Week 9 - Thing #23

Whew! The end is here. It has truly been a MAJOR learning experience and I now have a complete SOP(standard operating procedure) for all of the different technology tools covered. A real goldmine! This gives me so many ideas - I hope to implement a number of them next year and some even this next semester. It's all been worth it.
I do have one prominent suggestion for future use - expand the program to last more than 9 weeks. I think I understand the reason for the current structure but more time for each would have given me the opportunity to dig deeper into some of the sites. I sometimes had to stop short in order to stay on track. I do plan to go back to some as soon as I can. Time is always at a premium though.
I'm just glad I got this opportunity though.

Week 9 - Thing #22

The World EBook Fair' site is wonderful. So many titles and the free downloads could be really useful for class. It was easy to manuever through the site and I will definitely go back. I've been looking for a reliable site to provide texts for my students and this may just be the one!

Week 9 - Thing #21

Podcasts this week! - I added one from the Virgin Islands since it's my all-time favorite vacation spot. Had a bit of trouble with a couple of the recommended podcast directories. They would not open. Nevertheless, I found this one at Podcastalley.com. Pretty neat!
I hope to use this sometime but I need to do some more investigating first.

Week 9 - Thng #20

What's to say about YouTube? You have to dig through the fluff to get to the stuff, but there are some pretty good videos out there! Tried to put one on the blog but didn't get there yet. I will keep trying. These are pretty useful sometimes.

Week 8 - Thing #19

Check out My Library! This looks like a great way to track your reading. I think I will have my students create their own libraries. Wouldn't it be neat if they started in 9th grade and tracked it through graduation. They might be surprised at how much they've read during their high school tenure. I really like this one!

Week 8 - Thing #18

Zoho looks very useful. I will try it out with some tennis documents I think. It may be a good way to get information out to my tennis parents. I also went to the Google sites and the map creator is amazing. I will definitely make use of this one. I can use it for tennis matches and I think it may fit well into my "Dozen Ways ..." project since one of the requirements is to make a map of the author's travels. Cool stuff, indeed!

Week 7 - Thing #17

I went to the Califirnia School Library wiki page and also visited the sandbox. I tried to add an entry but had trouble with signing in. Will check with my PB Wiki administrator to get this clarified. I'm always learning!

Week 7 - Thing #16

Wiki, wiki, wiki! - These things are really fun and easy, especially with the help of our mighty resourceress! Nancy helped me create a PBwiki for my 142 class. We used it as the final step in their research projects - "A Dozen Ways to Know Your Author!" The kids picked it up quite easily for the most part and I have not had any trouble navigating the setup or making changes. I will still smooth out a few more rough edges but I am already thinking of changes for next year and how to use this in higher level classes, too.
I am a WIKI convert. I definitely recommend the PBWiki. It is very user friendly.