Thing #23 Wrap-Up

My favorite 'thing' was creating blogs. I created a blog for my (large) family in order to practice over this summer and it has been a huge hit. I have several 20-ish nieces and nephews whom I have impressed (makes this old aunt feel good!). It has helped us all communicate in a way that is efficient, easy, and fast and everyone loves it. I would like to think I could create the same communication medium at my campus this year. I also loved the Library Thing - creating my own bookshelf and lists of books I've read. I know several students and teachers will love learning about that. I hope I continue to make the time to follow up on what I've started with that. I guess my least favorite are the wikis. I still find them cumbersome to use and 'boring'.
You all did a wonderful job of making each item easy to understand! I think my 'challenge' is just finding the time to use them and getting around the 'blocks' set by our district. Another challenge I have is learning to 'think' like a younger person. My generation is used to reading text and analyzing information. This new generation seems more 'if I can't read it in 1 minute, I won't'. They also seem to be more confident about how much their opinion matters. I had a long discussion with some younger students and even though I can't really see a need to use Facebook daily, they use it to keep connected with each other. I don't feel that need as much as they do and I believe that's a generational thing.
What will I use this year in my school library? My foremost goal will be having the students use our FlipCamera to make 'mineos' of books they've read. I would also like to use the GoogleDocs to create a library and computer lab schedule online. That will be an ambitious task - to get all teachers to use that regularly.
I really learned a lot from North Texas 23 and want to thank all the staff that put this together. I can't believe this was done for all of us for FREE. I certainly hope I can continue to log on to all these 'things' for refresher courses throughout the year! Thank you, thank you, thank you all.