Thing 7 – Share Photos of your own on Flickr

Flickr can be a huge use to me in the classroom. Our curriculum requires my students to create a magazine article, which includes pictures. Up to now. I've been storing pictures to the used on our schools file server. With Flickr I’ll be able to put these pictures in a spot where the kids could get them online. The drawback is, when working will any pictures that are not original obviously we would not be able to put them on Flickr.

Other applications would be to post pictures taken of the students through their activities to you, make the Flickr account private, and give the parents and authorization to look at the class pictures. This would allow parents a greater familiarity with what I do as a teacher, and provide a greater sense of connectivity to their child's educational experience. By making a private, it would help protect the security of my students and their families in a Web 2.0 world.
I also wonder if there would be a policy limitations/recommendations let my district has in place over the sort of use of technology.

Thing 6 - Photo Sharing with Flickr

Let me say that Flickr is just plain fun! I enjoyed birdwalking from one subject to another; going wherever my thoughts, through flight of fancy, allowed. After spending far too much time at the computer (my wife wondered when I was going to bed), I found THIS picture:



Why did I choose this particular photo? Well, let me tell you. I imagine that many of the participants in 23 Things, if they explored Flickr for any length of time, eventually entered the name of their school to see if any pictures existed. When I typed the name of my school, Trombly, into the search line, I was presented with this autumnal picture.

I even found a picture of paper pumpkins neatly inserted into each pane of glass in the classroom window is a project that I have been doing to decorate the front of our school for years. Yes, this is a picture from outside of my classroom in 2007. When I saw that someone had appreciated the student’s jack-o'-lantern craft so much as to have taken a picture and posted it on Flickr, you literally could have knocked me over with a feather! This goes to show that the Internet holds surprises for those brave enough (and lucky enough) to discover. However, try as I might, I was unable to add the pumpkin picture to this blog. Could it be that the formatting was the problem (it was a gif file, not a jpeg). Too bad as it was a very nice picture of student-created paper pumpkins.

Thing 5 - Subscribing to RSS Feeds

I get it. The whole RSS idea; got it. It looks like a great way to keep up with a host of blogs and bloggers.

I have already set up a folder in which I am placing blogs about SMART Board resources (I guess I had better get on top of this as I am having one installed in my classroom for next year’s use/experimentation). Jackie had a few really good blog sites bookmarked in her Blogline feeds. I even found a blog produced by my old middle school social studies teacher. It looks like you never can underestimate the vastness of resources in the ‘Net’s ether.

One thing is clear to me: you can really lose track of time searching for useful blogs. A couple hours ago, I thought that I would fill a little time before going to bed. Now, as it is in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, I realize that I will need to tear myself away from my computer if I hope to get enough rest to finish painting the tall sections of the house tomorrow.

What’s that dear? No, I wasn’t asleep on the scaffold….I was merely resting my eyes.

Things 4 - What is RSS?

I have, for the most part, stayed away from blogs because 1. many can seem very informal to the point of stating opinion, buy mostly 2. I did not know of an efficient way to organize their access. I would spend a “month of Sundays” going from one site to another to find that is nothing new. I had known that RSS lets one know when a new podcast is available, but I had know idea the same would be true for blogs as well. This should allow me to view blogs most efficiently. It looks like I just may possibly be learning something….

Thing 3 - Blogs in Education

A blog might support the work that I do, as it is a very handy place in which people can interact with posted information. A blog would be a fantastic place in which my students could either get information or post information learned from their studies. I was intrigued by the book report form that I found on Alice Mercer's Class Website blog (listed in the 23 Things – Thing 3 example). I could see using a procedure such as this to collect assignments for my students. However, being that I teach second grade, the majority of my students (as well as their parents) would have to be brought up to speed on using this technology.

Concerns that I have about educational logging are as follows:

1. Safety/security/privacy - Can I guarantee the security of the students to my parents

2. Ability of all families to participate - even though. Technology is wide-ranging, there are still some families who lack connection to the Internet.

3. Time - always a factor when adding something new (now we just have to find something old, which is no longer germane to instruction, to do away with).

Blog for Thing 1 and Thing 2

I am participating in 23 Things because of the personal and professional need to say on top of trends in (educational) technology. The more that I know, the more I can bring to my classroom, students, and colleagues. I hope to learn how to make better use of teh resources available at my school so that teh students are better engaged and educated.

As for Thing 1 - Wow. This gave me a lot to think about. Could a staff be so unified as to bring an undertaking such as this to fruition? My mind raced, as I read this article, hypothesizing the necessary skill set that needed to be possessed by both the students and educators in order to make this model a reality. Sure there are still reading and writing involved. But there is also great need for skills development in keyboarding, collaborative learning, critical thinking, resource and information acquisition, as well as technology integration. Pretty heady stuff, huh? However, these skills are exactly what students are already developing on their own as they text message, surf the Internet, play video games, and interact with their peers. Wouldn't it be outstanding if the schools could seize on this richness of student potential and direct it in ways beneficial to both the learner and society?

The interesting thing is that many schools already possess the hardware and technology infrastructure to allow this to exist in schools today. It seems to me that the greatest element preventing schools from accomplishing dynamic change is, as President Franklin D. Roosevelt stated, “Fear itself.” Fear in trying something “new.” Fear in not knowing all the answers to all the questions. Fear that the students will be empowered to such a degree the staff will have to play “catch up” with technology. Fear in acknowledging that how we have educated students in the past is simply not the way to reach students today (and in reality, the way we need to reach students today may not be the way we need to reach them in the future). We need to get past our fears so that we can move on with matters of substance.

The video, “Pay Attention,” elicits powerful thoughts. It provided a lot of current facts, information and provides a vision for learning and instructional development for the future. The media elements (dynamic single instrument music, no dialogue, screen text in varied speed and format) made the delivery of the information meaningful and poignant (can we say the same of the lessons that we present to our students?). Due to the style in which it was produced, this was created to hold a person's attention. Much like the way technology changes in our society; if you do not pay close attention to the video, you will miss something. This would be a worthy video to show any district curriculum development committee at the onset of their work.

"How does writing on the Internet, knowing anyone could read it, change how you write or feel about writing?" is a great question! I have never had difficulty stating my mind (rightly or wrongly). Afterall, opinions are like bellybuttons: everyone has one. Years of teaching and sending weekly newsletters home to parents has made me comfortable in writing. However, writing on the Internet does cause me to choose my words carefully. I find that I, being a fairly guaded person, I do not want to share too much personal information in these blogs. Safety and privacy issues race through my mind when on line.

I look forward to more as I continue through these 23 things.

Looks Like I'm Connected

23 Days in the Tech Life is up and running. 45 years and this is my first blog. Some says "it's abotu time." I am forced to agree. I'm off to the calendar to pencil in a red letter as this is, believe it or not, an accomplishment in and of its self.