week 2

I had never heard of RSS feeds or readers so I had no idea what they would do. I found setting mine up to be too easy. I expected it to be complicated I guess. As soon as I created my account, Google Reader pulled in all of the blogs from class. I just sat there wondering how it knew to do that? I then subscribed to my local TV channel and a couple of the bundled feeds Google offered. I find having all this come to one spot more efficient but not less information to wade through. Setting up the blog was also easy but I found it time consuming to follow every one else's until they were all pulled into my reader account.Both the Blog and RSS lend themselves to the top tiers of Dale's Cone. Maybe I should say using them would be in the top tiers. If the students were having to set them up like we did then each tool could fit in all tiers.I agree with Siegel that it is "how we use technologies to achieve learning" rather than the technologies themselves. However, I find myself on the side of not knowing how to use available technologies imaginatively. Hince I am in this class. I need to experiment with both the blog and RSS more before I can give an "imaginative" educational use for each or offer suggestions on how my second grade students might use these tools. I am reading each reflection posted to see how vetern teachers think they could be used. In all honesty, I feel like I giving a lecture on open heart surgery. I know about as much about it as I do about using these technologies.