Is it the end or only the beginning....

I honestly loved so many of these exercises it's hard for me to narrow it down. I really enjoyed Flickr, Live Binders, Animoto, iGoogle, Picasa, and Image Chef & Mosaic Maker. I just loved creating the blog in general. I have never had one. I use the computer all the time but often never ventured out to find new resources. This class has made me realize I should definitely do that! I have learned so much fun and helpful information that I am really kind of sad it's over. I have been posting lots of these sites on my facebook page. I have been telling all my other art ed. classmates about them. I'm just so excited. I know this class has changed the way I was planning to teach art. I always thought it would be difficult to integrate technology into the art classroom if we didn't have a huge technology budget. Now I see that it is very possible to incorporate technology. I plan to have a blog about what is happening in my art classroom. I think students will enjoy posting things and parents will be able to see exactly what is going on with their students in the art room. I am happy to know that I can continue to follow the Learning 2.1 blog and continue my blog. I know this class has had a huge influence on me and my future teaching style. I feel so much better prepared to integrate technology. I am truly thankful that I had this class....and honestly that is not something I always feel at the end of a semester. Thank You for all the helpful information!

Thing 23

I didn't know about Creative Commons until this class. I do think that it is a great concept. I am an artist and I think it is very important to make sure the user always gives the artist or the author or the creator credit for their work. I would hope that once I am in my own classroom that I will always follow the rules and not use anyone else's work without giving them credit. I know there will be times that my students will need to use the internet to find images and I am happy to know that they can use sites like Flickr and use the photos in the creative commons section. I will also make it a point to teach my students about creative commons and to have respect for other people's work.

Thing 22

The titles of my binders are Art History, Art Games and Van Gogh. I think this is a great resource. I spent a huge amount of time just looking around the site at all the other art binders people had created. There was so much fun and informative stuff there! I think I would use this site for different reasons. One reason would be to find information for my classroom. I can find videos and drawing sites and art history sites and games. Once I found the sites that worked with my lesson I was teaching, I would save them into a binder that I could access in the classroom. If I have a binder like I described, if student finished their project early they could get on the computer and play a game that related to our lesson.

Van Gogh

Thing 21

Well here we go again...another awesome website that I just love! I recently went to London over Spring Break so I made a video of some of my London photos. I think I will use this site all the time now. It's just a great way to show photos in a quick fun way. I really like it.

Make a video of your own at Animoto.

Thing 19

I joined Teacher Pop and I am on Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, Pinterest and Art Education 2.0. I really enjoy social networks. I like connecting with friends and finding other people who have the same interests as me. I love sharing my ideas and learning new things. I really like Teacher Pop. I think it will be a useful resource. There was a lot of great information on there.

Thing 20

I love YouTube. YouTube is a great resource in the art room. You can an example of every art technique on YouTube. Many people (myself included) don't learn art techniques very well from paper. Many artist are visual learners and need a demonstration to be successful. I hope to learn as much as I possibly can about a variety of art techniques while in college but to be realistic I can not possibly learn them all. This is wear YouTube can be a great resource. I can learn from it and my students can learn from it. Also I might use it if a student is absent and misses instruction of a new subject matter. I can tell them to watch a certain video about that technique on YouTube while they are still at home and then I will go back over it with them when they come back to school. Great resource!

Thing 18

https://www.facebook.com/melanie.perry78

I have had a Facebook account for several years now.  I am a total Facebook addict.  I love it.  I joined the APSU Education group and I'm excited to see what that has to offer.  I also follow lots of different art museums and art teachers.  I think it is a great resource to stay current on what is happening in  our community.  I think it is a good idea to stay current with social media because our future students will spend lots of time using social media.   I think it is important to keep my Facebook page clean and appropriate so that no future employer or future student or future parents will see any inappropriate language or behavior.

