It seems appropriate that the TV series Amazing Race   (how about that permalink) ended this past weekend about the same time that this Amazing Race is ending.  As the participants of the TV series visited new lands and challenged themselves with things they thought they could never do, so too have the members of this course visited places they had never seen and challenged themselves in the Web 2.0 world.

As I mentioned to Shelley around Thing 20 this course has been:

·      Fun

·      Frustrating

·      Entertaining

·      Adventurous

·      Stimulating

As the next season of “Lost” begins next month, I think I will find myself going back to the island of Web 2.0 with hopefully not so many pitfalls as Jack, Kate, Benjamin, Hurley and the gang. As they say on the CBS “Lost” Website:

The band of friends, family, enemies and strangers must continue to work together against the cruel weather and harsh terrain if they want to stay alive. But as they have discovered during their 70-plus days on the island, danger and mystery loom behind every corner, and those they thought could be trusted may turn against them. Even heroes have secrets.

Sound a little like our adventure? As for the next step, hopefully I will be a coach for this class at my school as I convince teachers to experience the 23 Things.

• Under the Forum I found a reference to the new Microsoft Surface technology and also a post about Student Response Systems that we are investigating at school.
• For groups, I found 305 groups and found it interesting that many only had 2-4 members. I did find a John Dewey group that I told the school principal about. He is a Dewey disciple and did some of his doctoral work based on Dewey’s theory of education.  I think this will be a good way to introduce him to social networking.
• As for Tags I was hoping to find something on vocational education but was surprised on the lack of material. Perhaps this is an area that I could improve on with help from our staff.
• Under Members, I would like to see some sort of search by state or country to help find people in my area. However this probably defeats the purpose of social networking. At this point there are almost 15,000 members.
• The Latest Activity impressed me the least because I am not interested on a minute-by-minute update.
• The Video section delighted me the most because it showed some of the skills that I acquired during this class. I found the video “The Networked Student” which was created much like Common Craft videos. I was so proud that I could use Zamzar to download the video to show to staff members. Four “Things” ago I could not have done this.

I still have the feeling that the Web 2.0 world is still under construction because when I first tried to create this post I couldn’t get Edublog to respond to my site.

• I think Google docs could be used in an introduction to computers course where we would not have to have MS office on all the computers.
• I think we should have all the academic teachers require their students to use Google docs for compatibility since work done at home is often done in different word processing programs and it drives the teachers crazy.
• I think the vocational shops should use the spreadsheets and documents of Google documents when they show students the business side of the trade in doing job estimates and business proposals. Google docs also take care of the storage problem and students losing a document.
• For collaboration our English “shop” course would be a perfect fit. This course forces students to write essays and have other students review and comment on each other’s work. The English teacher has been looking for something better than Office and I think this is it.

For my “How To” video I searched for n-scale model railroading layouts and found some very impressive videos that will provide great input when I finally can get back to a hobby after this class. My favorite video is of Matt Ryan leading Boston College over Virginia Tech in the last two minutes of the 2007 game.

My next step is to create some tutorial videos for teachers using the Flip Video camera. I discovered the Flip Video from a video by Bob Sprankle on the K12OnLine conference from Thing 12. I also searched for videos on the Flip Video.

In TeacherTube I checked out a number of the construction trades (electrical, carpentry, plumbing, etc) because we have a construction cluster at our school. I didn’t like the ads at the bottom of the screen and there was not a lot of content for the trades. This is an opportunity for teachers at our school.

I have to admit to owning an iPod Nano but only using it for music. I have always used it to get away from work stuff. I use it on my daily walks and at the gym. I think I’ll try a couple of subscriptions via iTunes and download to the pod to see if it violates my “free space”J

For some strange reason I liked this Thing.  For starters it didn’t require my email address. Secondly this past year, I have started reading a lot more. I guess this is more of my retirement preparation.  I even went to my local library after 25 years and got a new library card. It’s so easy now. All my books can be requested electronically over the web. No more having to search the stacks as in the old days.

I think I will try Library Thing since I seem to have been recommending a lot of stuff I read to teachers and family.  From my cursory inspection, I like the reviews and some of the groups.  I can definetly see the web 2.0 aspects of social networking. Book clubs can now meet on-line. I could use this site  to challenge my grandchildren to read more.  At school we have a book club that meets every week. I will introduce them to the site.