Tuesday, February 8, 2011

More Tips from Mike's Tool Bag...

Mike became the internet magician once again and began throwing out useful links and resources like a friendly passerby throwing bread crumbs to ravenous pigeons in Trafalgar Square. This was a perfect opportunity to utilize one of my favorite social media tools - Diigo. There wasn't time to set up accounts or play around with the websites, so I just bookmarked all the links in my Diigo Library so I could come back to them at a later date. For me, this is a very useful tool to use because I have a tendency to distract myself or forget about some resources I come across.
One of the tools I tinkered with was the picture-video website called Animoto. This site could be used at any grade level, and I think we could find many different ways to incorporate the short videos into presentations or other classroom activities. In order to make longer videos, of course it costs money, but we found that it is actually quite cheap ($5 for a month or $30 for a year membership). Check out my video at:

My Bostons

4 comments:

  1. Jesse, I definitely agree that with all the great sites being thrown at us (nice analogy to ravenous pigeons in Trafalgar square... lol), it is both overwhelming and difficult to keep track of them all. I have also been adding things to my diigo account. I've also been keeping a run-on "diary" with a google doc. Just listing the speakers we've had come in, with a bit of info about what they are talking about just so I can remember briefly what each site does! I didn't realize Animoto was that cheap... really? I thought it was more! Hmmm, interesting!
    Nice quirky blog post!

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  2. Nice way with words, Jesse. Glad you found the sites of potential use, I hope you get some time to check them out more when things slow down. In the meantime, you can embed your animoto right on your blog.

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  3. It is wild to learn about all these different sites that make things so much easier. The only problem I get from some of them is that I bookmark so many more pages and articles than I know I will ever get around to reading. One that I really like is "Read Later" it organizes and is easy to use when you come across something online [it is an add-on for Mozilla, as well as an app] but I know that I am just digitally hoarding at times. Either way it is great in being able to call something up when you know that it will connect with others things that you are doing.

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  4. Awesome suck up comments Jesse! But I do agree that we get our hands on some wonderful websites from class. I can definitely feel my online presence and awareness growing on a daily basis!

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