LOOKS LIKE WE MADE IT, BABY!!!!

http://rebelzen.com/2012/08/10-ways-to-be-the-most-annoyingly-happy-person-you-know/

Wow!  I cannot believe what a long, hard journey it has been.  We need to celebrate our accomplishments!!

https://dreamshadow59.wordpress.com/tag/how-to-become-a-happy-person/

I feel more comfortable with using technology in my own life, but I still have more work to do before I am as comfortable with using technology in the classroom.  I've learned how to use iPhoto, convert slides into digital photos, and iMovie to produce four iMovies (original, son's birthday, two for Christmas presents).  I am very pleased with the results and my family loves the iMovies.  
I'm able to gather information more easily from internet sources and to share that information with friends and peers.  I'm still active on Twitter and really enjoy learning from my educational twitter friends.  I feel more comfortable linking sites and embedding  content to share important content. 
I enjoyed learning how to use icons to link websites for my professional online library and professional print library.  I will use both of these libraries on my classroom website and plan to add more links.

My favorite assignment and cool tool is the ThingLink and I will use it with my students.  I want to make make more ThingLinks using real aloud/audio books and I started another one.  I was surprised that not every book I wanted to use had a read aloud version.  I am inspired to post my own read aloud books on youtube and I never thought I would post anything on youtube.  

Thanks to my second grade team and their use of Seesaw and Book Creator, I am using more technology in the classroom.  We are recording students explain their thinking about how to problem solve CGI (Cognitively Guided Instruction) math problems on a weekly basis.  The students love using Seesaw!  

I really enjoyed learning about the Cool Tools and hope to explore them on my own since we were not able to spend much time on them during class.  

The journey has been difficult, full of tears and plenty of frustration.  I've wanted to give up, but once I finally mastered the task then I felt so proud of myself.

Reflective Post #5: Digital Tattoos. 

During tonight's class, we did a data mining activity to find out as much information about an assigned person in a relatively short period of time.  I was not surprised by how easy it was to gather the information, nor how much personal information is online for the world to see. This is why I am hesitant to post pictures or comments on Facebook, and want to keep my iMovie and website anonymous.  When I was first learning about the internet, I had a medical issue and I posted a question on a medical website.  It was pregnancy related and a little embarrassing.  Years later, I was divorced and dating again.  A tech savvy suitor informed me that during a dating mining search, my question was one of his first discoveries.  I was so embarrassed!  I've been very hesitant to post anything since that incident.  I know I am showing my age, but I cannot believe how much information and how many pictures that teens share online.  I'm glad that embarrassing moments from my youth were not captured online.  


digital tattoo

I found the data mining process enjoyable as it felt like a detective game and I love solving mysteries.  The implications of the activity did leave me feeling very uneasy as anyone with ill intent is able to view, stalk, and harm us using these techniques. I was tempted to perform a data mining activity on my ex-husband, but I really didn't want to go down that path.  It is really scary what can be learned about each one of us.  

I googled myself and the first entry was from Find the Data and revealed my salary and other information about my teaching experience.  Interestingly, it had some misinformation as well.  We just cannot control all the misinformation so I guess we need to make sure we put the correct information out there as well. 

I believe it is critical for children to be taught all the ramifications and consequences of their tendency to overshare. I don't think they realize that their digital tattoo will be with them forever and it may very well come back to haunt them when they try to get into college, or get a job.  With parents, posting so many photos of their infants, these children need to learn how to mold their digital tattoo  I think it should be a regular part of our curriculum starting at the elementary level.  

Dr. Seuss ThingLink

What a great tool and so easy to use!  Of all the tech tools we have explored, ThingLink is my favorite one.  Searching for examples, I found a large collection of educational ThingLinks incorporating all subjects.  So many great ideas that pertained to education.

I was able to navigate the site easily and create a Dr. Seuss ThingLink quickly.  I found an image with several Dr. Seuss characters so I was able to put a tag for the corresponding book on each character.  Finding the read aloud Dr. Seuss stories was easy on youtube as there was a large selection for each book.  It may be more difficult to find read aloud stories for different authors but then I could create my own videos using iMovie.  My students struggle with reading and benefit from listening to audio books.  I'd like them to read along as they listen so I used examples showing the words on the page.  I could develop ThingLinks for a variety of authors and load them on my classroom website (once I make one) and my students could choose from a selection of books on the ThingLink of a particular author.  I look forward to using ThingLink with my students.

Created with Tagul.com

 Tagul Word Cloud Link  

Tech Tac Toe: Part Two Word Clouds

I tried using Wurdle early in the semester and while I was able to create the wurdle with ease, I wasn't able to publish it.  I took screen shots of the two wurdles I created and will share one of them here.

As you can see, I wasn't able to figure out how to rotate the image (I did rotate it on my website).  I was frustrated that I couldn't figure out how to publish it or create a link for it.

