Is It the End, or Only the Beginning?

Wow!  I do not think I have ever been so relieved of completing an assignment.  No offense.  I have literally worked on the last section of the "things" I had left all day.  Comparing this to the first part, I find these last ones more addicting and less time consuming.  It is almost midnight and I have been working on the last half since about three o'clock.  I did not expect to get done today, but I just could not put my laptop down. 

During this journey of 23 Things some of my favorite exercises consisted of video animation, photo animation, the flow chart and mind map, Delicious, and the Wiki.  So many resources were offered within this program that I plan to use for educational purposes one day.  Some of the "things" I absolutely hated, but there were several that I plan to use to benefit my learning experiences and my future classroom lessons.  Before this program I honestly had know idea of the limitless resources avaliable to teachers. 

I plan to maintain my blog to create it into something I can use for when I become a secondary teacher.  Blogging provides numerous oppotunities to collaborate and share ideas.  As a future educator, I want my students to learn through today's world and interaction.  I plan to continue blogging and providing videos and other resources for my future students.  It is very important to me to provide my students the opportunity to expand their styles of learning.  That is exactly what I plan to do, and I would not have background knowledge if it were not for this tutorial of 23 Things.

Thing 23

The attribution that I chose was the Creative Commons video from YouTube.  I had no idea that this is what the class and 23 Things was all about.  As I progressed in my blogging, I was wondering how all of this was possible.  Now, I have a better understanding of how it is acceptable.  Everything through this blog was a useful resource created with Creative Commons.  There were some tools I was not fond of, but others were very beneficial.  Also, through reading about the Creative Commons I realized that not only APSU formatted this for the 23 Things, it has been shared from school to school to help benefit aspiring Educators using Creative Commons.  Creative Commons was a great tool for interacting and learning right from wrong when it comes to technological tools and how to appropriately share others information.

Thing 22

In this "thing" we created three livebinders.  I had never heard of this website or tool, but I found it to be one of my favorites.  It provided more acurate resources than Google has, and Google has always been my favorite.  Once I found the resources, I was able to save them in the livebinders for future references.  I really wish I would have done this blog a long time ago before I completed my INTASC Notebook for my 3070 class. 

The three livebinders that I created were titled:
1. INTASC Standards
2. Teaching Tips for First Years
3. 4-8 Lesson Plans

4–8 Lesson Plans

The livebinder I shared within this blog was my 4-8 lesson plans.  I chose this one because I do plan to use this tool when I begin teaching and even for future projects with my Education classes.  This is such a fantastic tool to save resources for a specific topic.  I plan to incoporate this within my classroom for lesson planning, interactive activities, parent communication, teaching tips, and much more.  I absolutely love this web tool and plan to use it to keep track of my findings according to categories.

Thing 21

I absolutely loved Animoto.  It was very simple to create an account and get started.  At first I was nervous though because I thought you had to pay for it, and I was not happy about that.  But I overlooked the trial.  Oops! All of the pictures I used were from my Facebook albums.  I chose the vintage background and kept the music that came with it.  It was very girly and relaxing.  This would be a cool tool for students to create personalized videos for group projects.  These videos could be used to be posted on a teacher blog for parents and students to access.  Also, it would be a wonderful idea for open house nights and other Educational gatherings.  I feel that it is important for Educators to stay connected with engaging and interactive tools for students to make learning fun.  The world is advancing quickly with technology, and students will be more apt to performing higher when it is something of interest rather than lecture material.

Thing 20

I went a little different on this "thing" then focusing merely on Education. The video I chose was a program that came to my high school called Between the Barrels. This program presented to schools all across the state of Tennessee and I was a guest speaker for them. The program informs students about teen driving and precautions to take while driving with friends, drinking and driving, or slowing down during construction areas.

This is only one part of the program but it was very informative for students to raise awareness in order to save lives. This video was filmed almost three years ago, but the program still presents every year during the Spring. I have always been a huge fan for YouTube because it is where I gain all of my videos and podcasts for presentations. This is a great tool for resources for students and teachers.

