Thing #8 Mash It Up!

I used http://bighugelabs.com/ to create this and then uploaded it to Flickr. All of these are personal photos, taken from my Facebook and Flickr accounts. I liked putting this together as a kind of visual representation of my life over the last few years. I think this could be useful in making presentations for students. Students can also use this easily. Flickr is also nice in that you can find photos of almost anything. Sharing these photos online does not bother me because they are not overly personal.

Thing #7, Flickr, Share It!

Finding a photo of pretty much anything on Flickr is easy. You just type a keyword in, like wildlife, and the it pulls anything that has been tagged with that word. Sometimes you have to sort through a few that are not exactly what you want because users tag their own photos. There are photos ranging from professional to everyday people just adding photos of everyday things. This is a picture of the Roman aqueducts in Segovia, Spain. There is no mortar in between the stones to hold it together, it is held together by weight alone. I took this picture when I did a study abroad in Spain in 2009. It was very interesting to me because I've never been able to see anything this old before and it still functions. It is also interesting to me thinking of the Romans being in Spain.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/melissax1/6790753832/

Thing #6, Web 2.0, So Many New Things!!

 I choose powtoon.com as the website to explore. It is a free website to make slideshows or videos with fun animations. You can upgrade if you want and this gives you access to more pictures, music, and the export quality is higher. Paying is not necessary to make this a great website, they have plenty of things available on the free account. I think this site would be very useful in making slideshows to introduce new concepts to your students because the animations will get their attention. It would also be easy for the students to use themselves to make presentations. It is similar to PowerPoint in that is has templates for use or you can create your own. You control how long each slide plays and when the animations come or go. 

Thing #5, 2.0 Means it's better?

School 2.0 is using technology in the classroom. I think this would be very useful in teaching a foreign language. Some students will never get to physically travel to the countries we will study about so I think that bringing the country to the student virtually will be of a big benefit. The students will be able to learn about culture, see pictures of historical sites and learn the history of a place. They will be able to hear the music of the country. Using the internet would also enable us to communicate with people from the countries we learn about. The students could have pen pals and practice using the target language or we could have a podcast with students in other countries using the language we are learning. I think this would open up learning for people around the world to learn from each other. I think eventually more things will be done using technology. The students of today grow up using these things, why not give them more tools they can use.

Thing #4, This whole blogging thing

Commenting on others blogs creates a sense of community because you let other people know you are listening. It's why people write blogs, so they can share their knowledge and people comment to show their appreciation and/or to add to the discussion. By reading comments you can get peoples opinions that you might never have gotten before, people that could be anywhere in the world. Making a meaningful comment is the best way to go. If you do not agree with the person, do not tear them down. State your opinion a a constructive manner and give the reasons as to why you feel this is true. Give your audience something to talk to you about. Ask people what they think about what you have said, this will make people feel more welcome to giving you their opinion.
   I have decided to follow http://musicuentos.blogspot.com/. This is a blog done by a Spanish teacher in KY. I want to be a Spanish teacher and I want to see what it is like in the classroom and how people are teaching students to learn and to make it stick. I want to know how to instill in students the desire to learn more so they will go out on their own and find things. I am also following http://bilingualteacherclubhouse.blogspot.com/. There are so many ideas on this blog that I feel will help me not only to teach Spanish but to improve my skills as well. They offer many free resources that will be very useful. This blog has options for Pre-K through K, 1st-2nd, 3rd-5th, middle school, and high school.

Thing #3 What am I going to use this for?

Since I want to teach a foreign language a blog could be a very good way to reach out to the international learning community. I want to teach Spanish. This could be a way that my students could follow blogs of students in a Spanish speaking country. This could give them practice reading in the language and they could respond to the posts which would given them practice thinking, writing, and responding in Spanish. The reverse could be true for the Spanish speaking country as well with improving their English skills. I could also use this blog to connect with other Spanish teachers. I could get ideas from them and learn from their experiences as they could mine. My blog could also be used by my students as well. I could post blogs for the students to read and respond to. I could have them find information online and start discussions with them.