Diigo tag dictionary [Organization]

Lately, I've been using http://tr.im to shorten links. I really like how Tr.im searches my Twitter feed for links that I've trimmed so I can get stats on those links. It's interesting to see which links people click on and which ones go relatively unclicked. For instance, I just sent a message to @concretekax with some smack talk about the Tigers and Twins. I thought it was a pretty personal message, in the sense that it would only be interesting to the two of us, but there are 18 clicks on the link I sent to a story about Justin Morneau being done for the season. I don't know why. I just find that interesting.

So, I started digging through the links I've sent out to see which ones have been the most popular. I don't have any graphs...oh wait. I think I do!

These are the last 10 links I've trimmed and shared on Twitter. Most of them hover around that 25 click mark. So imagine my surprise when I saw I had a link that has been clicked on 150+ times!

I realized I haven't shared that link on here, so here it is, with a little background first.

I've talked up Diigo on multiple occasions, but one thing that was giving me trouble was tagging my bookmarks so I could easily find them again.

When I hit a breaking point, I had all these different tags for the same idea: 21stcenturyskills, 21cskills, 21skills, 21stC, and 21c.

I decided I needed to create a personal Diigo Tag Dictionary (DTD). For the next week or so, I kept my DTD open in a tab at all times so I could quickly see what I should tag something.



As you can see, if I want to file a bookmark under a tag that has to do with 21st Century Skills, I just tag it "21c". It may not be the most descriptive, but it's consistent.

I also set up some mental ground rules at the bottom. Again, the goal is consistency.  

This has really helped me keep my bookmarks more organized. Hope it helps you create an organizational scheme for yourself. 

There's always something with me [Reflection]

I've been making a lot of excuses lately. And I've been accepting all the excuses I'm making for myself. In an attempt at accountability and transparency, I felt the need to call myself on this trend. I went to a mentor teacher today because I needed to spill it to someone. She reminded me that we go through phases in life and this could just be the swell of one of those phases; perhaps there really is something in the way of the things I'm trying to do now. But I can't forget, as my high school football coach always told us, I don't care how rocky the water is, just bring in the ship.
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I realize this is a bit vague, so I'll give an example of one of these "Well, there's this thing..." moments I've been letting myself get away with lately. I accepted the role of Second Chance Reading (SCR) teacher this summer a few weeks after I accepted my current position. I had never (and really still haven't) taught SCR before, but I was at the point where I wasn't about to say no to my principal (<-- excuse already). SCR is a program with a strict weekly schedule. Certain activities happen each day in a sequential order. The excuses for why I haven't started SCR yet are numerous:

• SCR is supposed to take place during my Learning Lab time. Learning Lab is a focused study hall. Students who need help with Math would go to the Math teacher during that time, etc.
  
• The students who should be in SCR are all over the building all day long; they do not all have Learning Lab during the same period.
• Learning Lab runs on opposite days from Band or Chorus. If a student is in Band or Chorus, they are only in Learning Lab every other day.
• Learning Lab is also my students' Study Hall. Of a 42-minute period, I can really only devote around 25 minutes to SCR.

Today, I went to our first SCR training of the school year, after 3 days of training this summer. Today was a review and reflect day. I found myself saying "Well, there's this thing..." more times than I would like. Then I started to get down on myself to how much I've been copping out lately.

I'll say things like, "This is technically my second year as a teacher, but last year I was only half-time and this is my first real classroom." And, "I've never worked with a textbook or had a real curriculum before." Or, "I'm really not trained to teach Social Studies."

When did I get so annoying? I am officially going to snap out of it. I can't make any definitive promises, as (no really) scheduling really is an issue with getting my SCR class going.

But I am no longer going to look for excuses. I am going to seek out solutions.

Don't blame the medium [Hmm]

I was lucky enough to get the phone number today of an educator who is a whiz at using Google Docs in the classroom. Before dinner, I gave her a call to see if I could soak up any of her knowledge. We spoke for a half-an-hour, with 25 minutes dedicated to the mundane issues of her life and 5 minutes of some great info on Google Docs sprinkled throughout.

Although the info really was great, it got lost in the blah blah blah of the rest of the conversation. I just can't handle going through that again, I thought to myself. As soon as I hung up with her, I dialed AT&T and canceled my cell phone plan.

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The previous story is not true. I made it up. How ridiculous would it be if it were true, though? Pretty ridiculous. That's how I feel when people tell me they "quit Twitter because they don't care about the mundane stuff in people's lives."

I'm not saying everyone has to be on Twitter, or even that it will be useful for everyone. There are just too many uses of Twitter that don't involve following people posting about their lives for that excuse to work. You control who you listen to (follow) and if their tweets don't fit with what you want to read, you unfollow them. Don't blame the medium.

Some uses of technology after the first couple weeks

Two full weeks into school, we have two teachers using Drop.io in their classrooms:

• Communications is using Drop.io's voicemail recording feature to have students record podcasts to be shared with each other
• Vocal Music is using Drop.io as a repository of solo audition audio files for students to either stream or download

I used Bubbl.us in my classroom to mind-map the idea of being "too descriptive" with my Language Arts students. The next day, I had a student bring me a Bubbl.us mind-map she had created based on choosing a book: too easy, too hard, and just right. It may just be this age, but I'm convinced Bubbl.us is what got her to take the learning home. Even in the first two weeks, we've done plenty of mind-maps on the whiteboard. No one brought me evidence they replicated it with a different idea at home until I brought in technology.

Yesterday, my classes discussed our classroom blog. We also talked about the reasons for blogging, and we discussed commenting on blogs. We talked about safety and spending time with their parents on the Internet. I'm excited to see how many students follow through on this (long) weekend's assignment: show your parents around our blog and convince them it's worthwhile to sign up for email updates. I want to hear from those students who couldn't convince their parents to find out why. Lack of content? Don't want all the emails?

I've already seen a big bump in our visitors from yesterday to today!

If you're wondering what I'm up to...

You'll find out on MrGoerend.com. I'm going to do my best to keep up with Tagmirror -- I've got some ideas for blog posts brewing, I just need to take the time and energy to write them -- but I can't make huge promises. My attention will be focused on my kids -- as it should be -- and because of that, MrGoerend.com is where I'll be doing the brunt of my blogging.