Task 23. Reflections...

I am really glad that I started on this and thank Helene Blowers who set it up and Lynnette and Denise who found it and organised it for us. I started off feeling very negative as it has seemed to me that so much stuff posted in blogs and You Tube etc is garbage.
However I have been forced to learn so much that is really useful.
For me my Yahoo photo account will be wonderful and I can see the point of Library Thing.
What I really intend to do now is start a wiki probably calling it "Glenlyon growing native plants" There are lots of people in our area all trying to re-establish native vegetation and we could all learn from each other. If I set one up with a list of indigenous plants and a page on my experiences over 20 years, and put a note about it in the local newletter I am sure others will contribute and make corrections.
If I do an interesting overseas trip I think a public blog would be the way to go. You could give all your friends the address and just add new posts as you had a spare minute, and upload photos as you had the time.
I feel much more confident now about all these new things happening on the web, and yes, if there was another course I would do it!

Task 7. Yahoo photos

I have investigated Yahoo photos for this task. I have not yet bothered to get into digital photography as I am not very interested in photography. However I have decided to get a digital camera in Japan in March. I have been sent plenty of photos as email attachments to my Yahoo email account so I sent some through to my Yahoo photo account and have set up two albums. I also practised with rotating, naming and moving around photos in "Our family" and chose the covers for both albums. So I am ready to start using a digital camera and will certainly keep this account going.
The link is
http://uk.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/cmgbellair/my_photos

Both albums are public so anyone can look at them

Task 22. Downloading books

I had a look at Overdrive audiobooks. The ones available are certainly very limited. I chose "At Bertram's Hotel" which is an ebook to read by Agatha Christie and downloaded it onto my computer. I chose that partly because I like Agatha Christie and partly because it seemed easier to download something that runs on Adobe reader. In fact I had to update my version from 5.0 to 6.0 but I don't wish to lisen to audiobooks on my computer and I didn't especially want to download the software. I can see that if you had an MP3 player it would be good to download books and music to listen to while driving, but all the different software systems you need to download first to listen to items in diferent formats are a nuisance.

Task 21. Podcasts

I have investigated podcasts and had a look at some. I have downloaded one onto my bloglines account. It is called Grist environmental news. Myself I am not very fond of listening to radio, but I can see you could listen to an interesting talk as you drive.
You can see my choice at my bloglines account
http://www.bloglines.com/public/cbellair

Task 20. A Quick Tour of the Gail Borden Public Library.

Seems well resourced- a drive-in library!! I did it! I posted a video on my blog!. Mind you I didn't find much useful stuff on public libraries but I suppose we can be amazed at all the features American public libraries have and we might get some ideas.

Task 19. Web Tools

I had a look at the awards and chose to do a new customised home page with Google. It is great. I have got BBC world news and Economist news and my Yahoo email along the top.
Underneath I have got To do, Calendar, Weather australia and Wikipedia.
Below them I have currency converter and a Google map centred on Daylesford.
My only criticism is that the calendar is American with the months and days back to front!
I might change the home page around a bit but I am certainly sticking with it.

Task 18. web based applications

I have created a document in Zoho and saved it , but when I click on "publish" in Zoho and then click on "publish in blog" nothing happens so I cannot transfer it across. I will try again tomorrow.
Zoho seems like word to use and I have emailed my document both inline and as an attachment, but I feel frustrated not being able to publish the recipe that is my document.

Task 17. Learning 2 wiki

I have added an entry to the favourite holiday spots (I did Tuscany and Rome) and added my favourite animal (goat, which no-one had got on the list!)
I also added my blog to the list of favourite blogs. I wish everything wasn't so American. If its not going to be Australian I'd rather it was English.

Wikis

I have long been a fan of wikipedia, which usually seems to provide good information for secondary students. I have been looking at the library wikis and really like the book review ones like the Princeton public library one
http://booklovers.pbwiki.com/Princeton%20Public%20Library
That is a great way for people to discuss and recommend and get ideas as to what to read.
I know Anita is interested in getting one up and running for Yarra Plenty
I can see how they can be useful for instance if a group of people were collaborating on writing some document.
Also if one were created for an event like a conference.
Also for a group. For example my husband has a motor glider and a few hundred people round the world have similar ones. It would a great way for everyone to contribute information and edit contributions.

Image generators

Here is a calendar made from a photo from our walking holiday. It is of the shipwreck coast

Future of Libraries

I have been reading the articles on libraries of the future and was interested in the dismissal of the concept of the "just in case" collection. This is the big shift that we are making at Yarra Plenty at present in response to the fact that non fiction gets less use than fiction but has as much spent on it and more space assigned to it.

Technorati

I have claimed my blog in Technorati and will in future consider give my posts tags if they have any worthwhile content



Technorati Profile

Del.icio.us

I have set up an account and put the two buttons on my browser, bookmarking a couple of websites on climate change. I can see how it could be useful but I haven't yet worked out how you have a look at what other people have tagged under that heading

Roll Your Own Search engines

I have put together one of these on Climate Change with an Australian focus using Rollyo
The web address is
http://www.rollyo.com
and mine should be found under climate change or climate change Australia

Library thing

I have joined Library Thing and catalogued a few books.

The website is
http://www.librarything.com

My account name is cmgbellair.

I joined the group"What are you reading"

I can see it can give you ideas as to what to read but most members seem to be American though there is a Australian group.

Task 5 Uploading photos from Flickr

Hooded Plover (Charadrius rubricollis)
Originally uploaded by pierre pouliquin.

We watched a pair of these on a deserted beach on the shipwreck coast when we walked the Great Ocean Walk from Apollo Bay to Princetown

I started a Flickr account and uploaded this photo from Flickr

shipwreck coast

This is a very wild and unspoilt coast. There is a beach with

shipwreck coast
Originally uploaded by Caroline Bellair.

anchors from wrecked ships half buried in the sand. we also

saw a pair of hooded plovers, of which there are only 600 in

Victoria

RSS feeds

I can see that this could be useful and I have set up my bloglines account
I have chosen RSS feeds that are mainly news like BBC world news. You can see my selection at

http://www.bloglines.com/public/cbellair

A LOOK AT MASHUPS

I found this link via maps. I had a look at crags to climb in Scotland on the Orkney Islands and in the Hebridean Islands. My brother is a doctor in the Hebrides so I visit there and I love walking. You can zoom in and out of the maps and choose the crags that interest you, and see photos of them

http://ukclimbing.com/databases/map

Introduction

I am going to use this blog to post information and articles about the environment because that is what I care most about