Thing 19

Seriously, how cool is it that APSU has their own website "TeacherPop?"  Way cool!  This has probably been one of my favorite social networking experiences thus far with "things."  Whoever created the TeacherPop for APSU expanded the unlimited opportunities for students in the Education program to network.  Currently the online communities I am a part of are Facebook, Pinterest, Wiki, Diigo, and YouTube.


All of these I find appealing because they are a great tool for Educators and peers to swap ideas and share socially.  Pinterest is my favorite of all of these because it is a virtual pinboard.  Everything that is pinned has a category it falls under and once you click on it, it leads to a blog or website for "how to tutorials."  Recently I have enjoyed Wiki as well for collaborating on group projects.  All of these mentioned are great tools for future resources in the classroom.  Each of them in a different aspect than another, but I plan to incorporate them all.

Thing 18

http://www.facebook.com/groups/137494276493/#!/profile.php?id=1182268628

It is important for teachers to know about social networking sites because it is a great way to expand your opportunities.  Social Networking has countless resources available for teachers and aspiring teachers.  Today's society is becoming more and more technologically advanced so it is vital for teachers to understand how it works aside from resources. 

I have had a facebook since I was in high school, so I am not new to it.  However, I did just recently add the College of Education onto my friends.  This is a great way for me to keep posted on things I need to do to prepare myself to graduate.  Also, it has valuable resources for Educational purposes.  I did not create a Twitter because I refuse to have one.  That probably sounds silly, but with Facebook I just do not see the point.  I feel that Facebook is a good tool for teachers to create an Educational page for students to access compared to Twitter.

Thing 17

Surprisingly I did not have a Delicious account.  Now, I am so excited to explore the possibilities this website has to offer.  The bookmark that I chose was "teachertube" because we have talked about this in my other classes.  So, I was some what familiar with it.  The more I searched and explored the teachertube I found it absolutely wonderful!  I am not sure how this could be incorporated into the classroom besides another option for furthering research.  As for teachers, this is a great tool to ellaborate on ideas and gain useful resources to use within your own classroom.

Thing 16

I chose iGoogle for my starting point for this post.  I am addicted to Google so I did not want to explore beyond familiarity.  From my home page, the gadgets I chose were the calender, weather, and to do list.  Each of these I use daily from my phone so I figured why not set my homepage to the things I need reminded of daily as well.  The online calender and to do list are going to be very helpful because I literally live out of my paperback planner/calender. 

I type faster than I write, so these online tools are definitely going to save me time.  Both of them I found time consuming because I detail everything.  So using these it is still taking me time to insert everything I want, but it will be worth it once I am finished updating it.  I would recommend both of these tools for future Educators because it is a great way to remain organized and productive in what needs to be done.  You can set time limits for yourself to complete what needs to be done.

Thing 15

With this specific "thing" I lucked up because I have recently used a Wiki for my 3040 group presentation.  The topic we were assigned to present on was Social Networking in Education.  The main part of our presentation was on the Wiki and how we collaborated our ideas and edited things throughout our presentation.  After the project was over I asked how they had heard about Wiki because I was so fascinated with it and they explained they had previously had this class.  I thought that was pretty cool.

I think that using a Wiki within the classroom is a wonderful idea for students to collaborate on group projects.  Often when students are placed in groups either one person does all of the work or it is hard for students to meet outside of school time.  By including the Wiki into project based assessments students can sign in without having to meet to share their information for their project.  Also, for teachers to assess the amount of work each student places into it the students could color coordinate their information in the Wiki by a different color for each person.  I absolutely love using the Wiki and definitely plan to incorporate it into the classroom.

Here is the link for the Wiki my group used for our presentation (not all of it is still on here though) but you get the idea :)

http://edgroupproject.wikispaces.com/

Thing 14

For this blog, I chose to use Bubbl.us and Gliffy to create a flow chart and mind map. Both of these tools were pretty simple to follow and create charts and maps. However, Bubble.us was my favorite out of the two that I chose. Gliffy was a bit challenging I feel for students to use with short class periods. However, Bubble.us was a simple mind map that the students could add information breaking it down into different boxes connecting it to a starting point word.

