Thing 2: Photo Sharing

Instagram is something that I have been using for over three years now and I don't think that I could live without it at this point! I share everything from pictures of my husband and I (most recently our wedding photos that I cannot stop sharing) photos with friends, and most importantly photos of my puppy Riley! I have become one of those crazy people that shares pictures of her dog all the time but I can't help it- she is like my child! I post more pictures of her then anything else and I wouldn't have it any other way. I love that Instagram is so easy to use and one of the best features is to be able to look back on what I posted and when. I love seeing Riley go from a small puppy to the dog that she is today. I also love that I can look back on each picture and remember all the great memories.

These are all photos of Riley that I took with my iPhone and then edited and shared on Instagram.

Riley as a puppy when my husband and I first got her

 

Loving her new bed and toys that she got for Christmas

All snuggled up during a snowstorm

 

Pinterest is another site that I use ALL the time and absolutely love. I don't think that I could have planned my wedding without it. I was able to get so many ideas that I may not have come up with myself and was able to find a lot of DIY projects that helped to save some money. I think it would be a really great tool to use with my students and think that they would have a lot of fun with it. They could create boards with pictures and ideas for projects and share them with one another.

I am sure that many of my students are already using sites such as Pinterest & tumblr and I think that being able to use them in the classroom and showing the students how to properly use them would be a great lesson. I already teach them about how to be safe on the Internet and using popular sites that they love would be a great way to get their attention.

I really liked exploring the photo sharing sites and even learned about some new ones I had never heard of. One of my favorites had to be the video on "Seven iPhone Photography Tricks". My iPhone is the device I use to take 99% of my pictures and learning those tricks was really helpful.

Thing 1: Blogging

Yay! My first ever blog post!

My name is Shannon and this is my third year as a Library Media Specialist. I work in the Wappingers Central School District and teach K-5 at Fishkill Elementary School. I received my Bachelor’s degree from SUNY Plattsburgh in Elementary Education, and shortly after a Master’s degree from The University at Albany in Library and Information Science. I always knew that I wanted to be a teacher and work with children but I never would have imagined I would be a Library Media Specialist. If it weren't for my mom, who is also a Library Media Specialist, I would never know how great it is.

I decided to sign up for this class because blogging has been something that I always wanted to do and figured that this class would give me the kick in the butt I needed- and would also be a really cool opportunity to share my thoughts and ideas with fellow colleagues. I am also interested in introducing blogging in my classroom to some of my older students and am hoping that I will learn some new ideas to share with my students.

I really enjoyed the first lesson and was happy to be able to have spent some time looking at different ideas for starting blogs with my students, and seeing some different ideas about what schools and libraries can do with blogs. I really liked the blog post "Why Students Should Blog". I think that blogs are a great place for students to express themselves in a safe environment, and can be a great place for teachers to give effective feedback to the students.

I am really excited to start this adventure and can't wait to see what lies ahead!