KING of new technology?

I have always thought of myself as good with new technology and found that learning new software has always come easier for me than others for some reason. Until Web 2.0. I now for the first time in my life feel overwhelmed with technology and all the blogs and igoogles and diigos and readers. I'm a super-organized type person and have always liked my content in a box. With Web 2.0, it's no longer in a box. It can jump out of the box if I tell it to. Or someone else can tell it to jump out. I realize that I no longer have as much control over technology as I used to. I also realize I much prefer a boxed content such as the Adobe suite to things more free-form like bloggers (although ironically I'm writing about this ON a blog). But, I guess it's as they say, "Times are a-changing". Not sure who to quote that to but I'm guessing it's from 1850 or so. (There was a lot changing back then, look it up). So with that, I'm back to the seemingly disorganized array of new Web 2.0 tools in an effort to put my anal-retentive organizational tendencies into overdrive to make them behave like I want them to. (And with that, he left the building)

picture by: Dan4th, "ripping hair out", September 28, 2010 via Flickr, Creative Commons Attribution

BP_Diigo Group

Here is my Diigo group: Brian Thomas Action Research. I've invited many good friends and even friends that are critical. None have had a chance to respond yet but I anticipate they are chomping at the bit to get into such an elite group. I'm a little puzzled at the uses of Diigo currently as it seems like I'm just copying and pasting articles I find from my EBSCOhost folder in the Diigo account. I don't fully understand why my critical friends are going to want to read my research articles but I'm assuming it's because I'm still new to the process of an Action Research project.

BP2_iGoogleScreenShots

Here are the screenshots from my iGoogle homepage.

Home Page

FSO Page

AR/CBL Page

ETC Page

BP1_Google Reader

My first REAL blog post. I've never really done the blog thing so this will be interesting. I've also never done the Goggle Reader thing so this whole course is going to be a new adventure for me.

The five RSS feeds that I've chosen to follow seem to be great fits for my action research project.

Education News - The New York Times »

I chose EDUCATION NEWS because I really like the short education opinion articles that it posts. They are fun reads and can offer quick insightful ideas.

RETHINKING YOUTH MINISTRY »

RETHINKING YOUTH MINISTRY is great because it offers simple lesson ideas for youth ministry. I was really involved in youth ministry in our old community in Alaska and I'm excited to build relationships with youth at our new church and start up a small group. The ideas in this blog can be great for mini-lessons.

Simply Youth Ministry || Simplifying Ministry ... Saving You Time »

SIMPLY YOUTH MINISTRY offers some sage advise for youth leaders and gives points to ponder in many of the articles. It also offers some teaching which is a great benefit of this blog.

YOUTH MINISTRY IDEAS - Games, Lessons, and Resources »

YOUTH MINISTRY IDEAS provides lessons and games that you can pull right out of the box and make your own depending on the needs and dynamics of your own group and community. It also has a picture or video in almost each post which makes it much more attractive. I can now see the benefit of us doing this as well in our own blogs.

Youth Ministry Resources (YouthPastor.com) »

YOUTH MINISTRY RESOURCES is centered around youth leader education. It provides resources to help youth leaders become better teachers by providing tips and suggestions for leading youth groups. I've already found some really great ideas here just by panning through a bunch of the articles.

What happened to this post?

It's a mystery.  Mostly I just don't know how to delete it.

Packers vs. Bears

The Packers play the Bears tonight and I feel that noting this is worthy of the first post ever on my new blog.  Of course, I will be cheering on the Packers.  I do feel bad for the Bears though because I can't imagine anyone will actually be cheering for them.  Including those in the stands.  But never-the-less, I do expect it to be an exciting game to watch.