Learning Blog

6th Day TTL 4 - Saturday

2006-06-17T14:08:00.000-07:00

Reviewed iPhoto and got lots of great information. This will be fun to share with the staff back at Ursa Major. I especially like to get a better handle on naviagating through preferences and picking a better editing tool. This will be so good with my photos that I will take this summer. I'm hoping to take pictures at a conference I'm going to so I can bring them back to the staff at U. Major.

I iMovies have been great so far. I have a lot of great ideas on how I can tweak my iMovie.

I want to thank the Tech Team and all of the other students for a great learning experience! Have a wonderful summer.

5th TTL 4 - Friday

2006-06-17T13:55:00.000-07:00

We learned about Atomic Learning. I had heard about that resource earlier, but did not use it. Getting in there and checking out the teaching videos was helpful and will be a great resource this school year.

Walked through getting tunes from iTunes. :) Everybody has been talking about iTunes and I did not have a clue on how to get it and then use it! I have a clue now!

Worked on the ASD Site Builder. I want to use this more next year. My one fear is that time will get away from me and I will not keep it up to date. I will also want it make it meaningful for visitors and students. This will be a challenge for me.

I enjoyed trying out PFD. I always thought it was for someone else. Hopefully, I remember what I need to so I can get through the glitches later when I need to use it!

4th Day of TTL 4

2006-06-17T13:20:00.000-07:00

This was my first day for working on a "Daily." I thopught this was a great opportunity to practice pulling what we have been learning together. I was so thankful that we were working in teams. My colleagues have taught me a lot!

I started out in elements to make my certificate and found it too frustrating! Moved to Powerpoint where I was much more successful.

Looking at the resources on the TTL site was helpful. Got started on our unit. Looking forward to finding more resources. I don't think summer will be long enough!

3rd Day at TTL4 (Wednesday)

2006-06-14T18:34:00.000-07:00

Today started out terrific! Ya Hoo! Two tickets to Hawaii with no blackout dates! What a blessing!

I found Jason Ohler's presentation funny. Humor always enhances the learning process. I especially liked the comment of turning concerns into goals. I found that I often am concerned about how I will be able to help all of my students, how will I know they are gaining the skills they need, and how and what will I evaluate student's work. It is also time consuming to assess their projects and give prompt feedback. Feedback is important for student learning.

Hooking up the wires was helpful. The time spent on actually hooking up the wires and then manipulating the tools was helpful.

When we were reviewing the ASD Blackboard I learned about setting up Tabs on Safari. I also learned about condensing responses to responses (threads) on the blackboard.

Doing the "Daily" was fun, but hectic due to us running out of time. Definitely learning by doing! Tomorrow will be another action packed day!

Day 2 - Essential questions and Story Boards

2006-06-13T16:26:00.000-07:00

Today I learned more about Blogging! Last week I never dreamed of blogging and now I'm on my second Blog. I would like to learn more about Blogging so I could set up a "Blog" for my students. A learning blog would be helpful. Students could read what others wrote about concerning their learning.

This morning we went over iMovie which was a lot of fun and informational. I practiced bringing in pictures, sound, and text. I also worked with grabbing the volume and fading sound out and in for my iMovie. We reviewed "bytes" of information and learned that there were now terabytes of information. A terabyte is equal to 1000 gega bytes. A DVD holds about 4.5 GB of information so I need to remember that when I try to copy media to CDs or DVDs. :)

Workiing with the digital camera was frustrating for me. I still use my 35mm regular camera. I also do not have an eye for the unusual for a good picture.

Looking forward to seeing the feedback on my essential questions. This unit is somewhat looming over me. I have to work on it THIS SUMMER!!! I also have to fix my problem at home about getting connected (reconnected) to the internet. It seems that keeping up with technology can be a headache too; especially for those who are easily technology challenged.

I thought Dr. Ohler's presentation was helpful and interesting. I got ideas that I can give my students for becoming better writers. I especially found two ideas helpful. first one bieng that the main character would make a transformation and then that an event brings readers into a story. Taking a simple event and thinking about a problem can make the story.

Lots of learning today! I appreciate the support from colleagues and instructors. Looking forward to tomorrow.

Day 1 - Monday, June 12th

2006-06-12T16:53:00.000-07:00

I enjoyed the "get to know you" excercise. I was thinking I could do something like that with my new students this fall. At the "Back to School Picnic" I could get three interesting facts about my students or on the first day of school and then we could do the activity.

Today we read the article "Technology to Dig for Meaning" which talked about teaching for understanding. I did not know or think of "Teaching for Understanding as a pedagogical framework!

I was feeling overwhelmed when we were starting our unit. Hopefully we have time to get a start on that!

I enjoyed getting all of the "tools" but felt at a loss with some of the wires.

Looking forward to tomorrow.