The differences I noticed were that with the flow charts you orignated from one specific point and progressed outward from that topic. With mind maps, you could add as many boxes anywhere you needed to insert information. The item I chose to share was a mind map on Cultural Diversity since I just recently did a lesson plan and based the standard on for my livetext project.

https://bubbl.us/

Thing 13

As I explored both Zoho and Google Docs, I realized that Zoho was very similar to Microsoft Word. Zoho provided a tutorial in how to use it, and I felt that for the most part I already knew how to create documents with it. So, I decided to move on to Google Docs because I am a huge Google fan but have never used this application. Using Google Docs I created a drawing using word art and pictures. I feel that my future students would agree with me that out of these two applications Google Doc is more fun. Students could use Google Docs in various ways for presentations, projects, and research. Here is my link for my creation and one of the images I created.

https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/1Y0zsi34t7V7bgyoD6uA_awDNLKfBXS6yl8c9FGRc_P0/edit

Thing 12

I use Google about as much as I bathe.  I am constantly using Google for research, random questions, and since I do not like adding pages to my home page, I go to Google to shortcut it.  The two tools that I decided to use were google translate and google calender.  With the google translate, I am kind of disappointed I did not know about it sooner.  This would have been a great tool in high school while learning Spanish.  It is a great tool that if I have students or parents where English is not there first language, this tool WILL be extremely useful.  Also, if students are not clicking with a foreign language, this website would be beneficial for practicing. 

I am new to the google calender, but I am all for it now that I am signed up.  I created an account and typed in something just to see how it works.  This can be useful for educators in maintaining organization rather than a bunch of post-it notes with important dates.  If anyone is like me, I have a paper calender with post-it notes on almost everyday.  The calender can be created and posted within a blog for students and parents to easily access.  The teacher could provide important dates that are within that month and due dates for assignments as well.  I am considering converting my paper calender into this google calender.  Less writing and more typing, yes please!!!


Here are links to my creations:
https://www.google.com/calendar/render?gsessionid=OK

http://translate.google.com/#auto|es|Hello%2C%20my%20name%20is%20Ariel.

Thing 11

I absolutely LOVED edublog!!! It had a column on the side of topics to pick from, then it lists the people in ABC order.  That is definitely my cup of easy!!! I love web pages that do not take you through tedious methods to get to what you need.  This web page was set up very well, anything I wanted to know or read on was right there in order.  Topix was another interesting one.  It was very informative on news and discussions that were occurring in the city I am in.  This would be a VERY useful tool if I were to plan to go out of the country, or an unfamiliar state.  This website could show me the gossip about a town that I would want to know, before I even got there.  How cool is that???  Technorati was the most confusing to me.  It provided a lot of options on what topics to pick, news, celebrity, politics, and such.  It probably had interesting blogs provided within it, but if I did not have an assigned topic it would take me a while to figure out what I wanted to look at.

Thing 10

RSS and newsreaders frustrated me at first.  I was trying to "sign-up" and some how I was already signed into the google reader without even knowing I had signed up.  This caught me off guard, so I literally signed out and retyped the website to make sure I was seeing it clearly.  Some way or another, I already had an account prior to this "thing."  Once I moved on I also realized I had website links that I had already been following.  I think this formed from websites that I have blogged on or repinned stuff on.  I like the fact that you do not have to click 100 times to get what you want or back click a million times to get back, everything you are interested in is right in front of you.

For educational purposes, I could see using this as a form of limited research for my students.  I could gather educational websites they can add and use for research projects.  That would allow supervision on the internet and a more hand-on approach for students.  Teachers could use this for their personal use to finding quick research for lesson plan ideas or fun projects for students.  Linking and making connections amongst other educators can open the doors to many opportunities for teaching.

