Ms. Martino

WOW!  That’s all I have to say Jen!  This was by far the most interesting professional development class I’ve ever taken.  I was not bored for a second and would like to continue learning about Web 2.0.  I know what you’re going to say, you’re going to encourage me to take Web 2.0 for Educators II.   Maybe I will take it.  Now that I’m starting to catch on to the mechanics of blogging and Web 2.0, I would like to learn more about how to incorporate this into my teaching.  Our building is so behing on technology and integrating it in the classrooms, that I would really like to start doing so if possible.  Of course there is always the challenge of finding time to fit it into the exisiting curriculum with all of the state demands.   But that’s part of the job. 

 This was a very interesting and useful class – definitely lots to add to my summer project list!  I would love to play around with it all but it will just have to wait until the summer.  Thanks for making this experience so great!  Hope everyone else in the class enjoyed it as much as I did. 

I kind of did things backwards.  The flickr viceoclip was taking too long to load here at home on my computer, so I went ahead and played around with the site while it was loading.  Then I watched the video when I was done to see if there was anything else that I could do.  So far, I just have some pictures of me and Danny through the years that we’ve been together.  I am familiar with a lot of the features such as tagging and grouping into sets because I have something like this set up on Facebook.  The difference I see is only facebook members can view my Facebook photos otherwise, I have to send you a link to one of my albums: Karen & Danny Album. 

I’m one of the few that still uses a film camera and not a digital camera.  When I get comfortable with something, it’s hard for me to change.  I would like to switch over to all digital because then I could share my pictures with everyone.  I think its more a matter of not having time at this point than not wanting to accept change.  I’m glad I know about Flickr now though, because it would be more work if I switched to a photo sharing program and then later on found a better one and had to switch again.  The only feature I don’t like about it is that you have to have a Yahoo account.  I just switched from Yahoo mail to Gmail and I was about to completely delete my Yahoo accounts until I saw it was necessary to have Flickr.  I just can’t stand the amount of spam that I get with Yahoo.  I can’t wait to go check out everyone else’s photos, I love looking at people’s pictures.  Hope you enjoy mine – more to follow in the future.  This will be a summer project for me!

I am definitely guilty of the “my head is going to explode” look that Jen refers to in her blog about teaching teachers.  Now I know how my students feel when I’m rambling on about something that comes so easily to me and they are just seeing it for the first time.  Now that I’m starting to catch on to the mechanics of blogging, I’m very eager to learn how I can use this in my classroom and with my students.

As I learn how to blog, and I read all of these professionals and what they have blogged, I wonder who is going to care to read what I blog about and do I really have anything important to say that will educate these professionals.  After reading Jen’s posts on our Web 2.0 Educators  blog, I realized that this is a normal beginners feeling and that people will read my blogs, and will be interested in them.  I have no idea how I will use my blog yet or what I will blog about, but I’m sure that’s what the upcoming sessions of our class will be about.

I walked into this class thinking I was pretty computer literate.  I thought I was somewhat with the times and quick with this sort of stuff.  Then Jen blew me away with a whole world that I knew absolutely NOTHING about!  I love computers and figuring things out as I explore them so thank you Jen for my new project!!  There is so much for me to learn about blogging.

The video clip “Did you Know?” really opened my eyes to globalization and where we stand in comparison to the rest of the world.  It’s kind of scary.  I almost feel as if time is taking off without us and its so hard to catch up.  We’re so advanced, yet other countries are so far ahead of us!  I’m afraid that I won’t keep up with the fast pace shifting that’s occuring and won’t be as technology savvy as I’d like to think I am now.

The second video clip “Web 2.0 in  under 5 minutes” I have to be honest, was overwhelming!  I have watched it twice already and feel I definitely need to watch it again.  As I learn more, I will pick up on more from the video.  I’m still getting used to using our Web Educators blog as well as my own blog.  I am looking forward to really getting into this and exploring what’s out there!