WEEK 9 - THING #21

Today was my first experience with a podcast. I was looking forward to learning more about a podcast before I began searching for one but the link for Yahoo: What is a podcast? tutorial is broken. So, I struck out on my own and created an account with podcast.com. I subscribed to a podcast called Wicked Decent Learning. I also, due to a recommendation from one of my classmates, subscribed to The ABC Book Reviews: A Beth and Cari Production. I listened to one episode from Wicked Decent Learning but it did not hold my interest. There was too much kidding around and not enough usable information being discussed. Maybe some of the other episodes will be better. I really enjoyed The ABC Book Reviews so much so that I put it into my Google Reader account (by the way, this was so easy to do, no copying or pasting required). This will be a useful tool for me. It will clue me into any new books being released and give me ideas of who would like these books based on their reviews.

For my library, podcasts could be used for my seeing impaired patrons. I could have book review podcasts for them to listen to (in a designated podcast listening area). Then they could decide for themselves whether they would like to check out that certain audio book.

WEEK 9 - THING #20

My daughter watches YouTube for music videos so I am pretty familiar with it. It can be very addicting, like the recommended 70s commercials. I went through those for about 45 minutes. I tried to watch Conan the Librarian but a message came up saying it was removed due to terms of use violations. I wonder what that is about. I very much enjoyed the Introduction to the Book. I watched this in my very first MLS course here at Clarion. I really can't find anything particularly negative about the YouTube site. I kind of like the video suggestions on the side and it loads relatively quickly. For libraries, I think YouTube would work well with booktalks. Just think, along with being able to read others' reviews of books wouldn't it be cool to have a YouTube video booktalk to view? I have found that I really enjoy giving booktalks. I think I will video tape them and make them available in my library.

I chose this video because I really liked this book "Dewey". I love cats and books so this was a book made for me. I would love to work in a public library that has a library cat. When I see my cat curled up in a patch of sunlight, it makes me want to grab a book and curl up with him (and I have). I recommend this book to anyone that loves cats!

WEEK 8 - THING #19

I love LibraryThing. It is so easy to add books and edit them. I put my five books for my WebQuest in my "To Read" collection date. I also set about putting some books in my "Favorites" collection. I gave my WebQuest books tags. I sorted all my books by publication date. I love how you can choose from different book covers and how you can see how many people like what you like. As for my five WebQuest books, the most popular one "Indian Chiefs" was in 68 other members' libraries. One of my titles "American Indian Tribes" was only in my library, no one else has it. It is an older book so maybe that is part of the reason. LibraryThing is going to be a big help to me. I read so many books that I can't remember all of their titles so I end up reading up to 50 pages before I get that feeling that I have read it before. Now I can check my LibraryThing account I know for sure. It will take a while to get all of the books that I have read added to my account but it will be worth it. Here is my link:

http://www.librarything.com/catalog/Cathier

WEEK 8 - THING #18

I didn't realize that sites like Zoho existed. I am a Word fan so I tried not to judge Zoho to harshly. I created an account and set about playing around in Zoho. Since I love poetry, I typed out one of my favorites by Marge Piercy. I was able to pick a different font and make the title red. I also inserted a picture. There weren't many formating options for images, but the finished result was decent. I wanted to put a boarder around my poem but did not find an option for that (that is not to say it doesn't exist). The real problem came when I tried to post my poem to my blog. The help section said I should click on the "Publish" option on the tool bar. I searched for 30 minutes for the "Publish" button to no avail. This is dissappointing because I thought this was a really nice selling point for Zoho. If anyone figured this out, I would love to know.

Zoho would be useful for me and my school work. Since I do some of my school work on my lunch break, I have to save said homework on a flash drive at home and REMEMBER to bring it to work. With Zoho, you could access it anywhere. Although, I think I might wait a while to try something like this. Homework is precious you know!

Anyway, since I could not post my poem from Zoho, I saved it as a .pdf on my desktop and will try and paste it into this post.

OK, I am not able to post the .pdf file so I will just paste the poem.

WHAT'S THAT SMELL IN THE KITCHEN
All over America women are burning dinners. It's lambchops in Peoria: it's haddock in Providence; it's steak in Chicago: tofu delight in Big Sur; red rice and beans in Dallas. All over America women are burning food they're supposed to bring with calico smile on platters glittering like wax. Anger sputters in her brainpan, confined but spewing out missiles of hot fat. Carbonized despair presses like a clinker from a barbecue against the back of her eyes. If she wants to grill anything, it's her husband spitted over a slow fire. If she wants to serve him anything it's a dead rat with a bomb in its belly ticking like the heart of an insomniac. Her life is cooked and digested, nothing but leftovers in Tupperware. Look, she says, once I was roast duck on your platter with parsley but now I am Spam. Burning dinner is not incompetence but war.