Thing 9

The links I used to process my images were comic strip generator and image chef.  I must admit that this has been my least favorite "thing."  Anytime I tried generating stuff it froze my laptop and half the time would close out on me, or click to something totally different then what I was doing.  However, there were a few that I liked.  The comic one I could use as a daily humor on education for my children to lighten the mood everyday.  For them to use, they could take a lesson we plan to cover and get in groups to create a comic series on it.  That may help engage them in what they are learning and help them remember key aspects if they make funny notes about them.  I also posted the "post-it note" because I use those for everything, literally.  Those will definitely be a vital material for me when I begin teaching.  When I was in school, we had a teacher who used post-its for almost everything.  Mostly they were on her desk for memorandums, but sometimes she would give them to us for group projects.  Using blogs with students and parents, I feel a computer generized post-it would stand out on the page if you had something important to relay.

Thing 4

Most everybody uses some form of Social Networking.  Whether it be texting, facebook, twitter, or email; communicating with other people is important.  Building relationships within those social networks can expand your connections with anything.  In today's society, networking is bringing about numerous ways of communication.  It is important that we become aware on how to communicate properly via internet.  Most professors are going to email you, it is important that you know how to properly communicate back.  Talking on the phone has become way more advanced then putting it to your ear, there are head sets, text messaging, emailing, etc. that will effect how the person receiving the message takes into persepctive.  The video Professor Wall showed us in class over powerpoints sums up some key points when using the internet as an effective tool for communication.

Through the readings I feel the most important findings were being humble and being controversial.  People want to hear life lessons or stories.  If people can relate to what you are writing, they are more than likely going to spark an interest.  I know with me, I look for something to link to that hits home, rather than something I have know experience with.  Also, there are tons of people out there who love a good argument, make your discussions controversial.  Who knows, maybe you will learn something new from someone else's perpective.

The 7 people I chose to follow are:
1. Allie Burkepile
2. Stephen Forrester
3. Erica Paredrez
4. Daniel Cozine
5. Nick Caudill
6. Janelle Ferrier
7. Colby Moates

I chose these people because I have had classes with them.  Choosing people I know, or can at least place a face with a name to makes me feel more comfortable establishing blog posts with them.  As I was looking through some of their blogs, I noticed I shared similiar ideas with each of them.  That is very important to me when posting on someone's comments.

Thing 8

Using the Mosaic Maker I created this collage on diversity. My standard I picked for livetext focuses on cultural diversity for 6th grade Social Studies. I found this source very neat in creating a collage that children can physically view and come up with ideas and questions about what is right in front of them.  This will definitely be useful for educators. You can take ideas and place them into a collage format to give a more visual perspective. This is a neat way to engage children into today's society and how it is continuously changing. I think that sharing photos online is okay, as long as it is limited to education resources only. Anything can be placed onto the internet without being censored, educators need to be cautious as to what web pages they allow their students to explore on for research purposes. Another way I think this could be useful is at my work. I work at a daycare and we are required to post pictures of diversity within our classrooms, this would be a neat tool to use to create a collage for me.

Thing 7

http://www.flickr.com/photos/58697642@N07/5402166798/
This picture belongs to egw320 (January 30,2011)


As I searched around on Flickr, I had no idea of what type of picture I wanted to blog about.  I searched off the wall things until I finally decided to do something that means a lot to me.  Here on campus, I am involved in a sorority called Chi Omega.  Every year we do "Wings for Wishes" in order to gain money to donate to the Make A Wish Foundation.  Make A Wish Foundation for those of you who don't know, grants children who are terminally ill one last wish.  Each year we have tons of community involvement in getting this one day organized to raise thousands of dollars.  Last year we were able to have a wish grant party with the child we granted all of the proceeds to that we raised.  The picture posted above is from a different Chi Omega chapter in a different state, however, we all have the same philanthropy in helping adopt a child from the Make A Wish Foundation and granting them a wish.  I am so excited for this April, because our goal (which will happen) is to grant TWO wishes to two different children.

Implying this web database seems like a good tool for students.  As I was searching like a crazy person to find a picture, I ran across pictures that I thought "hmm..this could be useful."  This website has tons of images with quotes, motivational and inspirational messages, and pictures from all over of different ethnicities and subject matters.  This could be a very useful tool for research and projects, or even to clarify on a particular subject.  A lot of the times, a picture can be worth a thousand words, versus an explanation.

