Thing Seven

Discover an interesting image on flickr that you would like to blog about.

Flickr was pretty interesting. I thought the tags were fairly helpful in narrowing down the searches like for example I searched for "turtle" because I love turtles and I think they are the greatest thing ever. And when the search came up virtually every picture that came up had something to do with a turtle; unlike some other photosharing websites that do not have more specific searches like flickr.

Here is a cute little picture I found of some turtles. I just though it was so adorable; it was posted by a user named mikeleus.

http://flic.kr/p/62FpEc

Thing Six

1. Select and site/tool from the list of Web 2.o web nominees.

2. Explore the site you selected.

3. Create a post about your discovery.

The site I choose to explore was picnic.com.

I absolutely love taking pictures so I decided to explore the site picnic, for those who do not know picnic is a photo editing website. One thing I really loved about this website is that it allowed you to use a sample photo that the site provided to give you a chance to play around with the editing software before you registered to the site. I like that they gave me the opportunity to play around on the site before having to sign up; it allowed me to discover whether or not I enjoyed the site before hand. Another thing I liked is that so much of the editing features are for free unlike other sites that let you do very few things for free.

It is defiantly a site that I would use to play around with my photos when I am bored.

Thing Five

What does school 2.0 mean to you?

What does it mean for schools of the future?

In my opinion I do not believe in the whole school 2.0 hype; while I do think technology and the Internet can serve some good in a classroom I believe that realistically it is more of a hindrance. To begin with there is so much information stored on the Internet and you cannot monitor who is putting what information up so you have absolutely no way of knowing for sure if the information is reliable or not. I do understand most people cite themselves to give what they posted some sort of legitimacy but when it comes down to it people can lie about who they are to try to give what they write credibility; which means in the end you never know who is posting information on the Internet and a lot of times you have no way of knowing if a source is 100 percent accurate.

Secondly if you have your students using the Internet to look up information they don't really read the information most of the time they will google something and then use something like ctr + f to immediately find exactly what they are looking for so they do not actually read the article or document which means they are not learning to retain information.

Third using technology is distracting the attention span of a teenager or child is not very long and when your using the Internet or other technology in school it is extremely easy to become distracted.

Fourth it seems to me, in my opinion, that people of my generation and the generation younger than mine are quite stupid. And I believe that a lot of that has to do with the increasing reliance on technology. We tend to not do anything for ourselves anymore we just have everything handed to us. When using the internet to learn you just type in exactly what you want and you get that. But, when you do that it eliminates the whole process of reading and searching for what you want to learn about there is no trial and error and I believe that is one of the most important aspects of learning.

Fifth my number one biggest issue with technology in the matters of education would have to be handwriting. I believe being able to write, and write well, is extremely important. But, do to the Internet age there is little to no emphasis on handwriting. Alot of schools already have taken cursive writing out of the curriculum which is highly frustrating to me.

My other issue with technology sources does not necessarily go hand in hand with how it is used in schools but I feel like people, especially the younger generations, rely on technology too much. In the event that something catastrophic were to happen and the Internet, cell phones, etc. no longer functioned then most people would not be able to cope without the technology because they are so attached to it. I feel like it is more important for people to go back to their roots and learn how to live life without having a machine live it for you.

So to answer the second question what does this mean for schools of the future I truly believe that the reliance on technology in life as well as in school is going to ruin the education system. But, like I said that is just my opinion. Maybe throughout my journey with the 23 things project I may be persuaded to see the technology side of things which I really hope so because technology and the Internet age is here to stay so I do hope I can see the good in it.

Thing Four

Explain why commenting helps create a sense of interaction and community.

Commenting helps create a sense of interaction and community because it gives the writer of a blog to have feedback and as people begin to interact back and forth through commenting it becomes a conversation. Through comments you can talk and debate just like you would interacting in real life. And as a blog begins to grow and evolve and more and more people begin commenting on the same blog people will begin to look at other blogs of similar interest to their own and form a mini-tech community.

Discuss two other points from the readings about commenting that you found important.

