My Final "23 Things" Post

Well, I am at the end of my "23 Things" journey & am amazed at everything I have learned.  I knew about a few of the "things," but most of the "things" I had only heard about.  I was afraid to learn about a couple of them, because I was sure I would be too confused to figure it out.  It was at those times that I was so grateful we were doing this project together and that others were wokring on the same things I was, because I could go to one of my "23 Things" counterparts & they could help me...a huge thank you to Charlie Wiggins for helping me with RSS Feeds & to Nancy for helping me with EVERYTHING!  I even learned a few things that weren't on our list (my favorite extra is my Voki).

At times I felt overwhelmed, especially when I was having to write papers for grad school which I hadn't done in YEARS - it was then that I got a little behind.  Then, when I was having to send letters to every parent in the school about service hours & the All-School Retreat  - I unfortunately got a little more behind.  Then, when service was due & I had to send out more letters to parents of kids with deficiencies - I got even more behind (I won't even mention teaching or cheerleading).  I was afraid I might never get it all done.  Finally, I am now caught up (thanks for the extension!!!), and am in love with the things I have discovered.  Overall, it was worth the time spent & I am now much more confident in my web endeavors!

A huge THANKS to Nancy for bringing us this amazing opportunity & for being there to cheer us all on...and to Perry for providing us with some extra incentive.  The journey was well worth it!!

Week 9 - Things 21, 22

Podcasts - I found some pretty good podcasts at podcastalley.com.  They had quite a few podcasts that I believe could be quite useful.  Of course I searched for Catholic podcasts & here are a few that I found:  Saint of the Day, Daily Mass Readings, and Catholic Classes...all of which I could learn from daily!  I included the RSS Feeds from my finds on the right side of the page.

Ebooks - WOW!!!  I had no clue that you could download free books.  I went to worldebookfair.org & found some amazing books: my favorite being St. Augustine's Confessions.  I am in awe of my discovery!

Week 9 - Thing 20...21, 22, 23 to come

Believe me, I already LOVE YouTube. I use it class all the time. There are so many videos on it that I can use in my class. I used one during my most reason lesson on Abraham. It was a music video on the sacrifice of Isaac:

Wow!! I also just learned how to embed a video into my blog...woo-hoo!!! I also showed the video that Chuck sent the faculty & staff about Advent to my students. It was great! It seemed to help with trying to hand out the "angels" from the Angel Tree. Take a look:


As for podcasts, the site I tried to use was blocked by the school firewall, so I'll have to try again at home. So long for now!

Week 8 - Things 18 & 19

Zoho - First off, I loved that I didn't have to create a new account with a different password and whatnot. I got to sign in using my yahoo acocunt, which saves my memory from trying to remember something else. As for the actual program....the clouds opened & the angels sang as soon as I began using it!! It's like having Microsoft Office on the internet...and being able to save to the internet. No more flashdrives, or emailing things to myself or anything...SWEET :) Also, now being the avid blogger, you can also add to your blog from Zoho (not that I would...but I could).

As for LibraryThing, I added some books, but I am totally NOT a reader. I read what I have to for grad school and for my classes. As a result, I don't really see myself using this site at all. Regardless, I created an account and added the following books:

• Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
• The Lamb's Supper by Scott Hahn
• The Screwtape Letter by C.S. Lewis
• The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis
• Reasons to Believe: How to Understand, Explain, and Defend the Catholic Faith

Week 7 - Things 16 & 17

I love wikis. I learned about wikis when I went to Chuck's presentation at the "Library Petting Zoo." It was wonderful, because it's like a blog except that more than one person can edit it. I can totally see myself using this is class. I envision a lesson on saints, liturgical feasts, service sites...the possiblities are endless :)

Week 6 - Things 13, 14 & 15

I already kind of knew about the tagging thing through Myspace and Facebook, and use the tagging features often on those...and also the "de-tag" option whenever the picture is horrendous...which is often, hahaha.

Del.icio.us - I definitely didn't understand the importance of this website at first, but now I totally see the value of it. It's kind of like the ability to save your favorite websites on the internet, in order to access them from any computer. I see it's value, but I don't know if I would use it. If I know enough about the site I'd probably just google it rather than logging into Del.icio.us and then finding it. That being said I'll probably create a list of my favorites on the site - just in case :)

Technorati - This site seems to let people blog about things that are going on in the world, but I know for certain that I would never use this site. I am much more in to googling things that I want to know about.

For thing 15, the question, "What does Library 2.0 mean to me?" was presented. Well, I after I looked up what Library 2.0 meant, I found that at its heart is user-centered change. It seems like it is a valuable resource to me mainly because it is focused on customer feedback.

Week 5 - Things 10, 11, & 12

I absolutely LOVED playing around with the image generators!  I could play around with my pictures all day long.  Here are just few of my creations :)

As for the Web 2.0 awards sites, I investigated Thinkfree.  It seems pretty neat.  You can save your documents - anything from Word to PowerPoint or Excel - to the web & access them from anywhere!  Forget trying to keep up with your flashdrive or expecting your students to...just sign on to Thinkfree.