Thing # 7: Flickr

I chose option two for this posting. I do not like sharing my photos via any online application. I facebook account, but even then, those pictures are older ones and I haven't put any effort to continue to update them. For this activity I chose to take pictures of inanimate objects and not people. Sometimes it is just easier to do.  

 

This first picture is my attempt at being creative. I called it Perspectives of life through one window. This picture represents how one scenario can be viewed so differently by people from different walks of life.  The second picture is of some zombie sports figures we have at the house. I think they are hilarious. I am the Chicago Bears zombie cheerleader. DA BEARS!!!! The other two are my husband's favorite New York teams. The last picture is a welcome home sign my son made about three years ago. My husband was  coming home from a two year tour overseas. My son was in the third grade and he stayed up late making this sign to surprise him. We loved it so much we kept it up on the wall in our livingroom. It is a big part of our lives.

 

As far as, using Flickr for my future classroom, I think I could use it for a project with my seventh grade Spanish students. We could use it to explore pictures from Spanish speaking countries and their cultures. I could have them interpret what the picture is trying to convey about their traditions, history, and the like. Personally, I do not like having my personal pictures on a photo-sharing site, even though I can select a privacy option. I am not comfortable with it.

 

 

Thing #6: Discovering Web 2.0 Tools I am.

After what seemed like an endless search on the Go2Web2.0 site, I finally found a website which appealed to me and would benefit my future students.  It is called Forvo, the pronunciation dictionary. It can be found by clicking on this link http://www.forvo.com/. 

I immediately became excited when I opened Forvo. It allows you to select how to pronounce words from over ninety different languages. Plus, you can participate in the site by submitting a request for a word to be pronounced, pronouncing a requested word, or becoming an editor. To do pronounce a word for the site, you must register. How awesome is that for a Spanish teacher, or any foreign language teacher?!! 

This is a great resource for foreign language students to listen to words in the target language and practice them for themselves. I think this is a great application to use in a library, classroom, and home setting. On Forvo, there is the capability for registered users to create their own list of favorite pronounced words. I think could create lists for several categories of words and have students log in somehow and pronounce a certain number of words each and also have them add a few words of their own in a few categories. By doing this, it will help students practice speaking orally and hopefully give them more confidence.

Thing #5: Web 2.0 and The Future

The topics at hand are Web 2.0 and School 2.0 and how they can take their place in our future or, for those already in the classroom, your current classrooms. To me, Web 2.0 is an endless technology toolbox that is used by anyone who has access to internet service and a PC/ Mac, tablet, and the like to help make their lives and jobs easier and more creative. School 2.0 comes about when Web 2.0 applications are integrated in schools and into our classrooms.  

Upon viewing many of the resources for this post, I had mixed feelings. I felt so amazed and overwhelmed by all of the applications and their possibilities in the classroom. (Bear with me. I am not tech savvy.) For a moment, I reverted to an "old school" mentality. I asked myself, "Why do we need to use all of this new stuff when there was nothing wrong from teaching from the textbook?" Not to worry I quickly brought myself back to reality after a quick review of my high school days and of my experience as an Alternative Licensure teacher. For a long time, all teachers had were textbooks of varying qualities, worksheets, library resources (like encyclopedias), and much later on a computer or two without internet service. Classroom instruction was very limiting and confined to a singular place.

School 2.0 brings the world and its applications to the classroom or more importantly, to the students. As a future Spanish teacher, it will be possible to use mobile voice to text apps to have students record themselves practice speaking in Spanish and  connect with students in Spanish speaking countries via a blog. These activities will facilitate the learning of a second language in ways that were never thought possible twenty or thirty years ago.

I guess the fear is that all of this technology in the classroom will create an impersonal atmosphere. What are your thoughts?   

By the way, did anyone else have trouble opening or viewing any of the resources for Thing #5?
  

Thing # 4: To Comment or Not to Comment.....

For Thing # 4, the following was required of us:

• explain why commenting helps create a sense of community and interaction

I must say that prior to this class, I thought that blogs were impersonal. Remember, I am new to this game of blogging. But, from what I can tell so far, commenting on blogs does connect you to others with a similar interest and there is potential for a support network to blossom from it. By commenting on blogs you can meet people from all across the country and maybe the world.

• discuss two other points from the readings about commenting that you found important

I think asking a question when posting on a blog is a good practice. Yes, it can draw attention to your post. Is that all I want? No, I want to know what others think and see how I can open myself to new ideas. I am all for new ideas to solve problems. The other important point regarding commenting on blogs had to do with sarcastic remarks. The Cool Cat Teacher Blog said not to use sarcasm when posting on blogs. I agree with The Cool Cat Teacher Blog despite the fact that I like making sarcastic remarks to make things funny. That is just me. But, blogging and sarcasm will not work well together because there is just too much that can be misinterpreted from it and cause negative tension. Any thoughts on this?

• give the names of the seven blogs (5 from our group + 2 others of your choice) you selected to read and comment on and tell why you selected them

Here are the blogs I chose to follow and why.
     Emily Ellison. After reading her posting for Thing #1, I found that we have so many things in common that I had to choose her as one of my five. In my comment to her I gave her some examples on our similar experiences and mentioned that I was hoping to learn how to make blogging a useful learning tool in my classroom. 
     Matthew Nixon. Since we have so few males in the class, I thought it would be a good idea to get a male's perspective on how to "begin with the end in mind" and how he deals with problems versus challenges.
     Ester Yum. I chose to follow Ester's blog because her strength is my greatest weakness. I admired the way she went back to her birth country to teach English for a year. I commented how I thought she did something my Hispanic family would have been totally against, which was great. 
     Melissa Suss. I chose to follow Melissa's blog mainly because I think her playful strength is bound to rub off on me.  On her post I gave her an idea how she can incorporate blogging for her future PE classes.
    Theresa Hines. Overall, I thought her blog had a lot of personality and her strength is admirable. Theresa mentioned in her blog that she has come up with different strategies which have helped her be a lifelong learner. I asked her to reveal one of her strategies due to my curiosity.

http://creativelanguageclass.wordpress.com/2014/01/21/is-your-lesson-perfect/
     The above link is to a blog titled, the creative language class. It is a blog for foreign language teachers that covers a variety of topics like, using stations, tech applications, class routines, teacher problems, and much more. I commented on a topic called Is your lesson perfect? I mentioned how great it was to hear of ways veteran teacher handle unexpected situations.
http://teachinglearningspanish.blogspot.com/
     The seventh and last blog I commented on is called teaching learning Spanish. One of the things that drew me to this blog was that it has been active since 2008. Its longevity proves that is has merit to me. It offers a lot of creative yet affordable ways to teach Spanish. I commented about an application that can be used on I-pods where Spanish Language learners can listen to news casts that are spoken slowly. I commented on how helpful this will be since native Spanish speakers tend to speak very rapidly while the target language learner will have difficulty in keeping up.