FireFox Add-ons

Wow, I have recently discovered firefox add-ons and am very impressed. First, I would recommend getting a multiple line bookmarks toolbar. That is awesome. Also, there is an add-on called clipmarks that lets you take stuff from certain web pages, blogs, articles and past it/email it places. To practice clipping, I want to past a video about clipmarks below. In order to get clipmarks, just google firefox add-ons and then search for clipmarks.

wiki, linkedIn, twitter, converting to PDF

I have learned a few new skills in the past few months I forgot to mention in my last post.

First, I found out how easy it was to convert word files into PDFs. You just use a website from a google search. Takes like 5 min.

In Prof. Ferree's class, we learned how to make/use a wiki. While I didnt practice with it much and don't see much of a difference from a google doc (besides having many pages within the wiki), I want to keep working with them a little over break bc wikis are popular and useful.

Also, I have been using twitter more lately, but just from the perspective as a reader. I try to get on once a week but that sometimes doesnt happen. I am follower to a few educators tweets. But my next goal with twitter is to learn how to have conversations with people...you type in like @smith or whatever the person's name is...I think that's all but not positive.

Also, I have been using LinkedIn, which is a networking/job site where you post resume and profile of yourself and you link yourself to contacts and you can write people recomendations and people can look at your profile and jobs can search you and check you out. Pretty cool.

Next batch of things I want to learn: how to convert youtube files to regular ones so I could use them in a school if I wanted..I know there is some site out there that does it.
In addition, here are some more things I wanna do with technology in the weeks that come:
-work with that site where you can teach ppl languages and they can you
-i want to find some good education blogs and podcasts
-want to find a site where I could make a newsletter pretty easily
-want to learn some digital art stuff (photoshop, etc) that I could possibly use with students
-I want to work on my google site

excel skills are growing...

Hola, this week I learned some tricks with excel and word tables. Basically, you can take text and convert it into tables. Also, you can highlight on the boxes and adjust one and it will adjust all.
To make a new row, you can edit copy it in word table or in excel. I forgot how to make a new column, but it is not too bad I would guess.

Right now I am using excel to keep track of my field placement hours and also how much I am working for my job as RA.

Another tech skill I have used lately is creating google forms. Wow are these cool. In order to poll some Spanish house members on where we wanted food from for our end of semester feast, i set up a google form. 17/23 residents responded and because the data was tough to read, I put in in graphs and it tallies up who had most votes and everything. Pretty amazing.

In addition, I know doodle polls a bit, too, and survey monkey. So my skill with numbers is growing a little these days, which is good bc I will be in the classroom as a student teacher in like 7 months or so.

getting inspired again with technology

Last spring I took an amazing classes called Teaching with tech. During that class I was really inspired to use some of the skills with my students because it is true we are living in an era where kids crave tech and are used to using it for everything: (internet, cells, facebook/myspace are a few examples).

In this class I learned: photostory, blogging, podcasting, making a site through google sites and some cool smart board techniques.

However, 6 months later I am struggling to recall what I learned and realize I need to stay up to date and practice this stuff, especially since I am going to be in the classroom for real in less than a year. In conclusion, I not only want to practice and maintain what I learned in the class, but I want to build on it. Any suggestions?

4-20-09: Mariokart tournament night

Hola, chicos. Hoy en mi dormitorio tuvimos un torneo de Mariokart. Fue muy divertido .Yo hice ok, pero uno de mis residentes, Derrick, casi gano. Andrew de los 130s gano.

Me dolia la cabeza por todo el dia hoy; en una escala de 1 a 10, fue un 9.5. Ahora, me siento mucho mejor. Estoy en los stacks de Thorton trabajando un poquito. Esta semana es ocupada para mi, y estoy nervioso de tener que introducir a la profesora Harold el miercoles en Last Lecture. Pero esta noche, de hecho, ahorita, voy a escribir la intro. (dos minutos).

Manana voy a visitar Burley para hacer voluntario.

???????

?Cual es su cosa favorita de la facultad de Curry?


"What is your favorite part about the Curry school?"

Es viernes

Caramba. Es viernes. Es el fin de semana. Pues, casi. Todavia tengo una clase de espanol el viernes por la tarde. Tambien, tengo una reunion con un TA para comentar sobre un ensayo. Vamos a reunir en Bodo's. 

Manana hay dos eventos con comida gratis. Recientement yo empece una lista de correo elctronico que dice muchos eventos con comida gratis. Mientras la mayoria de los eventos tienen pisa gratis, no es una dieta muy balanzada, pero espero que en el futuro puedo encontrar unos eventos con comida gratis que no es pisa...para dar mas variedad y mas nutricion!

Si esta lista con comida gratis te interesa, dejame saber. 

No me gusta usar el termino "grounds." Pienso que alguna gente es muy "snotty" cuando se usa el termino. Tambien, no me gusta hacer lo que hace los demas. Prefiero ser diferente. Es ironico que yo solicitara a la misma universidad de que 15 mil gente ha solicitado. Si te interesa conformidad y nonconformidad, debes hablar con profesor Handler, el decano de CLAS y un profesor de antropologia; el es muy interesante. 

Wow, it's the weekend. Well, almost. I still have spanish class friday afternoon. Also, I am meeting a TA at Bodo's for lunch to talk about a paper. There are two free food events tom. I recently started a free food email list with some of the events around grounds that have free food. Most of them are free pizza, so it is not a very balanced diet, but hopefully over the next few weeks I can find events that add both nutrition and variety. If anyone wants to get on the email list, I would like to share the knowledge about all the free food on-Campus. 

Don't get me started on the whole grounds vs campus thing. I tend to think it is a bit snotty, but then again I despise doing what other people do; I like to differentiate myself. Kind of ironic when I realize that I applied to Uva just like 15 thousand other people. If anyone wants to hear a cool professor talk about conformity and non-conformity, seek out Richard Handler, the dean of the CLAS and anthropology professor; he is very interesting.