Thing 47 ~ Evaluation

Overall, I had fun completing all these fancy things! I love learning, and I'm always excited by Web 2.0 applications! It seemed to go in phases for me though; I'm really glad we had an extra month to complete the things. The end of school is always hectic so the extension was appreciated. One bummer is that not many people commented on anything I had to say. That said, I didn't comment on many others, although I definitely read others. I think it's just a time thing for me. My main goal was to increase my knowledge and that happened so I'm happy with the program! Thanks to everyone who put time into this project. There is so much information, and it was presented in such an easy format! Thanks again!

Thing 46 ~ WebJunction Minnesota

I signed up for WebJunction earlier this year, but I haven't had much time to really look at the site. I really like all the links for promoting your media center to your teachers. I'll definitely spend some time there this summer as I look at ways of collaborating with teachers more and more. I love the idea of taking some classes too; I think it's great that they're free. I haven't talked to anyone who has taken them, so I'd like some input on what people think of the classes.

I also have used the Research Project Calculator and have it linked from my school website. I'm not sure how often students at my school are using it, but I showcase it during freshman orientation.

Overall, it's a valuable site with great links that I hope to use more in the future.

Thing 45 ~ Cloud Computing

I'm a huge fan of Google Docs! We use it daily in our school library media center to schedule classroom spaces and computer labs. In the beginning, there were definitely some problems setting up all of the accounts for the teachers, but once we figured out the bugs it's been great. I've had really great feedback from teachers and plan on using it again next year! To those interested in using it, be aware that there is a difference between an individual account and a team edition account. This is what gave us problems when setting things up. If you're aware of this before you begin, it should make things much easier.

Some of the advantages of using Google Docs for our scheduling:

• multiple people can view and edit at the same time
• revision history makes correcting mistakes a piece of cake
• people can edit any time or place
• you can upload documents
• automatically saves
• it's free

Some of the disadvantages:

• team edition can be confusing if the user already has a google docs account
• the email list feature didn't work properly so we had to copy and paste all the addresses

I also like all of the photography sites that keep a backup of all of your pics. I'd be devastated if I lost all of them and it's great to know they're backed up in several spots!

Thing 44 ~ The Economy

I really like some of these sites! They're easy to understand and think they'll be very useful to some of our teachers and students. The ones for balancing a budget and gas & cell phone prices are super too. I think some of our teachers who teach life skills would find these really useful for their classes.

Here's another site that our economics teacher recommended to me awhile ago. I think it's really great too!

The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

Thing 43 ~ Online TV & Video

I checked out both Hulu and Joost and think they're great. While much of the content is pop culture, there are some great videos available. For schools, the documentaries and National Geographic videos are wonderful! I love being able to download or embed them too. Teachers could post them on their webpages making it easy for students who missed class to complete any assignment that accompanied the video.

I really don't think online videos will change my viewing too much. It's a nice option to have, but with the use of DVR, I'm able to view what I want. I still prefer watching videos curled up on my couch with a big screen and surround sound! That's not to say you couldn't hook your computer up to your TV, but I guess I don't watch that much TV. But I feel at school, the options are wonderful and affordable!

This video Super Size Me is from Snag Films another cool video site that features documentaries. There are some fabulous videos available and you can embed and download them too!

Thing 42 ~ Music

I love all of the music available through the web. My favorites are Pandora and Last.fm. I haven't had problems with either of them, and I think they're super easy to use. I also tried out The Hype Machine and I love all of the different remixes that they have in one spot! I also liked that it gave a list of concerts in the area too, although I also get that service through iGoogle. I don't pay much attention to the blogs on the sites, but I do like that videos are linked for some songs as well. I also tried What's hot in Your Area, but it appears that the link is broken.

I don't really think that Internet radio will replace broadcast until technology in automobiles makes it affordable for the common man. I think of how many broadcast radio stations do so much for their communities and it will be interesting to see where it goes in the future. I'm sure they're already looking at how they will change and adjust their services in the future.

I also liked the 9 sites for music lyrics link. There are several teachers in our building who incorporate song lyrics into their assignments. The links will be great resources for students!

Thing 41 ~ Mash Up Your Life

I tried out Lifestream for about 2 weeks. While I think it's a great tool, it wasn't all that useful to me. None of my friends have accounts with it, and I already know what I publish to my various Web 2.0 accounts. I could see where this could be very useful if a lot of my friends and coworkers used it. However, I really still prefer iGoogle simply because so many of my Web 2.0 applications are already linked to it. That said, I enjoy learning about new sites and trying them out.