Thing 24: Just The Beginning

My favorite exercises were all of the websites that used photos. I enjoy being creative (or at least trying to) with new ideas in education, and for the age group that I want to do is at a great age of imagination. With hands on activities my students will surely love using some of these websites that involve them and make them use their innocent imagination.

This program has shaped the way I think about technology because I want to use it more and more. I want to be able to use all of this technology in the classroom. Since our technology keeps getting better and better I need to learn and keep up with all of the changes.

In teaching 5th grade, or any grade that applies in my degree, technology will be a large part in my teaching. Computers, tablets, smart boards, and much more I will be able to use and have the students do their work on.

I plan on keeping this blog for my future use. With my time being very limited with sports, classes, friends, family and more I will not be using my blog as much as I wish I could. I would like to keep this blog for ideas to use in my classroom, which is coming up faster than I can believe. Only a few more years and I will be using most of these websites for MY students!

Thing 23

The Creative Commons website is very helpful for me. When teaching I will be using sources that I either asked for or were given to me by other teachers and I must make sure I give credit to them for all of the work they have done. Creative Commons automatically gives you eligibility in giving that person full credit they deserve. In doing so, it also gives you ideas that are free and will not need any credit. This is such a great tool to use in the future in my teaching career.

Thing 22

http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=1182290&backurl=/shelf/my

I did not like this site as much as the other sites we were able to go through and figure out what they were. This site is very complicated and not very user friendly. I felt like the instructions made no sense at some points and were to small to even read. Even trying to create a binder was very confusing, and I was not even sure where to start or where it ended. I was not a fan of this website.

Thing 21

http://animoto.com/play/FiQCd5XfTr8cEoS6ksMNPQ

This is such a fun and exciting website! I think it is so cool being able to put a collage together with music and a theme of the slideshow together. I could use this is so many ways for a classroom, like a christmas party picture collage or an end of the year quick overview. I enjoyed playing around with this site and all of the different pictures to be able to put into the slideshow.

Thing 20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSn92BJ636k

Teachers Tips: How To Start a Classroom is a great, short video that helps starter teachers with the basics in a short timely manner. I think that beginning teachers should take a look at this because it gives you a little push over your nerves of being in control of a classroom. This will make you feel more comfortable to have a good first day in an organized classroom.

http://prezi.com

Prezi is such a cool website that makes the best presentations! It is very interactive for students and can have different ways of organizing the information that you or they have found. Students will enjoy the colorful, interactive website that will help them get the best grade possible!

Thing 19

Using social networks as an educator is such a great idea! There are so many social networking sites that have great opportunities for teachers. I think a great website for all teachers is Pinterest! Pinterest is such a interesting, creative, website. So many ideas are on this site and you can split up your search in specific words that adhere to what you want. You can have "boards" which are the combination of all of the pins you have chosen. Keeping your ideas in an organized fashion is great, especially when you go through all of the hustle and bustle of the school day! This site is great, and I hope teachers begin using it more!

Thing 18

I already created a Twitter and a Facebook, along with more than half of the population of Americans into todays times. I have had much experience with Facebook considering I have had one since I was in eighth grade. Twitter is just a little different, I have not had Twitter for very long, (only about two years) which is not very long considering that Twitter has been out for a decently long period of time. I mainly use these sites for social networking, where I would post pictures, update my feed, and much more. Until recently, I never thought how these websites could be used towards educational purposes. But since most parents or children have a Facebook now a days I guess I could create many groups to inform them about upcoming events. It would be easier on Twitter to follow teachers themselves and learning about new things that way. Since I spend a lot of free time on these websites I could learn new educational ways on how to use them!

Thing 17

This is such a great idea for everyone to use! My worst nightmare is to go through Googles results and see all of the random, not needed answers it gives me. This will be a great way for me to cut the time in half to do research for my classroom. Looking through tons of websites that only have the same word in common that you typed in the search bar is a pain. Now, with this device I am able to quickly find a website that I will be able to use for whatever topic we are discussing that day.

Thing 16

For my Thing 16 I used Symbaloo because it looked like a great organizing tool. I am the type of person who likes sections for specific thing. Using Symbaloo is a great way to have all of your objectives in a row. Having all of the social networking sites in a corner that you can click on if you are in a hurry. The weather and google search engine to check what is going on in the world. Or a shopping corner where you can go to if you just feel like you just need a break from everything.

http://www.symbaloo.com

I actually like online calendars. I like writing down what I have to do the next day so I can see it, but I also like to be able to check what I have going on anywhere I go. I like how online calendars can give you a message if something is coming up on your mobile device. An online calendar will be useful to me for a on the go teacher!

