Thing 7 All Things Google

iGoogle has so much to offer! I already use the reader, which is a great time saver, and I had an iGoogle page, but never used it. It was just one of those things where you have so much access to technology tools that you must choose which ones save you time and which ones cost you time in the long run. The home page cost me time, but the reader saves it!

Google docs is also a very cool way to share documents and to edit them as a group. A former group of us used it to add to bibliographies we created each month for a special library event, and we also used it for other special events where we all needed to contribute-- sort of like a private wiki!

Picasa is a wonderful tool that I have used for may years, but I use it for my private pictures. It does a great job of organizing pictures, but the drawback is that it pulls every image you have saved and tries to store it for you. This can be more annoying than helpful at times.

Google scholar is a wonderful search engine for scholarly pursuits. These types of documents are very difficult to find on the www without subscription databases or specialized search engines. Now that I am no longer in school and have less access to professional databases, I will need Google Scholar even more!

As I searched through the additional offerings of Google, I ran across Google Chrome-- which I do NOT have loaded on may machines because of data mining. I did a little more research on it and since some things have changed in the Google policy, it is a little less invasive, but I still don't trust it. I don't mind waiting a few extra milliseconds for my data in order to not have Google record my keystrokes!

I used Google docs to make a spreadsheet to record teacher book requests from the library. Since I will be in two libraries this year, having a spreadsheet available for all the teachers to access that comes to me is a great way for me to keep track of their requests. I also used the form maker to make a form that the teachers fill in. As they fill it in, it exports the info to my spread sheet. Very cool!

Classes could use Google docs to report their research, to create documnets basedon research for jig-sawing, or for posing work they need to acccess at home if they have Internet access. Teachers and grade level teams could use it for planning--in fact, whole grade levels could use it for planning. The calendar could be used much like Outlook calendar--it has the same features and is more easily expandable because each user can use it without having to be in the same system (like you have to be in Outlook!)

Thing 6 Mashups

Maashups are a lot of fun and I could spend hours making fun things for the library! The mashup I chose for Thing #6 was the trading card, since the blog post mentionned it as a favorite.

The cards could be used for research assessment, class games, signage...the possibilities are endless!

("Blanket Baby" photo by jenn jenn on Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/cheesepicklescheese/2129489541/)

I also played around with Motivator, Hockneyizer, Bead Art, and Captioner. With the right lesson plan, these tools could be used to help studetns create work that will assess their learning. In addition, they can just be fun use of computer applications and getting to know the new technology that drives business and fuels leisure time pursuits.

Thing 5 Flickr

Flickr is a great site for finding images that I can use in my work. I like the labeling system through Creative Commons that many people use. Searching for the pictures by going through the Creative Commons filters first seems like your best bet for finding an image you can legally use. This can be a time consuming process, since there are three categories that you are allowed to use if you are doing something like we are doing in this Thing 5--not altering or using for commercial use; so to find a picture you have to choose one of the filtered groups and start looking. However, I think most people just put their search term in the box and do not know (or do not care) about copyright issues.

Then again, if photographers were worried about people using their work without following copyright rules, I guess they would not post to Flickr.

Hmmmm.... well, I do know the rules and I am glad to be able to use a site like Flickr. I will post the photo I chose (including the attribute) by screen-shotting the large version that included the photographers name and copyright info.