Thing 17

I love this site!  I have never had any experience with a website like this.  I think it maybe a new addiction of mine.  I think it is a great idea to be able to access your bookmarks from any computer.  I know I have been in places where I used a computer that was not mine and I needed one of my bookmarks and didn't have it.  This site is very easy to use and it's nice that you can find book marks about educational sites and artistic sites.  I think this would be good for teachers to use among each other to share resources.  Also a teacher could work from home and add sites that her students can use in the classroom. This is a very cool site...I will use it all the time.

Thing 16

I chose iGoogle as my start up page to try out.  It was interesting and I can see how it would be beneficial but I did not change it to my homepage.  I have had MSN as my homepage for what seems like forever and I just can't make myself change it when a website asks me to.  I use hotmail and our apsu email can be accessed through MSN, so that is the main reason I keep it as my homepage. 

I can see how the calendars can be helpful also but I love my planner made from paper way too much to go digital.  I feel slightly the same about the to-do lists.  I make list after list to keep up with the million directions my life takes.  I have post-its everywhere at home.  I also have my iphone that has a digital note pad app.  I use it a lot.  I think that is the most helpful one for me since I have my phone with me all the time I can just jot my note down on that app.

I may use some of these once I am teaching.  I can see how they all could be helpful but I'm not sure if I will still be stuck in my ways of using actual paper and pencil...maybe it's the artist in me??

Thing 15

I created a post in the APSU 23 things sandbox wiki.  I have used Wikipedia before and often but I never really understood how information was added.  So, I learned a lot from this exercise.  I chose to talk about Thing #7 which was Flickr.  I really enjoyed Flickr since I love to take photographs.  As an art teacher I would use a wiki account to communicate with parents about what is happening in the art room.  I think it is a great way to keep them informed and pass information around.

 

Bath Abbey, England

Photo by Melanie Perry

Thing 14

This was made at www.gliffy.com

I chose this website because I like the graphics and the site was easy to use.  I chose to chart the Primary and Secondary colors.  I do with that I could change the color space that overlaps.  This would make the chart more effective. 

 Bubble.us

This chart is about the art process.  It is a chart showing the logical steps an artist should take when making an art project of any type.  It shows planning and the different steps involved.  I think I could use this tool to make a chart similar to this one just to blow up and hang in the classroom.  It would be there to remind students not to skip a step when working through a project.

Thing 13

I have never heard of Zoho before. I wish I had learned about it a little sooner. I have a Mac desktop at home and did not until recently have Microsoft Office for it. I couldn't figure out a way to type papers on my Mac. If I had known about Zoho I think it would have been helpful for me and would have saved me some money. I think Zoho would be great my for my future students if they were in a similar situation as me or maybe they have an ipad. It seems like a great tool.

I think my students would be able to use either of these sites if they were doing a group project. They would be able to access each others work from home without needing to meet outside of class.

I prefer Google Docs. I like that you are able to draw and use word type documents too. As a future art teacher this would also be a good place to let students who finish their work early, go to play with drawing pictures using the computer.

Thing 12

I used igoogle for the first time ever. It is similar to other sites so it seemed familiar to me. You could customize this site to your specifications, which was cool. You could choose which information feeds you wanted to appear on your homepage. I chose art as one of mine and found out that they have an artist of the day. I think this would be a good homepage to have on the classrooms in my art classroom. I could require the students to research the artist of the day if they use the computer that day. A quick 5 minutes assignment that makes them aware of modern artists that are working today.

This piece of artwork is by Alice X. Zhang. She was the artist of the day today.

I also made a Picasa account. This was very similar to flickr but it is already linked to my google+ account. I have noticed that any google account that you open automatically attaches to your other google accounts. So all your information is very easily accessed. This is just another photo sharing website. Students can share there own photo assignments and research other photography being done today.

This is one of my photos. It was taken at Cheekwood Botanical Gardens, TN Summer 2011

Thing 11

I found the easiest route to use was Google Blog Search. I use Google already for just about everything I ever need to know. So when I clicked on the link and it took me to a page that looked like Google, I knew exactly what to do. I think Technorati would be my least favorite. I couldn't easily find where to find blogs. I just kept seeing Adele articles. I did enjoy looking through the Edu Blog Award Winners. There were so many categories and I think I will go back and look through them more. I found a few different art teacher blogs that I like.I started following them both and added them to my Google Reader page.

