miller’s spin

As you know, I have been participating in the 31 Day Blogging Challenge. The task for day 21 (yes, I’m ten days behind) included a great suggestion;

ask your readers to do some self promotion.

So… “I’d like to get to know you well…” (sing it)

As well as giving you the opportunity to promote yourself on this blog, I’d like to take the opportunity to get to know you, on a more… personal level. Yes, I’m going to ask you to share something personal with me.

If you’re not comfortable with that, then share something that you use to strengthen your networks, encourage collaboration and, or resource sharing. I’d love you to post a comment, include a link to your Flickr/Facebook or other social networking site…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/flairandsquare

If you use Flickr, I’d like to know more about how.

• Do you really utilise all the tools that this site offers?
• Do you use it for teaching and learning?
• How can we get the most out of this tool?

Thanks to JoKay, I recently discovered MOO. Moo loves to print beautifully designed products with the photos in your Flickr stream. For just $25 I got 100 funky little business cards printed using the images of my choice. I used five images of my avatar, Spinner Mills. Click below to see them on my Flickr space.

www.flickr.com More of millerspin’s photos tagged with closeup

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Keeping up with “the Waters”…

Every time I check my netvibes (RSS Aggregator), I am astounded that there is one or two new posts from Sue Waters. I’ve mentioned Sue a few times throughout this blog and her content often inspires me to write a post in response. Like this post I wrote in response to Sue’s article about innovation being challenged by all the constraints currently on us, like blocked sites within DET.

Sue is a Aquaculture teacher at Challenger TAFE in Perth. She trials a lot of new technology with her classes, on her blog she provides useful examples, guidelines, tips and much more. If you are interested in m-Learning, PDA’s, mobile phones, spy glasses, etc, and you don’t already read or subscribe to Sues blog, you’re missing out on loads of good tips and advice.

As a busy blogger myself, I know how hard it is when you have limited time and it can be so rewarding when someone leaves you a positive or constructive comment. It seems to make all that work worthwhile. This was highlighted by the Day 21 Blog Challenge - Make a Reader famous, which is what this post is all about. So here’s to you Sue!

Think about this - Do you like recognition for good work? Of course you do. So why not pick one of Sues posts listed below, have a read and leave her a comment, and tell her I sent you!

A few good posts worth reading;

• How to Read Blog posts on a Phone Using Mobile Friendly Google Reader
• SlideShare Needs Our Support — Lets Help Them Out
• STOP, LOOK, THINK - What Is Material Really Going To Look Like on A Mobile Device
• How are we going to effectively use the mobile devices in our student’s pockets?
• For all the lovers of creating comics ToonDoo has added ability to make ToonBooks
• You Need Spyglasses - Are you Serious?
• Mobile Web Usage is Increasing - How Will You Use It With Students?

Thanks for all your efforts Sue, there are some great resources on your site that I’m sure many teachers will find useful. I certainly have!

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Dear Team,

In an effort to minimise inbox overload, and in response to your great feedback, enthusiasm and determination, I have decided to dedicate this blog post to you.

I agree with the comments Arabella Hay made in a recent email to you all;

“…you are all doing a fantastic job and thoroughly enhancing the skills and knowledge of your Faculties and Campus’s….”

“…it’s time now to consolidate, refresh and explore embedding new ideas and practices. So, perhaps entering a different phase with a different ‘look and feel’… ”

Accepting the role as a Faculty or Workplace e-Learning contact is a massive commitment considering how busy you all are. I am aware that you are all devoting more hours to this project than allocated and I am seeing some wonderful blog’s, wiki’s, Del.icio.us pages, Moodle Courses, etc as a result. I am also getting some great feedback from teachers, head teachers, faculty managers and our Institute Director about the wonderful support and work you are all doing.

So thank you all for your effort and hard work so far!

Welcome to Phase 2

Arabella has succinctly captured your feedback in the comments above. Having taken your feedback and suggestions on board, we are now busy preparing for Phase 2 of our project.

Let’s revisit some of the technologies we have explored to date and focus on ways to embed these technologies (as appropriate) into your Faculty or Workplace. In addition, let’s explore a couple of tools that you can use to engage colleagues in using the technologies you have explored so far; Jing, Bridgit and Adobe Connect.

I hope you’ll join me next week for the first Technolog-e session of Phase2.

In this session we will create quick some demonstrations that you can upload to your wiki/ blog or email to your colleagues, using the program Jing (you will need to download and install Jing prior to this session – you may require the HelpDesk for this).

We’ll follow this up with some Adobe Connect training for you, and we will use these sessions to look at ways to further embed the technology you have already explored. Technolog-e Session Schedule

Times

It’s always going to be hard finding times that suit you all. So I invite you to make some selections on the survey below. The most popular times will be selected.

This form was built using the Web2.0 tool Wufoo, it’s a great tool, easy to use web based form builder. It’s well worth signing up for a demo and using on your wiki’s and blog’s! Have a look at some example forms here.

Please feel free to leave a comment on this blog.

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Ever heard of Urban Dictionary?

Probably not as the Urban Dictionary is blocked within the DET network. I subscribe to the feed using netvibes (more on RSS and netvibes) to get the Gen Y word of the day.

Let me share a few gems with you.

wifive August 20

Short for Wireless High-Five, used when you want to give a friend a high-five, but you are further then arms reach from each other. It doesn’t involve any physical contact.

work hot August 19

A person that may or may not be hot, but is the most attractive person in the set of people you work with so you lust after him/her.

Keep in touch with Gen Y, Urban Dictionary has mySpace and Facebook plug-ins.

I also have some resources on this wiki space.

While I was there, I found this very cool T-Shirt site, Busted Tees.

Here’s a few of my favourites;

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