Future Intentions and New Year's Resolutions

I am pretty sure that I intend to keep writing this blog.  Even though my one constant reader (albeit forced b/c he has to read it) will now be gone because I have finished the 23 things project. Good Night Mr. Anderson where ever you are!  I want to have my thoughts handy since I have so few of them and It will be a good way to record my successes, failures and self-flagellations, and "finds" here in Oz.  New Year's resolutions:  Educationally I would like to more fully integrate technology in my classroom and to give my students more choices. I have some sort of fitness, mental health, nutrition resolution but it is not yet fully formed.  I'll get back to you on that.  Here is a link to my classroom blog,There Are No Excuses .  Hopfully this will be one of the success stories.  Happy last day of 2009 and Blessings in the New Year!!  By the way, Avatar is awesome!  Saw it in 3-D  liked it (:  Was going to add a picture from the movie how do you know what yu can use and what you can't on the web??? Next tothe picture it said may be subject to copyright.  What is that?!! I thought it was a YES of NO thing???   HELP

Apologies to Edublog

Well I feel that I must apologize to Edublog.  I still can not get the batch feature to work where you can add 15 users at a time but I did successfully add my students individually so I'm happy.

Twitter found resources

Here are several are resources posted in recent Tweets.  http://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dhn2vcv5_106c9fm8j  44 things to make use of interactive white board.  Some were presented in Mr. Anderson's smart board lesson class but there are also many things that are new to me.

http://ow.ly/PJxI  How to learn without memorizing.

 http://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dhn2vcv5_435hgx9r8gz  14 ways to support writing.

Follow The Yellow Brick Road

I wish I had a bunch of Munchkin helpers:Had to add a couple of pictures that I just uploaded.  That has gotten easier on Flicker since the last time that I did it.  They've changed the website I think.  I like blogging and I hope that I can bring this experience to my students.  Still waiting on edublogger(at this point the Wiched Whitch of the West and her flying monkeys!!).  I have to be honest I have not checked my news reader in several weeks.  That's going to be ugly!  The last time I went through it I marked a number of posts that had great ideas in them.  Have not got back to review those ideas.  I enjoyed this class because it forced me to take time to learn new things about technology.  I intend to keep learning about how technology can enhance my teaching and I think that the RSS feed and twitter will help me do that.  I think I need to set realistic goals and keep trying to add one new thing and then another new thing and eventually I will have a large number of technology tools in my toolbox.  My first goal is to get my classroom blog up and running and to get blogs for my students.  Technology will also be integrated into my students 8th grade research project.  We'll see what happens after that. 

The Lion, the Scarecrow and  Tinman: My favorite exercises were Flickr, blogging, Twitter for the PLN aspect and delicious. 

How to keep a house from falling on you: The thing that I found most surprising was how MUCH there is to explore, learn and use pertaining to technology.  This class has made me realize that I will continue to need to take technology classes and/or keep exploring as new things are constantly being created. 


Visiting Emerald City: I liked the freedom to work on this project at my own pace.  There were a few times when I wished that I had been in a classroom so that I could have gotten help immediately but Mr. Anderson you were very prompt with replies to questions I had, I don't know how you could have done any better. 

Ruby Slippers:  It's nice tht the Emerald City is only a click away, but there's no place like home and I have to make a cake for tomorrow.  I had a good time and I learned a great deal. I hope everyone that's not reading this has a happy holiday season and to you Mr. Anderson all the best and thank you very much for being Glinda we'll change the spelling to Glenda, emphasis on the Glen  and guiding us on our journey down the yellow brick road (:    How is this for corny I'm going all out!!!







Over  The Rainbow:  See you down the road...

Montreal 2009 160

Montreal 2009 160, originally uploaded by noradearborn423.

Botanical Garden in Motreal 2009

Roll Roll Rolling along

Well I made a search roll. I am happy to have this tool. The search roll I made is called Math games. I now need to learn how to add sites to this search roll, beyond the ones that would fit in the box. I can see this tool being useful in finding resources/activities for the classroom. Here is the link: http://www.rollyo.com/index.html  the one that says math games is the one I made.

