Thing #16

Wow, this one had some interesting stuff. I played with my igoogle start page. I rearranged and then got caught up in the games. I liked the things igoogle had to offer. It is fun to customize a page just for yourself. I am going to keep this page as my permanent page.
Online calendars can be very useful if you are organizing people like a team schedule. I can certainly see the benefits of an online calendar. If I could get my husband to use one we would all be better off. I loved backpack. It has everything you could ever want to keep you organized. I was introducing my husband to this and the calendar help. I think someone who has a really busy life and has to keep lots of things in order would definately benefit from something like backpack. I didn't even know things like this existed. The to-do list was great. I am very much a list person. I'm not sure I would use an online to-do list because I jot my lists as I am on the go, but someone who is planning a vacation or a presentation could benefit from an online to-do list.
I read through the Top 10 Productivity website and loved it. I also shared this one with my husband. He pulled the website up on his computer and was looking it over. It is fun to share the wealth!

Thing #15

Back to blogging after a week in "smokey" California. I already knew about wikis from teaching English last year and the ESL training I had. I think in some situations wikis are really good. I also think we have to be really careful since anyone can edit a wiki and can put wrong information in there. I like the misd Sandbox. I really enjoyed reading those. I think the students can really get into something like this. Sharing ideas with friends and whomever else wishes to read it. I am going to research wikis some more and find a way to incorporate this into some of my ESL lessons. I think students respond well to anything on the computer and will feel more free to blog or write on a wiki than writing on paper.

Thing #14

These are great! I set up accounts with Bubbl.us and Gliffy. You have to be careful with Gliffy since you only get a certain amount free. I will be using both of these in my ESL Reading classes. I can already think of some great ways to use these with things like plot, setting, theme etc. I am going to have my kids build mind maps using the stories they read. This will help them when trying to remember details. These applications make it much easier to use than the other way I was trying. Kudos to 23 Things class!

Thing #13

I didn't know anything existed like Zoho Writer that you could use to make documents that everyone could get to. I really like this feature. I typed a Keno list for my Keno group and wasn't thinking when I typed it on Printmaster. When I tried to send it to everyone, they couldn't open it because they didn't have Printmaster. I switched it to a Word document and some still couldn't open it. If I would have known about Zoho I could have used it and it would have been MUCH simpler!
I used Zoho to type a To Do List and a To Pack list since I am leaving Tuesday to go to California for a week. It is very user friendly. I love the smiley face emotion buttons. I put them all over my paper. This Zoho Writer is a great thing to have. This class is turning out to be much more beneficial than I first thought!

Thing #12

Wow, I love Google! I set up a Google Alert for Mesquite Information and Weather Alerts. I set up IGoogle for my home page and then spent 15 minutes playing the blackjack game. I spent another few minutes playing hangman. I set it up for Music, News, Entertainment and Games. I absolutely love it. This was the most fun "thing" of all for me so far. I set up a Google Notebook for all of the recipes that I love to copy, It took me some time to figure out how to use it but once I did I really had fun. I can certainly see the advantage of using the Google Calendar. With a very busy teenage son and a husband that is very much into riding with the Christian Motorcyclist Association I am going to start using the calendar to keep everyone organized. I can see where this would be a great tool for a coach who has to set schedules for teams etc. I wasn't real interested in the Picasa as I am already using Flickr. My old brain can only handle so much new stuff at once.

Thing #11

As I started checking out all of the different feed sights and search tools I got very confused. It was sort of information overload. Feedster took a really long time to load but was easy to use once it loaded. I really like Google Blog Search and added several feeds to my RSS. I am a raccoon rehabilitator and got some great information as I looked through these things. You really have to be careful what you put in as you are looking for things. I put in raccoons on one search and the first two sights it named were porn sights. Then when I put in raccoon rehabilitation I actually got what I was looking for.

Thing #10

I enjoyed learning about the RSS feeds. When I went to sign up for Bloglines I really messed up because I put in my home email instead of my school email which is what my google account is signed up under. This problem goes back to what they said at the very beginning, be sure to write down all the different passwords and email things that we sign up for during this class. I got frustrated and went to Google Reader and then figured out what I had done. I ended up liking Google Reader better than Bloglines. I subscribed to various sights on my two passions, animals and cooking. I found a lot of great stuff.

This RSS feed stuff can be very helpful in the education field. I am going to add some reading feeds for my classroom. It will be great to get the latest information at the touch of a button instead of having to search out different sights every day.