Thing 15

I have found out that Wikispaces is such an interesting and useful website. Being able to give students the opportunity to go online to your class website and see what is going on in the classroom is a great idea. This would be a great place to put ideas up that you have or homework so the student s can grab and go! Keeping the child on top of things, along with there parents is a great way to use this!

https://sammieebright.wikispaces.com

Thing 14

I love flowcharts! I think they are such a great tool for learning! I used them throughout school, whether listening to a teacher use them or using them myself in a presentation. I am able to use this in my classroom because I can show the difference between different types of nouns or adverbs. This would make it easier for the children to understand the difference between each of the words.

When using Mind Maps I chose to use Bubbl.us because I have never heard of the before. At first I had a little trouble understanding the website and getting the hang of it but after fooling around it started to come into place. A great way to use Mind Maps besides just showing the differences between something is, using it for student data. Having a students name as the topic and creating little bubbles below it to remind you if the student is understanding the topic or if they are struggling.

Thing 13

I have never had the pleasure of using Google Drive before. Let's face it, I never even knew it was there in Google. I thought before I opened it, it might just be something that I might use for a storage device. But as I continue to look through the Drive I notice it is much more than that! Google Drive reminds me of Word, Presentation, Spreadsheet creator all in one, but the bright side is you are not spending money at all to use it. I clicked the "create" button and chose to create a drawing for my Google Drive. All I did was create a picture where a student must write a story about what is happening in the picture. Using this tool you are able to have them create their own and tell about it, and give a good, creative story about the picture they created.

https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/1YdMFvPOWilEC80gxL1bRDFSAAZSU8O4IBmUxUF-Wt_Y/edit?usp=sharing

Thing 8

Flickr is such an incredible tool for school, and now the spell application makes Flickr even more fun! I believe students would enjoy using this tool for their projects that they have to do in the classroom. Possibly using the word tool for presentations or any work type of work required online. I enjoyed creating my name with this tool so I know students will gladly want to play around with this cool tool!

Thing 12

Google is my homepage on my computer at home, so obviously I must use this search engine a lot! Having to dig deeper into Google than ever before I found new things that I probably never would of noticed if it wasn't for this blog. I looked into Google translator. In school I only ever took Spanish in middle school and German in high school. Just typing your said word into Google and click translate can give you the correct way of spelling it and the definition in the required language. I really wish I would of  noticed this on Google when I was taking a foreign language in school. Along with this cool tool Google Alert goes along with that. Google will alert me of anything from the news to the weather around the world. Hopefully, the alert will go off for a snow day in the winter this year for us!

Thing 11

The easiest method for finding RSS feeds was going through tool on Feedly. All of the search methods were easy to me, but I am the type of person who needs to stay in one place and not needing many other tools to find out what I need. None of the other tools asked to use were confusing, if I had to I would use them all. The most useful feed to me that I found was Edutopia. While traveling, I found nothing odd or unusual.

Thing 10

I like that RSS has many options of what my news feed could contain. Ranging from news, cooking, teaching, and many more. A main object in the RSS that I like is being able to choose my news feed. If there is over 5 things or more on my news feed I would get overwhelmed. Being able to choose which feed I want to see is a life savor. This site is great for communication, and seeing when dates are busy or they are free. This is very educational for teachers because we can add different teaching sites to explore new ideas and different ways of teaching a topic. The RSS reminds me of a website called Pintrest. This is due t the fact of separating ideas in categories that could help people get ideas for what they want to do. Pintrest

Thing 9

I used the website Image Chef for this thing. The site was pretty easy to move around with. You could choose from multiple frames, different pictures, and wall paper that can make your pictures look very cool. These pictures can be turned into your work of art. You can create different text that allow you to make the picture you have chosen to really stand out! Creating my own picture for this assignment made me think of older social networking sites when we were able to really make it reflect our personalities.

