Thing 7 - Email/IM/Text Messaging

I'm pretty comfortable with most of the items listed in Thing 7. My first experience with IM was in 1994 when I joined AOL. I "met" a lot of people (and the rooms weren't full of trolls and spam at that time), but I had a really rude awakening.

At the time, I was just beginning to use an online service at my home, and AOL automatically set up my account. I was amazed by what the service had available. What I didn't realize was that there were no local access points; I was actually connecting to an access point 150 miles away. In other words, I was making a long-distance call every time I logged on.

My first phone bill was over $500! For a young teacher (with not a lot of fun-money), that was terribly shocking. I called my phone company, and the customer service rep didn't even know that a computer could make a long distance call. Times have changed!

I have used a number of IM services - ICQ, Trillian, and currently, MSN and Google Talk, when I have GMail open. Most of my family and friend communicate using IM. I generally leave MSN on and chat with people throughout the evenings.

I have used IM at school to conference with a number of colleagues on peer coaching issues. Our district bans chat for students, although we have done a few projects where students communicate with other students throughout the world. I like the idea of using an Instant Librarian (mentioned in the video), and that may come as more students take online courses during the day. If anyone doing the 23 Things Project wants to practicing IMing...I'd be glad to chat!

I was not impressed with the email tips offered on 43 Folders blog, but I also don't have problems with email taking up my time. I would have to say that I'm much more productive because of email. It helps me keep records of issues, communicate quickly and respond to requests as soon as I get one. If I set my email to check every hour, I'd actually fall behind! Of course that's the nature of my job. It is obviously different for others. Most of my friends and co-workers know that it's quicker to contact me by email than by phone!

I have 6 email accounts which are set up for different purposes: receiving political mail, responding from an anonymous account, family and friends, purchasing items, and work. It's really a good filing system. My accounts are on gmail, yahoomail, hotmail, inbox, my home ISP, and my work Exchange server.

In the middle school, students are banned from using personal email (they sneak it around, of course) but I have requested some students to use their accounts for school work, when appropriate. Our district has the capability for students to use the Exchange server, but it has not been enabled yet.

For teachers, I believe email has made a huge impact on productivity. I know that we rely on being able to communicate immediately by distribution lists. One of the issues I had always struggled with was how to make time to meet with teachers to plan lessons and projects. Email is now the preferred method for a majority of teachers. We can trade ideas and edit documents together without chasing each other down. Staff meetings can focus on curricular issues and not the nut-and-bolts information dumping that can be handled by email, rather than a face-to-face. District meetings can be scheduled and confirmed by email, rather than rely on interschool mailings. How did we survive without email? :)

Ah text messaging, the bane of the middle school teacher. Heheh. I could actually see this as a tool for teachers to remind students of assignments, or to help if students are struggling with homework - provided the teacher is agreeable to that. I personally don't like it for the simple reason that it TAKES FOREVER TO TYPE on that small keyboard! I'm impressed that kids are so fast. It just drives me nuts.

Webinar: I went through the "How to Create a Podcast" webinar. Great, great tool. We do use Atomic Learning in our district - especially the multimedia classes - but I love the additional pdf handouts. What a great resource. I'd like to advertise this for teachers.

I checked out Meebo and Twitter. I usually only use one IM service (MSN), but if I had more, MEEBO would be a great resource. When I did use a few services, I used Trillian, which is a stand-alone IM app. I preferred that to having to deal with many programs and their variety of "bip" sounds. It would be nifty if we were able to connect with other teachers and students and presenters using IM. I have noticed that more sales reps are using online tools like IM to present to districts. It has saved us money, and we are still able to get the information we need.

Twitter is a little anal for my tastes. I'm sure some folks like to be able to stay connected, and I can see this being a good resource for teens and their friends and parents. Perhaps it would work well for an admin or other employee who is on the run a lot.

I also joined the 23 Things Google group. It'll be nice to see other folks on there. I am a member of another Google group about...you guessed it...dogs, so my icon is canine-related. Hope to see folks in the group!