Is it the end or only the beginning?...

First of all, I just want to thank both of our wonderful teachers for being so patient and supportive. I have loved every step of this process! At first I was a little more intimidated by the Things..but as I progressed I learned to enjoy the challenge of each lesson.

I really can't even pick one "thing" that was my favorite..there were just so many favorites along the way..the RSS feeds with Google Reader, my Delicious account, and Library Thing-- all are definite daily habits now. All things Google...I loved the image generators and the mash-ups...they were fun tools I probably would have never found on my own. The pod casts and finding what a gi-normous variety available to us.. 100% Free..especially the NPR library and the ones available from America's best colleges. There is absolutely no reason to ever ever stop learning in our lifetime! And I guess the best thing I've gotten from this is the fact that it has taught me that my computer is not just for email anymore... haha!

The most surprising thing that I learned from this experience is the fact that blogs are not just for personal use...they are for business as well. I felt so very naive to the fact that this entire blogging world was going on without my knowledge! But now that I know about it...well my life is not going to be the same. My network of information just grew exponentially.

My last thought is a request actually. Please, please look into continuing on with thing #24-infinity! The computer world is constantly being upgraded and made more relevant..it can be overwhelming to try to find these new things on our own...help us continue to explore and learn together...it is less intimidating knowing someone is with you cheering you on and encouraging you to stretch and take it to the next level...

So thank you again...it was great to read what all of you wrote..I am addicted to blogging and the whole blogging world..and it's a great addiction to have!

Thing #23 Ning-credible

I was so impressed with Ning. I watched the video of the creator of Ning and was anxioius to tour the site. I started with Classroom 2.0. Wow! It's hard to believe that he only started it a little more than a year ago! It's amazing how many people are in his network, all learning from and teaching one another. Very impressive. I also want to check out Ning's Christian alternative to MySpace. I'll need to go back to Ning to find that...it was mentioned in their article, 7 things you should know about Ning.

Most applicable to us though was the sub-topic within that article; Implications for teaching and learning..
"For today's students who spend countless hours on Facebook and MySpace, faculty participation on those networks is often seen as an intrusion into a private domain. Ning provides an avenue for instructors to take advantage of social networks in a neutral setting, offering functionality and an experience that are familiar and comfortable to students. By creating social networks around academic topics, or even about specific projects for a course, an instructor can facilitate a strong sense of community among the students, encouraging personal interactions that can lead to the creation of new knowledge and collective intelligence."

I couldn't have said it better myself!

So, there you have it...my final "Thing".

I gotta badge..

Thing #22 Facebook

Well I never would have created a Facebook account on my own. I will more than likely delete my account in about a week. I just feel too..exposed. I like the idea of a blog because you have a little more control over who gets access to your writings/pictures personal information. I really didn't give that much information about myself. Information such as address and email address was MOST DEFINITELY not going to be provided. Call me paranoid, but these are scary times and I don't want to invite trouble. I think that for the younger generation, it is a wonderful way to stay in touch with all your friends that have gone off to school. I think it is even great for singles who are trying to make that love connection. But for anyone else...I think blogging is the safer alternative.

On a personal level, as a parent, I think this is something we all should familiarize ourselves with. I think we should help our kids sign up (when/if the time is right), in order to make sure they are using Facebook/MySpace in the safest possible way.

The only educational advantage I can think of would be to see what your students are talking about. I don't know or understand how you could find their facebook page, because when you sign up (if you are honest) you are automatically grouped with people you work with or went to school/college with etc. I did not investigate MySpace enough to see if this was the case as well. This really, has been the only Thing that I am not interested in pursuing in any way. But I still found it interesting.
OK...I'm off to make lunches for my kiddos.

Thing #7C..Google Reading

I love to skim all the articles in my Google Reader. I just wish I would get into the habit of doing it more often. It tends to get overwhelming otherwise. Whenever I sit down to the computer now..it's as if I have this treasure trove of things to do. I'm like a kid in a candy shop..rubbing my hands together and wondering what to try next :) I tend to forget my Google Reader. Yet whenever I return to it, I'm lost for at least an hour wandering through the postings available.
For this blog post I chose an article about Google Chrome as oposed to Mozilla's Firefox. The writer preferred Google Chrome for it's speed and potential. I decided to try the same experiment and see if I agreed. I really have not been impressed with Firefox, but my teens love it. So I want to be fair and get more input from them before I just remove it from my life..haha! Ok..enough about me, I'm going back to my reader now...just a few more postings left :(
It's sad really.

