Thing 17-Tagging and Social Bookmarking

I would like to mention that I benefit substantially from any of these activities that contain a video. It helps me to understand more thoroughly the activity we are about to explore.  This activity was mind boggling to say the least. I became lost and waylaid in all the sites. It never ceases to amaze me how much information is out there. I can see all the possibilities of and the potential of a bookmarking tool in the classroom. It reminded me of  an organizer of outside sources all brought together for a useful purpose. It also enables you to share with other educators. I would be interested in exploring this one further.

Thing 16-Get Organized

Wow! Finally something I can most definitely use! I couldn't decide to use Remember the Milk or IGoogle. I will explore both of these and make a decision on which one I prefer. I do like the gmail coming up on IGoogle. Since I use Google for almost everything, I tend to lean toward it. The calendars can be useful to me to keep track of everything in my daily life. I am a chronic organizer so I feel I could make use of one of these. Maybe creating an IGoogle account to use in a classroom may be beneficial to keep up with daily tasks. It could possibly be used instead of a classroom website. I don't think my classroom could use it but I feel rooms with older students could. I did like the to-do lists. Either of these could be used at home or in the classroom. When I decide the one I want, I will put it up as my home page.

Thing-15 What in the world is a Wiki?

For some odd reason this was easy for me. I would probably never use it but I can understand how it would be of substantial use to many teachers. It could also be used among older students to share ideas and group projects. The list is endless. I enjoyed looking at other student's classroom ideas. This appeared to be the most user friendly tool I have seen by far. This is something I may want to use in my personal life.

Thing 14 Exploring bubbl.us and Gliffy

That was an experience. Once I got started I was able to maneuver the tools in Gliffy to create somewhat of a floor plan. I am wondering if perhaps we could use this for when we design our imaginary classroom plans. That could be something I could do. I also tried out bubbl.us to make a flow chart. I created my family for fun. This I could see as being useful in the classroom even with my small students. You could use it with numbers, letters, colors and many more thing the children need to know. You could make it like a game they could play.I had a fun time moving the charts from once place to another.

Thing 13 Google Docs and Zoho

 I was able to create this on Google Docs, but unable to cut the handles from it. They were not on it when I used the snipping tool. I used way too much time here. I can use this tool too many places for it to benefit me here. I spent two hours on this project. As far as I can tell it would not benefit me to use either. I do not care to have all of my folders together. I did my best to try to complete what the assignment was asking for but it was difficult. I don't care to download things on to my new computer that I probably will not use. I can understand the benefits these programs can have for teachers teaching older students. I had not ever experimented with the tools to share documents. I have not been able to figure out how to share a document. I will come back to this if time allows and work on it further. I was expecting this to be easier as I am familiar with Google. I have yet to experience what all Google has to offer.

Thing 12-Google is Not Just for Searching...

I am officially a google fan.  I set up an Igoogle page, and I enjoyed exploring the tools.  I want to explore more and become more comfortable with this resource, but so far I've put a recipe for the day and dictionary word of the day on my page.  I could possibly set up a separate page for parents and students in my classroom.  I could post helpful links to other resources and post daily information such as homework, classroom activities, etc.

I also looked at google translate.  This would be a great tool for ELL students and their parents.  It is so simple to use.  I typed in different phrases and could choose to translate from English to Spanish and Spanish to English.  I have used other sites for translation, but it looks like I never have to leave google for anything.  With the ability to use the RSS feeds, blog-finders, and the tools found in this assignment, google brings everything to me.  I had no idea that all of these resources were available.

Thing 11-Finding Good Feeds

Google search was definitely my favorite blog search tool.  I did like the fact that Topix immediately showed local information.  I thought that was helpful.  Technorati was too much for me because there was so much information.  I prefer simple, so I'll stick with google.  I was able to find many blogs that were interesting and useful for both personal interests and professional interests in education.  It is amazing that I can find a blog for virtually any topic.  As far as the field of education, it's great to know that when I'm looking for information on a particular topic, I can bet on the fact that there will be current, valuable help out there in the blog world.