Thing 10

I used Google Reader for the first time and I think I like it! I really had no idea there was any type website like this. I didn't know what Google Reader or that little orange square icon were at all. I do think this is a very useful and time saving resource. Since setting up my blog at the beginning of this class I have really started enjoying reading other peoples blogs. There are so many out there and some have some great information! As a teacher, I think this would be good for the same reasons I think it is good in my personal life....saving time.

Thing 9

I used ImageChef to make this image. It was super easy. You can do lots of different things on this site, such as make photo collages or add words to your photos. I chose to use words to make this picture. It was very easy. You just choose the shape and the colors and the words you want the shape filled with, then hit the button and there it is! I chose to fill my shape with the elements of design. These are the basic building blocks of art and something every art student should know. I could use this site in my classroom to display definitions and terms in a creative way. Students could also use this site to enhance their photo work.

National Art Education Association - Home

National Art Education Association - Home

Thing 8

 http://bighugelabs.com/mosaic.php

I used Mosaic Maker to make this photo montage.  I really like all these sites.  I think they could be very useful in my art classroom. I search Flickr for tags of #skyscrapers and these are the photos I found.  I could use this tool in my classroom if I were teaching about perspective or certain photography techniques.  I would ask the students to choose a tag that intrests them, such as trees or art or sunrises, and then create a photo mosaic with those photos.  I also really enjoyed the site that makes words from Flickr photos.

    

Thing 7

These are just a sample of my personal photography

http://www.flickr.com/photos/melperry03/ 

I have never used Flickr before but I do like it!  As a future art teacher I can see many uses for this site in my classroom.  I could ask the students to all create their own accounts and give photography assignments.  I could ask the students to post their own work to the site.  Another option would be I could have a class account and post the top three pieces of work or just post every one's work so that the parents could access it from home.  I will also keep my personal account and post photos of my artwork.  Students can access this to see examples of my work.  Students could also use this site for research and inspiration.  

The only other photo sharing site I have used is Instagram.  I love this site too.  It is an app on my iphone and it allows you to follow others and view their photos and post your own.  You can also take photos through this site and it has tools that help you alter your photos.  

Photography is a passion of mine and though it may be difficult to teach if the school I am in has to access to cameras and photo equipment, I believe this site will get the students excited about their own photography. 

Thing 6

I chose Etsy.com.  I absolutely LOVE Etsy!!!!  I even have an Etsy app on my phone.  Since I am an artist and a future art teacher Etsy is right up my alley.  Etsy is a website that is similar to ebay but the difference is that everything on Etsy is handmade.  They have just about anything you can think of.  As an artist I know how difficult it can be to sell your work.  Etsy is a sight that makes it so easy for artists and crafty people to put their pieces in their own "store" and make some money!  I think this would be a wonderful website to share with my future students.  Often people think of becoming an artist only means a future of struggling to survive.  I would love to show them this outlet to display and sell their work.  It's also a great place for ideas and inspiration.  I just love this site....it's a place where artists come together.

www.etsy.com

Thing 4

Commenting is important because it makes the blogger feel they are being listened to and that someone cares about what they are talking about.  Although I have never blogged before I do have a facebook account I know that it makes me feel good to know that people take the time to read what I have said and to comment.  I like to know other peoples thoughts about what I have said.  I know it creates a sense of community because people are able know people think the same way as they do when someone comments.

On the Cool Cat Teacher Blog, they say that "you show the author that you hear them."  I completely agree with this.  I know that if I post something and no one responds I have all these thoughts pop into my head.  Did no one read my post?  Why did no one read my post?  Did no one care about what I had to say?  Maybe these are just insecurities in my head but this part of the article made me think I'm not the only one.

When reading "10 Techniques to get more comments on your blog" I thought that when he said "Interact with comments left" that this was very important.  If someone takes the time to post a comment on your blog I believe it is a must for you to respond.  You should continue the conversation and acknowledge what they said.