Thing #21

Wow! I love Google BookSearch! As we continue to be educated in all things Google I am more and more impressed. They have such vision! Among other things their mission statement says: "...we want to make it easy to find relevant books. books we coul not find any other way, such as those that are out of print." I toured the site and came upon this micro site and I am excited for both Google and all users everywhere for what potential this site will offer! I hope to use this feature alot in the future!
I also really had fun with Google Notebook. I can see where this will come in handy for all kinds of planning. For instance with Christmas coming up you can use it for gift planning, or decorating/entertaining ideas. Christmas tends to get overwhelming if you don't have all your planning organized in one place. So I can see the value of this. It would be great for vacation planning, for highschool students searching for the college of their dreams etc. etc.
I also went to the Lab for the pages in progress, I looked at the Quote site but was disappointed to see that it was only politicians who were the quotables. Maybe if they expand that to all famous folk, that would be a little more interesting. Also used Google Calendar and iGoogle for the fun of it. The more I learn about Google the more I love it. Once you've gone Google-you'll never go back haha!

Thing #20

I enjoyed playing with Google Docs. It is very user friendly. I dabbled with presentations. I also experimented with the spreadsheet option. I don't think I would ever use the slide presentation, but you never know. It is great to know it's there if you need it. The one I would use most, would be the word document program.

I think that the option for collaboration, would be the only reason I would ever use google docs. I watched the video at the beginning of this exercise and learned why email ties up alot of copies of the same document. Collaboration efforts would benefit by the fact that everyone can access revision history.

I can see this put to use by students working together on a presentation. It would also work for the individual student, when revisions are necessary throughout the paper. For instance, an English paper that the teacher has asked for revisions at several stages. I also think you could use google docs. for organizations like PTA or other non-profit organizations. When certain people have information they are responsible for and others have different information etc. they could use the spreadsheet option to add their info. and so on.

So, once again, something I had no idea existed. Free!! Gotta love it.

Thing #19- Voice Thread

Well this was an interesting exercise. As always I was impressed with the teachers that found uses for this in the very young classroom setting. The A-Z library project was adorable. I also was very entertained by the Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote antics, complete with Chalktalk on the VoiceThread website. The younger students seemed to be the most at ease with the chalk and the talk haha!

Once again I think something like this would be wonderful for the student who has trouble expressing themselves on paper. Working in CMC, I see how many students struggle with writing projects. This would be a great way to get around that problem.

It would also be a great way to stay in touch with long distance family members. My sister lives in Atlanta and has 5 wonderful children that are similar in age to my children. It would be a very fun and creative way to keep up with each other.

Thing # 18 I can YouTube too!

I've been watching videos, videos, and more videos. I've learned how to have smokey eyes watching a video by Sephora makeup. I've learned how to stuff a turkey, and how to become a ninja...pretty funny, long story. I think I've learned how to embed a video onto your wordpress blog, and hopefully on your blogger account. It was great going back in time to watch the Ty-d-bowl man yahchting around the toilet tank, oh those were the days :)


So my video of choice was a cute and educational video by Animaniacs. How great for teachers to introduce a very dull subject. The hyper animaniacs singing the names of the countries as fast as lightening..so hopefully my youtube tutorial will work...


OK...just a couple of lessons from this experience. The first video I embedded from youtube was great and it worked..BUTwhat I did not notice until I was watching it with my 11 year old son was the little cursor permanently etched into the corner of the screen was in the position of giving everyone the finger!! So needless to say my "cute" video was more than a little inappropriate. I had to go back and delete that html and re-copy the same video from a different source. I am still a little unhappy with this one because if you scroll through the selections that are also offered by this contributor..there is a video about Godzilla..who cares. I only wanted the animaniacs video but I got more than I bargained for.

Well I'm out for the night..I'm YouTubed out.

Thing #17-Podcasting

This is a topic that I am a little more familiar with since I have owned an ipod for the last two years and have subscribed to several podcasts regularly. However, I had no idea how many other sources were available to subscribe to. I enjoyed checking out PBS and NPR. I especially enjoyed the site called Skip the Tuition. What an opportunity it is, to able to hear elite college classes across the country..like Harvard, Yale, MIT, UCLA!

I also was very impressed with the educational podcasts that were selected. I especially liked the format of the 60 second Science podcast. "This'll only take a minute." I loved that! I also really liked the music and the sound effects that they used. The other one I listened to was Grammar Girl-Quick and Dirty tips for better writing. Both podcasts were short and informative. Which lets you know that you don't have to be intimidated by the 30-minute format. Just 60 seconds of information and you learned something in an entertaining way.

