Only the beginning...

I have learned so much throughout the process of completing the 23 things. I have really grown to love the blogging and plan to start one just as a way to express myself. I also loved exploring Flickr and plan to take some time to explore some more. I enjoyed creating images through imagechef and the short movie through animoto. I'm am also continuously looking for more ways to be more organized and will definitely continue developing Livebinders to use when I begin teaching.

I will certainly use the tools I have had a chance to experience in this course, throughout the future and strive to continue learning.

Thing #23

http://www.plcmclearning.blogspot.com/ this link is the original site of the Learning 2.0 process. It gives the steps of producing a 23 things project. And just by completing a Google Search it is easy to find many different school using the assignment of The 23 Things to teach students technology.

Now that I know about Creative Commons, I will be able to make better decisions about images I use and links I add into projects, websites, etc. I will also be a good tool to teach the students. I also plan to use licenses from Creative Commons on lesson plans I develop not only for school but Sunday school also.

Thing #22

The three notebooks I created were Math Fun, Spelling, and Inclusion. I find this as one of the most useful orginiazational web tools yet. This gives educators a wonderful way to not only organize their resources, but to share them with other educators and parents if needed. They would be a good tool to add different resources for your students to visit to enhance their skills that are lacking and each child could have a personalized one.

Thing #21

Summertime I enjoyed creating this video with Animoto. Listening to the upbeat music and watching the beautiful summer flowers and sunny scenes rotate brought a smile to my face. This would be a fun end of the year presentation of events through the year. Parents would love seeing the pictures and the kids would love feeling like they were in a movie.

Thing# 20

While there are many useless videos on YouTube there are also some great ones. I found a great Alphabet Song for Kindergarten students in my search. It teaches the Alphabet with music and animated pictures along with the proper pronunciation of each letter sound. There are many videos that can be used educationally and even for fun with your students. A quick search of YouTube can usually provide you with a visual addition to your lesson of the day, but remember always watch the entire video before showing it with your lesson.

Thing#19

Teacherpop Badge

I like the idea of TeacherPop. I believe as future educators we need a way to keep in touch and draw from one each others' knowledge. I am also a member of Pinterest and love being able to draw from ideas of others! I like the idea of the Gather site. Many times I feel like I need adult conversation. I love my children but sometimes I need deeper conversation. I believe this will be a great site to be involved with once everything from school calms down!

Thing #18

Social Networking---I have never been a fan of twitter, but I have a little addiction to Facebook (Tonya)! It is a great tool to keep in touch with friends and family that are too far to see. I do get aggravated at times when I can not locate someone I know has a page. I love that I get up-to-date info from the school district through their page and plan to have a private page for my class each year. It is a fun way to involve parents and can provide another way of keeping parents informed. Students could also use the page for questions about homework etc.

Thing #17

Delicious is an inviting website. I like the ease of use and the fact that I can be on ANY computer and get to sites I need. This will be a great tool for the classroom. "Tagging" websites used often in the classroom will help make quick transitions. I loved how the tags on educational technology items contained so many of the topics we have explored this far on our 23 things project. It will be a great tool in the future when looking for sites to further my lesson or professional development.

Thing #16

I chose to complete a homepage with iGoogle. I experimented with Netvibes but the set up did not appeal to me. I liked the way the iGoogle homepage looked and the features it includes, but I do not believe I will make this a permanent homepage. I love the online calendars and the to-do lists. They are very useful because they can be synced with my phone and husband. These tools can make our family activities go much smoother. I also like the idea of being able to create a class calendar and allow parents to sync with it in order to keep up with important dates for the class.

Thing #15

I like the idea of Wikis. I had fun looking at what everyone posted in the sandbox. I chose to post about my experiences with imagechef.com. I am part of two large families, one by birth the other my marriage as well as a large church. Developing a wiki would be a great tool in planning events. As far as the classroom is concerned I believe this would be an EXCELLENT tool in order to involve parents in your classroom. A great way to get parents to help with supplies or parties without making them feel like you are harassing them. With students I think it would be a good tool to keep up with jobs needing completing in he classroom and with group projects so you could alleviate some of the class time used to plan them.

Thing #14

For my flow chart I chose Gliffy. Honestly, I chose Gliffy because I did not have to wait for a invite to work on the page. This would be an excellent tool for reading classes or even a clothing and textiles class in high school. I would use it in elementary classes to make Venn Diagrams for things such as comparing and contrasting characters, or org charts for teaching concepts such as the food chain.

For my mind map I chose to explore BUBBL. It is a fun way to create a flow chart as you think. I do believe it could get a little confusing if you get carried away with your thoughts. This would be a fun way to have students to prepare for writing a report. They could use this to brainstorm before writing their paper in a more interactive way.

Thing #13

ZOHO doc!

GoogleDocs drawing

I had a lot of fun exploring both ZOHO and GoogleDocs. I like Google Docs a little more since it is so easy to share other things from Google Apps with it. Students could use this in the classroom to share their thoughts and creations with other students in many ways. A class Google+ page could be set up and students could share links to their work, it would be a great tool for students involved in group projects. Each member of the group would have access to the material and make changes as needed with only a few clicks.

Thing #12

I chose to use Google Alert and Calendar. The alert tool will help me keep aware of anything that may show up about me on the web, and hopefully help fend off any possible issues caused. There are many people named Tonya Haley and I can now feel better about the fact that I could have a "heads up" if I need to defend myself about something that was done by someone else.

 The calendar is the tool I will probably use the most. It would help me keep track of all my children's appointments, school dates, trainings etc. I like that it can be synched with others, such as parents to keep up with assignment dates, and my cell phone!

Thing #11

For me technorati was definitely the easiest to use. The blogs are broken into categories and you can easily choose ones that interest you. Topix was the one I liked the least, it seemed confusing and I did not really find anything I was interested in.
During my searching I found 2 new feeds to add to my list Organizing Junkie and Eco-Novice.
Organizing Junkie is full of wonderful ideas for organizing all aspects of your life. And eco-novice has great tips on "going green" on a budget.

Thing #10

The one thing that has bothered me about blogging in the need to search for each blog individually. After completing this activity, I will definitely keep up with more blogs. I found many that interested me and am looking forward to checking in with them. As for using RSS at school, the students oculd each set up a blog in order to provide more social interaction, the teachers could each set up blogs and then control them on an RSS. Using these blogs would give the teachers more ability to share ideas and support to one another.

My 5 feeds are:

2 teaching mommies
Christian Fiction 
Pioneer Woman
Elementary Education
Christian Living

Thing #9

The online generators from this activity will allow me to bring creativity and individuality into the classroom on the level most children can relate to. I love the smiley face generator and the comic strip generator. The Comic Strip generator would be a very handy tool in getting reluctant readers involved by making the story more enjoyable. Today I chose to use Image Chef to create my image.

It seems awareness of childhood cancer has taken over my family and friends. So, I used the colors of the awareness ribbon to create a word mosaic to support the survivors.
I also created one that would be cute to turn into a t-shirt for the classroom.