Since I like the idea of word clouds, I decided to try Tagul and I had a much better experience with navigating the site and I love the animated word cloud.  I was able to create the word cloud quickly and I prefer it to Wurdle product.  It was a breeze to find the code to embed it on my website.

I can see creating word clouds with my students as they would love it.  Many of my special education students struggle with various aspects of writing so it can be a painful part of the day for my students and me.  They could dictate words or pick words from their stories/sentences and tagul would generate animated word clouds to help their words come alive.  I'm going to try it with my students!

I looked up how to embed widgets in this blog and spent a long time trying to figure it out but no luck. Luckily, my classmates Barb and Ann Maria saved the day and showed me how to embed it.

Tech Tac Toe: Part One Postscript

I thought the blabberize video wouldn't play as I couldn't get it to work before I published but it looks like it will play now that I published the blog.  That is probably standard but being a tech newbie, I did not know that fact.

Tech Tac Toe, Part One                                                                                               November 6, 2015                  

After making an iMovie, this assignment felt like a walk in the park!

First, I must toot my own horn as I made another iMovie.  My son, Max, turned 21 this week and I wanted to do something special for him so I made an iMovie about him.  Second time around was so much more fun.  I used the scanner to upload all the old photos instead of taking photos of the photos. I navigated iPhoto and iTunes with ease instead of becoming frustrated.  I would add the movie but I want to respect his privacy. I feel like a walking commercial for iMovie as I keep telling friends/colleagues to use it.

To Blabberize or Not to Blabberize?

I found the Blabberize tech tool to be entertaining but I doubt I will use it in my professional practice.  Since I am able to navigate iPhoto now, I was able to try several photos in the blabberize process. It was easy to use and fun to do.  I could envision using it on a smart board but as a special education resource teacher, I work with small groups of students and I don't create or use smart board presentations.  I don't have a class website but when I create one then I could see using the blabbers on my website.  My students could create blabbers but I only have them for a limited amount of time and I don't want to spend that time on blabberizing.  In general,  I don't feel that it would be valuable enough for me to find ways to incorporate it into my daily practice.  I can see using it in my personal life as my teenage boys may find it entertaining.

The frustrating part of the process was trying to embed the blabber.  The website generated a embed code but when I entered it into the widget and published, it was blank.  I was able to download the video and upload as you can see below and I hope it works. I set up a link as well.

Halloween Blabber

November 1, 2015

Making an iMovie:  Frustrating but Rewarding

Wow, what an experience!  At first, I toyed with a more personal subject but thought I should create an educational movie so I wanted to create an iMovie on the book, 10 Things Every Child with Autism Wishes You Knew as it is a simple yet powerful book that I wish every teacher would read.  I found some good video clips that I could use and even a good song.  I made the mistake of googling the title and saw so many iMovies about the book that I decided against it as a project.  Back to the more motivating topic of my mother and her best friend.

I wanted to create a tribute to my mother's best friend for my iMovie assignment and I accomplished my goal after many hours, several tears, and much frustration.  The iMovie program is pretty user friendly and I was able to navigate it fairly well (with the help of a tutorial that Barb M found) and once I figured out the necessary foundational skills I needed.  My frustration stemmed from my lack of knowledge about using iTunes and iPhoto. I've never used iTunes and while it should be easy, it took me way too long to buy the song I wanted. I was very frustrated with myself and the process.  Next, I had trouble with iPhotos as I couldn't get all my photos to download and it took me way too long to figure out how to solve this problem.  By this point, I was very frustrated!  This is an example of how screen casts or tutorials would really help us navigate the world of tech.  I looked up how to do all these steps but the directions were not always helpful and it seems like a waste of time when it would be easy for a more knowledgeable person to gather better tutorials for us.  

In addition,  I needed to dig up old photos that I had stashed away in two bins.  I don't usually look at them as they trigger some difficult emotions from my divorce.  Needless to say, I was in tears as I looked through the photos to find some for the movie.
Once I got through these issues then I was able to begin the iMovie.  I took pictures of my photos as I didn't even think about using a scanner.  Only after I had finished my movie, someone mentioned using a scanner and I felt stupid for not thinking of it.  This is a good example of not having those foundational skills that are necessary for these projects.  It would have been so nice to have a tip sheet that mentioned using a scanner for old photos.

In the end, I am very pleased with my movie and my mother and best friend love it.  It brought them to tears!  It was quite a frustrating experience for me but well worth it on a personal level.  I'm planning on making another one for my mother and brothers as a Christmas present.

I'm not sure how I would use iMovie with my students as they are young and come to me for remediation and the iMovie process is lengthy and time consuming.  They are more tech savvy so maybe it would be much easier for them to use!  I liked how Barb M used the iMovie with student work and if I was a classroom teacher, I would use it to make iMovies of student projects.

Here's my iMovie if you'd like to view it.