Sharing photos online – finally something I’m familiar with and love to do! Ever since I got my first digital camera back in 2003 for my high school graduation present, I’ve been uploading photos to the web. The first photo sharing website I used was Webshots and I thought it was the coolest thing for everyone to be able to see my pics simply by emailing a link or placing it in my Instant Messenger profile.
Then Facebook came along and I think that’s when my obsession with taking pictures to document my college years really began. You could “tag” people and leave ridiculous comments and embarrass your friends with those horrible photos to no end. Until we realized that, one day all these pictures just might come back to haunt to us. Before this realization my friends and I didn’t care what pictures were on there – doing a keg stand…puking in the toilet, chugging drinks on top of the bar, whatever, it was all in good spirit. Now, as young adults trying to get our first real job, we’re a little hesitant about what photos go on Facebook and Myspace. But, believe me I still post pictures
I have a photobucket account that I constantly use to find images on to use on Myspace but I decided to set up a Flickr account for something new.

Through Flickr, you can create photo sets, which are online photo albums, so others can easily browse your pictures. Or, view the photos as a slide show. You can also develop a personal profile and even create groups.I thought it was annoying that you have to sign up for a yahoo account…why can’t you use your email address you have now? The Flickr account set up was really easy though. The pics were a little slow to upload but that could just be due to the large file sizes or my Internet connection. I loved how you organize photos into sets and you can give huge descriptions of the photos. The map feature was awesome and I really want to start using that
I think this would be a great site to use in the classroom, if our school’s filter didn’t block the site…

Final thoughts: Don’t post pictures that will come prevent you from getting a job in the future or get you fired from your current one Use common sense people!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lishaj/
check out my pics ^

Social Bookmarking. What was wrong with using that star icon on our browser? Ha. Well, when deciding on what bookmarking website to use, I was torn between Furl.com and Delicious.com. I finally decided on Delicious and I actually like it! I use a computer at school and a different one at home so I always had two lists of favorites with the exact same information on them. Now, all I have to do is use Delicious anywhere, anytime!

I’m still working on the tagging system, so my list is a little unorganizedm, but it definitely has potential to become very useful for me. So many times I come across great websites and end up losing them because I forget to go into my favorites, but now it’s so easy!

Here is the link to the beginning of my social bookmarks:
http://delicious.com/lishaj320 

This post is a follow up to my previous post on RSS feeds.

After being subscribed to 10 websites for a little more than a week, I wasn’t too impressed with the results. I mean, sure it’s awesome that you get all this information sent to you and that you only have to go to one website, but you get SO much information it’s overwhelming! I spent more time reading all the feeds than I would’ve if I had just Google’d the information. However, there was some interesting links that I came across:

Top 5 Links from my RSS Feeds this week:
http://mashable.com/2008/11/09/what-the-web-cant-help-you-do/

http://mashable.com/2008/11/06/google-street-view-art/

Anything from the National Association of Special Education Teachers

http://www.webmd.com/brain/autism/news/20081103/rainfall-autism-may-be-linked?src=RSS_PUBLIC

Anything from Perez Hilton….just  because it’s funny!

Personally, I do not plan on keeping up with RSS. I’m going leave my subscriptions on Google Reader and probably check them once a week. I just don’t see the addiction to RSS….

I just read the blog Teaching Moments by Will Richardson http://weblogg-ed.com/ and thought, “Wow, he brings up a really great point!” The blog discussed when teachers, need to stop teaching the lessons out of the book and make the lessons about what is really happening in the world at this moment. A lesson that we all should’ve been teaching on Monday and Tuesday was about the election. There could’ve been so many lessons involved – historical elections, race relations, what it means to be republican/democratic, how to decipher between fact and fiction. How many teachers out there used the election in at least one lesson during the previous weeks? And do you plan on continuing this lesson through out the year? 

Will’s blog stated that these teachable moments (see list below) make our students better citizens and I couldn’t agree more. So teachers, next time your students are fascinated with the leak in your ceiling when it rains – stop and do a mini lesson on water or if they see a really unusal bird outside, do some research on it. Don’t be afraid to put your teaching manual down and teach from the heart. You’d be surprised how natuarally the lesson comes to you.

Some teachable moments according to Will Richardson: please feel free to add your own suggestions.

This morning I was searching for a session of the K-12 Online Conference that I would like to review for class and I found this session:http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=340 -Parental Engagement in the 21st Century – Leveraging web 2.0 tools to engage parents in non-traditional ways

This session discussed how parents are using the 1.0 Web instead of the 2.0 Web. The hosts discussed that parents of this era are using the internet for email and Google but do not understand the new tools out there. They didn’t grow up online like the children today are and no one has trained the parents on how to use the tools. Parents do not use the social networking like students do.

The session stated that children are spending more time outside of school writing (facebook, myspace, blogs) than they are in school…and I agree! However, no one is truly monitoring what these children are doing. Sure, we have filters at school, but that just encourages students to find ways around the filter. And because the parents don’t understand what their children are doing online, they often don’t pay attention to the online behavior.

