Captains log star date 06-22-11. I come in peace. Wow, I have fully exhausted my TV and Movie Clichés in the first two lines of this blog...it should be a quick one. I titled this blog post research time because truly, about three weeks into what I had hoped to be my research period, I was able to begin working. Needless to say I was excited. My first order of business was to re-establish the community that I had began building before the big bump in the road. So I quickly went to HootSuite (an excellent way to pre plan, schedule, translate, and manage your Twitter feeds. You can also access and work with many other social media sites making it a great central hub for all of your social networking), and began writing my first tweet as a free man!! I felt like Andy Dufresne from Shawshank Redemption (sorry I couldn't help myself). My first tweet was meant to get people back into the game so I tweeted, "the first ten people to retweet the five types of energy, (which was what we were studying at the time) get a prize tomorrow in class. This simple yet effective way of creating a community on Twitter (that I can not take credit for...thanks Matthew Soeth) brought back most of the 42 followers immediately. The first ten students that retweeted were given a prize in class, and more importantly were publicly praised for their speedy response. I was back!
In the coming blogs I will provide the nitty gritty of my research including my data, which provides bonafide evidence of the positive effects of social media in my 8th grade science class. Please stay tuned, and subscribe to my blog. The one lonely subscriber needs friends:)
I want to share this press release put out by Microsoft which lists me and my project as one of 72 educators in the United States selected to participate in the IEF forum in Seattle in late July. Wish me luck! As always, thanks for reading.
Cool tech thing:
Flipboard is a great "central location" for lack of better words. It allows you place your social media, news, magazines, photography, and many other cool sites all in one app. I love it and I think you will as well.
Have you ever had to explain to your Grandma how to move about the computer? If so, you are probably going to love showmewhatswrong.com it allows you to have your grandma show what she is doing on her computer, then sends you a private URL with a video screenshot to diagnose what she is doing wrong.
Doceri is absolutely amazing!! It is free for educators and you can pay for an upgraded version. This will allow your iPad to become a remote for your desktop. It allows you to write with your finger over your iPad, which is now the desktop as well. You can manipulate everything on your desktop from across the room on your iPad. This app will render the thousand dollar promethean or smart board a waste of money!!
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