Thing 10

This was interesting for me. I have NEVER heard of an RSS reader until tonight. I THINK I might like it....MAYBE!!! This was actually very easy to set up. Apparently I already has a Google account so I really didn't have to do anything to set this process up. I was able to simply click on subscribe and enter the URL or do a search. I spent a little bit of time trying to decide what to describe to and why. That probably took me longer than anything else. I subscribed to a couple of blogs. One is a friend, another is an local pastor, and another is from someone who posts things about her faith and her daily experiences as a college student. After looking at what other classmates were posting/subscribing to, I also chose to follow/subscribe to a 2nd grade teacher. I play fantasy football with my husband and some friends and I subscribed to a site provided by NFL giving the latest fantasy projections. I also subscribed to Toys R Us and Target, because I always want to check out the latest sales. My husband always begins his morning with his computer. When I ask him what he is doing, he usually responds "reading the paper"....I have always laughed at this resonse, but now I get it. My dad would always begin his morning reading the local paper. He still does, he just now views the paper on-line. What I found funny was that subscribing to RSS and getting updates is really the equivalent of "reading the paper". I think that Google reader (or any RSS) can certainly be a great tool for teachers. Teachers can subscribe to educational sites or blogs by teachers that provide helpful information regarding the classroom. The teachers site that I subscribed to is really neat. She posts lessons and pictures of things that the class did. Teachers could get ideas for lesson plans, etc. It is true that RSS is not necessary. A person could simply surf the web and type in URL's and do different searches. RSS makes it a lot quicker to access pages that you are interested in and tell you in a second which of your favorite sites have made updates. RSS saves a lot of time. RSS could also be a fun and easy way for parents and teachers to communicate. (I say parents, because I want to teach the younger grades)...maybe there is potential here for teachers and students in older grades (middle or high school) to communicate. Anyway, this was interesting for me to learn. I think I will like it. When I wake up tomorrow, I will be sure to log onto my google reader and "read my paper".