This is it

This will be my last blog for this class. In spite of my initial trepidation, and numerous screw-ups, I did enjoy what this class had to offer, even the html lesson. I find all of this intriguing, but I definitely need to continue taking more computer techonology classes to increase my knowledge and confidence. What this class offered me were practical applications. I intend to continue to use my Blog during the school year, and when our personal web sites are set up, I intend to link my Blog to it, because it contains information I need to share with families. "For Parents" is currently under construction, since I am working with a new grade this coming year.

Thank you to Dr. Hardy for her almost contstant assistance!

Ning, wikis, changes to blog, and glogster

I knew I had forgotten something, and that was to invite others to my ning network. I remember starting to do this in class, but I don't remember why I didn't complete it. I added some more bookmarks to delicious, and retrieved some for my blog. I'm really amazed at all of the information and resources there are on classroom 2.0. I could get lost there. I looked up information on wikispaces, and I came across this link in the Forum section: http://gmiller.wikispaces.com/Wiki%27s. There was so much information, and this was just a small part of this forum on wikispaces. Initially, I had watched the tutorial from http://www.wikispaces.com/site/tour to reinforce information I might have missed in class. Apparently, our school district will be putting the teacher web pages on wikispaces some time next school year. I revamped my "Useful Links" page, embedding links in text. I took another look at www.glogster.com , and noticed something I hadn' t before. I could have my students make glogs without having to create a gmail account, which I'm not sure if they'd be allowed to do.

I'm plugging through this

I'm a little slow on the intake, but I'm getting there. Late last night, (actually early this morning), I added a different image to my Twitter page. It's the symbol for the American Cancer Society's Daffodil Days. There's one thing I've accomplished. Up until yesterday, I hadn't used delicious. com, so I tried to access it, only to find out that Yahoo wasn't very cooperative, (or maybe it was just me). Today, I had an easier time with delicious, so I was able to move things from there to my blog. I seriously have to look at ning, because I don't think I've properly set up my network invites. Luckily, I've saved email addresses, so I plan to do that. (I checked the sent folder of my gmail account, and it's empty. Maybe that's one thing I screwed up in class and forgot to finish). I added a video to my Interesting Links page, in addition to other links I've found, and moved links from my Home page.

Things I did today

That sounds like a story starter, but anyway, today, I added some some more links to my links page, and looked around web 2.0. I also added information on "For Parents" page, listing vocabulary words and spelling words for the first story in reading. On my Contact page, I added some more text, and inserted a picture of Park Elementary. It took time to do this, because for me it's a matter of trial and error.

Monday

I had put this aside for the weekend to give my brain a rest, and to re-coup! Today, I decided to work on moving things around on my blog. I worked on transferring some of my sites from my Home page to my Interesting Links pages. There is still a lot to do, as I need to find more interesting sites, and keep plugging at this.

Recap

I've almost survived a full week in this class, Internet for Educators. This whole experience has been a shock to my system to say the least. I feel like I've been immersed in this technology this week. What have I learned? I'm still a traveler, trying to find my way around the web and all of the tools we used. While others here have no trouble navigating, I still get tangled up in the web! How would I have known, learning typing skills in Sister Mary Francis' class, that one day, I'd be using those keyboarding skills on this thing called a personal computer? ( I still have my old Remington manual typewriter, in fact). I guess I'm dating myself, though. However, suffice to say, I think I've learned new things, albeit with some trepidation and a lot of frustration. As I'm trying to make a page for my glog, I had to re-do it twice, because I wiped it out. This blog is new. Setting it up was somewhat complicated, but expressing myself in posts, seems to be the easiest part. Html coding wasn't surprising, because I knew I wouldn't like it, and I didn't. My youngest daughter on the other hand, asked me, "What's the big deal"? She then proceeded to give me a lesson, but it didn't clarify anything for me, and I walked away. The class lesson was interesting, but I'll let the coding to someone else! The whole classroom 2.0 is a fascinating area, and I will re-visit this next week.
More tomorrow.

Last evening

Sometimes I forget what it was like to have toddlers around the house, but the grandbaby usually reminds me. Last evening while here, she spotted my sink full of bubbles because I was doing dishes. She reached for me and said, "Bubbles," but I tried to ignore her because the counter was cluttered as well. She in the meantime, pushes one of my dining room chairs over to the sink, and proceeds to play with the bubbles in the sink. She continued with this activity for at least 15 minutes, until she spilled a lot of water. Suffice it to say, my floor got cleaned in the area around the sink!