Blog-Wiki Linking

I just learned how to use an external link to link my blog Becoming Tech Savvy with 3Cs Learning with my summary of personal learning wiki, Savoring Satisfying Sections I had a momentary set-back this morning when I was adding an linking an article to my wiki. Suddenly all of the pages except for the home page were invisible! When I checked recent changes to wiki, I saw that all of the pages had been edited, but I have no idea how. I had clicked on edit navigation because I couldn't find my Introduction page, but when I tried to add one it said that I already had one. What confusion, but thanks to the assistance of a colleague, we were able to re-create links to the pages. Whew!

Hearing is Learning

I just added another way of experiencing my blog posts, added with the auditory learner in mind. When I discovered this web 2.0 tool, I thought of the many possibilities for using this my students who have difficulty reading and need to listen to books on tape. See the odiogo website to add this gadget to your blog.

Memories of Culture Shock

As I watched Kim Cofino's Original K12 Online Conference Going Global Keynote Post I was engulfed with memories of our first year as expatriates living on the tiny island of Barbados. Finally a topic where I am an "expert"! Culture shock is a phenomenon that I am well acquainted with. In August 1995, we seized the opportunity to experience life in the Caribbean on the island of Barbados. It was interesting to note Kim’s observation that expatriate families are often insulated from the country where they are living; we were living in a foreign nation but not truly a part of it. As Kim Cofino described aspects of culture shock, I recalled many of my experiences as embarked upon this adventure with my husband and three children. Bryan quickly adapted to the business community of Barbados where he was welcomed with open arms by nationals who wanted to learn how to grow their businesses and enter the global marketplace. I spent three hours a day driving my children to a private school which was based on a British model of education. Classmates of my children were transplanted from Canada, United States, France, Belgium, England, Germany, South Africa, as well as Barbadian nationals. Just as Kim commented, there were two groups of students...children of families who were temporarily relocated to another country and nationals who wanted their children to have an education that would prepare them to participate in a global community. She commented that culture shock, varying degrees of discomfort, can last months and even years; it took us a good year to become acclimatized and adjust our attitudes, expectations, communication and behaviors to adapt to the local culture. It took incredible flexibility to leave our comfort zone and immerse ourselves in an unfamiliar culture. We definitely learned new things about ourselves and how to interact with others. We were often thankful that the language of Barbados was English even if we couldn't always understand what was being said due to the rapid rate of speech and different accent. My children quickly picked up the "Barbadian accent". While experiencing frustration and challenges we were unaware that the impact of adapting to this new culture would energize and change us forever. The lesson that I learned that year as I attempted to emerge from the dark cloud of unfamiliarity was to always expect the unexpected.

In her presentation, Kim Cofino discussed a variety of variables she has observed while adapting to new cultures, particularly in Asia. I agree with many of her observations. We were always in constant motion, yet the pace of life in Barbados is much slower and often there was no awareness that a faster pace would be more effective. There was no customization of services; they did it the way it has been done for years and so need for change. At that time there was no striving to provide an individualized educational experience. The school did not see a need to adapt to change; there was a high resistance to change. I agree with Kim that education shouldn’t stop when the bell rings to send kids home. We sought to educate our children by traveling throughout the Caribbean while living in the area. Collaboration with other expatriates was effective in solving problems and learning how to adapt. We were aware of the need to blend our customs with the news ones that were were observing. I appreciated Kim's observation regarding blending of old and new and how this applied to incorporating technology in the classroom. We wanted to include new customs, yet maintain many of our traditions and values in an attempt to teach our children the "best of both worlds". I appreciated her comment regarding "just in time delivery" where new skills are taught as needed and in a contextual basis. Although many of our expatriate friends received "cross-cultural training" prior to relocating, we were on a need to know basis, solving problems as we encountered them. We were quick to pass on "advice" to new expatriates as they arrived to our community. I chuckled when she commented on the impact of the global community in faraway places with respect to familiar brands, and international bookstore and restaurant chains. It is interesting to note that Barbados is one location where McDonalds Restaurants did not survive. We had to rely on the locate chain, Chefette, for our fast food fix (rotis were often the choice of my children rather than hamburgers.) On a final note, since I have been rambling on while remembering...We did indeed learn to be flexible and to this day my children demonstrate a desire to respect and include others. They quickly adapt to new situations and think nothing of navigating airports. My son is currently about to embark upon a study abroad in Australia, while my daughter ponders the options for travel available to her in upcoming years. After viewing the presentation last night, I asked each of them to send me an email summarizing some of their memories of experiences that impacted them. Since I found the comments shared in the video from third culture kids, I'll share these comments in a future post for anyone who is interested.