The other thing I walked away with is the fact that you don't need an ipod or mp3 player to view the video podcasts! I had never given this a thought!! I would always steer clear of any videos because my ipod does not have video capability. But I tried out a couple of video podcasts from NOVA and Jean Cousteau etc. I was impressed..who needs TV? There is so much available to read and watch on the web, you could literally spend all your free time in front of the comp screen instead of the TV screen.

Thing #16 Library Thing

Well I absolutely love, love, love Library Thing! I love books! I love to read. I love talking about books, and I love reading about good books to read...so yeah! This site was made for me. I know that I have come upon it in the recent past, whether through 23 things or in researching a book I can't remember... I had it bookmarked already.

So now I am an official Library Thingster. I already read at least a book a week...but now after all my investigating...my list of books to read has grown exponentially!!

This site would be wonderful for Reading teachers and English teachers who have assigned a novel by an author who has more than one book to their credit. Then the student could search for which novel they would like to read next by the same author. I know of several students I had last year that loved the book The Giver. They were not readers by any stretch of the imagination, but they found that they actually enjoyed reading this book. I told them if they liked this book they might like other books by the same author. If I had known about this site, I would have taken them to it, and looked up the author right then and there.

OK..I'm going back to Library Thing..I think I'm addicted.

Thing #15 Delicious Social Bookmarking

Ok..I'm truly addicted to delicious! I have been playing with it for hours and had to force myself to stop...you can just keep going and going...it's a never ending string of places and information. Very cool! I didn't have any trouble tagging..or bookmarking...but I did have trouble with the subscription part of it. I tried to "subscribe" to PC World..but when I put the tag in...an entire 7 pages of subscriptions showed up ...No thanks...so I deleted them until I can figure that part of it out.

This will be so much more organized than bookmarking. I have two tool bars with the bookmark option and can never remember which bar has the bookmark I need..so now I will be able to find the website I need by quickly looking at tags...it's just like a filing cabinet!

My delicious user name is Gibzchats. I think delicious would be great for research sites and educational podcasts..the list is endess really. You could use delicious as another search option for any subject. I will be a loyal delicious user from now on.

Thing #7b

Checking out my latest RSS feeds in my Google Reader....
I came upon an article that caught my eye from techlearning entitled Seven Tips for Late Bloomers. It mentioned the fact that no matter what your level of ability you can always learn more. I loved that, because I never want to stop learning. I think you only begin to get old the day you believe you know it all. Once again I am floored by the amazing number of tutorials available for ongoing learners. It's exciting really...it feels like there is an entire world waiting to be discovered..I know I sound cliche but I love this! I really love this stuff! This is by far the best class I've ever taken. yeah!

Thing #14

Well I looked at alot of these and some were easier to use than others..I especially liked the Tada list though. I am having about 20 people over for Thanksgiving and starting to stress a little. The Tada list has little check off boxes when you've completed a task..you can even email your checklist to yourself. Quick and easy..

I also plan on using Weebly.com for a company website that I am in charge of updating. You can use it for an existing domain free! That is wonderful..because the one I have to use now is very technical and not without alot of frustration attached.

Once again, I am amazed at what is available free online. The gliffy website was cool too...I loved the idea of flowcharts and floor plans..you could actually use those for classroom floorplans when we have to make a map of the room for TAKS testing...timelines etc.

OK...I'm off to the Wiki Sandbox

THING #13 Image Mania

Well I have been at this, literally all day. I have been diligently travelling back and forth, between my computer, and the rest of my housework like an obsessed photo maniac. My poor husband has given up on me, and thinks of himself as a 23 things widower..and he's right..haha! The price of of an education in web 2.0 tools!

I could say this was fun, but I would be lying. Parts of it were, but for the most part it was just frustrating! I had to upload my photos over and over again, for some reason. I tried to use photos of sunsets for one mosaic that never worked out..so I used pool photos instead. It ended up being quite good though. I really liked the image generators. Some sites were much more user friendly than others. For instance image chef is great!

I think that mashups and generators would be fun and interesting in lieu of written reports once again. I think students get so burned out on written reports of 500 words or more etc. But if you told them to research a subject using only images and let them present their notes to pictures..well maybe kids would be a little more excited about their homework.

Well, I am exhausted and ready for a nap now..no more computering for me tonight.
I'm out.

Sunset Sailing

sunset sailing Thing 12

Wow!~ This was fun!
I really liked Animoto..and it was easy..very user friendly.

