Google Reader- Bringing Information To Me!

A couple weeks ago I created my first RSS feed through Google Reader. I decided to use Google because I love using Google Docs, so I figured it would be an easy transition and I would be more likely to use it regularly if it was linked to my email account. So far, I have really enjoyed Google Reader. It allowed me to bundle different sites I liked according to categories. This makes it very easy for me to find the latest information based on my interest at that moment.

Here are a couple screen shots of my Google Reader page:

  

I've been checking on the Reader almost every day and am constantly amazed by how much new information there is. I have gotten some really great ideas and information about literacy and technology most specifically. There was one site that I added which I read frequently called Teen Literacy Tips.  I commented on one of his recent posts called Wikipedia as Bathroom Graffiti. Although the comment is pending approval, I basically let him know how much I appreciated the article he provided in the post because I will be starting a research project soon and I will be using the article now to explain Wikipedia to my students. He mentions that it should be used as a resource to get started finding information, but not as a source.

I have enjoyed checking my RSS page each day and finding all of the new information. I have noticed a difference in frequency of updates between the literacy sites and the technology sites. The technology sites that I subscribed to are updated either every day or multiple times each day, whereas the literacy sites were only updated every few days.

On another site that I subscribed to huffenglish, I saw an interesting variation in the posts. One of the first posts I read from that site was about the Delicious site potentially shutting down. She wrote an interesting piece about how word spread that Delicious could be shutting down and her own use of Diigo. Another day she posted about Diigo Links that she used and I noticed that it is a weekly post that she does. This is neat because it provides me with even more resources that I can add to my own Diigo account. A third and most recent post of hers described how she had students design their own test questions based on literature they had read using Bloom's Taxonomy. I liked this idea a lot. It is something that all teachers learn, but why not teach these levels of learning to the students? Being aware of Bloom's Taxonomy and how to create their own levels of questions could certainly help students to analyze their own thinking processes and how they approach questions. I would like to put my students up to this challenge one day.


Now that I know what Google Reader is and am becoming more and more familiar with it, I am shocked with how much time I wasted in the past by not using it. It also helps me to really stay on top of the different areas of education and technology that I am interested in. Before, I knew about many of these sites and might visit them once or twice a month on a whim. However now, I have all this information being delivered right to me! I look forward to all that I will learn by being constantly connected to such great sources of information. I am already finding ways I can use the information I learn from these sites in my classroom. I think this will be a huge change in how I look at the internet and how I keep myself informed about current information.