Thing 17: Social Bookmarking

Delicious.com just got themselves a new fan. This is a one stop shop for some great websites and will only get better with time and more users. I'm really glad this assignment has introduced me to this site. My girlfriend is a big fan of pinterest.com and this site has a lot of similarities. The social aspect is probably the best part of all. Unlike diigo, where you need to be invited to see a list or a groups bookmarks, delicious.com is all public and anybody is able to see what you thought was worthy enough of a bookmark. I can definitely see myself using this site a lot in the future!

Thing 16: Getting organized(ish)

I am a big fan go Google, so it probably isn't a huge surprise to see that I chose iGoogle as my homepage. I really wish that they chose a better name for it though. I get really annoyed with how much stuff exists with a lower case i in front of the name of the product....i digress.

Google has lots of tools available to add to your homepage. Its completely customizable. I chose to add my gmail, a moon phase calendar, my horoscope, weather for me and for where my parents live, a random fact app, and a small google map. I can go to this one page and catch up on a lot of things fairly quickly. If I need to do more things in my mail, it is right there for me to open up. iLove iGoogle.

I checked out the sticky notes sites, and I just don't get it. I don't understand the need for a separate app just to write down a quick note. I'm pretty sure every computer has a note program pre-installed. I think the sticky note thing is just for people who want their digital notes to resemble post-it notes. I am definitely a function over fashion person, so I will be skipping this one.

Online calendars are awesome. My school makes the entire year available in a digital format which I can put on my computer, phone, or iPad. It makes it very easy for me to find out exactly when grades are due, when our fall or spring breaks are, and every other holiday or day off for that matter. Two thumbs up from me.

Thing 15: what's a wiki?

Wikis can be a great resource for a classroom. It can be a place where students can add material or where they can go for answers to homework problems. For all the good that wikis have to offer, they can also be a source of misinformation as well. Many teachers intentionally go to wikipedia and put misinformation to show students that anybody can write whatever they want, and just because it is posted online does not make it a fact. There have been quite a few times in some of my classes where some of my own classmates have quoted things I knew to be untrue. It does not make them look very smart at all. Be careful! I hope everyone liked the changes I made to their posts on our wiki. They were subtle, so you'l have to look hard.

Thing 14: Flowcharts and mind maps

For this assignment I chose Gliffy for my flowchart. I chose this site because of some of its other features besides just flowcharts. Although I can see a use for flowcharts in my class, it was the Venn diagrams that really caught my eye. I can definitely see myself using this site to show the commonalities and differences of different polygons, or maybe using a flowchart to show the correct procedures to solve problems.

For a mindmap, I chose bubbl.us. I had not had much experience with mind maps in the past. This site was very simple to use and had nice clean graphics. I don't like it when some site try to get too cute and end up going overboard with the graphics.

Thing 13

Google never ceases to amaze. That must be an incredibly fun company to work for. I have been using Gmail, Picassa, and Google docs for a while now. Here is a doc I created a while ago. It is pretty standard practice for my friends and I to collaborate and coordinate food and other various sundries when we go camping. This could be a great way for students to collaborate on projects without having to be at the same place. I remember working on group projects where we had to meet up at someone's house. Now students can simply open up there project in Google and correct mistakes someone else made, or do any other editing or revising that may be necessary.

Thing 12: Google and beyond

Google has become so entrenched in our vernacular. In many ways it is similar to Xerox. For a long time people would just say "Xerox this" meaning copy this. But where Xerox has a limited bag of tricks, Google seems to always have some new tool up their sleeve. iGoogle has been around for a while, but they are constantly adding new gadgets and improving the layout. I recently added the Useless Knowledge gadget and the Current Moon Phase gadget. I also have my gmail show on my iGoogle page. It lets me see a few of my most recent emails at a glance. I have the weather for my house as well as where my parents are living. All of the gadgets allow me to quickly view what is important to me. One of the things I like most about this feature is that I can sign into any computer and my iGoogle will come with me. (I just have to make sure I log out)

Google translate has also been very helpful to me. Last fall I had an ELL student and Google translate allowed me to type in word problems or definitions and then tell it into which language I would like it to be translated. Caveat: Google translate is an excellent resource and tool, but it has been my experience in speaking with native speakers that it does have some limitations. It will sometimes translate exactly how you want it to, but more likely is that it will translate into something that will express your idea but may not be exactly grammatically correct. I'm not sure exactly how the software works, but apparently some languages work better than others.

Thing 11: discovering interesting blogs

For me the easiest and most effective blog finder was Google blogs. It seemed to consistently find blogs that were most like what I had in mind when I entered a certain keyword. I also like how Google's predictor works even when searching for blogs. Sometimes I would start typing only to let Google change my mind and I eventually found an interesting blog that was maybe just a little different than what I had originally intended. For example, I started typing "high school math" and got the results shown.

Every single one of these subjects interest me. I'm going to have my hands full. But at least they'll be full of useful information!

Another great way to find helpful blogs is by looking around on the blogs that you have subscribed to. Most of the well established blogs will have lots of links to blogs or websites that they enjoy and find informative. Happy hunting!