Thing 11 Blog Feeds

The method I used most of the time was going to some of my favortie bookmarked sites and look for blogs that were already set up on those sites that I never even looked for before. I added a few of those to my blogline. The search tool that I found easiest was bloglines search tool since I was already set up on blogline and familiar with it. I found Technorati a little big for my purposes, so did not spend too much time on. Same thing with Topix.net. I already added the Dallas Morning News to my blog lines, so I'm not really interested in another news feed. I added several art educator blog feeds to my blogline that I had not found in previous searches. It is good to know that different search sites provide different sites to choose from, so that in the future, if I'm looking for something specific, I know there are numerous feed searches to try. I also found googleblogsearch very helpful with my topic searches and was surprised to find that you can add a topic, such as mesquiteisd, and google will e-mail you whenever news on that topic comes up.

Thing 10 RSS Feeds

I chose Bloglines to set up 15 blog feeds. Once I got started, it was hard to stop. It was very simple to use. I still can't believe I have never heard of this stuff before. I can see how this will make my life easier, and MUCH more plugged in to current interests/news. I chose several art educator blogs, which will provide new lesson ideas and teaching strategies/tips. I also chose a new word of the day so I can increase my vocabulary, and a cartoon for a quick laugh. On a personal level, I chose a health/fitness/diet link to help stay motivated to create a healthy lifestyle. I also chose a link that gives up to date art competition/contests that I can share with my students who are interested in entering. I'm sure I will continue to discover new uses for this tool.

Thing 9 Image Generator

I used "Grafitti It" at http://www.signgenerator.org/graffiti/ to create a sign for my art room, as the students think this stuff is pretty cool. It was very easy to create by editing the text, then choosing a background. The hard part was ajusting the spacing to get everything to fit centered on the page. I could see using these sign makers for bulletin board displays or signs to use around the classroom.

I also played around with Monopoly Card Generator at http://monolpoly.game.cards.txt2png.com/ to make some reward cards to use in my classroom. These would also be fun to make to hand out to friends at parties, or to create a new game for the classroom.

Thing 8 more flickr fun

chris a la warhol
Originally uploaded by teacharttx

I created "chris a la warhol" using fd's flickr toys on Big Huge Labs called warholizer. This tool intriqued me because I teach a lesson similar to this using students photos and iPhoto. Warholizer was much quicker and easier to do, but doesn't allow the user as much creative control over the outcome, but this could sure be used in my curriculum. I am learning so much about computer art, that I have decided next year I'm going to dedicate an entire 6 weeks at the end of the year to computer art for my advanced class - as long as we can get in the computer lab or a class set of laptops. The kids REALLY like working on computers, and are not afraid to explore. They are also a lot more open to posting their photos online than I am. I discourage my own children in doing this, but all their friends have their pictures online, so I think I'm fighting a losing battle. The most I'm letting them post is partial face shots, because of the online predator threat. For my personal artwork, I am concerned about copyright infringement. Other tools I explored were the mosaic maker, jigsaw, calendar, and bead art, and I plan to do much, much more. The opportunites are endless as to the uses in an art class. I get permission already from parents to publishimages, so I'll just have to keep track of that and make sure I keep on top of it. I can see us using flickr to share images we create, expecially ones we create using online tools. I think this could even turn into an online gallery for our school, which the other art teachers would probably find intriguing as well.

Thing 6 Web 2.0 Awards

After reading other's blogs, I decided to try out del.icou.us, because I'm always emailing websites from home to use in my classroom. I do most of my surfing research from home due to the security blocks at school. When I finally find a site I like, it would be great to save them to del.iciou.us to access from anywhere, even on vacation. I also like the way I can add my own tags to it, and save it with hilited text. what great features! In class, I have been making handouts that list specific sites for students to visit. I have a set of classroom computers, and now instead of getting on each computer and setting up bookmarks, or making handouts, I can just set them up in del.iciou.us for students to access interactive art sites that they can go for for assignments, or if they have free time. A few of the sites I used this year in class for students was translating their names into Chinese to include in their artwork, as well as researching Andy Warhol for a computer art assignment.

Thing 7 Flickr!

grounded again II
Originally uploaded by teacharttx

Flickr is flexible and user friendly, although I did have trouble adding the photo to the blog. I tried adding the photo from a url, but it didn't work- I'm sure I was doing something wrong. So I tried creating the blog in flikr, and that seemed easier. I can think of a lot of uses for flickr. I could post pics from my classroom for students and their parents to see, as well as student artwork to share with other teachers in the district. My students are always wanting to see my personal artwork, and this is an easy way for them to access the images. On a personal level, I can post family pics to share with family and friends living far distances. We are currently remodeling our home, and I plan to post some pics soon to show off our handy work.

