Thing 2-Face of Your Classroom

https://sites.google.com/a/wyomingps.org/ms-harris-mathematics/

This is my website that I created using Google Docs.  I decided to create it for this school year as a tool for students to access what they missed in class, provide them with additional resources and so they wouldn't ask me a zillion times "what did I miss in class yesterday?"  Needless to say, my students still ask.

I will say that it did take some time (days) for me to set it up because it was all new to me.  But after the initial frustration blew over it did get a little easier.

Thing 1 - Diigo

http://www.diigo.com/user/tulip1970th

Diigo makes it so much easier to locate my bookmarks because they are all in one place verses being on my home and work computer as well as on several Word documents.   Easy access to what I need or other colleagues may need as well as students.   Definitely, better than writing a website down on a piece of paper.

Thing 1 Shortcuts

1.  The double click shortcut to highlight a word is so much easier to use than having to place the cursor and drag it.  Definitely a time saver.

2.  The underline feature for a full line across is useful but I'm not sure if I would use it that much.  Is there a shortcut way of just wanting to underline a word or several words other than highlighting them and using command u?

3.  The hyperlink didn't work as well as I thought it would for me. I got really frustrated with this one!!  Maybe I'm doing something wrong.  I tried copying and pasting the web page I wanted to hyperlink and I wasn't able to paste into the box provided.   I had to manually type in the web page.  Below is a screenshot of what I am talking about.  I used a Word document from a few years ago and I'm not sure if it's compatible with MS Office 2011 that I am using.

4.  The Find shortcut was pretty cool to use.  Didn't know that even existed.

5.  Maybe it's just me but the format painter shortcut seems more complicated than just doing the formatting the "old fashioned" way.   Not promising to use this shortcut unless I'm offered a million bucks.   :)


  I Jing!  You Jing!  We all Jing!

Okay, I am starting to love this!!  I can see this as being very useful in my classroom to point out key concepts, adding tips to homework problems, being able to use visuals embedded into notes and having students using Jing! in their projects.

Thing 0-Questions

1.  Having information that is interesting valuable to you and possibly others that share the same interests.

2.  For my classroom it would be one way to communicate real time information with students that need extra help with homework, additional resources to help them better understand the material and a way for them to stay on top of their learning when they are absent from class.  I could also use it as a way of gathering their ideas on what types of activities to incorporate into lessons that would make it fun yet challenging for them.

3.  Not only are blogs an easy way to be published but they are also a quick and free way to get a person's own thoughts, ideas, and information ( their style of news) out there for others to see.  People love to know about other people, interests, ideas, thoughts, and so on.  Blogging can be an easy avenue to accomplish that.

This is where my next vacation will be in a couple of weeks.  Zion National Park:  The Narrows.

21 Things-Getting Started

What do I hope to learn through this course?  Well, everything!  :)  I  would like to be proficient with several of the technological resources that are out there and available for me to use on a daily basis for my classroom and in my personal life.  Basically I would like to keep up with what my students already know  and be able to integrate technology to spice up my math classes.