The classmates blogs I chose to follow and comment on are: Alyssa Kniffen, Kelley Poole, Natasha Pentacost, Morgan Garton and Katie Robello.  I chose these blogs because I liked what they had to say and felt like they had given good information.


I chose to follow a blog called Art with Mr. E. This is a blog that is from an art teacher in Nashville, TN. I like to look at this blog to see what a local art teacher has to say. Mr. E shows his students work on his blog. He has links to TAEA and NAEA. He has a Wish List of things he needs for his classroom. He has important artists birthdays listed, museum website links and examples of his own artwork.
http://artwithmre.blogspot.com/



The other blog I chose to follow is Adventures of an Art Teacher. I first looked at this blog just because the name is funny and I liked it. This art teacher is an elementary art teacher. She has examples of her students work. Each grade as a link on the page. She has project examples and pictures of her ideas and samples. The main reason I like this blog is because she has a huge list of other art education blogs listed on her blog.
http://artteacheradventures.blogspot.com/

Thing 5

School 2.0 to me means a school that is using the web for best, most up to date, information for it's faculty and students.  Schools that understand and know how to use the internet in the most helpful ways can only benefit.  Students love technology and will be more interested in subject matter that incorporates technology.  It may take teachers longer to appreciate School 2.0 but they should embrace it.  I believe schools of the future should be fully integrated into School 2.0.  These tools make information easier to obtain and more easily passed from person to person. 

Thing 3

I am excited about this blog!  I have never had one before, so this is all new to me but I think it will help me keep track of all the info I learn in this class.  I have a tendency to learn lots of things on the computer and then once I don't use them all the time I forgot them.  So I think this will be a great tool for me to always be able to look back at and remember what I learned.  I am going to be an art teacher once I graduate.  In art it is often helpful to keep a journal of your ideas and inspirational words or pictures.  I think a blog is a great way for my future students to do this.  Having a list of your favorite ideas and photos right at your finger tips could be very helpful for an artist and art students.  They can blog from home or school and probably from their phones too. Then when that next art project is assigned and they need ideas, they will have some where to start.

Thing 2

I decided to use my real name for my blog.  I first thought I should come up with something unique and creative but decided just to stick with my name, so that people who know me can find it easily.  Creating the blog was easy and fun.  I've never created a blog before and I loved being able to select my back ground and theme and change the font styles.  I think I changed everything ten times already!  I also had never created an avatar.  This too was pretty easy and fun.  I made my avatar pretty accurate to what I actually look like.  I made my avatar have a skirt which I rarely wear but I just thought it looked cuter with my avatars outfit.  I also put a laptop in my avatars hand.  I wanted to put a paint brush or something pertaining to art but didn't see anything like that.  So I chose the laptop.  I have my laptop with me all the time so I thought it was fitting.

Thing 1 continued...

Of the 7 1/2 habits of lifelong learners, the easiest one for me is "Having confidence in yourself as a competent, effective learner."  I recognize through out my life, when I have tried my best to study and learn I have always been able to accomplish my goals.  There may be times when things didn't go as I expected but as long as I stayed on track and didn't give up I was able to achieve my goals. The most difficult of the 7 1/2 habits of lifelong learners, for me would be to "Create your own learning toolbox."  I am a non traditional student, a wife and mother of two little boys and often times I am stressed and things are scattered.  I know that I need to find a way to better manage my time.

Thing 1

Life long learning is something that I am passionate about.  I am a nontraditional student, so I personally believe it's never too late to finish what you started.  You are never too old to learn a new skill.  Also I think to keep your mind young you must keep your mind active.  I love to read and learn as many new skills as I can.  I would like to learn as much as I can about web tools.  I know I have a lot to learn and I think knowing as much about web tools as I can will only help me in my future teaching career.  Students love technology.  I have never set up a blog before but so far this has been fairly easy. I'm just excited about this class and the potential that comes with it.