Booked In : Sourcing and Creating E-Content

WOW! It is amazing how the internet has opened up opportunities for people to be able to share their creativity and knowledge. The interactive nature of digital resources has certainly added a new dimension to reading and learning. Like previous weeks, this week provided an opportunity to further explore some great resources. I had heard of flipsnack and scribd, but had not visited the sites before. I found this blog very useful - 31 of my favourite Digital Storytelling Sites. The students at school love to use Storybird. I loved the simplicity of PicLits. Dom animate was also fun to play with. I found Toon Doon to be a useful tool for creating cartoons and have included a strip I had  created for an assignment. Most of these sites are fairly easy to navigate. There are so many wonderful tools/resources out there to use (although it gets a little frustrating at times that you have to sign up to them to explore their benefits).

Week Nine - Read Later : Condensing Resources, Managing Time

I like the idea of being able to catch and condense resources and information from the internet. I know some days I seem to sift through "reams" of information, but never seem to get anywhere. I did not find this week's activity very successful. I visited each site and tried to explore some in more detail, but due to time constraints, university assignments and fighting the flu, I struggled to get my head around setting them up properly. This will be worthy of a revisit to fine tune my catching and condensing. 

Re-search : Top Search Results Don’t End With “oogle”

There are so many options to search on the internet and it is difficult to believe how little cross over there is at times. I thought Twurdy was a great search engine. I liked how it provided information about ease of reading and suitable ages.I also love Wolfram Alpha - I have used this quite a bit at home with my children, particularly for Maths and Science. I hadn't visited many of the search engines that you mentioned, but have now and will again. Blekko was one I hadn't heard of and I discovered that Podscope no longer exists. Some of the other search engines I like to use are search-cube, yometa, quadoople, boolify,  and spezify. I try to introduce my students to a variety of search engines, but it is hard to break their habit (and their teachers) of "googling".

Week Seven - Picture Pop : The Image Culture

WOW! I had fun exploring and sharing with family and friends this week. Again I visited every site. Loved tag galaxy - shared this with my husband who then shared it with colleagues at his school. Ffffound was interesting although it is not a site I would probably use often. The editing sites were great. I usually don't spend time "playing" with images - my children love doing this and have shown me some of their creations - but after this I think it is a tool I will utilise more frequently, especially Pixlr and  BeFunky.
Here are some of my creations :

Week Six - Video Killed The Radio Star : Sourcing Audio Visual Content

Wow! There is so much "great stuff" available to use and some very talented people willing to share. I went to each of the sites suggested. I have always loved what TED has offered, finding them very entertaining as well as informative and thought provoking. I love this video looking at the future possibilities of books - A next-generation digital book It is great to see the addition of TED ED. This was the first time I had visited Youtube EDU. I found some great videos that I could use in the classroom. I like this one on extreme alliteration Extreme Alliteration I will certainly be accessing these sites again to inspire and educate my students. Although the Khan Academy had some worthwhile material, I found the tutorials were a little monotonous and very American-based. 

Week Five - Presently Surprised : A Standing Ovation

My husband introduced me to Prezi a couple of years ago and I was very impressed by the product. Although I never created any presentations myself, I have seen several. Sometimes it takes a task, like this, to give you the incentive to investigate further and take the plunge.  I loved the Romeo and Juliet presentation that I discovered while exploring. I created a very basic presentation  about the book Nanberry. There is a variety of tools to use and I am hoping to utilise these to create a "great" presentation for work. I also played around with SlideRocket and found their tutorials helpful. I decided to import an existing powerpoint that I had. I then edited some of the slides.Here is the link to the presentation. http://portal.sliderocket.com/BXUIW/TheFourCandles
 

Week Four - Save Me : The Superheroes of Online Organisation

What I love most about these online organisation tools is that they are available wherever you go, but I also like the fact that you can share with others and vice versa. I registered with Diigo and saved a few websites that I had discovered from other users and began experimenting with private and public settings. I took the opportunity to explore another similiar site, Delicious. I had heard about both these sites before, but had never taken the time to explore them in depth. I briefly looked at Springpad, Instapaper and Float and intend to investigate them further.

Week 3 - Social Awareness

I struggle with this aspect of the digital world. I joined Twitter to learn more about it, but am reluctant to tweet and have no desire to follow anyone. I find the public nature of this type of social networking awkward and overwhelming. Pinterest is more appealing to me. I found it much easier and less threatening to participate in. I enjoy the visual aspect of this site.The Pin It Bookmark makes it quick and easy to build your board.

Week 2 - The Suite Life

Google has so many useful tools, unfortunately some no longer exist like wonder wheel and study search. Google docs is a great tool for working collaboratively. Our group of teacher librarians have used this occasionally to collaborate because we are isolated by distance. It is an easy tool to use, however I had difficulty trying to share my document, so am using the option of providing the link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13QEAUGVW7FoqfUE0o0N40AcPkLriyKOdSvVh20FGL50/edit.

I was unaware of Google Reader until this week. I liked how you can set up folders for your sites. I enjoyed exploring the recommended sites and subscribed to a few. It provided me with an opportunity to locate websites I may not have found otherwise. I also like viewing what is new.

I found these products reasonably easy to navigate and believe they are worthwhile sharing in my workplace with staff and students. It is even better that they are free. However, there are many similar products on the market and it is important to explore a variety of products to find the one that best suits your needs.

Week 1 - In the beginning ......

My journey using Web tools has been overwhelming at times. There are so many wonderful tools out there that sometimes I just don't know where to start or how to apply them. During studies and professional development I have been exposed to a wide variety of Web applications. I am constantly amazed at what people can create with the tools.I have written blogs for assignments but it is not a medium I am comfortable with. I have read blogs, mainly for professional reasons. These blogs have usually been referred by colleagues. I have also had the opportunity to explore wikis. Working collaboratively has many benefits and wikis can enable people to collaborate on a project from any location.