Google Docs

After exploring Google Docs, I know understand that Google rules the universe. Holy COW! Basically,the foundation of our personal learning networks is completely Google-based, from the Wikis, to the Blogs, to features like Google earth and Docs. It's amazing the evolution of the Google corporation (I lived near their headquarters in Cali when they were just blowing up). They are a (good) monster! Have other search engines adapted this same business model and expanded themselves into so many aspects of the cyberworld? Yahoo? Ask? Just curious...

Web 2.0 Tools

I was blown away by exploring some of the Web 2.0 tools available that Val posted on the course Wiki. There are SO many tools to explore and use, it's mind-boggling. And for every aspect of your life! There are tools that help you organize you finances, organize your vacations, organize your life. There are tools that help you download music, store music, create music, and so on. Virtually every aspect of your life can be controlled, organized, modified or simplified by using the thousands of tools available online. I particularly liked the doodler site, Drawto.com, which allows people to draw and diagram the same image from different locations. Too cool!

Online Communication

This module was both frustrating and rewarding for me. I get frustrated with computers. When the computer or internet connection is slow, I feel completely helpless--computers are both our slaves and our masters, and I rather dislike being so reliant on a machine, but it is the way of the world. I was very frustrated using Teachertube. Every time I logged on, the site was too busy to respond, causing me to logon repeatedly. This is just a minor inconvenience, but what bothered me most was the fact that I posted a video, and then there was no message about it being posted, just a blank screen. I posted it four times with the same result. Finally, by scrolling through my account, there was a message saying that my video was up for review by the moderator. This would have been nice to see after I posted the video each of the four times. Oh, well, it's posted now...
On a different note, I LOVE Voicethread. What in an ingenious idea! I have big plans to use this program for science next year--it's so user friendly, I think it will lend itself nicely to 6th grade science classes.

Class Tools

I found this module to be one of the most overwhelming thus far, not because of the amount of work that went into the required writings, but because it blows your mind with the amount of tools out there at our fingertips that most people have no idea about! It would seriously take years to go in depth into the tools listed on that website alone, and I feel like by the time I have a chance to really explore many of these tools, they will be obsolete, and everyone will have moved on to the next new and amazing thing! It hurts my brain! And the options on Google docs are amazing as well. Google itself is so loaded with tools available to all, it is hard to wrap your brain around. I would love to see what percent of the Google-using population even has any idea of the vast capabilities of this website...I'm guessing that percent would be very small...

Google Earth

Wow! This is a great tool! I have used Google Earth as a visual in my science class all year, and I never really had the chance to explore all of its possibilities. The tour was so easy to put together, but I did have issues with getting my text to appear on the tour when viewed from the kmz. file I created. I noticed that other classmates had the same issue, as their text did not show either. The layers option on the most recent Chrome edition are amazing! I spent a long time looking through the National Geographic articles of interest that is one of the layers--what an amazing resource for science and social studies classes.

Photo Sharing

I am very familiar with a number of different programs for posting and editing photos (when you have all out-of-town family and a new baby, you become VERY familiar with photo sharing). I have a couple programs that I have purchased that are great photo editors, but I do have to say that Picnik is a wonderful free editing program. It actually does many of the same things that the software I have can do (just a bit more basic). What a great tool for anyone to use. I also wanted to comment about how cool I thought the Blog Response was for Mod. 6. I love the idea of telling a story about someone else's photos. A little opportunity for creativity is good for the soul. :)

Bookmarking

Such a simple idea,and yet SO useful! I find that, although this iknow class is a lot of work (especially with an extremely mobile 1 year old at home) it is worth every second you put into it. The exposure to various tools that you would otherwise have no idea about is so valuable. An example: The bookmarking features of Delicious and Diigo. These sites are both very different. I find that where Delicious is great for having bookmarkability between locations, Diigo is great for finding and sharing information and being able to highlight certain parts of a webpage and annotate it as well. The toolbar for Diigo is rather extensive, but it is really useful as it allows you to highlight, share, etc at the click of a button instead of having to go to a drop down menu. Great sites, great exposure to something new.