Thing 7

I am very new to Flickr, I have never used it before but I have heard of the website. As I looked through the website, I noticed that all the pictures are absolutely fantastic! The picture I chose was swimmers swimming some sort of marathon in the ocean. I personally am not a big fan of water, since I was little I was always afraid of water. Water still intimidates me from time to time, but I enjoy pictures of the ocean because of how the light hits the water. When I was searching for my picture I wanted to choose a ocean picture, but from time to time I enjoyed changing my topic to see what Flickr had in store for me! After finding my picture I put it on my blog but went back to Flickr to just search different topics to see what kind of pictures the website has! 

License: All rights reserved by Cuba Gallery 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/4375353644/in/photolist-7ECQcN-84wVXv-99AdrD-b2qpwa-aDraMT-9aiRzx-7QRe6a-7kHMpq-68DyHB-99RqtK-9c7ipx-6aJhfU-fNGwmA-6aJgzS-8jR7NM-4ZbAXd-dN6W4n-E57Nb-6GDkVx-63AtVM-9ntNgN-6aJgN7-9eYaXd-7xvPiJ-9EtDLR-7ysQqX-7jUSNA-7wiwrU-8maMkj-812LCz-68S75V-8FDqj4-7yGp8k-9JVfhS-6pXeFw-88F8zb-9mn3Yr-52MpHH-a9hBTx-78WM2h-iPoN1-6qcdrU-47Dfjc-6ohaC-cGsFNC-7K7NgM-aaGgn9-b6qLek-5dvdDM-vvKSq-n6F4U/

Thing 6

I went to Web 2.0 Tool called PicFull, http://www.go2web20.net/site/?a=Picfull, which is a photo editing site. I was extremely happy to find a picture editing site because I love pictures and different ways to make them look different. The picture I posted is of the main singer of Maroon 5. All I did to the photo was have the color balance technique. There were many other types of editing tools but I like this one the best. If you enjoy editing pictures, this is the site for you!

Thing 5

School 2.0 is way of improving technology in schools to help teachers and students. I think that this type of improvement will be very helpful in the school systems. When technology improves we find out ways that will help schools and I feel like School 2.0 is just that.

Thing 4

Commenting on a blog is a key component of blogging. Commenting is the way to see how others that have read your blog feel and react to your views. Not everyone is going to agree with every thing that you say so comments can show their opinions and how they view the topic you are discussing. Comments can also show if the blogger has a good blog or a bad blog. When someone comments on your blog, it can tell the blogger if your opinion is a good one or it is just a waste of space. Some people don't even have a blog they just view other blogs and get ideas from them and comment on others blogs . I think commenting on blogs are important because if the blogger does not get any feedback then he or she might stop blogging even if they have a great idea on what they are talking about.

I will be commenting on others blogs throughout the semester!

Thing 3

Being a teacher, I would use blogs to connect with students and their parents along with researching new ideas for the classroom by looking up other teachers blogs. Blogs are normally made from teens that are in love with some boy band or a type of actor, but if I dig deep I will be able to find other teachers with new and improved ideas that might spark more imagination in my head for new work in the classroom. Blogs are very helpful with creating new relationships with other bloggers and better relationships with those in the classroom and the parents of those in class.

Thing 1

As I went through the 7 1/2 Habits of Lifelong Learners slideshow I could tell which habits were my strength and which ones were my weakness. The habit that comes easiest to me is viewing problems as challenges. I am a very competitive person in my life, so viewing my problems that may be difficult I look at them as challenges that I must overcome to go onto the next challenge. The hardest habit for me is to be confident in myself as a competent, effective learner. When I was a younger student I had more trouble in school then I do now. I always felt like I was behind everyone in understanding a topic and I became more and more less confident in myself. Even now if I do bad on one test I take it to heart too much and get down on myself. Now that I have realized what my strengths and weaknesses are it will be easier for me to fix them. This way I will become the best student that I can be!

Thing 2

The experience for setting up a blog was new to me! The only use I have ever had with blogs is reading others on their website, especially the blogs about food. I enjoyed setting up my blog. I enjoy learning new things especially with technology. I feel like I am normally a creative person, but with my title for my blog I could not think of anything that would be a funny pun or anything, maybe I just had a brain fart. Instead, I just kept it simple and used my name and the classes name. Creating a mini me was my favorite thing to do. I tried to make it look like me as much as possible. With short blonde hair and brown eyes with a pale complexion, I think I did a good job! I am very excited to use a blog for the first time and see how good I can become at becoming a blogger!