I had fun choosing which site I liked best even though it was a tough decision..but in the end I think Animoto is best for grown-ups..the others seemed more glittery..and teen-agery. I can't even begin to imagine all the ways we will be able to implement this in our personal and professional lives.

Again, I chose sailboats as my theme. My inspiration was my desire to just get away from it all and float off into the sunset...

Here are my photo credits:

Sailing by jphilipson http://flickr.com/photos/jphilipson/
sunset and sailboat by listen to reason http://flickr.com/charlestilford/
Sailboat at sunset by webbmb http://flickr.com/94028658NOO/
Sunset Sailing by rusty one http://flickr.com/bac_clin/
Sailboat at sunset by lapstrake http://flickr.com/lapstrake/
Sailing into sunset by tiarescott http://flickr.com/tiarescott/
Another sunset but this one from Hawaii by Jim Frazier http://flickr.com/jimfrazier/
Sunset sail by Markus941 http://flickr.com/markus941/
Sunset from Diamond Head w/sailboat by ca16938 http://flickr.com/candersen/
Sailing wether by wildpianist http://flickr.com/wildpianist/
Sailboat at sunset by godfreek56 http://flickr.com/borntoworship/
Sailing into sunset by ducktourer http://flickr.com/hodgiemullo/
sailboat at sunset by sskennel http://flickr.com/sskennel/
Dennys Beach Sunset by Don Gato http://flickr.com/dongato/

THING #11 Flickring Sailboats

Well I am Flickred out! I have been working on this Thing for 3 nights now..and I still am a little confused. Ok..more than a little confused. I see that you can upload your own photos. I understand that you can use other peoples photos with creative commons. I guess what is overwhelming is what do you do with all these photos. More importantly how do you do it. So I still need to research that end of it.

I chose sailboats as my subject because I am in the mood to just sail away. These photos were just so very peaceful and calming. I just imagine myself on each and everyone of them just floating away..ahhhh! Especially after this assignment haha! One of my favorite photographers is Wisdoc. His stuff is beautiful!

The only way I could think to download each photo was to save them into "my pictures". Then I cut and pasted them into my sandbox...but I could only paste 2 for some reason. No matter how many times I tried, the third one would replace the second and the second would disappear into cyberspace somewhere???

I really want to try some flickr toys. In my travels I have seen links to websites such as bighugelabs.com, and and krazydad.com for picking photos all in the same color story..oh yeah and deviousgelatin.com for creating a montage of mini flickr images. I'll just have to save these projects for all my spare time...

So on that note..I am off to investigate krazydad's website. He is a pretty cool guy. He not only is a great photographer, he is very tech savvy and he creates puzzles like Sudoku..my absolute favorite!!
I'm out.

THING #10 Creative Commons

Ok..this one was an easy one. I have always been frustrated by copyright laws. They can be so picky..you can copy excerpts but not entire pages or chapters blah, blah, blah. So this was refreshing. To be quite honest I have never noticed the creative commons logo before this lesson. I will sure be aware of them now.

I think students can have alot more creativity with the availability of cc. Now they will be able to build off from each other..I picture it as a gigantic set of legos ..one student starts a project and others from all over add to it, personalize it, learn others creative tricks, and make them their own..it's just another type of giant classroom, where freedom reigns. t Teachers won't have to worry about getting confused by the legalities. It's really just a relief to know this exists.

Once again, 23 things is opening up a new world for us. What we are capable of with the internet. What a goldmine!

OK.. I'm out.

THING #9 Diggin in the Sandbox

Well I am still more than a little confused about wikis and sandboxes, but from what I think I understand...sandboxes are for playing around with what "real" wikis can do....I think.

I had fun making my page. My kids were gathered around me while I followed the directions step by step. I had my 10 year old help me move my "gilligan's island" image from the top of the page to where I needed it to be. Of course he did it in 2 easy steps..whereas I was pushing, clicking, dragging all to no avail. My older son was home from college and he helped me download the image to begin with...they are just more confident all around when it comes to computers and the internet..so it was good to have their moral support! haha!

I think I have completed this assignment by writing this post, but I will have to go back and double check. It seemed like there were alot of steps to this "Thing". I really liked the billboard and newspaper snippet programs that we can add so I think I will go play with those for awhile. I am constantly being stretched creatively by these assignments. Come up with a catchy title, create your own license plate, how about a newspaper headline...my mind is being stretched out due to previous underuse haha!

OK...I'm out for now, I'm going back to play in the sandbox.

