Good times were had by all.  As the first day of classes started, right into storming, then forming, then norming.  We didn't start out forming, we were thrown right into things.  We have all come to the conclusion in this course that sometimes being thrown into things is the best way to learn.  I will remember this at work.  It's a real life scenario.  Lots of times we are thrown into things or encounter unknown waters, sometimes our first reaction is not the best.  As we have seen  throughout our two weeks, nothing is ever as hard as it seems, once

I just noticed as I browse my planning page with the tools and skills listed under literacies that I listed as having coming into the course that I have some things under skills and tools in the wrong place, that is what newly aquired computer literacies will do for you, realizing what I didn't know then, but know now.

I get excited more and more as the days go by because there has been so much great material and the funny thing is, I come to class into the second week without feelings of getting behind or overload.  This is the same sense I get from the other learners.  We have formed our own sense of community and are getting used some of the technologies and we are not as afraid to make a mistake.  Now chatting on edtalk has become the norm and we are quite comfortable with it.  As some will remember the phrase from a utube video in the last course about tec

Crazed women goes rampant after information overload during summer school at Holland College.

Another day of learning, The information from Dave on RSS and aggregating accounts was very eye opening.  There was alot to absorb, but the application is soooooo useful.  I really need to take some time and pull all this together for ease of viewing so that I can actually make use of the accounts.  I would really love to have time to set up a pipe feed to receive information on special education, that would really ease researching.

The presentation by Carl on Excel was very useful, including the handout and practice.  I don't use this program much, but it is good for me to have knowledge of it so that I can show students how to makes graphs and charts for course projects.  I did not know how to use the adding and subtracting tip that Dave gave us. I am writing all of this down.  The demo on wiki sites was great, I had seen these sites posted  but now I will be more inclined to actually access since I have had more exposure.  It all seemed so easy.

read chat            Critical friend portion for Jen

I enjoyed today and learned so many things. Using the web cam during our webcast was new and great to experience. While webcasting and chatting on the edtalk site I was given alot of great sites to refer to by guests from outside the class, it sure was a quick way to get help.  Here are a few of the sites I took away from the edtalk chat; www.slideshare.net - to use to upload power points and then slidecast them and view them.

If I download a free software and create a file in this software, to be used as an interactive tool.  How do I enable everyone else to have access to this file?  They could all download  the software but they wouldn't have my file.  It is not a social networking file.  If I sent it to the class delicious or a wiki they still couldn't interact with the file could they.  What is the best way?  My brain is not functioning enough to get the logistics of this at the moment.

Today learning was great, when engaged with the class community and personally while working on my own.  The class atmosphere seemed more cohesive and productive as we all gave and received help from one another. This is a good sign that things are coming together for most people and we are starting to use what we have learned through the week.