Technology

I really liked this part of the assignment.  As I have already blogged, I love to use technology.  While working as the computer lab technician, it was my responsibility to get the teachers and students using technology.  I enjoyed the challenge of incorporating technology into the daily activities of teachers and students. 

For this experience, I have tried a lot of new technologies.  The https://bubbl.us/ is a site that I am going to be sure to share with teachers.  It was super user friendly.  What a wonderful resource! 

PowerPoint is software that I have used many times.  I like to use it with students because it is fun for them to explore all that it can do.  I also think that allows them to create super presentations.  I tried some new things with my presentation that I have not done before.  I used the animations tab to "show" multiple pictures on one slide.  It was challenging for me to set the timings and get the pictures to flow like I wanted.  I am proud of how it turned out.  I could have maybe added music, but this seemed like it might prove some posting difficulties.  For school, I have created end of the year slide shows that have music added.  It is a nice touch and adds a little something special.

I setup a Delicious account.  I had never heard of or used Delicious.  It was simple to create and use.  I liked the ease with which I could create and organize my bookmarks.  I did encounter some performance issues after I created my account.  These problems were because of my security settings. 

Another great new tool that I tried was NoteStar.  I liked this one a lot.  As I mentioned earlier, I like to take notes and keep them organized.  This program was somewhat difficult to set up, but well worth the work.  I created a teacher account, then a class and project.  I also created a student account to view the assigned project.  I was then able to use the notecards to record information.  It was wonderful for recording source information too.

As a side-note…I also tried Awesome Highlighter.  I was not successful in getting it to work.  I just did not understand what I needed to do.  I quickly became frustrated and moved onto something else.  I suppose in this regard, I faced it much like one of my students would have.  In today's world of technology, it is far too easy to give up and move on to try another technology.  I will definitely keep this in mind when I work with students.  I want them to learn patience and not give up when things get tough.