Thing 5

Maybe I've been living in a cave, but the term "School 2.0" is completely new to me. I knew our school/district/world was encouraging and implementing more technology into education, but I really had no idea that so many opportunities for this were available to us, and for free. School 2.0 means to me, that the physical walls of the school are no longer the boundaries for learning, but that reading, and most importantly, writing, will occur in a much broader environment via the internet. I know from personal experience taking college courses that many assignments/tests are now done online, but didn't realize this was trickling down into our childrens' educational experience. I think the future will bring a much more collaborative educational environment, where students from all over the planet will be learning together and communicating with each other, by sharing what they have written, or thru blogs, podcasts, etc. I think that the face of education as we know it today will be completely different in 5 years. Students are demanding to be taught on a more technical level, and it is becoming more difficult to inspire and excite them by teaching with traditional methods. I, myself, am all for it, but I'm sure a lot of teachers are not, as it is going to require teachers to become better trained in technology just to stay ahead of their students.

Thing 1

My experience so far is that learning to blog is both exciting and scary. Once posted, your thoughts are out for the whole world to see (I must remember to proof read!). I'm very excited about the possibilities that blogging can open up for me both personally and professionally. I do not consider myself gifted with technical abilities, so I just forge on and hope things turn out right.

I'm excited about learning all the onlines tools, and hope they will prove relevent to my job or personal life, and hope they will be quick, easy, and convenient to use so that I will actually use them on a regular basis.

Thing 4 Comments

Commenting helps create a sense of community by sharing common interests and experiences. The interaction between comments allows a dialogue to occur, allowing all parties to share and learn new things.
Blog comments must be relevent, intelligent, and nice. It is also important not to let some online meanie get under your skin and destroy your confidence inthe process.

The seven blogs I chose to read/comment were:

1. coolcatteacherblog – I chose this blog because it stressed the importance of not letting mean, vicious comments destroy my confidence and deter me from expressing my thoughts and opinions.

2. ten commandments of blog commenting by brown thoughts blog– good advice on the etiquette of blogging relating to basic common courtesy ; be relevant, nice, or if you can't, go to a different blog
3. Commenting using an alias vs. your real name - from Blogging Basics 101 was about how choosing a blog name is really a personal choice. It seems many start out as anonymous, and as they become more comfortable with blogging, they begin using their real name or a combination of real/alias.
4. Technocricket – this blogger is ahead of me in the course, and seems to be more techno savvy than I, but after reading his/her comments, I am looking forward to learning flickr, and del.icou.us sounds very useful to access bookmarks between school and home, which had me using e=mail to accomplish the task.
5. Ictbailey’s blog inspired me to explore flickr with her photo alphabet. Since I teach art, I’m hoping to use this site in a variety of ways with students, as long as the school doesn’t block us. I'm up to 4 digital cameras in my art class, and we use them more and more every year.
6. lovingsummer’s blog was chosen because I also LOVE summer. I share the author’s misgivings on the amount of time this course will take, simply because it is so much fun to learn and explore new things, but in order to meet the deadline, I feel it is necessary to somewhat skim over things I would have liked to explore at greater length.
7. Michael says - the blog discussed youtube, of which I am already familiar, thanks to my own children. I want to learn how to download movies to the site and use the site in class. I have found several videos on claymation and sculpting that I wanted to show in class last year, but the school blocked them.
8. Teddy bear blog sounds really excited about learning new things, which I can relate to. Sounds like this will be a rewarding experience for everyone.
I chose these blogs because something in the blog names spoke to me, and I was able to relate to all of them on some level. After reading the comments, I am really pshyched about learning everything I can about online tools.

thing 3 blogging

I could see myself using blogs for two purposes. The first would be to communicate with other art teachers within my district to share what we are doing in class, offer tips, ideas, and share what I have learned in various staff development, etc., and encourage others to do the same. Right now, we occasionally do this through e-mail, but this could be taught during one of our staff developments to teach everyone how. The second blog I would use is to share news with students and parents. I think it would be fun for this to be a project for my advance art class to create an art newsletter for parents/students to let them know what we are doing in class, or upcoming events, etc.

Thing 2- 7-1/2 habits of effective lifelong learners

The habits are very common sense, and if applied, would help more people reach more of their goals. I think we do a lot of these things already without knowing about it, but the habits help us become more organized and reinforce what we are already doing to make us more successful. I plan to implement some of these strategies into student goal setting in my classroom. One of my goals is to learn to how to blog. I'm hoping this will become something that can be used between myself (teacher) and my students and their parents, and/or between myself and other art teachers in our district. I am constantly introducing more technology into my work and home experience, and am excited about learning about new and free online tools available to me. I feel my largest obstacle is time constraints and interruptions, so my plan of attack is to schedule 1-2 hours early in the morning each day before my family is awake to work on the 23 Things. That way time will not slip away from me and I will be able to finish in the allotted timeframe, and also avoid interruptions.

I have always been an advocate of lifelong learning, and I tell people all the time that I have learned more after I became a teacher than I did during college. Teaching others forces me to always learn new things as well as reinforces my learning, especially since I repeat the same lesson 5 times each day.