I think it would be great if the community would hold free classes (or for a very reasonable cost) maybe 3 or 4 times a year to parents on Web 2.0 tools. Of course, the classes wouldn’t have to go into great detail, they just need to be shown what is out there and what their children may be participating in…good or bad. If schools and communities can collaborate with parents, I think we would certainly see an increase of parents trying the new web out!

If you’re new to Social Bookmarking, like I am, read the article on WikiPedia for a complete definition of social bookmarking –  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_bookmarking but it’s basically, taking your favorite website and organizing them publicly. Personally, I don’t really like this…yet. I’m so use to having my websites saved on my favorites organized into folders, it’s tough to change. I chose to use the site delicious.com for my bookmarking - http://delicious.com/lishaj320. I haven’t done much with this yet because I’m still learning. Hopefully, it will prove to be a useful tool.

Anyone out there hear of Everyday Mathematics? The school district where I am working at has just implemented this new curriculum K-12. Personally, I don’t really care for it. The ways of thinking are very abstract and often confusing for the students. I am using the Kindergarten Level to teach 3 First Graders and the very first lesson on the first day of school was about measurement! Mind you, my kids don’t know how to count past 15, say the days of the week, or know their birthdays. Needless to say, this lesson did not go over very well! EM uses alot of manipulatives and they are very time consuming to create. I have done nothing but make a ton of adaptations to almost every lesson. Granted, my students are Learning Support kids but I have heard alot of negative opinions from the other teachers.
I co-teach during Math in a 3rd grade classroom and have seen my fair share of confusing faces on those students. I never knew there were so many abstract ways to learn how to add. I was taught using the re-groping method but now there is partial-sum method, counting down, adding up and who knows what is yet to come! One day they are doing number stories, the next they are working on fractions, then time. I don’t know if it’s because I’m new to the series or what but I haven’t seen one lesson that I really liked. How about you, what are your thoughts on Everyday Math? Love it? Hate it? Never Heard of it?

Anyways, I found an article on WIkipedia about Everyday Math and decided to add my two cents on there about how two of the most popular games the students play every Friday.

The following is what I posted to Wikipedia:
Games include:
Addition Top It This is when two to three students use a deck of playing cards (0-10). The cards are shuffled and the deck is placed in the middle of the players. Each player takes two cards and adds them together. The player with the highest sum wins that round and takes the other players cards. The game is over when there are not enough cards left for each person to pull two cards. The person with the most cards at the end of the game wins.
Beat the Calculator Three students play in groups – one player is the “caller,” a second player is the “calculator,” and the third is the “brain.” The game begins by the “caller” selecting a fact problem by using a deck of playing cards (0-9). That person selects two cards and creates an equation using the two numbers on the cards. The “calculator” then solves the problem with a calculator as the “brain” solves it without a calculator. Students try to race each other to get the correct answer first to the equation. The “caller” decides who got the answer first and that person wins that round. The players trade roles every 3-5 minutes depending on how much time is available.

The entire article can be viewed at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everyday_Mathematics#Application_in_the_classroom

RSS. Have you ever heard of that before? Prior to taking my grad class at Waynesburg those were just letters in the alphabet that meant nothing to me, until we had our assignment for Week 2: Get an RSS aggregator. Great.
So I type RSS into Google and find this really cool video on YouTube – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU which also happened to be the same video on Blackboard. This was so simple to understand! 2 steps and that was it I was on my way to having my own RSS Feed at Google Reader. On Google Reader there is a quick 2 minute video on what to do, which was again very simple to follow. I chose my 10 subscriptions on topics from varying from Autism to Facebook to the Pittsburgh Steelers I’ll let you know how this adventure with RSS goes. I can’t say much about it yet besides that it was easy to set up…

I read an interesting blog tonight that got me thinking about my online identity and my real life identity. Take a look at it…
http://bobsprankle.com/bitbybit_wordpress/?p=565#comments
Who -ogle Are You? By Bob Sprankle

This blog gets you thinking about when and why you decided to get rid of that fake name and start using your real name. Or maybe, you still use that fake name and this blog will change your mind…

This also made me think about how everyone seems to have a Facebook or Myspace account these days and what some people choose to post on there just blows my mind. I really think there are some photos and information that people can do without seeing on the internet…

Welcome to my brand new blog!

Since this my first post I’d like to take a few minutes to introduce myself:

My name is Alicia and I’m currently back in college for my Master’s Degree in Special Education.  I am also working full time as a teacher’s aide in a Learning Support Classroom. Sometimes I feel like I’m doing more teaching than the regular teacher but I’m gaining so much experience. Last year I worked in an Autistic Support Classroom as an aide and that experience is what led me back to Grad School. I would love to specialize in Autism. 
I completed my Undergrad at The University of Pittsburgh @ Johnstown with a BS in Elementary Education. I graudated there in 2007 and have been back ever since then. I’m an only child, love my golden retriever and my family and friends are extremely important to me.
I love the Pittsburgh Steelers and Pittsburgh Penguins, cold snowy winters, wearing flip-flops, Halloween, and text messaging

I look forward to connecting with new teachers on here and to learn new ideas and helpful tips.

Take Care – Alicia