What was introduced today that was new to you?

Blogs
Google Page Creator
Twitter
Google Calendar
Image Chef
Google Docs
Image Chef
Lewis and Clark KMZ
What applications are you going to try within the next two months?
I will try using youTube with my staff
Google Earth will be downloaded at home
I will get Google Earth loaded on more teacher computers

I will learn to blog this week.
What would you like to know more about?

How to convince the powers that be that all of this is something to put on their agenda!

Dusting Off the Virtual Dust

No excuse this time that it has been a very long time since my last post, but I am back blogging!

I am preparing for an administrator academy about blogs, podcasts ,and wikis here in Northern Illinois and I am wandering around the Internet, twittering (just started that last Friday morning), Skyping (started that a few months ago, but actually made my first independent call last night!),investigating uStreamed (Signed up last Friday, a participant uCasted me that afternoon) and my usual reading of my RSS feeds using Bloglines.

Many of you reading this blog post and wondering "YIKES, where has Meg been, under some virtual rock"? Actually, I have been busy teaching. Teaching all day and driving kids each evening. My teaching schedule was heavier this Fall than usual and in my mind I was keeping up with the great folks at classroom 2.0 over on Ning, researching using wikis, watching some great mashups on You Tube, investigating Teacher Tube, following my blogs using RSS feeds, and keeping up with my friends on Linkedin.

Just so you don't think I was standing still I also have been immersed in the virtual world of Second Life where I have been designing my dream home, serving on committees, and participating in amazing networking events. My avatar Meg Writer is getting more hits than my real name Meg Ormiston, based on the data from my Google Alerts. I have been using my shared Google Calendar to coordinate carpooling to and from school, and playing with Google Docs and Spreadsheets.

My current professional development is learning to master Google Sketchup, for this I am using videos found on You Tube. I LOVE this, and can see amazing applications for everyone! I particularly love to browse through the 3-D Warehouse and look at the things that others have built and shared. Still Google Earth is one of my favorite tools of all time, could rant and rave all day but not to be missed is the Street View in Google Maps.

With my teaching I also have learned how to use Garage Band to create Podcasts with students, Comic Life across the curriculum, and taught myself Adobe Fireworks. I have helped teachers create iMovies, Windows Movie Maker projects and made amazing websites using Google Page Creator. Exploring Flickr with various staff members they have created some great lessons, and others have learned advanced searching in Google to locate resources.

There is much more as I reflect over the last month working with k-12 teachers, but still look how much I missed in the short time. This world of Web 2.0 is absolutely amazing and it is changing every second.

As I reflect over what I have written here, I am wondering a few things:

1. How many of the sites referenced in this post will the administrators I am working with know and have used?
2. If I can't keep up with the explosion of possibilities how can our administrators add that to their over burdened plate?
3. How do we extend the learning beyond a one day face to face session?
4. How do we reach the teachers in the classroom with students and help them stay current?

Big questions, lot to think about!

Second Life

I am wandering around Second Life and having a ball! This is such a learning experience for me, I love it! I have a house and I am about to totally rearrange everything. Come join me in-world at (SL) Meg Writer
http://slurl.com/secondlife/megwriter/80/27/22/

Visualize Information

This was part of a blog post I read, amazing ways to visualize information!
http://mashable.com/2007/05/15/16-awesome-data-visualization-tools/

Tech Teachers the Digital Home of Meg Ormiston

Tech Teachers the Digital Home of Meg Ormiston
Finally updated!!

I'm Back in Google!

Celebrate!!
I have no idea what happened, but a few months ago Google stopped indexing most of the pages in my web. Upon further Googling I found this can happen for a number of reasons, none I even understood, much less did (I think). Today I did a search on something, there I was! Back! Now I have some serious updating to do!!
yiiipppee!

A Modest Curriculum Proposal | Edutopia

A Modest Curriculum Proposal Edutopia
Like always Edutopia is right on! This example of teaching students to play basketball with a textbook is perfect. In so many of our classrooms the books are ruining teaching, the passion the stories. Instead we have a race to get through the book, but is that real learning?

Today is my SL Birthday!

This is a copy of a post I made on the four eyed technologist blog, thought you would enjoy it!
Hello all!
I am giddy, especially about my new house on EduIslandII! What a wonderful opportunity to meet Ryan in real life, Existential Paine comes to life! Today is my birthday, I am one month old today, and no new wrinkles! I absolutely feel I have learned more in the past month than I have with my professional reading in years. Like most people I wondered in after hearing about SL, and wondered around orientation island like a fool. I chatted with a man in Italy and thought I was virtually visiting match dot com. I logged off and left.
Kathy Schrock dragged me back on April 17th and her teleport to the island saved me! Wondering around ISTE, meeting the wonderful helpful people, I started to get it. I jumped in with the help of my boys, and we are all learning together. They are over on the teen grid, having a great time!
For me the collaboration has been wonderful! I have met so many people willing to help! Existential Paine and Kathy really saved me! Think about how we could save so many other teachers from the isolated boxes we call classrooms. We can bring people in and talk professionally. My goal for my house is focus on k-8 curriculum connections. High school folks seem to “get SL” k-8 might need more concrete examples of what is possible. Just an observation, I am still a baby, one month old (today)and who am I to become the expert!
I better go make a Google Alert for my aviator, a birthday gift to me!
Come check SL out! My in-world name is Meg Writer!

SL vs. RL

WOW,
I have spent some time the last week or so exploring Second Life, WOW! If you have not checked it out, you need to. I am hoping to get the last house on Eduisland tomorrow. It is probably blocked at school, and you need to download a small piece of software on your machine, so try it at home and let me know what you think. My online name is Meg Writer, look for me and I will teleport you to the island.
By the way RL stands for real life and it can really take that over!!

