week 9

Instant messaging reminds me of high school. It does come in handy to chat with someone really quick when you are on your computer or if they are at theirs. For example, I have a friend who was at work but needed to talk to me about an upcoming trip. We used Google Talk and she was able to email me things and chat with me while I was looking at them. She was also able to look at her work while waiting for my responses. (PS she was working after hours, just to clarify!) I think instant messaging can be convenient at times, but I would still rather talk on the phone or Facebook. I think that is safer, also. However, if you never go to meet anyone in person, I guess chatting is pretty safe, too. Just don't give out personal information.

week 8

Google Docs was my mission this week. I worked on a page at the same time with other people and entered in data from our students. It was pretty cool to see the other cursors from the other peoples' computers! I also like how we can change anything we need to at our own convenience and then share it with anyone we need to. We simply type in their email address and add them to it! Very cool! We actually use Google Docs and Google Calendar as a building and it works out really well!

Week 7

My Twitter username is maurer_melissa. (Creative, I know!)

Honestly, I am not a huge fan of microblogging. Sadly, I don't have a lot going on in my life that I want to Tweet about every 5 minutes. If there is something I would like to share, I use the phone or Facebook. Also, if I have a question I can post it in one of the teacher blogs or look it up online and usually get an answer.

I did find Twitter easy to set up and use. If I can do it easily, anybody can!

I started following 23 Things, Rachel Ray, and Librarians. So far, I could look up anything posted in their Tweets if I needed to know it.

I do see how microblogging can keep you in the know and updated on current events. That is something I definitely need to work on! It can also help with networking.

PowerPoint presentations

I had no idea that it was okay to be funny and not completely rigid in a presentation that you give in front of adults, possibly even your boss, but it would definitely make it more fun! I did learn that PowerPoints should be short and that you shouldn't type everything you are going to say on the slide. I did have a class over the summer where we had to answer questions on the slide so I wasn't sure how to do that without writing a bunch on the slide, but it worked out. I knew that you are supposed to keep the colors and fonts to a limit so it's not too crazy and disjointed. I didn't know about the pictures that you could add. I'm really excited about that!

digital native or digital immigrant!?

I am a digital immigrant, but I am so fluent that it would be difficult to tell. I had to laugh because, after I read the first article, I wanted to print it out to read it instead of reading it right there on the screen. Kind of gives me away! Although, I did read it on the screen and was fine. I just seem to gravitate towards the old-fashioned way of doing things for some reason. However, in this world and work place, I have to get fluent in technology pretty quick.
I am working on becoming equipped to teach the digital natives in my classroom. Luckily, my natives are 7 and 8 years old, so they don't have much on me. I do have some You Tube frequenters and I tell them to email me links for soemthing and we will watch them if they are appropriate for class. We also use You Tube quite a bit to help reinforce concepts. The kids are glued to the screen. I try to use Brainpopjr and You Tube a lot to keep my students interested. I also try to switch things up to keep them interested.
This class is helping me a lot to keep up with technology and new trends and ideas and activities. Using the blogs also helps. I have a co-worker that watches a couple of blogs and gets the cutest ideas. I usually collaborate as my main means of expanding my knowledge of multimedia. I'm a talker.
My kids only see the videos that I show them. When we get on the computers, we have a very specific website to go to because most of them can't navitage quickly yet. You would think they could, and they are very good at Webkins, etc., but most can't type their own name very fast or know where to click to do something they haven't done before. I know there is editing software out there that lets you cut the ads out and there is also software that lets you edit and just show a part of a You Tube. Those are good ways to show just what you want.

tagging

I think Delicious is a great website to keep all of your bookmarks in one place. However, I could nit for the life of me figure out how to use the send button. I watched the little video and did what it did on there, but there was no send button for me. Other than that, I really like how you can use it anywhere you are. That will be nice to be able to find things at home and access them at school. I don't know how many times I have emailed myself links. I still do it, but I will try to start using Delicious more and give my email a break!