Stirring Up the Dust » General

:-)

Kitty Forbus — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:39:35 +0000

According to an article on CNN’s website, the smiley face consisting of a hyphen, dash, and parenthesis will celebrate its birthday tomorrow. It seems that Carnegie Mellon University professor Scott E. Fahlman first used the emotional icon, aka emoticon, in an online electronic bulletin board at 11:44 a.m. on September 19, 1982. It’s amazing to see how the emoticon phenomenon has spread world wide in these past twenty-five years. Thanks, Professor Fahlman and Happy Birthday Smiley!

Technorati Tags: emoticon, smiley

8 Random Facts Meme

Kitty Forbus — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 19:14:57 +0000

While reading the 21st Century Collaborative blog a few days ago, I jealously noted that Sheryl had been tagged by the 8 Random Facts Meme. It brought back that feeling of wanting to get picked for the team out on the playground. She’d been picked and I hadn’t. Guess she was just more popular or (sigh) the better player. Well, lo and behold, I’ve now been picked for the team. I got tagged for the same game as Sheryl! Thanks Cathy for making me part of the team!

So, here are the rules:

Post these rules before you give your facts

List 8 random facts about yourself

At the end of your post, choose (tag) 8 people and list their names, linking to them

Leave a comment on their blog, letting them know they’ve been tagged

After reading a few other people’s facts, I’m fearful that mine are not quite as exciting. Anyway, here goes:

1. I met my husband on a blind date. We were engaged a month later.

2. My thumbs are double jointed.

3. I never learned to turn cartwheels.

4. Whale watching brings tears to my eyes.

5. I love NASCAR and hope to meet Dale Earnhardt, Jr. someday. Yes, I follow the races every weekend.

6. At the age of 7, I read the most books during the summer reading program at the local library.

7. My favorite reading spot is the bathtub.

8. I believe Saturdays in the fall were made for AUBURN football!

I tag:

All of my other blogging friends have already been tagged!

The New School Year

Kitty Forbus — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 02:12:26 +0000

It officially began today – the new school year. Our faculty returned today for the first of five work days before the students arrive. The summer seems to have flown by, and I can’t believe it’s time to start another year of school. I have high expectations for the year and hope to implement many new things I’ve learned about over the summer. I can honestly say, as far as professional development goes, I’ve learned more this summer than in any other two month period that I can remember. Blogging has by far been the best professional development activity I’ve ever been a part of. To read and participate in discussions with so many other professionals in the field of education is priceless. Although blogging was not something I learned to do over the summer, it is a skill that I became much more comfortable with. Blogging led to Skyping, which will lead to so many more things in the media center and hopefully classrooms throughout my building. In addition, I’m making preparations to begin podcasting this year. I’ve scoped out some equipment and recruited some help. My hopes are that through my activities I will generate interest in Web 2.0 tools across my faculty. While I can dream of 100% participation, I would be happy with just a few teachers jumping on board the Web 2.0 train.

The dust was definitely stirred in the days prior to the beginning of school. I began the process of weeding some of the “oldies” from our media center collection. What was the first to go? Well, I pulled all of the old read alongs. You know the red and white striped boxes which hold 8-10 copies of a book and the cassette tape recording of the story. Yes, I said cassette tape. Remember, I did call them oldies. That was the first of a series of updating projects I hope to accomplish.

Rather than focusing on the elimination of the old, let me tell you about the implementation of the new. One goal for the year has already been accomplished. I had a wireless router installed in the media center. For a school with no computer lab, that is a major step toward technology integration into the curriculum. Now I just need to find funding for a few laptop computers! Grant ideas anyone? It may seem like a small thing to some of you, but my media center is housed in two former classrooms in a building that is over 50 years old. We’re not “wired” for technology at all.

Tomorrow is our second teacher workday of the year. The media specialists from our county will be meeting together then. It will be my first opportunity to share some of the new technologies I am so excited about. I’ll take my duster and get to work! Wish me luck!

