The Final Post

                I honestly do not think that I ever would have expected two months to fly by as quickly as they have. Nor did I have any idea when the next time that I would read two books in two months. My perspective and conception of time and the world has entered into that world that I never thought would happen to me. As a child, I remember declaring to adults that I would never do the following things:

11.       Run out of energy.

22.       Feel as though time was passing too quickly.

33.       Go to post-secondary school for more than three years.

Being the stubborn mule that I am, for a few years I refused to be a hypocrite and burned the candle at both ends, working nearly full-time and attending school full-time. Well, that took care of childhood belief #2. Wow, does time fly when you are constantly busy! After a couple years, my wick grew short and became tired and turned twenty-one. That’s when I realized that I preferred Biology courses over my English courses and switched degrees. “I could never be a doctor/lawyer/etc., that’s way too much school.” That thought crept back into my mind as I made the transfer and signed up for 3+ more year of school. I guess people change and I am no exception.

I even submitted to the thought of being stuck in my old ways for a while, especially in terms of technology. All of the new tools and gadgets out there scared me right into my shell. I'm so thankful to have been a part of the Nantais ICT class- none of these tools are half as scary as they seem!

Couple newly learned tricks

Although not complete, I'm starting to gain a web presence outside of my undergrad Facebook life and cat pictures.

I have acquired a couple of "in-progress" websites (and this blog) pertaining to my teaching career. I have shared my basketball coaching link already, but it has been updated, so I will do it again! I have certainly put more time into my basketball coaching website as it is already being used by my athletes. I have uploaded games and results and a team roster! My eportfolio needs some tidying up and a little fine-tuning, but I can certainly see how a digital version is so much more convenient than a hard copy. I have been learning and now with the course drawing to an end, I need to find away to keep practicing my newly acquired ICT knowledge!

ePortfolio: http://msderemiensclass.weebly.com/
Coaching website: http://katelynderemiens.yolasite.com

Check them out!

Digital Storytelling: Part 2

So I have had the opportunity in two of my classes to dabble in digital storytelling. 'Back in the day,' I used to love messing around in movie maker and creating little videos for English class or working on larger projects such as our high school grad video and a wedding slide show.

My most recent project started with me brainstorming an idea for a children's story for my ELA methods class. Every idea I had seemed generic and forced. No natural flow whatsoever. Dealing with copyright and creative commons makes me nervous, so as a time saver, I turned to my own pictures. Here is where I found mountains of pictures categorized into makeshift folders/albums. I have always meant to make scrapbooks from my old pictures- or at least hard copy albums. I love nostalgia and really enjoy looking through old pictures. I stared for a while at my copious cats photos and thought about how I could turn them into a story.  That's when the simplicity dawned on me. I could just tell the true story of my recent trip with Habitat for Humanity to Honduras. I was immediately engrossed in the process. At moments, the memories made me a little bit misty. I loved taking time to revisit my thought processes when making the short film. I think digital stories are a great way to consolidate old memories and store them for future trips down memory lane.

The downside to becoming so entangled in the process was that my original video was 3 minutes too long and my final copy was a minute and a half over time. I did not use the story board process as I should have, because I had already lived the story. The result of my poor time management left me with a video that I did not have the heart to trim down to meet the criteria of the assignment; however, the assignment gave me that nudge I need to finish these projects that, although meaning a lot to me, I had completely forgot about.

Digital Storytelling

I made the grad video for my class in 2005. I haven't really learned any new "movie maker" skills since then. I have been meaning for the last couple of years to turn my photos from certain trips and life events into videos instead of making photo albums. I normally just import a bunch of pictures, throw my go to transitions in there, and maybe a little music.

Animoto is a really useful tool and creates amazing videos. The effects and transitions are easy to use and look super professional! There is a little bit of overlap with my ELA methods (we have to make a digital story) and some of my classmates have found other storyboard tools on the internet such as slideshare.net. So it looks like I am going to have to put aside some time to deal with masses of photos that I've accumulated over the last seven years!

Addiction

I'm officially addicted to my website. I am constantly wanting to update it and add new things! I most recently changed the youtube videos to suit my players needs... ankle sprains... I love the connection it brings between my players, their parents, and myself. As a kid, any piece of paper that I was told to take home, rarely made it home. Having our practice schedule (now that it finally works..still learning!), tournament draws, and results online makes it easier for parents to be in the 'know.' I also included a poll for player input regarding what we do in practice. It opens up the lines of communication and creates stronger team bonds.