Wiki Wonderment

Spent hours last night creating two new wikis. I am in awe of the possibilities wikis provide for organizing lessons, collaborating with colleagues and storing and sharing resources. I think that I am becoming addicted!! My two new wikis will be useful in summarizing my learning in this course, as well as organizing and sharing curricular information and resources.
SavoringSatisfyingSections

Common Sense Communication

Summarizing with Wordle

During social skills groups this week students practiced expressing appreciation. We created a wordle to summarize our lists of people and things in our lives that we are thankful for. This is definitely a practical application of technology to enhance learning in the classroom. title="Wordle: Showing Appreciation"> src="http://www.wordle.net/thumb/wrdl/1380342/Showing_Appreciation"
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Introducing Nonverbal Communication via Wordle

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alt="Wordle: Nonverbal Communication"
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I thought that this would be a creative way to introduce the topic of nonverbal communication with my social skills groups. Throughout the year it could be used as visual aid as students learn to monitor their use of the nonverbal aspects of communication. Is there a way to embed the wordle in my blog rather than creating a link.

Embedding a Video

Considering Creately

Last night I watched a demonstration for using Creately to create diagrams. Looks like this would be fun to experiment with when I have some more time. I'm wondering if anyone has tried this tool yet. Any sugestions for application to the classroom.

More Voki fun

Experimenting with Voki

One more task for the day involved creating my first voki. What a sense of freedom as I imagined what type of character would be struggling to enter Tech Savvy Land. I successfully created my voki, but I'm having difficulty adding her to my blog. I'll try tomorrow.

Successful Linking

I discovered what I was doing wrong last night when I tried to link to a website. I wasn't highlighting the title. Now another success! I still need to figure out why I can upload images from my photos, but can't add an image from the computer websites such as Flickr. Any ideas of what I am doing wrong?

Embedding a Link-Help!

As I viewed my last post I slid down the mountain a bit since the link to the website for "cool tools for schools" wasn't there. I'll have to figure that one out tomorrow. I copied the URL and clicked on add a link icon and inserted the URL. Did I miss a step?

Sharing the Tools

I discovered this evening that my sister, a guidance counselor at a private school in Canada is also embarking upon the journey to Tech Land and needs to equip herself with the Web 2.0 Tools. Believe it or not, I was sending her suggestions of websites to investigate and forwarded her a link that Susanne sent me today, Cool Tools for Schools.
In this journey with its ups and downs, I shut off my computer for the evening on a mountain top high since I feel that my time spent today experimenting has been worthwhile and exhilarating. I still can't believe that I have learned enough to share with others! This is definitely an adventure best experienced and shared with others who also have a similar destination in mind.

Experimenting with Glogging

My First Glog

Seesawing Together is Twice as Effective

Experience has shown me that learning as a community or with a friend or colleague is valuable and essential. For example the "high" as I experimented with Prezi with a classmate was closely followed by the frustration as I attempted to continue with solo experimentation. The satisfaction with successful learning is enhanced by sharing the discoveries with a colleague, just as seesawing with a friend alleviates anxiety and accentuates the exhilaration of flying into the air.

Learning Together

Experience has shown me that learning as a community or with a friend or colleague is valuable and essential. For example the "high" as I experimented with Prezi with a classmate was closely followed by the frustration as I attempted to continue with solo experimentation. The satisfaction with successful learning is enhanced by sharing the discoveries with a colleague, just a seesawing with a friend alleviates anxiety and accentuates the exhilaration of flying into the air.

Blogging Standards: To have or not to have?

As I signed in to my blog, contemplating the content of my post, an article about blogging standards caught my eye, "Blogging on the Brink: Time to Set Standards" (I tried to make my title link to the website, but to no avail. I'll work on that tomorrow when I am more alert.) Since I teach social skills and encourage students to take responsibility for what they say and do, I was pleasantly pleased to see that some bloggers are raising the bar when it comes to posting blogs. While some continue to take a wild west approach to blogging, there is an increasing trend towards holding bloggers accountable for their posted comments. I agree that standards are necessary for responsible blogging as opposed to an "anything goes" policy for posting.