Buyer beware I have not actually tried this to see what happens. Duh, probably should have done that before writing this post. Well I will do it and if there are "issues" I'll let you know.

I DO have isues with EDUBLOG!!!! I paid to be a subscriber so that ads could be blocked from blogs that I want to create for my students but I can't get it to work. After a great deal of searching (I read advice from the forum and followed it to no avail) I found a discription of how to email them directly but am still waiting for a reply. I have to say that while I know 39.95 doesn't buy much these days I wish that it bought a direct email link or a telephone number to call if you have a problem. I think I had to work too hard to find help with something that I paid for, but maybe I'm being Scroogy! Maybe I'm just dumb and should be able to figure it out on my own? I don't care I'm blaming them. I feel better now.

Update on Twitter. I found a REALLY great resource for practicing reading fluency and/or language learning (ESL) from someone that I am following on twitter. Unfortunately I can't remember who it was and I can't find the original tweet!! I need to search again but here is a link to the sight: http://www.englishcentral.com/en/videos Students can watch movie clips and other video clips from a wide variety of sources. They can stop the clip after each sentence and then listen to it, slow it down, get words defined etc. When they are ready they can record themselves reading the sentence and get a score. Then they can go back and listen to each word as the recording said it and as they said it. If I find it I'll retweet it as I have not retweeted yet.

I love BOOKS

I wish I had time to sit here and put all the books that I've read into Shelfari and to put in all the ones that I want to read!!! It will be a great way to keep track of what I've read if I take the time to put in notes about the book. I did not do that with the ones that I entered because I know them well and like them tremendously.


I got my picture to upload!!!! all the other sites will not take my pictures because the file is too large and they don't automatically crop it to the required size. When I tried to edit a picture for my classroom blog I was not successful. Frustrated yes, successful NO!! This is something that I still need to learn.



http://www.shelfari.com/ is a link to shelfari but I have a felling that it will not go to my shelf of books. Lets find out

Weird and Fun

http://www.exopolis.com/holiday/2007/factory.html#a=fem&l=nutcracker&t=steam&hd=samurai Make your own dancing robot!!! Fun
http://www.onlyknives.com/diy-kung-fu-movie-script/ Make your own Kung fu movie script: funny I liked this.


http://www.letterjames.com/products-overview/personalized-images-e-cards.html?cat=1&inscribe=439&oldpicid=1261513397-81257-97818 Add text to images at letter james, I did not really care for this one.


http://www.pqdvd.com/flashediter/edit.php singing pictures would be fun to send for various occasions.



http://bighugelabs.com/ This is my favorite and we looked at this site before. You can design movie posters, make collages and many other things. You can link it to your flickr account and use your own pictures to create things. Very Cool!! Still my favorite!

All of these sites were fun and I can see myself using them to add things to lessons using the interactive white board. I did not try to add these things I'm just hoping that when I try to I will be able to!!!

Twitter Twaining Twuely Tantalizing

I enjoyed a number of the 25 things to do with Twitter in the classroom from writing stories, to updating parents about ongoing events in the classroom and field trips. I can see it being a very useful tool. As a way of engaging students in learning I think it would be beneficial. I also think that it will help me as an educator to learn about what is working for other teachers. I joined a Twitter group with a LARGE number of educators. SO I expect that i should check my tweets more often that I have been!

I have to go to twitterfall.com to see what that is about. And I still have to try and get my classroom blog up and running. Which is what I'm going to check on right now.
Merry Christmas!

Twitterpated

I'm on vacation!!! And hopefully today will finish up this 23 things project, which is the beginning and not the end of my explorations into technology. I signed up for a Twitter account, which was easy. I think I understand how it works. I have gone back and looked at some of ny tweets. I an comfused as to why I am receiving twitter info in my email instead of just on my twitter page? Also I TRIED to put a picture of myself on my profile to no avail. I am going to try again today at some point to see if I can figure it out. IF not I will be sending you know who another email.

