THING 13 - Tagging and Discover Del-icio-us

The Del-icio-us information was easily understood and presented in a straight forward way - should be easy to use throughout the school year. This tool has unlimited opportunities in the classroom. Depending on what is being researched, this can definitely narrow down and limit the direction we send our students. Their time in the lab is limited enough - this will help make their time used for research more efficient. I have a teacher based webpage where this could also be posted for at-home use for those MANY (....right....) students that continue their work outside of class - kindof like the good old days when they all LOVED doing homework. As for our librarian - I would think this could save a ton of time. Our wonderful librarian already pulls and organizes research tools for us for any given unit. This could certainly save some time for her as well as the teacher and student - pull together a list, post it and the numbers able to access at any one moment are unlimited.

THING 12 - Creating Community Through Comment

Well, what do you know - in my past post, I was just saying I wanted to add a widget for the bookshelf, and I found it on this activity. There's so much to learn about a blog! There were many great tips and comments about comments....I found it interesting and probably very true, that one blogger said "make it easy". People are less likely to comment if they are required to log in each time. Sounds lazy, but I've been that way once or twice and have certainly heard similar comments from others that do not like having to create users/passwords to access so many sites. I think a second tip that seemed VERY good was that one should make a point to return the comment - let someone know you are reading the words they took time to say regarding your blog.
As the game has been going on, it has been easy to make comments along the way. I would say I've met and passed the "5 comment requirement" here. It is surprising how interesting it is to read others' words and to want to share with a total stranger your thoughts about that they said. It's in doing this that I found the bookshelf widget.

http://expertvoices.nsdl.org/middle-school-math-science/2008/08/01/math-starters-projects-to-begin-the-year/ is a great blog for ideas and motivation.
http://today.ttu.edu/2008/07/this-one-really-is-rocket-science/ is another blog of interest. I didn't take too much time to check it out but will keep it as a reference.

THING 11 - Library Thing

I found Library Thing to be a great tool. What a great way to share your favorite books as well as find out about others that would share a common interest. When viewing other blogger's libray lists, I ran across one blog that showed an actual bookcase in the right column, with each book "placed" on the bookshelf. While the book reviews are of interest, and the purpose here, I am now curious as to how to get a bookshelf to show up on my blog.

http://www.librarything.com/home/elewis5103 - I've just picked a few books for now, but will add more titles as time goes on and share with friends. I would like to create a second profile for student/teacher use. I will post books relevant to our topics at the time, both fiction and non-fiction. This seems like a wonderful tool for a Language Arts teacher to use with her class - maybe even set up a profile for each class period so students can enter their personal reads and compare to those of their peers.

THING 10 - Online Image Generator

This set of links could become addicting and very fun!!! So many neat tricks and links to check out.

http://www.imagechef.com/ - this is where I was able to write in the sand and wish you were all here to enjoy the continued days of 100+ temperatures....all without having to lug my camera or jeopardize getting it wet. I was also also able to permanently mark the engagement of Katy and Nick. Yes, Mr. Oliver, it's finally here!!!! Congratulations to the happy Spring Oaks couple.

On the "BigHugeLabs" site, I continued playing with the jigsaw maker from Thing # 6. Seems like that would make a great gift for a younger child in the Christmas stocking, or even a fun thing to use in the classroom in place of flashcards. While I am typing, I am trying to convert an image into "bead art" and it seems to be taking a very long time. . . and here it is many minutes later....

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/beads.php is the link to do this, and the effect is pretty interesting, but be prepared to wait awhile for it to complete its things. Of course, a larger view makes the image that much more interesting as well.

THING 9: Useful Libary Related Blogs and News Feeds

Edublog awards was very interesting and easy to find things that suited my personal needs. It doesn't get any easier than Topix.net. The use of this site to identify a topic and isolate it to an area makes this very student friendly. Atomic Learning was not as helpful to me, or maybe I'm still in that "confused" state.

I ran across this link in my playing - http://expertvoices.nsdl.org/middle-school-math-science/feed/ - seems very interesting and one that I might access often when the new year begins.

While doing this activity, I added several feeds to my reader and will go back to sort, add and edit later when things slow down.

Just thought I'd add a photo I ran across while going through this activity. This is a shot of Mt. Hood in Oregon. I arrived here two days ago to visit my daughter and this is one of the views I have from where we are. Mt. St. Helens is also in view as are two other nearby volcanoes. What a GREAT place and what fun it would be for students from flat, hot Houston, with its limited geology, to experience.

THING 8: RSS Feeds and Readers

This is one Google tool I had not practiced with. I linked to the Google Reader instead of picking one of the others to utilize. This one became a little frustrating. The download times and the times to manage shared articles both bogged down my computer. I am certain it's something I was doing wrong, but will need to focus on that later when the crunch is over (remember the four days left from the previous post??)

I like the idea of having a streamed topic that can be accessed, where updated information regarding one theme is posted. This could be very helpful in the classroom to stay updated with events pertaining to our instruction. Something as simple as selecting "volcanoes" or "hurricanes" could be a quick way to keep students updated on the world around them while consolidating a group of recent events to eliminate search time.

On our campus, there are opportunities to send groups of students to the library while the teacher remains in the classroom for continued instruction. Our library could have RSS feeds set up using ouur suggested topics, allowing students to do their research but not waste limited time doing so. I can see this helping students feel more comfortable with their research as well as they can feel more successful with little to no guidance necessary.

I definitely need to revisit this THING later and refine my created reader.

THING 7: Cool Google Tools

FINALLY back on board. The summer has been overwhelming and busy with events so now it's time to crunch and see if I can finish the Library2Play in the next four days. Here goes.....

Thing 7 is actually pretty easy. So many of these items I've been using for quite awhile. I have a Google calendar already, which is not so impressive. For my summer employment, we switched to Google and gmail last summer to coordinate our team's work. We each use the Google spreadsheet to submit our daily report, which is viewable by all team members. When a report or document is due by all, and if we are unable to meet, we create the initial document in Google documents, post it in our gmail and each of us adds or changes our items of input. VERY handy and a great way to consider planning and working together at school with fellow teachers. We aren't all off at the same time, and some do their planning from home. What a great way to extend our communication and planning!!

For several years, our classroom has used Google Earth. If there is an event going on, as with earthquakes, volcanoes, or last spring's big Texas sinkhole, we just click on the globe, zoom in on our location and off we go. The students seem very impressed, and yes we ALWAYS have to zoom in on the teacher's roof to show where she lives....they just seem to think that's cool and that somehow they know some top secret information.

I have albums posted on Picasa from various trips that I share with family, and if they are on topic with a lesson, then they are quick and easy to share with the students.

I could go on, as most of the tools from Google have been user friendly and very convenient for things going on for me at work and home.

Check out http://www.13nightsontheriver.com/. The image above is this summer's poster advertisement - details are posted on my "shared" calendar and a Picasa album is soon to follow. I'm in Oregon at the moment, and the scenery and weather are unbelievable.