There were 2 points from the Cool Cat Teacher blog titled "How to comment like a king (or queen)" that seemed pretty important for starters when you comment you are showing a blog author that "you hear them". When people blog, generally, they do so because they want their voice to be heard. I mean they would not be posting their thoughts on a public forum if they didn't want to be heard. So for a blogger just knowing that someone out there "hears" them is really what it is all about and the only way to give the blogger the satisfaction of achieving their goal is if people comment.

Another point is that it draws attention to you and your blog. When you comment on some other blog then that blogger, and other blogger's, may take notice of your own blog which in turn gives you more opportunity to get your own voice heard.

Give the name of 7 blogs that you choose to follow (5 from the class + 2 others) and explain why you selected them.

The 5 blogs I choose to follow of fellow classmates are:

1) Tabitha's 23 Things

2) Rkiethblog

3) Chris Earheart

4) BDuncan3040

5) Casey Ball

The 2 blogs I choose to follow that do not relate to the class are:

1) Cherokee Truth

2) Native American Blog

I choose my 5 classmates randomly. I do not know anybody in the class, nor do I know anything about them. So, I had no other methods to go by in selecting blogs to follow. As for the other 2 blogs I choose them based off of my passion. If you are going to know anything about me then know that my passion is Native American history, particularly Tsalagi (Cherokee) history. I am about 1/4 Tsalagi, which is where the passion comes from, and my ultimate goal would be to push Native American history into the school curriculum.

Discuss the comments you made and why you made them.

I have yet to really comment at this point. But, most of my comments I can guarantee will be to agree or disagree with what others are posting in an attempts to spark a little friendly debate. Because, the world is so interesting with a healthy dose of debate.

Thing Three

Ways I Might Use a Blog in my Teacher Education Program or Future Classroom.

Before reading the Edublog post by Anne Davis I would have never thought about using a blog for education purposes. I have always had it in my head that blogs were pointless and used mainly as a social-based media. I had no idea that blogs could be so versatile and thanks to Anne Davis I have discovered that I can use blogging in a very positive way not only for myself as a teacher but for my future students in my classroom.

Some ways that I have discovered to use a blog to my advantage as a teacher is that I can use a blog to communicate with other teachers and get ideas from people whom I would have never otherwise communicated with and I can provide my own tips and tricks that I will learn over time so as to help other future teachers.

As far as using a blog to enrich my classroom I can use a blog to gather and organize information that corresponds to the content I am teaching so my students have a way of accessing good and reliable information.

Thing Two

How did you decide on your posting name and the name on your blog?

It is pretty simple my posting name and the name on my blog is pretty much my last name, my first initial and my class number. I just choose that so the teacher can easily know who I am without me giving out my full name.

What was your experience in creating the blog? Was it easy or hard?

My experience was nothing spectacular I just followed the directions. But, it was pretty easy all of the directions were clear and to the point.

How does your avatar reflect your personality? Does it look like you or someone totally different? Why?

Well my avatar looks pretty much like me. I choose to make it look more like me as opposed to someone else pretty much for the simple fact that I like who I am and I don't need to pretend to be someone else. I don't think that it necessarily reflects my personality just for the simple fact that my peronality would normally be expressed through my clothing chooses and the doppleme website does not give your poor avatars much in the way of clothing choices.

Thing One

The 7 1/2 Habits of Lifelong Learning

All of the habits detailed in the video the 7 1/2 Habits of Lifelong Learning are all very important and I think all should be incorporated in daily life because I believe you cannot live life without constantly being in a state of learning and these habits just incourage you to learn things in a positive manner rather than a negative.

For me personally the easiest habit to master would be habit 2: accepting responsibility for your own learning. I learned along time ago that if I want anything in life it is up to me to achieve my own success and it is up to me to learn and figure out things for my help. It is important to know that you can ask for help but you can't always expect it and you won't always get it. I rely on myself 100 percent of the time, always.

The hardest habit for me to master would probably be habit 6: using technology to your advantage. I do understand that technology can enrich your life and it makes things easier. But, at the same time I have always felt that technology has gotten to the point where it hinders learning because it makes everything to easy. With technology you don't even have to try to do anything and it eliminates the whole process of trial and error which I think is important to the whole learning process. So me and technology do not exactly see eye to eye.