Feed Me! — Thing 7a
I fed, and I fed, and I fed. My eyes are bloodshot. My brain is screaming “uncle.” My Google Reader has quickly gone from enjoyable to overwhelming. Becoming RSS literate is not an easy task. I have been practicing “skimming and scanning” for the past week; it is not a skill that comes naturally to me. There is, however, one thought that keeps me going: Habit 1-Begin with the end in mind. It’s the mantra that plays over and over in my head these days. I know that the more I use my aggregator, the easier it will be to utilize in the long run. It will eventually be my technological best friend.
Whining aside, I am astounded by all the relevant information that is delivered directly to me each day. For this task I avoided finding new subscriptions through blogrolls, as I felt that was the easy route. I used the suggested lists, but I found most of my subscriptions on blog search engines. A few edublogs that I really enjoy are coincidentally connected to each other via blogrolls. I guess I must be doing something right. Edubloggers, I’m finding, have their own little cyber-clique and I feel like I’ve been invited to their party.
One subscription I am really enjoying is Free Technology for Teachers. In a post I’ve already sent to two colleagues, I found an online game called Synonym Toast that I am sure my students will love. To score points, you must place the piece of toast with the correct synonym on it into the toaster with the matching synonym. I’ve already played a few times and have had great fun.
Another subscription that has tickled my fancy is Open Educator by Graham Wegner. In his post, Immunity, he writes about he and his principal stirring the pot in the teacher lounge with statements such as, “I can see a future where handwriting is an irrelevant skill.” What he was really trying to do was get the faculty to think about the future of education in the technology age. Shouldn’t our educational system be advancing at the same pace as Web 2.0?
Last, but certainly not least, was the Carnival of Summer Blockbusters found on Learn Me Good by Mister Teacher. Here he lists, in a most entertaining way, a list of must-read blog posts for educators. Each post is billed as a summer movie blockbuster and you can almost hear Don LaFontaine introducing them all.
June 5th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
I agree that Google Reader is amazing and overwhelming all at the same time. I have played around with RSS before, but gave up on it. I love the fact that you can personalize it with information that you care about. I am finding all of the education and technology blogs interesting as well. I am also enjoying subscribing to friends blogs and other sites of interest. Hopefully this course will give us all a chance to develop a habit of using our reader so that it begins to change our lives.
June 7th, 2009 at 7:04 pm
I also agree that the Google Reader is overwhelming! One great thing for me is that I am now in VA visiting my grandsons, and I can still check the saved sites since the reader is collecting them for me! I’m sure I will learn lots from these sites as well as from my fellow classmates.
June 11th, 2009 at 10:25 am
How fast does your Google Reader accumulate new blogs and new information? It is very tough to “keep up” with all of the new information and learn low to efficiently skim over all of the unwanted material to get to the “good stuff.” It is amazing, though, that once you’ve found subscriptions that you are really interested in and that, in your words, “tickle your fancy,” you can’t wait to check out all of the new RSS feeds. Thanks for all of the blog sites!
June 11th, 2009 at 10:40 am
I’ve found that “skimming and scanning” can take up to 10 minutes, depending on how long it has been since my last visit to Google Reader. While I am skimming and scanning, I “star” the posts I want to read more about. I then come back later and go only to my starred posts and read them. This routine is the most time efficient method I have found thus far.
June 12th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Google Reader was KILLING me until I realized I could organize my feeds into folders. Now I think it is much more manageable. It also just occurred to me that I could follow classmates’ blogs and be a more active commenter if I pulled their blogposts in as well. Call me a little thick. . .
June 14th, 2009 at 8:51 pm
Thanks for mentioning the Free Technology for Teachers site. How can there even be more for us to boggle our minds with?! I am glad pmcewen commented about the folders on the reader. I was wondering if that was possible to make organization easier. The reader is fascinating, but once again all of this is very time consuming. There is no way I could have taken this class during the school year. Thank Goodness for summers!
July 15th, 2009 at 2:53 pm
The Synonym Toast game is great fun. I enjoyed playing with you and will use it with my guys too!