the Clarksville Leaf Chronicle, you can go to Delicious and type in Cookin' and see where I was this past weekend. I actually utilized this for practice.

Thing #17

I checked all the listed resources, Del.icio.us, Furl, and Ma.gnolia. The one that I found the easiest to use was Del.icio.us. I like the storage ability and capacity of this tool. I went ahead and created an account for my own use. The use of tags allows me assort and categorize different web sites without conflicting with my own Favorites tab on my home page. This can be used to several ways for the classroom. As mentioned in the tutorial, one is the accessibility to the web sites by other teachers for their use as well as adding their own discoveries to the list of sites. It can also be used by students for their own research or learning activities. Overall, this can be really useful in the classroom as well as for personal use.

Thing #16

Like Tink, I had already set up iGoogle as my productivity tool. I do like the fact that I now have a bar that has news, sports, weather updates, etc. which can be accessed directly from my desktop. I had already chosen Google calendar for a previous exercise. Therefore, I selected Sticky Notes. I find myself sometimes forgetting something of importance, that may get left off the calendar. With Sticky Notes, if I should think of something that needs to be addressed, I can make myself a note and then put it on my computer. Hey I can even send my wife a note to remind her that she needs to leave work and come home (she sometimes gets a bit wrapped up in her work at AAFES). I can see both of these tools being useful in the classroom, especially when something of importance needs to be addressed, or when an event occurs that may be of interest to the class.