By: Marge Piercy

WEBQUEST

Here is my WebQuest. The template was easy to follow and helped me get my thoughts in order. Like others have stated, it kind of messed up your numbering (which is strange because it actually states to make sure you number your instructions). I also wish you were able to do a little more customizing but overall I think WebQuests are very useful. Here is mine. The Native American project is for a 5th grade social studies class. I could not get it to post a link so I just copied and pasted it!

Name:____________________
Date:_____________________
Subject: Social Studies
Professor: Ms. Ruble

Introduction: With Thanksgiving Day coming next month, now would be the perfect time to learn about Native Americans. The Native Americans lived on the North America continent long before Columbus "discovered" America. It was the Native Americans that helped the English settlers survive their first harsh North American winter. Let's have fun learning about these amazing groups of people.

Task: For this project, you will be writing a one to two page report on a Native American Tribe. You may chose a tribe from the North, South, East, West or the Plains. Your report should described the type of housing, clothing, food and crafts that pertain to your tribe. You will also be constructing a Kachina doll.

Process: 1. You will use the Rollyo website provided to conduct your research. 2. A "research notes" page will be passed out. You will search for information on your tribe's housing, clothing, food and crafts and write your information on your notes page. 3. You will use these notes to construct your first rough draft (Don't forget to use your own words and not the websites). 4. I will check each rough draft and will let you know if you can start on your final paper. 5. After your paper is completed, you will start on you Kachina Doll. Please read about what a Kachina Doll is and search for instructions on how to make a Kachina Doll on the Rollyo site. 6. After you have printed your instructions, you may go to the craft corner and create your Kachina Doll. 7. After your doll and paper are finished you will present both to the class.

Resources: I have created a Rollyo site title "Native Americans". This is where you will be doing all of your research.
http://rollyo.com/cathier/native_americans/
Native American Rollyo

Evaluation: Your paper will be graded on content (did you include housing, clothing, food and craft information), grammar (no typos and correct punciation) and construction (must have clear introduction, body, and conclusion). Your presentation will be graded on your delivery (speak loud enough to be heard and clear enough to be understood).

Conclusion: To celebrate our new knowledge of Native Americans, we will have a "Thanksgiving Feast". You will be asked to bring in a poster decorated with the types of foods that your tribe eats. These posters will be put on displayed around the classroom. Snacks and drinks will be provided for our "feast".

WEEK 7 - THING #17

I went to the sandbox provided in the California classroom 2.0 curriculum connections wiki and edited the page with my comment about origins of old sayings. I enjoyed reading others random thoughts some of which were quite entertaining. I also went to the section about the 23 things and learned about a voki talking avatar. I have to experiment with that! Taking the idea I saw in the sandbox, I think having students collaborate on a class story would be fun and interesting. As a class you could decide on a topic and each student would contribute maybe 4 or 5 paragraphs to the story. This could be blown into a really big project by having them create illustrations for the story and actually making it into a book to put in the classroom library!

WEEK 7 - THING #16

I like Wikis. I think they are easy to use and practical. I had some experience with PBwikis in one of my courses. I remember having to put a library budget on the wiki. We used a table copied from word. The formatting was tricky but I think that just for basic word processing a wiki is a sufficient tool.

I looked through the websites and can I just say, is Meredith Farkas everywhere? She created the Library Success: A Best Practices Wiki. I have read her name numerous times since I started this LS program. She is definitely a mover and shaker in the library technology world. Anyway, I really liked the her wiki and added it to my Google Reader. I also need to look through the list of library blogs available on Library Bloggers Wiki. The list is extensive! In the TeacherLibrarian Wiki I read about a librarian that offers a Books ala Carte services. That is an idea I will tuck away and hopefully use someday.

I can see that one of the most obvious uses for a wiki in a library would be for book discussion and reviews. As far as the classroom, I would setup one like the Westwood Schools teacher, Vicki Davis has (one of the samples posted in week #7). Her wiki is not just for special projects that are here today and gone tomorrow. She definitely has a lot going on in her wiki and makes it an active part of her classroom. It has won many awards.