Teacher Tube

Thing 23

Happy Dance! As Dora the Explorer would say, "We Did It! We Did It! Hooray!"

I really enjoyed this trip through 23 Things. I am proud of myself for trying new things and am also happy to find that I knew about some of the 'things' so I must be a bit technologically hipper than I thought I was!

I hope to use Teacher Tube, Image Generators, Google Docs and Nings. I want to Podcast and do PhotoStory. I hope to inspire my teachers to use these tools, also, and to bring this knowledge to the students and create lessons for them to start using these tools, also.

Thing 22

I liked Nings. I enjoyed looking at the school librarian ones and I can see sending some of my teachers to the Teacher Ning. The new teachers who have tons of questions could benefit but it's also a great place for networking or for doing pen pal type projects. A place to find lessons and more. Nice. I liked the book reviews on the library blogs. I think I could use these Nings to help myself out with lessons/book ordering and more.

I think I could do a Ning with my college friends spread all over the country. We could post there and keep up with one another and keep it to just us. We all have blogs but have discovered that our inlaws, parents, even friends of friends tend to read them so we have to keep ourselves in check. Facebook and MySpace are, of course, not real private either. This would be a fun place for us to keep up with each other.

Thing 21

Thing 21 is on hold until I get some kind of recording device. I don't have anything here at home on my old clunker.

I did attend Region IV's class on Podcasting and did play around with audacity during the class. I thought it was fun and am excited to use it with the students and teachers at school. I just can't do one right now, from home. Tune in later.....

Thing 20

I love the Teacher Tube. I didn't know about this until I started this program. I've been a fan of You Tube as a way to waste time and look up old 1980s music videos. I'm even on You Tube with my appearance on the Rachael Ray Show.


I see so many ways to use Teacher Tube. I checked and it has information on using Smart Boards. My school just received a smart board for every classroom and I can see sending teachers to these online tutorial videos as a way to learn more about this new equipment. They can watch it on their own time!! Of course, there are some cute Dewey Decimal videos which will help me teach the ol' system to the students at my school. Here's one with sock monkeys!

Thing 19

Danger...Danger...Danger...too many fun ways to waste time! I signed up for Twitter to keep in touch yet another lazy way. This one even more so than Facebook or MySpace since it's just one line answers. Niiiice.

Etsy. That's dangerous. Not only do I want to buy the homemade gifts, I'm inspired to run out to Hobby Lobby to try my hand at making my own handmade gifts to sell (and this usually turns out bad...somehow the image in my mind is never what I end up holding in my hands)

I love Farecast and Kayak. I love traveling and the librarian in me always has to research good deals. These sites are great.

None of the above would be used in school but they sure are fun for me!!

Thing 18

I'm working from home off an old PC and even with our high speed internet, this old baby can't handle much and grinds and snorts when pushed to her limit. Therefore I didn't even bother to download the Open Office. I have a Google account so off I went to Google Docs.

Now, I've been using Google Docs with HISD for our preview book program but I just logged in and put in my reviews. I didn't fully embrace the Google Docs. I love them--presentations, spreadsheets, word. I can share (or not) and this could be used for collaboration with teachers when planning a library lesson or for doing some of the paperwork (i.e. writing the school improvement plan) when everyone needs to work together but can't find the time to sit down to write it out together. COOLIO!

Here's my brief presentation...I was feeling nostalgic....
http://docs.google.com/Present?docid=dfczqhdx_1cq7h8zch&invite=ffk6gv5

Thing 17

I created a search for Children's Lit using some good Children's Literature sites. For when I'm searching for new or notable books, etc.

I can't for the life of me figure out how to link it here. I can tell you that it's under Children's Lit by J-Lib. Hope you can find it when you explore Searchrolls. I can find it, I just hope you can.

I would say, by far, that this Thing had some of the least 'how to' instructions and I'm a little lost. This Rollyo is one of the things I don't think I will use but it's good to know about. Especially if I want to search fashion sites via a searchroll by a fashion designer. Good to know. Especially for someone who shops at Target (but when I buy clothes there, I like to say it with a French accent. You know, Tar-zhay)

Thing 16

I added to a wiki! I'm so proud of myself! As I said in the sandbox, I am really excited to learn about wikis. I've spent too much time hollering about Wikipedia and showing students its evil ways. I want to imbrace the wiki-world. I can see many educational purposes. I could create a wiki space for each grade level and then they could have student collaborate when working on projects. For example, if 5th grade students are researching science projects, whenever they find a good site with multiple project ideas, they could add it to the wiki.