With this post I am experimenting with double posting and inserting a link to an article. Let's see if I was successful..

Creating with Cool Iris

I discovered the pictorial resources available when I downloaded Cool Iris to view the 50 Ways to Tell A Story. Unfortunately, I was only able to view the stories since there was no audio. I tried two sets of headphones and then called my son who used to use this wonderful machine. His response, "That's partly way I decided to get a new computer...The audio was inconsistent." Since I have successfully had audio accompaniment to visual presentations in the past I continued searching, only to discover that the mute button was on. I certainly wish that I had inherited the tech gene. Back to Cool Iris..I tried to upload an image from Cool Iris to my blog but to no avail. Is it possible to browse their images and add them to my posts or are they protected by copyright. I found some great shots of Beit She'an, Masada, and Qumran that would be great additions to my major sharing project "Exploring Israel" for sixth grade social studies classes. Any suggestions?

It's Magic!!

In my last post I ranted and raved about adding an image to my post. When I published the post it magically appeared in my blog. Finally a success tonight. I'm going to try it again. I'm sure that this is "child's play" for most of my classmates, but I am missing the tech gene...had I mentioned this deficit before. This would come under "Confessions"..another of the Cs of tech learning for the 21st century classroom. I must confess that I almost gave up on adding images, even though I am the queen of visual aids in the classroom. I'm going to try another one..

Trying to Add an Image to my post

I'm trying to add an image from my computer to my blog since I have been unable to move my pictures into my Prezi. I clicked on add an image, selected my picture, and clicked back to edit my post and voila...no image. This too falls into the category of "challenges" in Cs of Becoming Tech Savvy. This certainly has been an evening of challenges. Read my next post for the continuing saga of Challenges in Entering the Promised Land of Tech Savviness. Before publishing this post, I will try adding an image one more time. Here goes..Well, my picture was successfully uploaded to a blog post, but when I clicked "done", this is what my post looked like. What is all the gibberish at the top of my post? Help? I was so excited when I saw the image uploaded in my post box. And the instructions said I could edit and post. I will post it as it ended up and perhaps someone can explain what happened to my picture.

Formulating Google-proof Questions

I was fascinated to read the comments in the Electric Educator: Google-Proof Questions

Playing with Prezi

After reading Sue's post on creating a Prezi and participating in the class intro to Prezi, I was inspired to add this tool to my repertoire of tech tools for my 21st century classroom. I started by viewing several helpful videos on the Prezi website:

In fact, I was so enthralled with the task that I forgot about the banana muffins which I had put in the oven to bake while I continued my journey to Tech Savvy Land until the aroma of overcooked baked goods wafted into my workspace. I paused the videos as I scurried to salvage my muffins..the cost of emerging tech knowledge. What would satisfy my hunger I wondered only to quickly arrive at the conclusion that I could be sustained by this new found knowledge, or could I? Perhaps that will be a debate for future posts. Check-out these videos to refine your prezi presentation skills.

Frustrated

I am feeling very frustrated as I try to navigate our class wiki to find the essential readings for today's class. I was planning to re-read the Kiva article and comment on the characteristics of the 21st classroom, yet after diligent searching I am unable to find the cluster listing the essential readings. Earlier this week, after meeting with our study group to experiment and encourage each others' learning my confidence level was increasing and I was excited about continuing on this journey. Now my stomach is churning and I have wasted too much time without anything to show for it. This adventure sure takes persistence as I find myself taking two steps back for every step forwards. I find it extremely frustrating when I set aside time to learn and encounter technological difficulties. #i3Cs21

More Footprints

Just added another badge on my own...I'm thrilled that I remembered all of the steps. At one point I was ready to give up or tweet a friend, but a click here and a click there and I achieved success. I have to keep on reminding myself that it is a journey with many tiny footprints. My other achievement today as I collaborated with my study buddies who are also becoming tech savvy was to investigate Google Reader. This is an amazing tool and will increase my efficiency in keeping up with the flow of information oozing into my life.

Badges

I just learned how to "get a badge" for my blog. I'm going to try an add one right now for a ning that I just joined. Let's see how this goes...

Steps to Understanding

My overall goal as I maneuver through this course is to become tech savvy. Starting from gound zero I have a long journey ahead of me. With so much information to sift through I am learning to celebrate each step of understanding. Actually at times I feel as if I am drowning in information. I must remind myself to be content, and focus on what I have learned and not what is still ahead.