Thing 5: Digital Storytelling

http://animoto.com/play/m2FffSl4fkXn6X2SdPJHiQ

I decided to go with Animoto and stick with using the swimming pictures.  The link above is for the short 30 second video.  It was very easy to use and very quick.
I have used story telling software in the past, mostly Windows Movie Maker and also iMovie.  What I've found is that you really can lose yourself doing this and it takes a lot more time than you think - selecting the pictures, putting them in order and adding any text or music.  I enjoy it though.
Our school has clubs every other Friday afternoon and I am in charge of the Tech Club.  We have been taking pictures around the school to share with our sister school in China.  It has been a challenge to keep the kids focused and get them to take their time to really frame the pictures.  After lots of pictures of the floor and plants in the library, I had to take pictures they could use.  I might suggest they use this Animoto product.  It is much easier and faster than Movie Maker.

Thing #4: Photo Sharing

Finally catching up on Cool Tools!    I have used photo sharing sites in the past.  I use Facebook and also have an account on Snapfish which I have used to share photos from our librarian retirement parties. It is the most convenient way to share the photos with everyone quickly.  It also allows anyone to order copies at their convenience.  I recently created a collage print using my Walgreens account to display library activities.  Sharepoint has worked well for me in the past to maintain a library of school photos for staff to access.  The picture I posted today is of my son at his most recent swim meet.  My friend is the "official" photographer for the team and uses her account on Shutterfly to store the photos.  All the kids and parents can access them to view, dowload, or order prints.  I downloaded this print from Shutterfly and used BigHugelabs to create this poster.  I initially wanted to make a magazine cover, but was finding it too time consuming to design one.  I have been enjoying using the iPad to video the swim meets.  It is so nice to use because instead of using the tiny view finder as I've had to do in the past with traditional video equipment, using the iPad, you can watch in realtime and video at the same time.  The iPad also does a great job filtering the sound and handling the lighting in the pool area.
Happy New Year Everyone!

Thing #3: RSS, Personal Home Pages and Feed Readers

 After spending the last couple of weeks clicking back and forth between the list of participant blogs and saving the blog sites as favorites, I figured there must be a better way and.. who knew.. there was!  feed readers like Netwise!  I even showed my son how he could use it.  I set up the dashboard and also a tab for all the blogs I would like to follow.  So far I like it, although I'm having trouble adding and deleting widgets (I think that is what they are called).  I'm using my laptop and Netwise doesn't always let me get to the delete choice before the pop-up window disappears.  It works much better on the Ipad.  Also, when I add a blog/widget to my dashbord, it seems to be adding it twice. Frustrating.  It did say something about brower versions when I started.

If I can get it to work I might try and put all my email accounts on it then I don't have to log into three places every night to check them.  If it works it will be a big time saver. 

I've checked a lot of the blogs today and I really like the look of Wordpress much better than Blogger so when I get some time (haha) I may switch over. I'm impressed - many people have added pictures from their libraries!

Well, I have to get back to my old fashioned hand-written plan book for this coming week. 

Setting limits

Had an interesting situation today regarding online communities.  A parent in the school sent me a friend request on Face Book.  I hadn't previously discussed Face Book with him at all.  When I saw it Sunday evening  I declined it.  He came in the library today and told me he sent the request.  Awkward.  I had to tell him in person I declined because I think it best to draw a line and keep personal and work issues separate.  He said he respected my decision but it was still awkward.  I didn't feel comfortable - not because I'm worried there is anything wrong with what's on my Face Book, but because I think bringing personal Face Book pages  into parent / teacher communications crosses professional lines.  Too many risks, like if they let their kids read their Face Book, or if the kids have a Face Book, you definitely don't want to friend students.
On the same topic, I know someone supervised student teachers at a local college and a parent searched and found the student teacher's page on My Space.  The page was very inappropriate.  The parent told the principal, the principal called the supervisor, and the college and school decided the student teacher had to leave and the college would not recommend her for certification.  Online communites bring with them new issues our society is learning to handle.

Thing 2: Online Communities and Personal Learning Networks

I have a FB page and use it in my personal life. To use verbage from cool tools you could say I "lurk" on FB a bit - I check it everyday but don't post much - mostly pictures of special events. I enjoy following others and mostly started one because my two children have one.
 I don't have a Twitter account.  I  looked at Twitter and now finally understand what all those hashtag names are.  I always thought they were people's account names. You see these pop up more and more during television shows - tweets to follow. Twitter seems to be the next generation of listserves.  I don't think I will get a Twitter account right now.  I have three emails now that I have added this gmail account and FB to follow and this blog to keep up.  It does look like a helpful place to go for info though. I found many great articles.
Can you search for a particular topic within a hashtag?
It took me a while to get used to the format - very short messages, the abbreviated website links followed by all those hashtags  - very different than other social media tools.

 

I'm finding that on this blog platform - Blogspot - the security letters and numbers that you have to type to verfiy and submit your post are often very hard to read even with my glasses on :).  I have to go through three or four of them before I am successful.  Is anyone else having this issue on Blogspot?  Is it an issue on the other platforms?

Picked up my iPad today and using it for my post!  I like typing with it, but some of the websites I visit on a daily basis require an app, which is frustrating since I have no way to get apps at the moment.   Will check with Colleen to see if there is a district account that will be put on here.  Also I can't get my district email on here.

Thing 1: Blogging - Well this first lesson turned out to be a challenge for me.  I thought I set up the blog, but it was just my gmail profile.  I then did set-up my blog, but not sure how I got there :)  I then had to figure out how to get the URL name.  Then I couldn't get back in as the owner.  I think I have it now.  So far the first night I've learned many things about blogs - the first being it wasn't as easy as I thought, but I stuck with it.

I did it!  I'm a newbie to blogging.  Looking forward to the class and working with everyone!