Thing 15

What does Library 2.0 mean to me. Does this have to be a 5 paragraph essay with correct margins? No--ooooh, I see because of 2.0, I can respond via blog or wiki and gone is the 5 paragraph essay--hoo-ray!

But seriously, I love the concept of Library 2.0. I love that we're evolving and embracing the new. I was a 'forward thinking' librarian back in 1999 when I, shockingly, suggested that my students do some research via SIRs ONLINE. Oh yeah, I got down with my bad self back then. However, I've noticed that I'm still suggesting SIRS. That I got comfortable in what was once the 'new' and 'hip' ideas in Library Land and have been passed by when the new technology toll road opened. This is important to me. This is important to my school. I need to know this and so do the students (or, for those that already know this, I need to know this to keep up with them!)

I liked the perspective of "Away from Icebergs". I think his thoughts on collection development were spot on. I also thought he was spot on about placing the information for our patrons out on the web for them--not so they have to come to us. Good stuff.

Thing 14

Hi, I'm J-Lib and I am a blog-a-holic. I think technorati would get me in trouble. I also am amazed that the blogs I love to read: Pinkisthenewblog, Dooce and Greek Tragedy are not in the top 100 via technorati. These people make a living off of blogging and yet, they're not in the top 100. Weird.

I found it interesting by finding the 'popular' button that people seem to be doing a lot of tagging or labeling for Crocs. Wha?!? Ok.

Again, if there was an assignment for students to keep track of something, say, McCain/Obama, via blogs or posts, then this is great. They can link to a whole world of information.

However, I have to ponder if tagging would be similar to filing. The problem with filing is that I always forget did I file it under 'appliance' or 'refrigerator' or was that 'fridge'. I wonder if I'd do the same thing with tags--today I meant YA Lit but tomorrow it'll be Young Adult. This isn't a technorati or tagging problem, seems like a personal problem to me. HA!

I, myself, am going to stay far, far, faaaar away from something that will only lead me to read more blogs. Stop the madness!!!!

Thing 13

Boy, taking a few days off for the holiday weekend and I'm running slow. I have searched and saved via Del.icio.us using tags like YA Lit or School Libraries but I'm just not quite 'getting it'. I'm not quite where I completely understand how this will help me. Can't I just put these sites that I like up on my iGoogle page? Does going to Del.icio.ous site help me or is it just another step to take?

However, I can see if a teacher is having students do research on specific topics and would want to revisit those sites or find other sites/blogs with similar tags, then sure, it's good. I'm just starting to feel like all I'm doing is creating more work when this should be easier, right?

Maybe I need to take another long weekend holiday break....

Thing 12

As a blogger for over 2 years now, I find that comments really keep me going. I will sometimes post for weeks and not have any comments. I'll feel like no one is reading it and then randomly someone will say that they read something on my blog and I want to scream "Why don't you leave a comment?!?!?". However, after reading about successful comments, I see that when I post with questions or a pondering thought, I tend to get lots of comments. When I post about my family's comings and goings, I don't get comments because they would be more of the 'right on' or 'sounds fun' type which isn't really the best kind of comment.

I found 5 blogs to comment on for this exercise on the Library2Play site.

Leaving comments on other blogs was easy, as I've posted, I have an entire iGoogle page full of feeds to all my favorite blogs. I left a comment on a Crockpot365 about a girl who is using her crockpot for 365 days in a row and I left one on Pink is the New Blog. However, I did it as my alter ego from my personal blog.

Thing 11

I am already a member of Shelfari and because I've been using it for over a year now, I'm a bit more loyal to it than Library Thing. Plus, I'd hate to have to transfer my friends over to yet another web based too. Really, they're the same thing--a Facebook or My Space but for the literary type.

I like the concept and find it's another way to keep in touch with friends (via what we're reading), keep up to date on what's new and notable, and I enjoy being in groups with other librarians and/or other moms.

So I joined Library Thing for this project but really, I'm going to stick with Shelfari. But that's just me.

Thing 10

Image Chef was by far the easier of the two and with less pesky ads. Ugh. You can see below that I tried to do the comic strip and I just couldn't get it right. There was, in my opinion, no straight forward directions. Too many ads mixed with what I was supposed to be doing.

I liked the Big Huge Lab image generator, also, as seen in the Flickr posting earlier. This was fun!