I feel like I have so many more creative outlets to draw from when planning lessons now! So many more resources, which lead to more (engaging) ideas for the classroom. In my first student teaching placement, I had no idea how to navigate the internet other than *googling* things. Incorporating some of these tools into biology presentations (vs. power points or posters) can give kids something to play with and have fun making their presentations. I have come up with many real world applications (not relevant to school, coaching, or class) where I can use these new found tools!

Becoming a nerd

So I have spent much of my spare time 'diddling' around on my website. I don't feel like I have actually 'worked' on it, just playing around, having fun, and making progress. I like it. A lot. I've always had a feeling that I was a nerd at heart. I first saw it develop in my science classes, specifically Bio and Chem, but I have never considered myself "techy"- I'm starting to change that assumption. I feel so lost on the web most of the time that I've never ventured much past research and Facebook. You mean there is other things you can use on the web? Cool, I like it. AND I think it will make lesson planning and classroom activities so much better and more engaging.

Check out my site!
katelynderemiens.yolasite.com

I think that I'm starting to get the hang of this...

I like to think that I'm becoming a little tech savvy here! A lot of my down time the last few days has involved doctoring up my personal website (assignment turned fun project). I haven't really included many personal facts about me or my teaching philosophies yet... BUT as I am deep in the middle of basketball season, I have created a page which showcases my team (roster, game results, practice/game/tournament schedules, basketball relevant website links) and under that page I included (password protected as requested by the girls!) a separate page for our plays. It's actually been fairly tedious and time consuming, but I'm really enjoying it and pretty proud of it! The girls seem to get a kick out of it!

I'm currently working on getting parental permission to have pictures of the team/video uploaded onto the website.

Here is a link to my pride and joy, work-in-progress: katelynderemiens.yolasite.com

I just came across a list of the top ten eportfolio websites:

1. mahara.org

2. electronicportfolio.org

3. osportfolio.org
Internet Laws, Internet Privacy, Laws, Law News, Legal

4. adobe.com
Featuring Photoshop, Illustrator and After Effects

5. truveo.org
Online video search engine

6. eportconsortium.com

7. epsilen.com

8. digication.com
Digication provides e-Portfolio and Assessment Management Systems for K-12 and Higher Education Institutions

9. r-campus.com
Free membership and usage. Create your academic presence, faculty and student websites and ePortfolios

10. eife-l.org
GANDI is a domain name registrar and cloud hosting company. Free website, SSL certificate, blog, and e-mail included. VPS dedicated

I haven't visited each website, but the sites that included a brief description, I copy and pasted under the link.

Whoa, that's a lot of info...

I have learned so much already in the two weeks that I have been in this course. There are so many interesting websites and tools that can be used in used in the classroom. I've decided to start making an 'inventory' of the different websites that we have used:

1. Epearl
2. Blogger
3. Flickr
4. pixlr.com
5. yola.com
6. weebly.com
7. wordle.net
8. mindmeister.com
9. Face Swap (I've gotten far too much use out of already.)
10. wallwisher.com
11. compfight.com
12. www.easywhois.com - evaluate web site
13. diigo.com (new bookmarking tool)
14. prezi.com
15. ebooks.com
16. storybird.com
17. audacity.com


I know that there has been more, but I can't seem to remember them... which is basically my 'inspiration' for creating a list that I can refer back to and keep everything straight.

I really like the idea of the epearl website as means of organization. I, typically, bookmark webpages or copy websites down on a random piece of paper that I will never find again. The epearl website will allow me to 'bookmark' the gems that I stumble across and organize it into different content areas that are visually efficient. Now I just need to make an effort to use these new tools in  my everyday life!

This image was found and created using compfight.com and pixlr.com. Nothing too extraordinary, but a reminder of what these websites can do!

Back in computer class

It's been 9 years since I've been in a computer class and the only tools that I have really stumbled upon since then are social media sites... and I can't even navigate those very well. The rate of technology development is astounding. It almost seems pointless to learn about a new piece of technology full-well knowing that a brand new substitute will be on the market in 6 months. However, it is time for me to put my stubborn nature aside and get back into an open frame of mind and learn things that I have no idea how to do.

Even in the first week of classes, I feel that I've learned more new technological tools than I have in the past 6 years. I thought that the word splash was super easy to use and a great way to make visual appealing vocabulary list (which, in my experience with science courses, usually take somewhat dull concepts and display them in an even more boring manner). I think the wallwisher site is an amazing tool that could be used  for brainstorming in class; especially, with more timid students.

I'm excited to extend my ICT knowledge past Microsoft Office, Paint, Minesweeper and Facebook!