This blog explained

Hello!

I notice that people are suddenly finding this blog so I thought I would explain it's purpose.  In 2008 the multi-library cooperative offered an asynchronous, free, online class called "23 Things on a Stick".  Each "Thing" was a Web 2.0 tool.  Participants had to create a blog for our first Thing, complete with avatar.  I have had the nickname of Bluebird for many years and, since I live  in northern Minnesota, decided to call myself "Snowybluebird".  The poem on the side is my ONLY attempt at poetry and describes how I felt about the class. 

Later, another 23 things were added and I began that class but did not have time to do much. 

When I bought a website in order to host my graduate projects, I used the same name.  Then I added the "Samples" pages... and am probably confusing people by having two "Snowybluebird" sites.  My apologies.  I am reluctant to hide this blog as it does show how I learn and the first tools I learned.  So feel free to look and comment.  Just remember when it was written and expect to smile often at how little I knew :)

Laurie Jo

Thing 28- Home pages

I did this the first time round and love it! I have homepages on both Yahoo and iGoogle. The main reason I keep my Yahoo one is that I love the theme I found. Yahoo supposedly feeds from more local news but the Grand Forks one has the same articles on it from 4 months ago. With iGoogle, I have a feed from Wired that keeps me up to date on tech stuff so I can constantly bug my students with articles and pictures of the newest whatever. I also have CNN and another news site, so don't have to remember to watch the TV national. I have my stocks and weather on it. I recently added the eyes that follow your cursor around. My favorite is that I have both regular and spiritual things to ponder. Although they repeat some, I enjoy having the new thoughts every time I log in. I have a second page that is all geared to teaching English. A dictionary, grammar helps... The only downfall I see is that you miss Google's great salutes on their classic search, like the Morse code one recently.

Thing 27- Twitter

Twitter does make a lot more sense this time around. Last time I didn't stay signed up. It still seems kind of pointless for me. My eyes are tired by the end of the day as it i. Maybe they need to make it all audio. Then I can complain about how slowly it is read! I am always curious about any Villwocks, and found one that also had my maternal grandmother's maiden name. Now I'm really curious! I can't see myself going for this too much at this point. Like Ning, it is time consuming in a world where I am still just hoping my dishwasher works! As for library uses... I wish I could get people to realize that our catalog is online. Since there aren't any computers for students to use within the library, it makes it hard for me to think beyond that at the moment.

Thing 26- Ning

I am more interested in Ning this time around, but that just got me more frustrated. I can't get any of my photos to upload from iPhoto. I didn't try from elsewhere yet. It wouldn't access iPhoto, so I copied my pics to the desktop and dragged them from there. It looked like it would work, but one picture at a time I was informed there was a problem and I needed to delete that picture. I never did figure out the badge thing, as far as putting it on my blog. I did write to someone, but didn't ask about friends yet. I'll see if she answers first. I also wrote a comment on someone else's piece. I'll just have to come back and take a better look later. Maybe I can upload pics at home.

THING 25-blog

Wow! Life just buzzes by at times. I got sidetracked with other projects and see that it's been over a month since I wrote. I must have looked at 25 at least 5 times before I made it to the end. My main problem with blogging still goes back to the time issue. It's like twitter and facebook, I don't really have anyone I want to connect with or follow. I took the typealyzer that happened to be on blogger when I logged in, it says I am independent and like to problem-solve. I did look at things, just keep filing them away for the future. I keep wondering where the wall will be; that spot where we decide that we are connected enough and just want to go back to the simple life. I don't want my cell phone to go to the internet every time I hit the wrong button and wish it would let me move things like my old one did. I see the same thing going on that I saw with computers. Windows 95 allowed me to call my programs what I wanted to, gave me options of where to download them to, and let me add and subtract things to the start menu. All the flexibility that I loved is now gone. Now I see this with phones. I wonder when I will see it on the net and how it will manifest itself. Am I wrong?

Thing 24- It begins again!

Greeting to whomever! I am very happy that more Things are being added. I did try to update my blog look, but I really liked how it was. Besides, I'm one of those people who always order the same thing in restaurants, keeps their furniture the same for 20 years... Once I decide I like something, I tend to keep it that way. I did change the color, although all that blue may get old after awhile. But it had been the one thing I hadn't been able to find last time. I tried to add one of the color clocks, but it wouldn't even load the preview. I did add a slide show from my flickr account. Unfortunately, I am in the process of trying to put together a slide show about my car accident, and so many of the pictures are from that. The red van was mine, by the way, the other driver was killed, and I broke an ankle and a foot. In some ways, beginning this class is bittersweet. I only got time to finish the last one during the time I was unable to work, so most of it was done in a wheelchair. At least I've graduated to a chair with one leg elevated. I almost think you should assign groups to write to each other. I remember that I wrote repeatedly to at least 6 bloggers last time and never had any response. Hopefully I can make some connections this round.

Things 22 and 23- Summary

How to keep up? That really is a question for anything we do in life. How to keep up with the house, our kids, our career, our hobbies... I loved learning about all these neat, useful tools we can use. I have passed on several, and have begun using others. I bookmarked, I created, I analyzed, and now I have to move onward to LIFE and see where it all takes me. In reality, I can't see that I will take time every day to check on the latest news in any area. But, I am much better equipped to learn and find the things I need. Overall, this course was a huge eye-opener for me. I had no idea that the whole world was sharing all these things, and leaving the rest of the world clueless. I can't begin to imagine what the future of the Internet will evolve into. Part of me is excited to see, and part of me wonders when it will all end, and where my rights to privacy travel. All I can do is try to help my students learn what is there and guide them in how to respond to what's new. "Our Mission? To explore new worlds..."