Summary - Learning Thing 1 -23

Wow! This class was an adventure, I learned some new things and got to become more familiar with some oldies. There are so many tools that I can take away from this program and use in both the classroom and in my personal life, like I have said before the possibilities are endless. I know some were disappointed that Web 2.0 was not an application/program that you could use with your students, but a multitude and compilation of a toolbox of some really stuff, I on the other hand am a 100 percent tech geek, and was excited to dive into all the technological stuff, I stayed up till 1:00 some nights, just playing around, learning about the different components of this "program". Who know that when you were playing on the computer you were "improving your skills". Really that is so true, most of my computer knowledge is self taught, when you have to learn how to do something, you just do! Yes, there were a few things that took time to figure out, but once I had it figured out it was smooth sailing from that point on. I love, love, love the image generators, I also really enjoyed making the animoto video clips, that is something that I really want to figure out how to use in my class at some point. Social networking is something that I was involved in before taking this class, but I was pleased to learn more about the concept. Technology is ever growing, and in the community of lifelong learners it is increasingly becoming something that we need to add to our repertoire of life long learning skills. I have found myself using the Google Reader a lot more than I though I would, I check it everyday and am thinking about subscribing to more blogs (suggestions would be great!). I was suprised at how easily the majority of the stuff was easy for me to complete--- guess thats what I get for being a tech geek :0.
This is going to sound crazy, but it took so long for me to start the classm becuase I didn't know which link to click on to get the directions. I signed up for the social network site, before I had instructions to do so or before I created my blog. I did not realize that the "23 Things" link to the site was the instructions for the course, I thought it was a link to another blog. Luckily I had a friend enrolled in the class and she told me where I could find the directions. Once I got started, though, I did not encounter any real problems. It would have been nice to have more direction to where the directions were located.
I would 110% particpate in another discovery class, it is the most intriguing staff development, and I have taken more away from this than I do most classes.
I plan on sharing and showing some of what I have learned to my fellow teachers, and coming up with projects we can do to utilize these tools, because like us, the students need to be exposed to them, afterall, they will be more prominent when they are adults than they are now.
I plan on keeping up with updates of happenings on the Web 2.0 through the use of Google Reader and blogging ...if anyone knows of any could blogs about 2.0 -- please share!
Enjoy exploring!