I’ll keep you posted!

Applying Skype in the Classroom

Kitty Forbus — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 00:21:04 +0000

Not long after my first Skype conversation, I read Carolyn Foote’s post about Skype and its possible uses in the classroom. I loved her thoughts on using it in a library media center. She says:

I’m imagining the use of this tool as a librarian, skyping in a guest speaker, or guest “researcher” for a class working on a particular research problem, or skyping in authors for a chat with a class. Or hosting a regular once monthly “skypecast” of a guest speaker on a technology topic. Or hosting a book discussion ”skypecast” during the evening as a special library event for students to join in. It’s video conferencing made very simple, and like blogs, though it is a techology “tool” it offers all sorts of connective possibilities for us and our students.

So many of the web 2.0 tools allow us to remove barriers–the hours of a school day, the walls of a classroom, the walls of a building, the city limits, a country’s borders. What can we provide for our students when we open up the possibilities of a barrier free learning environment?

Indeed! You can read the rest of her post here.

Technorati Tags: blogging, library, mediacenter

More on Aggregators and RSS and Using a Video on My Blog

Kitty Forbus — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 13:56:57 +0000

One of the questions I asked myself when I began this blog was, “Who is your audience?”. In my thinking, my audience would be educators and others like me who were somewhat new to the Web 2.0 technologies with a great desire to learn more about them. In learning to use them for ourselves, we would be laying the foundation necessary to introduce the technologies to our students for use in our classrooms. Therefore, for some of the more seasoned bloggers and technology pioneers, much of the information I post in these beginning stages may seem very primitive. I hope so. That means it is reflecting my learning from the ground floor up. I do hope one day in the future to look back on these first entries and laugh at the simplicity of what I see. However, for now the simple side is where I am and where I need to be in order to draw others into the “web”.

The most technical terms I used in my last post about Bloglineswere aggregator and RSS. I found a really great video on YouTube that explains RSS (Really Simple Syndication) in simple terms. My hope is to post it here so that you can see it too. This is my first attempt at putting a video onto my blog. I hope it works! If not, I’ll keep trying until I get it right. After all, this is a learning experience for me too.

On the tool bar above (as I type this post) there is a yellow button with an “A” on it. When I place my cursor on that button, I see the words “Embed media links, YouTube, etc.” That is where I will start. Okay, once I did that another window opened which told me to place the URL (or web address) of the media link. I went to the video on YouTube and copied the link. Then I pasted the link in the window. Some text then immediately appeared on my post below the last thing I had written. Now I’m really not sure what to do. I think I’ll post the blog and see what it looks like. If it’s not what I want, I’ll start editing.

Oh my gosh! It actually worked!! You’ve just witnessed my learning experience for the day!

I hope you’ll watch the video to get a better understanding of RSS feeds and the benefits of a reader or aggregator. Too, please notice the comment left by Dr. Frank Buck on my last post. He gave information about a different aggregator he uses. Thanks, Dr. Buck!

Technorati Tags: blogging, rss, youtube, video, aggregators

Using Bloglines

Kitty Forbus — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 02:28:13 +0000

For one to truly get the most out of blogging, besides creating your own blog, of course, you should read other blogs. Other blogs are a great form of professional development and help you to keep your thumb on the pulse of blogging. The other blogs that I read regularly are listed in my blogroll. I found these blogs through Google searches, by looking at blogrolls on other blogs, and simply by following links from comments on blogs I read. I am going to try and keep my blogroll under 20 blogs so that I don’t get into INFORMATION OVERLOAD, which is easily done.

So, how exactly do I manage to keep up with updates to so many different blogs? I currently use Bloglines to handle that bit of business. Bloglines is a FREE online service that maintains a list of sites I am interested in and alerts me when new posts are made to the site. In technical terms, Bloglines is my aggregator or RSS reader. Rather than checking 20+ different sites, I can access Bloglines from any computer with internet access and see what’s new on the sites I subscribe to. Bloglines offers many other features that I encourage you to check out on their site.