Educational uses would be to create a nametag for a famous Texan listing all their accomplishments, or having a book character motivational poster. This really was fun and I think kids will get a kick out of it. So easy (with Big Labs and Image Chef, not the others so much--too busy with all their 'stuff')

Thing 9

I wonder if Dr. Seuss knew there would be more than Thing One and Thing Two...just a random musing as I type Thing 9 in my Title box.

RSS Feed finders. I'm a big fan of blogs. It's how I keep a window on the world of friends from high school/college, family, and other Mommies. I don't do technorati tags on my blog but my cousin, who blogs exclusively about Rachael Ray uses it so that others can find her blog and so that she can make sure to give shout outs to bloggers talking about Rachael.

I found myself liking the Google Blogger search (is this where I admit that I'm becoming much friendlier with Google than I ever thought I would?). I liked looking at the EduBlogger awards and seeing the library blogs out there (I really need to broaden my blog reading--I have been in a rut of peeping on friends/family and then the lives of celebrities).

I don't see myself using Topix much as it was more of a news base than blog base.

I think I will continue to check out library blogs to add to my reader as well as some new, funny, mom blogs. I'm starting to love seeing that others out there making the same mistakes (and celebrating the same triumphs) as I am on this roller coaster ride.

Thing 8

Here's my shared reader. At least, I think this is how I share it will y'all : http://www.google.com/reader/shared/13217176151407840639

As I stated back in Thing 7, I love the RSS feed option on my iGoogle page because I can always do a quick glance for updates and if there are none, go on my merry way without clicking through all my 'favorites' on the computer. It really saves time!

For schools, you can have a reader set up for different projects. For example, I saw some Texas History blogs. How cool would it be for kids doing their Texas History projects to check updates on blogs from scholars and/or enthusiasts. Perhaps they'd learn something new--as it is being discovered!

This Google reader also allows for a librarian to, erm, 'control', per se what comes up on the reader but students feel like they have control over what they read AND they're being allowed to use Google (because up until this project, I'd scream about "NO GOOGLE" and turn into the Library Hulk if I saw any Googling in my library)

Thing 7

I already use iGoogle to help me save time. I have several friends with personal blogs, and even have one myself, and setting up feeds to the their blogs via iGoogle allows me to quickly check for new posts. It also allows me to keep up with the entertainment news and I have a tab for cooking, too, so I can check for easy recipes for dinner.

I've already begun to think about iGoogle for education purposes. This would be a great way to create pages for research projects. Teachers (or grade levels) can have a page with the project information. Updates can be viewed easily and websites that are pertinent to the research can be viewed.

I like the Google calendar, especially, for making public with my friends so they can join me and/or my family for our adventures and minimize emails back and forth to plan. This way I can say "Here's where we're at...see you there!"

Thing 6

How cool is the trip planner via Flickr Mashups? I peeked at a few trips to Wisconsin since I'm having Midwest withdrawls. I think the Trip Planner could be used to have students present on a state research project--pretend you've planned a trip to Wisconsin, keep a journal, etc. It's perfect. I also liked the tools on Captioner. As a teacher, I used to have students create comic strips to summarize a chapter or book. This would allow them to search for photos via Flickr and then caption them as characters in a book. Amazing and fun stuff out there. WOW.

Thing 5

I know several people who use Flickr while I'm still using Shutterfly to upload my photos and share with friends. I like Flickr to use but don't know if I'd use it myself. But it sure is fun to brose.

Here Flickr helps me illustrate "How I Spent My Summer Vacation--Especially Because I Forgot Batteries for the Camera"

We took my daughter to Disneyland

We had some R&R soaking up rays on Laguna Beach

Thing 3

I created a blog with a play on the whole J-Lo thing with J-Lib as my pseudonym and J-Libby-Lib as my blog title because, well, it sounds like whickety-whack and makes me feel like a hip-hoppin' library lady.

My avatar is wearing her ALA approved sweater and cute shoes. I meant to have a library background but must have forgotten to save (oops). Still, this gal is cute. Makes me want to make a hair appointment to get that snappy little slicked back 'do.

Thing 2

Problems as Challenges? Ha! Problems mean that the universe doesn't like me. And, challenge? No, no, no...if I can't do it right the first time, I don't wanna do it. Nope. No way. Forget it. So what is my hardest lifelong learning step---Problems. Working through them and learning from them and thinking like the Little Engine that Could...I think I can, I think I can and then after facing the problem and the challenge, chugging along with I thought I could, I thought I could, I thought I could....

The easiest? Teaching others. I love to do that. Especially when it makes me look like a Rock Star! Woot!