Thinking About...Thursday, August 6, 2009

Yesterday I was at the beach in Ocean City, NJ, with my mom's friend, Laverne. This lovely lady is very intelligent and has quite a few grandchildren, so it came as a bit of a surprise when Laverne was lamenting about the fact that her son had signed her up for a computer course. "I don't even have a computer. I don't want one, I don't have room for one, and that's that," she stated emphatically while she drove with me to the local store to get a newspaper. I told to tell her she could read the newspaper on line, but she wasn't having any of it. "I need to do my crossword puzzle every day." As we went back to the house, she attacked the crossword puzzle while I sat with my laptop doing my "every day things like plurking. "Do you know a goddess who had horns?" she called out. I quickly googled it and gave her the answer. "Another word for Heat Home?"
This went on for a bit until she triumphantly called out she had completed her puzzle. I smiled to myself. She was happy and I had learned about Isis and Miami Heat basketball team.

Later I got thinking about why I love the computer and others don't, and there are many who don't. Whoopi Goldberg, who probably has a computer but doesn't seem to take to things like Twitter and answering machines, has amazingly creative minds. Laverne would rather paint, redecorate, sew and do other creative things. Both ladies probably also finish every thing they start. I don't. I love to learn things quickly and start many things I don't finish. My friend, Jeff, uses the computer because he HAS to, but given the opportunity, he'd throw it out the window. Meticulous, an end point always in his head, his "I can't do anything else until I finish this" drive me nuts.

So, maybe that's the difference in educators who adapt and use the technology and those who tolerate it. Maybe I need to be more cocnicient of the fact that they are just programed that way, like some of my students. These are the kinds of people we can LEAD to the computer, but unless there is a concrete end for them to see....they aren't going to drink from it.

Monday....tech day....August 3, 2009

All sorts of tech things here today from an on line alarm clock to flipping your texts. Please feel free to add any fun technology sites you know to this blog.


WAKE UP
kukuklok.com
Cool alarm clock....all sorts of sounds for you to choose

Wonder how people flip their text on plurk or other places??
http://www.revfad.com/oldflip.html

Looking for a web site...lots on one page here
http://www.joongel.com/

Better read these 21st century excuses before you assign homework this year
http://www.projectrethink.org/2008/08/26/21st-century-excuses/

Like snipit
http://www.urlpass.com/


Be sure to check out audioboo.com I can see all sorts of uses for this.

http://www.discoveryeducation.com/aboutus/newsArticle.cfm?news_id=571
Educators Set to Begin New School Year with Enhanced Curricular Resources and Integration Tools from Discovery Education

Found by Plurker Mrs Smoke.....Organize your classroom library
http://www.gurulib.com

From the Universe:
It's truly a sight to see, when the inhabitants of any planetary civilization cross the tipping point and begin to individually accept complete and eternal responsibility for their own happiness.

Yet, this hardly compares to the mountain quaking, body shaking, polarity-flipping, hero-making occurrences that transpire when such inhabitants graduate to accepting complete and eternal responsibility for their every twinge of unhappiness.

Brings tears to my eyes,
The Universe

Friday, Web Site Day....August 7

http://macmillanmh.com/math/mathtoolchest/mtc_online/

http://www.gazzump.com/
Gazzump is the ultimate online application for downloading youtube videos, myspace playlists, movies, audio, images, javascript, objects, applications, flash, links and many other things.

http://www.printwhatyoulike.com/
Tired of printing web pages only to find your printout is full of ads, empty space and other junk you don't want? PrintWhatYouLike is a free online editor that lets you format any web page for printing in seconds!

http://www.google.com/landing/searchtips/index.html
Search is at the heart of everything we do at Google. Our engineers work every day to solve the hardest search problems, and thus improve your online experience. Here's a glimpse at what they do, the features they've built and the remarkable user stories that inspire our work.

First, pick a thinking skill...

http://www.byrdseed.com/differentiator/

Adapted from Revised Bloom's Taxonomy

Free book download:

http://stopcryingintherestroom.com/

worksheets and more

http://www.shambles.net/pages/staff/WorkSh/

A daily math journal prompt for first graders. Print them out and bind for

each student, or copy prompt to the board. Features addition, subtraction,

patterns, and more. [link] - Sun, Aug 2 2009 12:54 am

1 message, 1 author

http://groups.google.com/group/googleforeducators_educationresources/t/3f8cc9db787a4e7a?hl=en