Thing 20

YouTube, what a life saver in the classroom.  It has yet to let me down when trying to find a video for class to supplement material that is discussed in class.  Most recently, we have been discussing simple machines in the physical science class that I teach.  I have given notes over them, worksheets, had class discussions, and even demonstrations.  But nothing gets my students more excited when I turn off the front row of lights and say today I want to show you a short video about .....   You would think that they have just won the lottery and they will be your best friend that day.  I was fortunate enough to find a video from my childhood that none of them had ever seen and by someone that few of them had heard of.  In fact some thought that this person was dead.  I am not going to tell you who or what, you will just have to watch the linked video below to find out yourself.

Thing 19

Maybe I am just an inter vert, but social media is not really my thing.  Yes I have a Twitter account, so that I can follow our school superintendent to find out when school is closed for snow or ice, and I am on Facebook, so I can post pictures of my daughter once every blue moon for my family in other states to see.  But when it comes to actively engaging others, I tend to be more of a reader then poster.  My wife on the other hand, is the complete opposite.  She will post, tweet, and pin with the best of them.

I find social media sites to be interesting and I will take the time to look through them for ideas, but actively participating is not something I have the stamina for.  One social media site that I like, (and I look at my wife's account because she is a teacher also) is Pinterest.  There are some truly neat ideas that my wife has collected for the classroom on there.  Some of which I have built for both of our classrooms.  And the recipes that she has gathered and organized, very nice.  Pinterest to me though, is similar in a lot of ways to the bookmarking sites.  The difference is that Pinterest has photos associated with the links.  For me, I like this better.  I am a more visually driven person, so seeing an image associated with a specific topic or link is much more appealing.  

When it comes down to social media in the classroom, I see that there are some practical applications.  However, social media is not something that really perks my interest like other resources do, so it is not something that I am going to incorporate very heavily or rely upon greatly in my own classroom.

Thing 18

Social media is something that every teacher needs to be aware of.  I think most are, but there are some who still live in the dark ages.  I have had a Facebook account for at least 7 years, probably longer.  My Twitter account is almost 1 year old.  Mostly I just follow, don't do too much "Tweeting".  Feel free to follow @Jim_Akins

Initially I set up my Twitter account as an additional way to keep in touch with my students, but upon reflection, I decided that I did not want to go that route.  I try to be very careful when it comes to "friending" students on social media.  It is too easy to get in trouble.  Since then I have found other ways to keep in touch with my students, however that is a conversation for Thing 19.

As far as the use of social media is concerned, I do monitor a Facebook page for 2 school clubs.  What I find most interesting though, is that Facebook is no longer the best way to connect with students.  I think because the message feeds have become so inundated with the number of people we are friends with, and all the games that send messages and advertisements, that messages with meaning are lost in the background.

Thing 17

I don't know that I see a practical use of social bookmarking for my classroom.  I think for me personally it is a great place to find sites and reviews of sites that I can then link to on my classroom webpage by subject or topic.  This way I can review the relevance of the website to the topic or class and determine if it is useful for my students.  

It may just be a bit of the control freak that I am (and think most teachers are since we are master and commander of our classrooms), but I want to make sure that if my students are going to a web page for resources, it is worth their time and relevant.

Thing 16

I think of all the customized "start" pages, I liked Symbaloo the best.  I am just simply not a fan of having a start page that requires a large amount of scrolling to find information.  Having the app icons to select what I am interested in viewing when pull up a browser is much nicer than having to scroll down to find it.  While I had to scroll down on the Ustart page, I do like some of the expanded features such as the weather and calendar.  After looking at each of the sites, I am not sure if I want to make one a permanent home page for my web browser.  I am still on the fence just a little because right now I have the page I use the most, Google Search.  I just like to look at the Google banner each day to see what they have come up with.

In regards to an online calendar, I have been using Google Calendar for quite some time.  I have it linked to my iPhone account and Wunderlist app.  I don't know if I really want to have it as a part of my home page when I open a web browser, but that is something that I am going to give some consideration too.  It might be helpful if the calendar was the first thing that I saw, instead of sports headlines.

One other tool that I have found beyond useful is Zamzar.  If this site is not on your bookmark bar, then you need to get it there pronto!  I can not tell you the number of papers that students have typed at home on old software that is not supported by newer apps at school that I have sent to Zamzar to be converted so that they can access and print them off.  Zamzar is just fantastic and beyond simple to use.

Thing 15

Wikipedia is a site that I constantly stress to my students when working on a report NOT to use as a reliable reference because of the freedom to edit them.  I do suggest they are a nice place to start to find links to reputable sites that can be used.  In playing with the APSU 23 Things Sandbox wiki, it gave me the idea of creating my own "sandbox" for my class to illustrate the freedom of changing information.  I think it will be a great hands-on exercise for my students to see this concept in practice.

With that said, I also think that wikis can be a place that I can have students create and post projects to for class.  Each of the projects can then be viewed by their classmates and open discussions can held.  I think that there are some great opportunities that can be had with wikis, however, it is something that I need to investigate a bit further to make sure that there might not be a better tool, such as a blog on Google Drive.

Thing 14

Mind maps vs flow charts ... can't say that I have a preference for one or the other.  I find that there are times were mind maps are more appropriate for the through processes that I am going through than flow charts, and vice versa.

For this thing, I looked at flowchart.com and mindmeister.  I found both to be simple to use and intuitive enough to learn.  However, for me, I personally like an app. that I have been using for the past year called MindNode.  It is very similar to mindmeister, but allows you to convert your mind map into a flow chart.

For class, I find mind maps to be the better choice, because I don't feel as constrained when I am putting together a lesson.  Typically I will create a mind map first, then upon reflection of it, convert it to a flow chart before I make a final draft of my notes for a class.  I find the flow chart to be a more organized form of my charts than the mind map.

With my students, often times I will have them take a small section of notes or chapter of the text book and create a mind map of the ideas presented.  I like to to this before I lecture or discuss the content with them, because it exposes them to the terms and they are able to see for themselves how ideas and concepts are connected and related.  I recently did this with the rock cycle, and then had them expand it with each of the rock types.  

I don't know how useful I personally find each of the tools in this exercise, but I can see their potential from a collaborative standpoint.  For me, I tend to fall back to the old pencil and paper mind map.  I just like the feel of it.  If I know it will be too big for notebook paper, then I will use my MindNode app.

Thing 13

Google Drive is a tool that I love to use in my classroom.  I will have all of my students set up Gmail accounts if they do not already have them, and write their papers or work on lab reports using these tools.  Yes we have Microsoft Office in the computer labs, however, not all of my students have access to this software at home.  By using Google Drive I can make sure that my students are able to not only have access to word processing software or spreadsheets, but are able to use them.

One of the other things that I like about Google Drive, is that I can create a spreadsheet of data for a lab, then share the link to my students and have them use that data to create graphs and make interpretations.

Another advantage that I have found in using Google Drive in my classroom is during activities that require group collaboration, such as a class presentations.  My students can share their files with each other and work collaboratively not only during class, but after school on projects.

I find another advantage to be that all of the files are stored on their accounts, so there is no need for them to bring a USB drive, or email a file back and forth, to try and keep up with their work.  All they have to do is log into their Gmail account and they have access to everything.

I looked at the Zoho site, and I don't really have a problem with it.  However, I do prefer Google Drive, simply because most of my students already have an account and are familiar with how it works.  This is a tool that students don't only use in my class, but other teachers at the school I teach use it along with sites such as Dropbox.

To see a simple file that I created in my own Google Drive account, follow this link: smiley face.  Hope you enjoy.