New Technology

Find more videos like this on 23 Things on a Stick

Thanks go to Nancy McGuire for pointing my way to this. I have worked with this kind of teacher and student. Haven't you?

Season's Greetings!

Season's Greetings! Here is my favorite Christmas song.

Social Networking

This one is about social networking.
This one is about social media in general.

I love these Common Craft videos. They are simple and clear and let my students know the basics.

Summer and Reading

One of the hallmarks of this summer for me is the (almost) daily arrival of the UPS delivery person. I have been ordering books like crazy. I have been gathering YA books that I just have to read. Paranormals, historical fiction, and mysteries that I want to read. And, lately, books that will tell me more about Responsive Classroom. So that I can put into practice this fall what I spent a week this summer learning more about.

The internet is wonderful. It has vast resources. But sometimes I feel like I am getting too much information. I am a follower of lots of blogs regarding Childrens and YA literature and they keep telling me about books I just have to read. I follow a lot of blogs about my favorite genres of fiction and they lead me to great books too. Shopping at Amazon.com couldn't be easier. All I have to do is click the button and a couple of days later the UPS guy arrives with my books. (And then the credit card bill arrives!!) Sometimes I long for the days when I used Booklist and School Library Journal as my sources for what was coming. It seems like in those days I could keep up with new books. Now I am being buried.

I have said that I use summer to try to catch up on all the books I want to read. However, I have received a very good month's reading in the last few days and haven't even dug into the crates I brought home for summer reading. The first week I was here at my summer home I didn't have internet access. I think I read 11 books. Of course, those books were ones I had recently purchased and sent to my summer home to wait for me. Since then the new books have been piling up again.

I've read some really good and memorable books. King's Shield by Sherwood Smith finished the story of Inda that I have been wondering about since I read the first two in the trilogy last Spring. Linda Howard wrote an interesting comtemporary romantic suspense title called Death Angel that put a different twist on romance characters. Who would have believed that a romance between an assassin and a drug lord's mistress could be interesting? I finally read Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead and I am sure that my high school girls who are into Lynne Ewing and the House of Night sereis by P. C. Cast will like this one too. I'll be donating it and the sequel Frostbite to my high school media center this fall. I also read Undead and Unworthy by MaryJanice Davidson. Queen Betsy is getting better. Everything doesn't revolve around her just almost everything.

I've been trying to mix up the books I've been reading -- first a YA title, then a historical romance, then a paranormal. Sometimes switching from one to another feels like whiplash. Other times there are surprising similarities between titles in vastly different genres.

Enough blathering on. It's time to dive into today's book. Yasmine Gaelenorn's Dragon Wytch is calling to me.

Summer Days

I love summer!! Summer gives me a chance to try to catch up on the books I have been adding to my ToBeRead baskets during the year. Summer gives me a chance to spend time with my family. Summer gives me a chance to think and reflect on the past year. And later in the summer, gives me a chance to plan for the up-coming year.

Thus far, I'm still in the wind-down stage of summer. I've been buried in a book most of my days off so far and have read 18 books already since June 6. I have been using the LibraryThing 50 Book Challenge group to keep track of my summer reading. I have been averaging about a book a day so far this summer which should mean I'll pass 50 in mid-July if I keep reading at this pace.


I've made a couple of trips to my favorite casino. That looks like it will be a once a week thing to do. It is a fun way to spend a few hours while my brother is at work. Of course, I have to fit in my casino time around another favorite activity. I watch the Braves play baseball on my computer thanks to MLB.TV.


I've slept in late and stayed up late too. Because my brother generally works from 2 to 10, my brother's schedule is regularly staying up late and sleeping late. I find I adapt very easily to the same schedule. The thing I hate most about the school year is the alarm going off at 6 AM.

I love summer!!

Another 23 Things Group

Today I took a look at some of the stuff being done by the next 23 Things group and found a couple of YouTube things that got me thinking on a sunny summmer day. (And in a little while I'll remember how to embed a YouTube video here, I hope.)




Thank goodness for Help menus and the sense to use them.