The Bashful Blogger

Twitter Remote is a widget that shows which twitter users recently visited your blog or website.

I purchased Keynote Remote on iTunes for $1.29 and without a doubt it’s the best $1.29 I’ve ever spent.  For you Windows users out there Keynote is Apple’s far superior replacement for Microsoftt Powerpoint and now it’s even better.  I can use my iPod Touch as a remote control for presentations on my MacBook Pro – using wi-fi anywhere in the room! Using Keynote Remote I am able to progress through the slides in my presentations by swiping the screen.  If I hold the iPod in “portrait” the current slide and presenter notes are visible.  If I hold it “landscape” I can view the current slide as well as the next one.  Keynote Remote only works with the iWork09 version of Keynote but we received this free from the Ministry of Education this week!

I’ve had a play but I’m really looking forward to my first opportunity to use it for real – probably next week at a parent orientation evening.  Wish me luck!

It’s been big news today – Google Earth can now give us under sea views.  The educational potential for this tool is huge!  Imagine hooking the students into a new topic by exploring under the sea on the data projector

Just been trying out TwitterSheep to see a tag cloud of the bios of my followers on Twitter.  Very interesting.

div.mosaic img{ padding:0px; margin:0px;}Make your own Twitter Mosaic.

I noticed a couple of weeks ago that Amanda had been tagged for a meme by DigitalLearning and I remember thinking that she was lucky.  However, once I started reading Amanda’s meme a couple of days ago, with a sense of dread and anticipation, I got a funny feeling that she was going to tag me and sure enough she did!  So here are seven things you may not know about the bashful blogger …

1.  I’m a Palmerston North girl originally

I’m the youngest of seven kids and was a real surprise as my mother was 44 and her children ranged from 16 to 26 at the time!  My favourite teacher at school was the late Miss Eleanor Thompson – she was the teacher who greeted me on my very first day at Central Normal School and I was lucky enough to have her again in my fifth form year at Palmerston North Girls High School.  I have had the same best friend since I was 15 years old – Anne – and every year we celebrate our anniversary like an old married couple (28 years and going strong)!   Here’s a photo of us at my 40th a couple of years ago! When I was nineteen I started working in the Department of Food Technology at Massey University and met Karl.  We moved together to Wellington a couple of years later and married in 1990!

2.  I have a pen friend!

Her name is Hisayo and she lives in Japan.  When I was 8 Hisayo and her family lived in Palmerston North for a year – they lived just around the corner and Hisayo and her brother, Motoya, were both in my class at school.  When Hisayo left Palmerston North we kept in touch with many letters and Xmas presents.  It slowed down over the years but 35 years later we still send the occasional email and cards at Xmas and birthdays.  She is a doctor and married with two sons now.

3.  I used to be a marching girl!

I started off in the reserves and over four years worked my way up to leader of Minuet Midgets Marching Team!!!!  I’ve got 101 medals from our competitions but they haven’t seen the light of day in a few decades …

4.  My mother died when I was 18

She died suddenly (heart attack) when we were at a family gathering and it has been the single most important and defining moment of my life even 25 years later.  It’s a difficult time to lose a mother as those teenage years are turbulent and I was no exception!  A couple of years ago I made a scrapbook dedicated to my mother and included stories about her life that I gathered from discussions with family.  Her name was Lily, my 10 year old daughter is Georgia Lillie and mum’s great grand-daughter is also Lily.  She was 62 when she died and would be 87 today.

5.  Before teaching I worked in admin and later the computer industry

The first computer I used in my working life was a Wang in 1984 in a legal office.   Next I had a Redstone PC at Massey University and was using Wordstar on a floppy disk (no hard drive).  In 1987 I started using IBM’s DisplayWrite at the Wellington Hospital Board as PA to the CEO.  I hated that job so moved quickly to ICL, a now defunct computer company, and had my first taste of email.  I moved onto another now defunct computer organisation, Digital Equipment Corporation (now Compaq), where I really got into helpdesk support, desktop publishing and email.

I started teacher training in 1992 (aged 26) and bought my first PC running WordPerfect on MS-DOS.  I still have every document I’ve created since the day I got that computer from lecture notes and assignments to weekly timetables, unit plans and class lists!  The first year I taught I was the last teacher in the whole school to get my register totalled correctly at the end of the year – the others were all off drinking while I was still at my desk with a calculator in one hand and twink in the other.  The next year (1996) I started day one with my register in Excel and the teachers at my current school are still using that same spreadsheet in 2009 – amazing!

6.  I’ve lived in Australia, Switzerland and Singapore

My husband has had a few jobs that have required us to move over the years.  We’ve lived in Melbourne twice (three years total ) and our son Harry was born there.  We were only in Switzerland for only a few months then headed for the expat lifestyle in Singapore where we stayed for two years.  Harry was diagnosed with Autism while we were there so we came home earlier than expected so we could better cater for his special needs.

7.  I’m into scrapbooking

I got into this accidentally as I have always loved taking photos and keeping albums.  Over the years my albums got more elaborate until I finally realised there was a name for what I was doing – scrapbooking!  I love getting the albums out to look at with friends and family.   I don’t do scrapbooking very often anymore, just mostly for special occasions like weddings, birthdays etc.  I’ve got a sea chest full with about 10 years photos (pre-digital cameras) still to go into albums!

Now 7 people to tag to carry on the tradition:

Lyn

Bridget

Karen

Kathy

Catherine

Lyndal

Anthea

I just discovered TweetWheel tonight.  Lots of fun to see all the connections with your Twitter friends!

I’ve been passing on a link to this Christmas wiki of Suzie’s quite a bit recently so thought I would do a posting so I don’t have to keep emailing to everyone!

It’s a great source of Xmas ideas, activities, websites so enjoy and thanks Suzie!

I don’t know why but the Milestone 2 report for our cluster has been a mammoth task!  Milestone 1 was certainly not a small  task but does not compare to the amount of work put into this latest one.  Trish and I spent many hours working our way through the requirements, principals wrote individual school reports and I added in statistics from our online survey.  Suzie then checked what we had done and came back with many required improvements to put it mildly!  After submitting the report and contract variation for the third time today they were finally accepted so I can try and catch up on my “real” job!

It may seem mad but I met with our principals today and set most of our dates for 2009!  I’ve learnt my lesson with the milestone process and I’ve already planned in meetings and workshops around the 2009 milestone dates so we are organised well in advance.

MagnumMac opened their new Auckland flagship store last week in a prime location – 123 Broadway, Newmarket. My husband was away on the day of their official opening and taking my two kids along with me didn’t appeal so I had to put off my first (sans brats) visit until yesterday. It was worth the wait!!!! The store is an ‘Aladdin’s cave’ for Mac fans and I returned home with a long list to pass onto Santa. The interior of the design is suitably stylish as you would expect for the display of Apple gear and makes the shopping experience even more enjoyable. I will definitely be a regular visitor ….

Photos are  from the MagnumMac website.