Well, a few days have passed since my last post, but I am back to my 23 things. This evening I played around with the myriad of tools that Google has to offer, specifically the calendar, notebook, and news alerts.
I have to begin my response with a disclaimer of sorts: I am not a calendar keeper. (Perhaps this is why I never know what the date is! I rely on my A.R friends, family, and students for this information. My watch does have a date window, but as my forty-something vision changes, that added enhancement becomes moot. I love that word - moot! I shall add it to the list of words I love...) But I digress: generally, I can keep about a month's worth of important dates in my mind, and I leave planning beyond that to my husband. JTKIII is a great calendar keeper - - pages are color coded by event and events planned up to a year in advance.
This cavalier attitude toward planning might suggest to some that I am disorganized or careless, but I am not. I just resist the idea of filling my days for the sake of filling them. Remember what Thoreau said about "work, work, work!" and the "infinite bustle" of human life. "Simplify, simplify, simplify," he offered instead, and it is a suggestion that I try take to heart.
As long as I am quoting my favorite transcendentalists, let me throw in a little Emerson.: "Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. " So now, drawing on latitude offered by those particular words, I will add that for all of my resistance to calendars in my personal life, I do (of course) keep several s calendars in my professional life, ranging from long-range overviews of the school year, semester overviews, monthly calendars, and daily lesson plans. In that light, I can see an application for this tool with my students. How about a class calendar posted on my website? Homework assignments, upcoming tests, papers and projects, library dates, etc... Could students even post dates on the calendar? It can be edited by multiple parties, I think! I played around with the options, and it is quite easy to use.
And speaking of student use, have you looked at the Google Notebook? Any teacher that has taken a class of kids to the library for research will find this feature helpful. Because of the great library website that our district created and all of the wonderful resources we have to choose from, the kids have little trouble finding material; however, organizing it and keeping up with their print outs is another matter. Wouldn't it be neat to have them use the Google Notebook as a system of record keeping? With all of the neat organizational tools this feature offers, the students could even arrange their material into an outline of sorts.
Oh, one last option I used was the News Alert feature, setting up a daily e-mail alert with news releases featuring "Top Chef." It is on Wednesday night, you know... Who will it be? Richard, Stephanie, or Lisa? My fellow TC afficianados know that I have been plotting against Lisa for some time now, just waiting for her to get the boot... surely tonight will be the night! Back to the news alert, I'll be anxious to see what ends up in my e-mail tomorrow following tonight's program.
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