Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Wikis

My 2nd and 4th blocks are currently working on wikis. It is a good way to keep all my energetic boys focused!! The only kink using Moodle is if students don't have an e-mail account. He just created one in Yahoo. I'm guessing you have to have an e-mail for most programs. The really nice thing is the student accounts are already set up in moodle, and their name goes on everything they do so they can't have weird screen names that I can't identify.

It doesn't have all the bells and whistles, but it works!

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Thing 9

The lesson on creative commons was a really great reminder for me. While I try to follow copyright, I know I have been guilty of stretching the rules. It is ironic, because I beat citations into my students (practically, not really) but I am not good about citing pictures when I use them. It was also great to learn that there are musicians allowing their songs to be used. It is nice because it is so easy to just grab a song, yet we are so against pirating music so we really shouldn't just use it in our presentations either.

The hard part is reminding myself because it is still easier to just grab something when you are scrambling at the last minute than to follow the rules.

Learning Facebook

When I first joined Facebook, I thought it was just a social networking tool. As Karen blogged, it definitely is a powerful one. I have also learned that you can do so much more. I'm involved in daily pillow fights, and I just added good reads to my profile. You need to go to www.goodreads.com to sign up, and then you can link it to your facebook and your friends can join. It is a place to list and rank books you have read, are reading or will read. Your friends can comment on your evaluations of the books and vice versa. As all tools these days, there is more it can do that I have yet to discover but it has been fun enough so far.

I was talking to a student the other day about how glad I am that I joined facebook. This is how they communicate, and now I am aware of what is available to them. Student council and DECA both have groups to get information to students. I feel that it is an important tool for teachers and one that we need to understand because our students have mastered it and use it every day.

PS-I'm up to 32 friends:)

Friday, February 20, 2009

Facebook

Facebook is becoming a bad habit for me. I still do not know all the fancy gadgits, but I can find friends. Instead of doing my grad school work, I've been searching for friends. It's a little sad when you only have 11 and everyone else has at least 100. I'll never compete with social butterfly Travis. Who knew that social networking could be so lonely?

Monday, February 9, 2009

Facebook

Well, I finally joined the 21st century and joined Facebook. I have no idea what I am doing, but I have 4 friends already:) I know it's hard to imagine me with friends!! I already got a mini tutorial from my students this morning, so hopefully they will help me learn quickly!!

Monday, February 2, 2009

Blackle

I feel like someone blogged about this, but I was reminded of www.blackle.com. It is powered by google custom search, but the screen is primarily black so supposedly it saves energy. A student in my class says that it doesn't really save energy because of the new computer screens, but I think it's an interesting concept.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Technology Implication

I read an interesting article in the paper today about Twitter. I know we have talked often about its uses. People are now using it to find jobs. One woman put out a message to some people she had met at a conference that she was looking for a job. A week later she had an interview, and two weeks later she had a job.

It is also interesting because people are now recommending that those applying for jobs make information about themselves more accessible. They said to link personal web sites, blogs or profiles on professional networking sites, and one woman links her blog to her twitter profile and lists it on her resume for recruiters.

As I was reading this I was thinking about my father-in-law who is looking for a job. He has become discouraged because he cannot just pick up a paper anymore. He feels at a disadvantage because he knows most postings are on the internet, but not only does he not own a computer he does not know how to use one.

It also made me think about all the things people post on blogs and Facebook...etc. Not only are people looking at Facebook to check out potential hires, but they are not interviewing people based on what they post. At a time when jobs are so hard to come by, it seems that we have another responsibility to our students to make them aware of the implications for what they post and also try to help them be aware of how they can take advantage of new technologies in the job hunt. Of course, it would be great if I was aware and knew how to use them first. Thanks to MILI:)