Bloglines is not the only aggregator out there, but seems to be the best “beginner” site. Jeff Utecht wrote a great comparison on his blog about 4 of the most recognized aggregators -Bloglines, Google Reader, Pageflakes, and Netvibes. Read all about them. Decide which one you’d like to try. Dust off the old keyboard, and start that blogroll!

Happy blogging!

Technorati Tags: aggregator, bloglines, googlereader, netvibes, pageflakes, RSS, blogging

I’ve Been Discovered!

Kitty Forbus — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 22:25:18 +0000

Wow, the dust had hardly settled on my first post when the comments started coming in. Thanks again to Frank Buck and Cathy Nelson for their support. Both wrote a post on their blog today after reading mine. The posts are all about MY BLOG! I truly do feel like I’ve been discovered. In addition to their blogs, Melinda Miller also chimed in on my blog with a comment of her own. It really is amazing how quickly a network is formed using Web 2.0 technology.

I’m still fine tuning my blogging skills as will probably be evidenced in days to come as I discover new tricks and add new components to the blog. One of the most exciting things for me so far has been the Clustr Map. How shocked was I when I saw that someone in Australia (!) accessed my blog? How’d that happen? I wish the visitor had left a comment so that I’d have a little more information about them. Maybe next time.

So where do I go from here? I suppose my first task will be to update the blog for my media center. I began the blog last year, but wrote a very simplistic one. For my husband, who has little to no computer skills, I likened my first attempt to building a house. Although I built the house, I did not paint, decorate, or purchase any furniture. It was simply a house. Stirring Up the Dust was my first attempt at building a house and filling it with furniture. I suppose I’ll decorate and stir up the dust as I go along.

Technorati Tags: web 2.0 blogging media center network

The Journey Begins

Kitty Forbus — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 20:34:45 +0000

Although this is not my first blog, it is a first in terms of its purpose. I plan to use this blog to educate myself and others, especially those in my school and district, about the endless uses of technology and their application in the classroom. I have so much to learn, but have learned so much I’d like to share.

One year ago, I had never heard of blogs and wikis. Now I have blogs and wikis of my own. Thank you Dr. Frank Buck for showing me how to set up a blog in ten minutes. Your workshop at the Alabama Technology Conference in June of 2006 set me on the road to blogging. Since then I’ve roped two other teachers at my school into starting a blog. My goal for this year is to have all the media specialists in the system blogging by May. I even ventured WAY out on a limb and presented a blogs and wikis workshop at the Delta Kappa Gamma Southeast Regional Convention in New Orleans in June. My co-presenter for the workshop was fellow teacher and blogger Kim Smithwick.

I also need to thank Catherine Nelson for her inspiration. I stumbled across Cathy on the internet and began an email friendship. She has given me advice as I have worked toward National Board Certification and continues to educate me through her TechnoTuesday Blog. She inspired me to use blogs in my media center, write more grants, read more blogs, and put myself out there making presentations. As I follow in her footsteps, I add more links to my bloglines, make plans to attend more conferences, and truly grow technologically each day.

While still just a baby in the things I know about Web 2.0 tools, I feel like I am stirring up the dust from those who have already journeyed down this road. I am so far behind that the dust from the pioneers has settled. Too, by bringing this knowledge of technology into my school, I am stirring up the dust from the way things have always been. Tools such as Smartboards, blogs, wikis, podcasts, Skype, Elluminate, Twitter are foreign words. We’re too set in our ways from the good old days. The dust has settled on us and many times we cannot see it. I’m hoping to stir up that dust by introducing some new tools for our teaching repertoire.

It’s a long road, with much to learn along the way. Won’t you come stir up the dust with me?

Technorati Tags: blogging