Thing #8 Wiki Wiki What?

Well I have been doing this assignment for the last two nights...and I think I am still a little confused about wikis. I mean yes..I understand that "it's a really easy way to make a website", but I guess I had a hard time navigating around some of them. I think unless the main home page has anything of interest on it..they lose me in all the links and tabs. I never knew if I was really getting the main idea or not.

For example I really felt lost in 1001 Flatworld Tales. I would click on something and I would be reading a story and then I wasn't sure where to go from there. I think that it was just a website with many students stories posted on it. Some were actually pretty good. Time consuming and fun if you knew the students I guess.

I really enjoyed several others though. I thought Kindergarten Counting was very cute, but the photography needed improving for it to really work. A lot of the photos were out of focus, or had busy backgrounds. Several shots were just too far away and would have been better if the subject had been closer. But the idea of the wiki was adorable. I think the idea of starting kindergartners on computers is wonderful. Salute to Seuss was enjoyable and simple.

Primary Math was great..you could tell the students really enjoyed the process. The patterns section was particularly cute. But my favorite was Schools in the Past. What a great way to get the students talking to their Grandparents. Older people like nothing better than reminiscing over their child hoods..and young people need to hear about their heritage...how their parents and grandparents lived.

I learned the most from Wiki Wiki Teaching of course. Cool Cat Teacher..is one cool teacher. Her students are to be envied. I hope they understand how very special she is! I loved the story about her overhearing students in the hallway squealing about adding English notes to their wiki..when is the last time you heard student excited about learning or studying anything? So yeah..that was pretty great. I especially loved number 3. in her original assignment; ask yourself what don't you understand yet about the topic you are investigating and research some more until you do understand and record your findings..I think that is so key in everything about the computer! So that was worth the whole assignment!

As far as creating my own wiki...I think it is something I would like to play with for sure. I think that it would be fun for long distance family members to keep in touch with each other...I think especially if you could load music and photos and even voices..yeah that could be really fun. Grandkids could play their violin solo for their grandparents and a message to NY from TX. Other family from Atlanta could add their soccer pictures and scores from their latest game etc. for all to see. I could really run with this if wikis did all that :)

Ok....I'm out!

THING #6 CIRCLE OF THE WISE

Wow..the world is truly at our fingertips...and it's a little overwhelming!
I started out this activity by reading cool cat teacher's blog entry called How to create your Circle of the Wise. It was inspiring. The next best thing to being wise oneself is to live in a circle of those who are..C.S. Lewis
She mentioned the things that were her criteria for choosing to add someone into her circle of the wise. Among them were, good character, inspirational, responsibility, life-long learners, excellence, conversationalists...she said "You become like your circle".

She closed with the most thought provoking and inspiring question; "Let me ask you this: If you were able to read the writings of Abraham Lincoln, or C.S. Lewis, or Ghandi, or Dale Carnegie on a daily basis would you have done it? The are among you now. Find them and become transformed".

So it motivated me to go out and choose and re choose until I find my personal Circle of the Wise.

One I was especially impressed with was The Fisch Bowl by Karl Fisch. He had several articles I enjoyed and even a YouTube Video called Life=Risk that was so great I had to show my kids. Check it out it's short and encouraging.

Another article he wrote was about the ability to connect with others anywhere in the world in real time. He said that because of this it could virtually change the way we do almost everything. Because of that fact alone shouldn't that mean that schools need to help students learn how to do these things really, really well? I agree wholeheartedly. If nothing else this class is teaching us that we really need to step it up where our students are concerned.

On a funny note..I also read an article that google has a new feature available on your gmail account that you can enable to keep you from "drunk emailing" haha! During that questionable time if your reflexes are too slow, this feature will not allow you to "send" the email but will save it for later..in case you want to rethink your comments! Loved that!

Thing #7

You know it's funny, I didn't think that I would learn much about commenting from the various blog posts we were assigned to read. I thought it was pretty obvious what commenting entailed. But I found the posts both interesting and informative. I must admit though, I find it a little intimidating to comment. Even though I really relate to something I've just read...I find myself all tongue tied and suddenly I have nothing to say. I'll sit with my fingers poised over the key board and just wait..haha! I'll type something and then delete it...type something else..and think no that sounds wrong..I need to just relax and remember that it is only a conversation. That's what blogging is all about...sharing ideas with folks who share the same interests...opening up communication with people you wouldn't normally be able to converse with because of time and distance. It's a whole new world and I'm loving it...nervousness and all.