Thing 6

The web tool I decided to use was a very familiar one, but extremely useful; http://www.youtube.com/ I absolutely love using youtube, it allows anyone to share videos online, either from their hard drive or record it using a Web cam.  I will definitely use a lot of videos for educational purposes in my classes.  Videos are available for almost everything, literally.  Not only for my purposes, my students could use this for research projects and presentations.  Another way this could be useful beyond group projects, for students who have a difficult time reading, they could find the book on youtube and listen to it rather than read through it.  There are endless ideas educators could imply with youtube.  If a teacher wanted to create a weekly video for parents to see, you can have the parents add you on youtube and post the videos the students create every week.  Youtube is a free database that students could use for many different sources.  I found a video I think will some up the limitless ideas students can find.

Thing 5

Schools of the future have such an amazing opportunity ahead of them with using Web 2.0.  New generations are changing things about social networking with social life and education purposes.  Incorporating Web 2.0 into the school systems is a genius idea.  The internet is used billions of times during the day for email purposes, homework, research, and much more.  Today's children need to know about Web 2.0 and how it can further them with education.  Educators can guide children with presentations, powerpoints, research generators, and new ways of learning beyond textbooks and lectures.  Children normally learn better when they are provided with hands on materials, why hold them back from becoming more technological advanced.  School 2.0 in my opinion, is a new and better opportunity to advance schools with technology based learning.  This will not only open the doors of learning for students, but for educators as well.  The world today is advancing at a fast pace, it is up to each educator to provide students with reality when it comes to learning things that will matter in their futures.

Thing 3

As I was reading the EduBlog Insights, I really thought about how I can incorporate using a blog with my students.  Since I will be working with Middle School, I could use my blog as another tool to keep parents informed on what is going on within the classroom.  One of the ideas I found, was using it to post homework assignments, calenders, events, etc.  I really like that idea.  It seems like a great tool to keep the parents and students involved with what is going on in the classroom, along with extra curricular opportunities to get the children involved.  I could use the blog as a way to engage my children to want to learn more as well.  We could do weekly videos and post them online for parents to view.  The more I am doing these "things" the more fascinated I am getting with this whole blogging idea.

Thing 2

The name I chose for my blog, is the screen name I use for almost everything.  It is easy for me to remember, considering it is also a part of my APSU email.  I know it is probably bad to have the same username and password for almost everything, but I have so many accounts for education purposes right now I had to take the easy way. haha.  For the most part, the blog has been pretty easy.  It took me a little bit to get into it, but now that I have actually started, I am enjoying doing it. I honestly did not think that I would like doing this at all, because I am not a fan of social networks beyond facebook and pinterest.  In choosing my avatar, it did not really give me my hair options or eye color.  So at first I thought about making it commical, but then decided to match it as close as I could.  Unfortunately they did not have an option for hazel eyes, so I chose the color my eyes are most often which is green.  When trying to pick a skin tone, I can get really tan but I chose to keep my avatar white because tan was not really an option.  I wanted my avatar to represent what I would want to reflect as a teacher.  So, I made it look as professional as possible.

Thing 1

    As I was viewing these life long learning habits, I was trying to pay close attention as to what challenges me and what comes natural.  Habit number 4 caught my eye on the challenging part.  It was dealing with having confidence in yourself as a competent, and an effective learner.  I will be the first one to admit that I second guess myself all the time.  I have had teachers embarrass me infront of class if I have a problem wrong.  Since then, I have always found it challenging for me to volunteer to present any problems in class because I fear the teacher will embarrass me.


   When it comes to the easier end, habit number 6 was close down my alley.  My mom is a computer technician, so she knows everything there is practically when it comes to computers.  So, for the most part dealing with technology comes pretty natural.  I am fascinated with technology and the activities you can create with it, especially for education purposes.


   By using Web 2.0, I hope to be able to implement new ways to engage children to learn.  Teaching at the Middle School level, they are all about technology, so I hope to be able to set up an ideal learning environment using technology to help them learn.  I will admit though, if I did not have these guidelines on how to set things up I would be losing my mind.  As much as I love technology, I can become easily frustrated when I am unsure of what to do or how to operate things.  I am really excited about this blog network we have set up, hopefully it is something I will want to use in my future teaching career.