About Blogging

Here are some of the things we've been learning about technology.

At the most basic level, a blog has only text about whatever the blogger wants to write. But ideally, blogs should include links to other things on the internet. There is an option called "Blog This" that is a fast way to write a blog about a certain website or webpage. Just add the "Blog This" tab to the tabs on your computer.

A tag is a key word that is used to search for certain items on the internet, when using Boolean operators. If you set up an account on the del.icio.us website, when you find certain websites that you want to be able to reference easily, you can can tag them. You should tag them in such a way as to be able to find them later (or else what's the point of tagging it anyway?).

To publish photos, use a program like Pikasa. You can find it at pikasa.google.com, which is a fantastic photo organizing program.

The reason I am typng this is because I am in the computer lab right now learning about it, but I'm pretty tired. I know that taking notes helps stay awake and focused, and it has worked well for me.

Stepping Up

My role at the school is to be an assistant gym teacher. But sometimes, like today, the head gym teacher is gone and I fill his shoes. In those times, I tend to see the gym class differently. I tend to feel more resposible, so I take care to make sure everything is as ready as it can be before class begins. I also am more aware to the realities of what certain age groups are capable. This doesn't happen so much when I am serving as an assistant because it's not my decisions that determine how class will go, but rather the head teacher's.

Stepping up for a day has a way of either boosting or diminishing my confidence. This morning when I found out for sure that the head teacher would be gone, I had a small amount of stress because I didn't know how it would go. But then I realized that I would just do the best I can and that things would work out OK. As I write this entry, my confiidence is bosted because I realize that nothing serious went wrong during the day. Also, we played a certain game with second grade and again with first grade. I found out during second grade class that I needed to be a little more specific in giving instructions, so with the first graders, I improved and they understood the directions great. Seeing improvement is always encouraging.

I'm not sure whether I would want to be the head teacher for a whole schoolyear. For all my life, I have felt most comfortable in roles where I'm a leader, but not the very top leader. I guess I lack the confidence that I could really head up something big. But hey, there's still plenty of time to get better at that. There is always a learning process which involves making mistakes and growing from them, no matter what the goal is. For now, I am thinking about setting the goal of becoming confident as the top leader of something. I'm probably qualified in more ways that I know to "Step Up".