Thing#5

The blog I chose for my reflective post was What is Learning? I felt it was the most appropriate for my personal journey...my lifelong educational quest so to speak. I never want to stop learning..I never want to be "obsolete". I don't want to gather moss and be irrelevant. Two quotes from her post that especially moved me were "Teachers are the guardians of knowledge" and "Sapere Aude" or dare to know.

The author expounded on the fact that without knowledge there cannot be thinking, and without thinking there cannot be change. She said that learning is the process in which a person takes themselves farther away from ignorance.

Now the quest will be to light the fire under our students to get them excited about learning, and therefore thinking.

Thing #4

Well this "Thing" has been a little more time consuming, but very enjoyable. I got alot out of each of the blogs that I visited. I am very impressed with the fact that many teachers are successfully using classroom blogs..and it seems they've been doing it for a long while. I feel a little behind the times...but catching up!

So the first blog I checked out was "Why I don't assign homework". I found it very interesting in that I realized that I agreed with most of the teacher's ideas. I didn't think that I would...I thought I believed in homework! But after listening to his very logical and intelligent arguments I had a paradigm shift. I also enjoyed many of the comments left by the readers.

The second blog was my favorite site that I visited for this assignment. Mrs. Edmison's Class Wow! I only wish I would have had a grade school teacher like Mrs. Edmison! She has literally put the world at the fingertips of her class by introducing them to the author of their favorite book and opening up a dialogue! How exciting and wonderful. The possibilities are endless! You're learning about space? Let's see if we can get an astronaut to answer some of our questions online...you want to know about what's on the ocean floor...let's talk to this marine biologist. Politics? our senator, our governor, or mayor...endless possibilities! Loved her creativity.

My least favorite was "Spies like us" it left me a little paranoid and fearful. So I choose not to dwell on the negative possibilities of technology. Next was "Teaching Brevity", and I really liked that. Brevity is something I should concentrate on more. I loved the idea that we should assign an essay not on the length, for example 5oo words, but on the brevity of perhaps one paragraph. So that each word is packed with meaning...it takes infinitely more thought. We'd have to choose our words much more carefully if we knew we only could use 50 words to describe and entire book.

Last I chose Duck with a Blog, and I thought this was adorable. How fun for parents to check out their childrens comments, with all the misspellings intact. I really marvel at the teacher's bravery and ingenuity.

I enjoy blog reading very much. It opens up a whole new world of conversations that you wouldn't normally have...it is uninterrupted thought recorded for any and all to see. I find it enlightening and mind expanding. I also think an important part of the experience is reading other readers' comments. They sometimes give opposite opinions or expand on the author's original idea and take it to the next level. Lastly, most of the blogs I read, illuminated the fact that blogs really work for your class. It was pretty much..."If you build it, they will come"! haha!
Loved this assignment.

Thing #2

I was really impressed with all the information that could be virtually at our fingertips. The list of tools available was almost overwhelming. I admit that half of them I had never heard of. Things such as social bookmarks, social networking and wikis are new terms to me. The ideas made me feel like we really have entered the 21st century, now we need to catch up!

We have access to anything and everything, we just have to make the choice and run with it. For those of us who may be a little intimidated by the idea, start out small, but start! The potential for students to abuse the privilege is always going to be there. We can’t let that stop us from moving forward. Instead we should reward the students who show responsibility and penalize the ones who make the wrong choices. How dull it will be for the student to sit with pencil and paper while the rest of the class uses laptops.

Thing #1

Well first of all I just want to say how excited I am about this whole process. I have been trying to start my own blog for about a year now. My sister has a wonderful blog and I really enjoy keeping up with her family by reading and enjoying the great pictures she posts. She has really shown her creative side. I'm looking forward to trying it myself.

So the habit I think is the most challenging for me will be habit number 3;
View problems as challenges, or another opportunity to learn. I tend to get very frustrated if I can't get something to work the second or third time I try. I will have to learn to be a little more patient and really focus on the fact that this is a learning process. It may not all happen at the click of a mouse :)

The habit I think is the easiest for me is habit 71/2. Take time to play. I love to play. I have no problem with making time to play. Almost every weekend we have a family game night. I play sudoku and word games online pretty regularly and I read for pleasure daily. I have a lot of various interests and I truly enjoy surfing the web pursuing those.

Lastly the habit that I think will be most important during this class is habit number 6. Use technology to my advantage. I'm sure that not all of the "Things" are going to be easy so I plan on using the internet to my advantage. YouTube has been my saviour on more than one occasion.

So there you have it.
My very first "Things" post!
Yeah!