Thing 12 - Learning about Podcasting

I am listening to a podcast as I write this. Having a hearing impairment I have trouble hearing everything that is being said (I watch TV with the closed captioning on), but I can tell what a professional sounding podcast this is. It is supposed to be a book talk, but I think she is reading a part of it right now. It is from a high school/middle school and I am wondering how the media specialists have time to practice such a show. Now, I have to remember how to link in this program (ahhh!! we've been using so many, okay I see the link symbol) Okay the site is Hopkinton High School & Hopkinton Middle School Library, the link is http://www.hopkintonschools.org/hhs/library/podcast.html

My physical science teachers do an element unit each year where the students come down and have to research an element or two. I actually get to do a little stunt with them where I play the element song and show them the differences between some of the web pages they are going to use (web site evaluation is not a topic my teachers generally teach students) Anyway, back to the podcasting, this Eagen High School site is an excellent example to show the students and teachers, the different type of projects they could do instead of just making a periodic table on paper. Perhaps they could put a power point together to go with the commercial. How do you do enhanced podcasts? (I haven't looked ahead to see if that is covered.) Any way the link to this site is http://www.eagan.k12.mn.us/fletcher/acn/projects.xml

Other than my previously mentioned hearing impairment, podcasting sounds like a motivation tool that I must get my teachers to use. Wouldn't it be great for speech class? Especially those who don't want to get up in front of the class. They could practice and hear what they sound like.

Okay, onto the next thing so I can figure out how to teach my teachers how to do this.

thing 11 - creating a Wiki - a work in progress

I started my wiki for what I mentioned in thing 10. I loaded an image and tried to put a word document attachment but it did not work like I thought it would. I sent an invitation to RESA and the teachers I want to work on the wiki with me. I also made links to the page. It needs a lot of work, but I think it shows that I can use a wiki space. I like that it combined the RSS, blogs, and other skills we have learned while working on our 23 things. Since it is June 16, and I am running out of time, I will limit what I am doing with this for now.
I think the wiki is a more elaborate blog by all means. There is more that you can do with it. One of those things is to make it more of a webpage. I have a Dreamweaver produced web page so I can get a feel for the difference in making a web page with a wiki and one with an HTML editor. There is a difference. But I also am used to Blackboard and downloading documents to that is very easy. Hopefully I will be able to figure it out in the wiki (once I get my other things done.)

The address for my wiki is http://actclassgchs.wikispaces.com/

Thing 10 - Reflecting on Wikis

When I first saw the video of the Lefever right away I thought, hmmm maybe this will work for the teachers I am collaborating with for a new class next year. Because right now we are emailing stuff back and forth to each other. It seemed perfect. I quickly explored the other wikis in the list, thinking "Hey these are easy to do websites. They solve the problem of having to find a home server." Then, before I started to write this I looked at Tech Time's reflection because I know she has been using wikis and thought, "Ohhhh, Nooooo!"
So I don't think any one wiki I looked at inspired me to create one of my own, like I said, the video did and the article both made a wiki out to be a great collaborative tool, so that is my inspiration. The hurdles I forsee are trying to get the teachers of my project to use it. Some do not have many computer skills (but I have at least taught them how to email more effectively). It would take training with a wiki to overcome most of those hurdles. But some might actually be the internet itself. I have teachers who do not have a computer or internet acces at home (How do they teach?) Is it worth the fight? With the struggle I have had to get my teachers using email and viewing a schedule on a website, I don't know if it is worth the fight to try to get them to use a wiki as well. But, for reasons I don't think are even clear to me, I will keep trying. "Never give up, Never surrender," Galaxy Quest (1999) http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0177789/

Thing 9 - You expect a lot from this thing

Okay, I made the image, saved it to my pictures folder, and uploaded it here. Maybe it wasn't as hard as I feared. Although the directions then said to add a link to where I made this. Where was that??? AHhhhhh! Okay, I can do this, I've only closed down my windows a million times, but I can recreate what I did. Let's see, I would like the Things better if when we clicked on a link it opened a new window, can't you set things like that?
Okay, I opened up 23 Things again for the tenth time tonight, found Thing 9, clicked on Big Huge Labs and then Movie Poster, so the link to that is http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/poster.php. And yes there was a Link icon to add it into the blog. But I wonder if I had just copied and pasted. I am going to copy this link http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/poster.php and see if there is a difference. Now what else did I have to do for 9? Reflect, probably, I'll go back and check.

Yep, reflect. It would be fun if I didn't feel like I was running out of time. When you said play, you ment play. I don't know that I like to play online. I want to know where I am going and what I am doing. I often get into a website and get busy playing that I forget the objective. I was playing with creating an avitar but then couldn't figure out how to use the avitar. It did make me want to load my casino game on this computer though, because it has a great face creator on it and that would be a neat thing to put on my blog. I had a good creation on my last computer before it died. And I digress. Fun, but time consuming (especially when you babble).

Editing

How do you edit in this program? Go to new posts, then you can edit an old one.

Thing 8 - Cool Tools or Fustration Causers

After I played with the tools, I was glad I read the posts below because I had a lot of the same questions. 1. How do I get to these tools if I was in Flickr? 2. How can I put these tools somewhere other than the computer? 3. How can I use these tools while teaching?

I liked the spell - because it could help teach about layout. Often as I look at my students' newspaper and yearbook, I wonder if anyone teaches layout anymore. The letters need to be similar or have a connection apperance to them. The spell feature had a neat way to change a letter to make a better "fit".

I did the matching using the RESA23 tag, so they were familiar pictures. I could see my Japanese teacher taking photos of the kangi characters so students could make sure they were recognizing them (but if the sight needs to connect to Flickr to do it, then the students would be blocked.) But I liked this matching because it flips the cards for you. (Like the appeal of computer solitare)

And I like Sudko anyway, so I liked that. It might be easier for a student to learn to do that puzzle before a number one just because it may be easier for some to focus on the image rather than a character.

Thing 7 - Finally, my reflection

I can't beleive it has taken me so long to get back and do my reflection. I was hoping that I would see a response from someone on the Thing 7 blog, about not getting our pictures to post in the RESA23 Flickr list. But there is no response that I've seen. Anyway, I put my picture there, and I can see it on my account, I just don't see it with the others. But I notice there hasn't been anymore added since I tried to add, there's been something like 86 pictures. Is there, perhaps, a limit?
But back to the reflection question, how would I use Flickr in my classroom? I can't. It is a site blocked, and I don't see myself fighting for it to get unblocked. While it is a neat tool, I'm not sure I see an absolute educational need for it. If kids want to electronically show us a picture, they can throw it in a power point, that works well.