Thing #16 & stretch

What a great invention. I love Library Thing! I keep a list at school of books I have but I struggle to keep it updated. This site makes that so much easier. With a few clicks it does it all. I think it is an excellent tool for classroom organization. I did join, so using my tags I can find the books needed for particular units much quicker. I like that I can get opinions and recommendations as well. I did hit a glitch. Each time I click a link to add a book it takes me back to the beginning of my search. Am I doing something wrong or is there a way to go back to where I left off? That part is a pain to me. I enjoyed going to the "groups" area. The children's fiction site could really benefit me.

Thing #15

I had a lot of fun exploring Delicious. The tagging part really interested me and I found that if I wanted to "jog" my memory about a specific site I could put a crazy tag on it to distinguish it from others. My favorite part of all of this is being able to access my bookmarks from ANY computer. There have been times I thought I marked a site on my school computer, only to find that it was on my home computer and it would have to wait. No problem with that anymore. I find that I am short on time these days but doing these "things" has made me find new sites that are beneficial to my teaching. Here is a link to my delicious account.

Thnig #7a

I found it very interesting that in Mrs. Smith's Kindergarten Class, Room 118, they were doing much the same thing we were. They had several firefighters come to visit them and talk to them about fire safety. We only had one (but I have a small class) and it was my son-in-law. He gave a wonderful demonstration and we took pictures of each student with his helmet and coat on. The post told that Mrs. Smith's class got to feel how heavy the coat was. My class thought the same thing. Her class got to look at the trucks and engines. We have plans to do that on another day. I think I'll leave her a comment about the amazing "Smoke House" our city provides for kids to learn about fire safety.

Thing #14

While I checked out several tools listed, I thought 30 boxes would be a great tool for use with my parents. I would love to post things that we are doing, as well as, upcoming events for my class. I have emails for most of my parents and I could also post it on my blog. I thought the Ta-da list would be good for me personally because I live by lists. I also thought this would be a good way to teach responsibility for students of any age. As a teacher, you could list daily (or weekly) activities to be completed. Grades could be based on how much was done along with how well it was done. Field trip needs or party needs could be listed as well. Parents could use this at home for kids too. It's a good tracking device. I think Blabberize could be a fun way to introduce new units or maybe teach things about particular animals. It did take a "while" to get everything adjusted just like I wanted.

Thing #13

What fun!!!! I had a great time just playing around with these generators. I'm not sure these could be real beneficial in a Kindergarten class but maybe I could download a few for my kids to be creative with. They could, at the very least, practice their names by placing them in a Trading Card Maker. Ideas are always welcomed. I pretty much just clicked and followed directions on each one I tried. I created the name Colton on Spell with flickr, because I have a grandson due ANY day now. I used the Custom Sign Generator to make a Hollywood Star and my chalkboard. My happy face sign came from the Happy Face Generator. There were even more to try on the Generator Blog that I would love to work on later - like AFTER I finish this class. It was good to have a fun and easy "thing" this time. It was a good stress reliever.

Thing #12

Make a Smilebox slideshow Okay, I have to admit it. I had no trouble making the slide show, but when it came to posting it, that was another story. I finally got it! Here it is along with credits. Fallen Leaves of Autumn by capn madd matt, Falling Leaves

by northstander, Fall Colors in Robbinsdale by jpellgen,A single leaf fallen on Earth by ionushi, fall dancing in red by jmtimages,Fallen Leaves by KM&G-Morris, fall project: the lovebirds by brina head, The fall by satosphere, and Day 149/365: Fallen Leaf by wenzday01.

Thing #11

I was blown away by Flickr. I spent more than a "few minutes" exploring. I found some great FALL pictures to use in my classroom. Although I did enjoy the exploration, I found myself weeding through a lot and wishing for better and more precise tags. I realize that we all have different opinions of what goes under a particular label but WOW. Some pictures are a real stretch. I did like one in particular called Fallen Leaves of Autumn by capn madd matt. It contains such beautiful colors all in one picture.

All of my kids could really benefit from slide shows using these pictures. I can see were it would help my ESL children as well. It could be used as a teaching tool or a review tool. I would love to download several for later use with writing prompts. There is such a variety to choose from. I have always taken my own pics for class projects but if there are so many out there to be used......why not??