Thing #12

Two important things I learned from reading the different blogs were to interact with comments left and to hyperlink in your blog. 10 Techniques to Get More Comments on your Blog said that as a blogger you have to comment to get comments. After reading, I agree that as a blogger, you have to be open and comment to others to be able to receive more comments. If others see that you are responding, then what you are saying and what others say means something to you. Blogs, to me, are used for communicating ideas and cooperating with others. As a blogger, if all you are doing is writing, then you are not going to get as much out of it. You will get out of it, what you put in it.

How to Comment Like a King (or queen!) says that putting hyperlinks is important. We all look for a simple way to get information. People are going to be more willing to go to the blog and look at the information if it is just a click away versus having to go search and find what you were talking about. Then once they find the information that you referenced, then they can make comments to you.

One blog I found was from my Google Reader. It is the Librarian and Information Science News. One post that caught my attention was about how school districts are cutting librarians. I can't believe the percentage of school districts that have decided to cut the librarian (19%!). I couldn't believe it.

Librarian Philosopher made a post about the TLA conference. It drew my attention because the other students in the cohort had the opportunity to participate, but I had to make the choice not to go due to it being so close to the TAKS test. In her post about TLA, she put hyperlinks to information about the several sessions which was beneficial.

Thing #11

I think that LibraryThing would be fun to make with a Language Arts class. The students could see what books their peers are reading, which to could lead to them reading a different book. Each time a student checked out new books, the teacher could add it to the list of books that were read. At the end of the year, the students could see how many books as a class they read. This would push them to read book they may not have read or to find books they may not have known about.

Thing #10

I created a fake magazine cover for an author. I think that like the trading card for an author, this would be fun for the kids to create. They could make brief statements about their author. This is one way for the students to do research, then have to limit the information they found. They could put the most interesting information they found about their author. They could also create a cover at the beginning of the year as a get to know you assignment. The teacher could post them on the wall, so the students could get to know each other in the class with their picture as the cover of a magazine.

Thing #9

I found the Edublog Awards site the easiest for me. The site is set up by categories. For instance I could go to the "Best Library/Librarian" blogs, then click on the different blogs to read the information. It was easy because there were only a few in each category, so it wasn't overwhelming.

The Syndic8 was confusing to me. When I did a search, the information that came up was from early information (2000) to the latest (2010). If I wanted to find the most up to date information on the topic I had to scroll through many different pages.

As a teacher, I found Creating Lifelong Learners blog interesting and useful. I will be moving down to first grade next year, and I found he had done a post on Literature Circles. The author had also done some other posts that I found very helpful as a classroom teacher.

Thing #8

I signed into Google Reader and found that it had already given me suggestions for subscriptions other than what was suggested on the Library to Play site. I think the idea that the information comes to me instead of having to go to out and look for the new information. This seems to be quicker and simpler.

I will use this in my school by helping with professional development. By finding the most up to date information, I can inform my teachers and staff about the useful information that I have found. Others can use this to find different strategies that are useful in the classroom. When teaching, everyone needs to be thinking about what is best for the kids. It they find the most updated information, then the kids are going to be challenged and taught things in a way that may not have been presented to them before. Struggling learners will benefit from the newest strategies.

Thing #7

I researched the Picasa Web Albums. This would be great for teachers or librarians who take a lot of pictures of different activities in their class. They could share the pictures with the families at the school. This enables parents to see what is taking place in the classroom. It also allows students to share with their families what they are doing.

I also thought that the Google Calendar would be a tool for teachers to use to share the topics that the students are learning about in class. The teacher wouldn't be sharing the lesson plans, but the topics that are being covered on a weekly basis. I know that my parents love knowing what is taking place. Parents can then ask their child about the topics. They will also know when tests, checkpoints, or other important school events are by using the calendar.

Thing #6

I have never heard of mashups before. I found it interesting. I found myself spending a lot of time looking and trying different things. One thing I created was a jigsaw puzzle of a picture of my two dogs. I also played around with the trading card. This tool would be a fun project for the students to use in the library. There are so many different types of trading cards that could be made by the students. It would definitely be something different for them to create. I know our language arts teachers have done a character study. The students had the opportunity to dress up as their character. It would have been an asset to the project if they had trading cards to pass out to tell about themselves.