Windows Vista

I know two posts in one day is more than you have come to expect, but I am setting up my new laptop with Windows Vista, and at the moment I really like the look and feel of it. I have not yet opened Office that I have read is very different. It will take some getting used to, but so far I like the look and feel!
Meg

Blogging Excuses Continue!

My excuses continue! I was asked last night what am I going to do with all my free time when my School Board term is over, and I told them I was going to try and keep up with my blog! Love Margaret Johnson's comment about my first post in a loooooong time!
I have created a GooglePage with a gadget to help me with the countdown. http://megormi.googlepages.com/schoolboard

I look forward to joining the many dedicated bloggers!!
Meg

METC 2007!

OK, OK, I know, I am a BAD, yes, BAD blogger! Excuses, I have many!
1. Young kids
2. I am a School Board President, stop laughing it is HUGE work!!
3. I surprised my boys this Fall with a new puppy, LOVE her "Napa Chardonnay" My Golden Retriever is amazing!
4. Writing two books at the same time.
5. Traveling and speaking.
6. Life. I (LOL) when David Warlick linked to my blog that needs a facelift, sorry, go to my website for content!! More soon! www.techteachers.com

Teddy Bear Blog from Brenda

Hi Meg!Thanks for your great session at the ECOO conference, I really enjoyed it!Here's an example of changing times in education. In the past I've done the global project from iEARN.org called the Teddy Bear Project with my primary students using email. This year, I tried to make it more collaborative and visual...a place to tell our story and reflect on it over the year. We spent until January posting with our friends from Australia and now continue to write about the travels of our koala bear.Check it out at:www.mrssherry.blogspot.comI presented it at the ECOO and primary teachers seemed to really like the idea!

MAME Communication

Hello all!
Just a note, if you send me comment on the blog I can't email you back because the link is from anonymous blogger, not your email. So if you send me a post try and send me your email also!
Thanks!
meg

Thanks for all the Comments from MAME!

Thanks everyone for your comments!
I have enjoyed a rainy day by the fire really diving into the world of publishing! We should have vblogged our time together, then they could have have been edited into podcasts and small vblogs on each of those topics. We could have vblogged Judy with her simple, yet fabulous presentation, thanks again!

Danny's report is now in cyberspace! Margy wanted to use it for a presentation on Tuesday, now you all can use it. There are three clips waiting for you to use. Keep me posted if you use them. Here is the link to the videos

Thanks for a great session!
meg

MAME Spring Conference

Good morning!
We will use this blog today as our question board. Please leave questions and if we don't get to them today, I will answer them on the new MAME Blog!

Connectivism Blog

Connectivism Blog: "I think this is the wrong question. People don’t want to visit your content. They want to pull your content into their sites, programs, or applications. This is a profound change, largely not understood by educators. We are still fixated on the notion of learning content, and we think we are making great concessions when we give learners control over content (and start to see them as co-creators). That misses the essence of the change: learners want control of their space. They want to create the ecology in which they function and learn. Today, it’s about pulling content from numerous sites and allowing the individual to repurpose it in the format they prefer (allowing them to create/recognize patterns). Much like the music industry had to learn that people don’t want to pay for a whole album when all they want is one song, content providers (education, museums, and libraries) need to see the end user doesn’t want the entire experience – they want only the pieces they want. We need to stop thinking that learners will come to us for learning content – our learning content should come to them in their environment."

Blogging Before Breakfast

Hello Michigan Mame conference!
I am wrapping up my breakout session for the morning and I have found some wonderful resources for you to explore. Even if you can't make the session the links will be with my other digital handouts on my site at http://www.techteachers.com/conferences/links.htm

Send me a comment about your thoughts after the session!
meg

The Shifted Librarian Does it Again

Jenny's blog was the first one I started reading, it it remains my favorite. Jenny's blog is filled with ways public libraries can better serve the changing patrons. Her message is also so appropriate for schools. Today as I was reading Jenny's blog as I prepared for the Michigan MAME conference, she taught me something new! I am sure it has been there all along, but today I clicked on Jenny's Blogroll and I can now see all the feeds Jenny subscribes to. What a great way to get started using RSS feeds and connecting to new blogs with the direction from an expert.
There are many blogs out there that I have no interest in reading, but Jenny is a great filter of information for me. As someone said in a session last week, a blog can be thought of as the Cliff Notes from various sources. Check out what Jenny is reading and writing about!

Everything Bad is Good For You

I just completed this page turner, and wow is what I have to say. This book is a must read written by Steven Johnson. I am now rereading and focusing on how these ideas apply to change in education. This information on blogging caught me eye.

“more than eight million Americans report they have a weblog or online diary. The wonderful blog-tracking service Technorati reports that roughly 275,000 blog entries are published in the average day – a tiny fraction of them published by professional writers.” Page 119

“ Ater only two years of media hype, the number of active bloggers in the United States alone has reached the size of prime time network television” Page 119

“There’s plenty of arm chair journalism out there, of course, but the great bulk of personal publishing is just that, personal: the online diary is the dominant discourse mode in the blogoshere.” Page 119

“There is no denying the content of your average online diary can be juvenile. These diaries, in fact, were created by juveniles. But thirty years ago those juveniles weren’t writing novels or composing sonnets in there spare time; the were watching Laverne and Shirley. Better to have minds actively composing the soap operas of their lives than zoning out in front of someone else’s.” page 120

Now on to gaming!