Thing # 23Things

Even though I was familiar with most of the applications presented, I did enjoy the guided practice and the blog posting part. It was easy to just write like I would talk to a friend or colleague but I could also share videos, images, and links to other websites of interest. I enjoyed reading what other members were writing and the ideas they shared on their blogs. I don't know if I will keep this blog going or not. It does take time and I SHOULD be posting booktalks to my library bookshelf blog. That type of writing takes more thought and preparation so I have not done as well with keeping it up.

If you offer this online workshop again, I would like to suggest you double-check some of the links that we found were not working. I would participate in another workshop of this type again next summer if you develop one for some newer web 2.0 applications.

Thanks again for your guidance!

Thing # 22 eBooks and Audio Books

If you are looking for old books in the public domain, you could use some of the websites suggested. However, I found World Ebook Fair is only available for a month a year. You still have to go to Project Gutenberg or the other contributors to find the free downloads. For public domain audiobooks, I think Librivox is the best choice. I like the short story collections, ghost stories, science fiction, horror stories, and Aesop's fables would all be good choices for teachers and librarians to use.

My public library provides access to Netlibrary. It is the service I use to download children's and young adult books to my mp3 player. I listen to them as I commute to work or travel long distances alone in the car.

Thing # 21 Podcasts

A couple of the podcasts directory links are no longer working, Yahoo Podcasts and Podcast.net. I looked at Podcastalley.com but didn't find it easy to search. They need an advanced search in order to limit the education podcasts lists even further. I do like Educational Podcast Directory since it is just that. However, I found most of the middle school podcasts were out of date. I did find a couple that were very good however so I bookmarked that site in my delicious account. I want to be able to show teachers some examples to help them see how they could use podcasting in their classes.

Thing #20 Youtube

We use Youtube at my house to listen to our favorite music performed by the original artists. I have an account so I can subscribe to my favorite producers. When I log in, I see what they have uploaded recently. My subscriptions include RandomHouse and Penguin Young Readers for book trailers, TechLearning Online, Lee Lefever, and Google Apps for the latest in technology how-to videos. I suppose libraries could implement something similar in the way of different "channels" for different genres.

Thing #19 Library Thing

Okay, I must admit I didn't see any use in spending time "cataloging" books already in my school catalog. I did put in some titles and gave them stars but I didn't write reviews for them. I tried to include the book cover gadget in my sidebar but can't seem to make it work. I'll try to include it in this post. I found several other people who had posted the same books I did, Lone Star titles for this year, and liked seeing the reviews. I guess it would be a good place to find other books that I might add to my catalog but I don't think it will be replacing my current selection tools.

Thing #18 Online Tools

I tried Zoho a couple of years ago and although it looks like they have really expanded their products, I still love Google Apps. Google has them beat just because of their name recognition. Students will choose Google over Zoho because that is their search engine of choice. I like the fact that everything Google offers works together so well. I created a Google Site about a few Google Apps for a technology camp presentation for teachers. It is available from my library website's Teacher Resources page. It is the first link USS Google Fun Ship in the Teacher Tools section. My favorite discovery is the forms application in Google Docs. When you complete this form and click submit, your answers along with everyone else's is recorded in a spreadsheet in my Google Docs account. I am going to create one of these to collect email addresses of my students' parents.

Extra: Steve Hargadon: Web 2.0 Is the Future of Education

Steve Hargadon: Web 2.0 Is the Future of Education

Because paradigm shifts in education move with the speed of a herd of turtles, this 16 month-old blog post is still relevant to our conversations today. Mr. Hargadon presents some very thought provoking ideas which are discussed even further in the comments from other educators.