Speaking of Mr. Anderson, I appreciate your tweet about dealing with being overwhelmed a skill. Clearly one I need to work on (:
so I will not say anything about the fact that this is how I feel, but excited also! I sent out a tweet this morning and I am interested to see if I get any responses back to my question. I definitely like all of the resources that can be found through twitter and the idea of a personal learning network. I don't know what I would have to offer others in return. I'm a newbie and it seems like at least for a while it will be a one sided relationship. Are there expectations of me as a participant? Curious about this as I feel that one more expectation just might send me over the edge. Is there a class to learn how to deal with being overwhelmed in many areas of your life? Maybe I need to go back to therapy!

Tasty!

Delicious! I imported my favorites from my home computer which is where I am right now. Home sweet home which I have not seen enough of this week. The eighth grade dance last night was not a big success, We need to come up with another way to make money, preferably one that doesn't involve being at school until 9:30 at night!!! I really like being able to have access to my favorite from any computer and if people in my building started using this it would be a great resource. Before when I would research web sites for school from home I would have to email the site to myself, now I can just bookmark it. A TIME SAVER (:

I bookmarked your bookmarks Mr. Anderson, a treasure trove!! Also bookmarked one of your bookmarks, technology integration as I would like to do a project that integrates technology this year. Yes I know I should be doing this already, I did one last year but I am looking to expand my horizons and go for two, maybe three. This is a sad number compared to what some teachers do but I have to start somewhere. Finally I went to popular and read a post about the 10 ways social media will change in the future and comments by others. Social media will definitly change the way we communicate, access information and access products and services.

I forgot my pail and shovel

I should have brought my pail and shovel! I can see where this would be a great resource if you were collaborating on a project with people that you had never met it would be a way to get to know each other.

It was very easy to participate. Maybe I'm getting better? I am however having a hard time coming up with any more feedback about it. My puppies found homes!!! One went to Maine with my sister. The other two went to a no-kill shelter in Arrarat, VA. They weilll stay there till they find adoptive parents. It's not too late to get a PUPPY! How was that for something completely off topic...

My Eyes are Burning!!!

No, I didn't see anything inappropriate on a Wiki, I'm just REEEEAALLLY tired(: I bookmarked the 21centuryedtech wiki and the Bear Den wiki. the Bear Den wiki has several great rubrics for note taking which is something that we will be doing when we do our 8th grade research project. I did not read a great deal on the 21st century wiki but I would like to go back to it. I like the idea of a wiki space. I liked the Bear Den use of the Wiki as an organizational tool so that things students need are all organized and put in one place. I can see myself using a wiki for this as I have a horrible ability to lose a piece of paper (Or a whole stack) in less than a minute!!!!! I would love to use the wiki for collaboration and writing but I fear that my students would not be able to stop themselves from writing something inappropriate or erasing someone else's work. I wonder how difficult it is to monitor as I have organizational skills issues as already mentioned. I am going to find out what our policies are pertaining to wikis, and see if anyone else in our building uses one. Yes this is all one big long paragraph and because this is not a wiki you can't go in and edit it for me and I am too tired to do it (:
Peace

There are Books Out There

I am excited about the websites that offer free e-books. I don't know that much about adolescent literature that would be available free because there is no more copy write law. I liked the site, great big library that cost 12.95 per month for one classroom. I did not look into it extensively but I like the fact that they have children's books online for a low cost because then the students could have the books read to them using a reader which I'm assuming that we will find out about sooner or later in this class. Many of my students struggle with reading and do not do enough of it. They do like it if I read to them and they like a good story. I Think they would listen.

I really liked the British On-line Library and the ability to see and hear famous books and have them explained. I can see this being useful in Social Studies for primary sources and for a comparative religion class.

Many Books on the places to get free books looks similar to the other free ebooks web sites in the titles that they offer. I thought the Book crossing website was fun. Leaving books in different places for others to pick up read and then leave for someone else. it would be interesting to see where a book might end up. I would like to look into this.