This is my very first (and only) GIF.  I cannot begin to explain all of the learning that went into my being able to create this little baby – it’s the story of my backyard by the way – but the hoops I had to jump through to create this animated image are actually irrelevant.

What IS important, is that when I first began watching Jim Groom’s session on creating GIFs, my immediate thought was, “This is over my head, not for me, it will be a long time, if ever, before I can do something like that!”.

But all week long, people in our etmooc community were posting their GIFs.  How hard could it be?  I felt out of the loop.

With the help of my husband, (much against his wishes, he has been learning right along with me!), I managed to create a GIF using the free GIMP software suggested in the Tumblr tutorial we were sent in our etmooc Digital Storytelling introduction.

I was so proud of myself for being able to create this silly little GIF; but then couldn’t figure out how to upload it to my blog or share it on Google+.  Each time I tried, it would lose its animation.  So I posted a question in the Google+ community.  With the help of +Alison Seaman and +Andrew Forgrave I was finally able to upload it.

What did I learn?  I learned that I can do things I never thought possible; that an online PLN is an incredibly powerful resource; that learning is not easy, but persistence and determination will be rewarded; and that success feels really, really good!

As I re-read this post, I realize that as a student, learning was always easy for me.  Math, Language, Science, loved them all… I never had trouble in school.  Going through this etmooc, I feel, for the very first time, like a struggling student.  It has given me so much empathy for those children whom I serve that just don’t “get it” the first time around.  I think that is the most powerful piece of learning in this etmooc for me.