Thing 23: Congratulations

Reflection and Sharing about 23 Things

• What were your favorite exercises:  see Thing #20: Recess
• How has this program (23 Things) assisted or affected your learning goals: I have a greater appreciation for the role librarians play in technology. I feel more competent now in technological applications for the elementary classroom. Setting up my own classroom blog was a big deal and having one of my prospective students reply to my Welcome and first assignment was a huge affirmation. 
• Unexpected Outcomes: 1)getting to know two of my classmates better and adding them to my Facebook 2) reading daily updates about areas of interest via Feedly
• Improving Program: Overall I had a good experience--the format and concept are geared towards a self-learning of the technological tools available to teachers and librarians. 
• Another Discovery Program like this: Yes, I'd participate. I'd blog my heart out.
• One Word or Sentence: Revealing

Thing 21: Online Image Generators

This has been a difficult assignment for me. My luck with online image generators has been dismal.

Being the 11th hour, I've decided to create a Photostory vidcast for my 5 week old granddaughter.

Thing 22: Your Turn

Not being all that tech savvy, I'm at a loss for applications and websites that will add to anything I've learned  in writing this blog. I anticipate though, that the educator who isn't familiar with technology in the classroom is going to ask "How does technology fit into the philosophy of education?" 

I'm delighted to be able to answer that question and the digital bloom's taxonomy will help me.

I loved this image when I found it on the Feedly Newsread. (It's a living document; search Bloom's Digital Taxonomy to view various configurations). That being the case, these are my additions: since RSS is missing on the taxonomy, let's add it to Understanding. Oh heck, Delicious earned two levels on the pyramid...and reading Feedly definitely leads to analyzing. We'll put RSS beneath Understanding AND Analyzing. 

Wouldn't this be a great way to entice teachers that are reluctant to use technology into a 6 hour PD?. The librarian facilitates Tech 101, and she tackles one level and one application at each session. The librarian can pick the tool s/he's most familiar with to present, while challenging participants to explore other tools in that level. Within each session an analogy is drawn between the tech tool, category/level and how it applies to Bloom's Taxonomy. 

P.S.   Where would you add your favorite web tools on Bloom's Digital Taxonomy? 

Thing 19: Mashups

This assignment was hard. The wiki I was using to conduct my searches in this area had many linked sites, but they were either dropped or so filled with advertisements that I couldn't navigate my way through. Luckily I found this blog entry on my Feedly

Mashable-13 Fantastic & Fun Image Generators. http://mashable.com/2009/08/22/image-generators/

I chose to investigate tuxpi.com. photo editor. It allows the user to upload a photo and then adjust brightness, contrast, saturation and hue to make a photo 'perfect'. User can then download to their computer files or publish. Other adjuncts which I haven't investigated on tuxpi are making posters, collages and stamps with the photos.

So, with tuxpi I used the above photo of my youngest grandson's b-day pic (with his brother) and transformed it into this:

Just kidding- both pics were altered by tuxpi.com's photo editor.

Thing 20: Recess

After a flurry of postings, this assignment is truly a break. It allows me to reflect. The question is not what I learned the most about, but what was most fun and engaging. Adult learners are not all that different from 10 yr. olds...they want to have fun. If I had a great experience with a 23 thing tool, I'm hoping my students will find it likewise.

Will use as a teacher librarian for professional use (including PD for teachers)

• Feedly
• all the great blogs and newsreads I've added to Feedly
• Facebook (some of the greatest library pics come from there)
• Flickr and its common share 
• Video-sharing

Will use as teacher librarian to collaborate with K-5 classroom teacher and lessons

• Kidblog
• Photostory
• Prezi
• Glogster

On my docket to learn more about:

• Voki
• Mashups
• Edmodo
• Twitter and Tumblr

Thing 18: Shelfari

Shelfari: Book reviews on your book blog

Shelfari is alot like Goodreads.com, but I haven't been using Goodreads in a while, so I signed up for Shelfari. Shelfari allows you to post books you've read, hope to read, and recommend favorites. You can also follow others' book selections among friends or readers with the same interests. The cool thing is I was able to upload a widget, or gadget, to my 23 Things Blog on this post and show my blog followers what I'm reading.

I hope to set up either a class wiki, pass-word protected blog or Edmodo for my class this fall; I found in reading TeacherLibrarianNing that I can upload Shelfari to whichever interactive teaching platform I use for my class and then post books that my students read and review.

Thing 17: Ning

Ning is a social networking tool that allows users with the same interests to collaborate with others within that field or area. I chose to explore and join TeacherLibrarianNing. It allows the user/member to peruse groups of particular interest (technology, book reviews, literacy, etc.), participate on a forum, post photos or videos of interest to other teacher librarians, and much more. The forum allows any member to post a query related to the field and receive responses, or v.v. respond to someone else's question. After exploring the various groups available, I became very interested in the Web 2.0 in the Library World group and expect to find some great ideas for using, teaching and collaboratively planning with some of these Web 2.0 tools.