Technology Medley

Nothing technology related here, but I love this video and wanted to share.

I enjoyed this article found in Business Weekly about 21 items, mostly technology related, that have become obsolete in this decade. It really makes you think about how quickly our world is changing.

If you don’t have time to read the entire article, here’s the list of items that are covered:

PDAs
Email Accounts You Pay for
Dial Up Internet
Getting Film Developed
Movie Rental Stores
Paper Maps
Newspaper Classifieds
Landlines
Long Distance Charges
Public Pay Phones
VCRs
Fax Machines
Dictionaries and Encyclopedias
411
Music CDs
Floppies and CDs for backup
Bills in the Mail
Buttons (instead of touch screens)
Losing Touch
Boundaries
Paper
Record Stores

What would you add to the list? Please leave your suggestions in the comments!

Salem City Schools recently added Google Apps for Education to its list of technology options. Google Apps provides a free alternative to Microsoft Office products for students in the secondary schools to use. Teachers can easily create and share documents and calendars with each other as well.

I have created several files explaining how to use the various features of Google Apps in Salem. The plan is to add gmail this summer to replace our current mail system. Even though some of the information is specific to Salem teachers, others may find it useful. You can access the pdf files from these links:

Your Dashboard

Start Page

Contacts

Google Calendar

Google Docs Overview

Google Documents

Google Presentations

Google Spreadsheets

Google Forms

Google Sites

Just before Christmas, 2 little bichon frise puppies came to live in my house. Having lost my elderly dog last May, I had forgotten how much work, and how much joy, having a puppy can bring. Having two at the same time was a whole new experience! This video was taken on their second night in their new home:

Here are a few things that we can learn from puppies:

• Explore – Don’t be afraid! The world is the limit, and that’s how you learn.
• Elimination – Sometimes it’s necessary. Just let go of those things that you no longer need.
• Play – Play a lot!  Chase a ball, pick up a stick, just to see what happens.
• Snow – 16 inches of snow to a 10-week-old puppy at first seems overwhelming, but soon it becomes one more thing to investigate. Go ahead…jump right in and see what happens. There is always someone nearby to rescue you should you find yourself unable to climb out of the snow drift by yourself.
• Nutrition – Feed your body and your mind. Keep yourself growing by learning new things.
• Chew on that – Sometimes you just need to take time to think about new technology and other tools and how to best use them in your classroom.
• Chase your tail – Feel like you’re running in circles? Stop! Take a break. Turn off the computer, call a friend, create a special meal, do something for yourself.
• Accidents – Realize that accidents happen. Accept the consequences and learn from your mistakes.
• Greetings – Greet your friends and family with love and excitement, even if they’ve only been gone a few minutes.
• Rest – Take naps, and get plenty of rest.
• Affection – Thrive on attention and let people get to know you. Everyone can use extra hugs!
• Simplicity – An old sock can become a favorite toy. Delight in the simple things of life.
• Help – Before you get too frustrated with a task, let others assist you. Don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it.

I’m sure that those of you who own pets can relate. If you have additional items to add to the list, please leave a comment!

Occasionally, you may find a SMART Notebook file that contains one or two pages that you’d like to use, but you don’t want the entire file. The simplest solution might be to delete all of the pages you don’t want. Just click on the page thumbnail and select Delete Page from the dropdown menu.

However, what if you already have a file created and you want to copy those same two pages into your file? If you have the original file open right beside your own file, you can drag the pages from one to the other. Here’s a short video that might help:

What are your goals for the new year? How will you challenge yourself this year? What will you learn? What will you do differently? How will your new skills impact your instruction?

Why not try at least one new thing with your students this year? Create a VoiceThread, use the SMART Board, allow your students to blog regularly, use a Flip video camera, Skype with another class, create projects with Kidspiration and TimeLiner….the list could go on and on.

While we’re discussing the new year, I’m thinking about my own future as my retirement approaches in June. I do plan to substitute and maybe work with some technology projects in the school division next year, so I’ll still be around. But I often find myself drifting to that land of the unknown, wondering what I’ll be doing 3, 5, or even 10 years from now. The part of this job that I have enjoyed the most has been actually working directly with teachers, showing them how to use a new piece of software or how to create lessons using new tools on the internet. I love teaching classes and creating resources for teachers to use at their own convenience. So, where will this all lead? I’m not sure.

Maybe I’ll teach classes at the community college or one of the local universities. I’d love to teach a technology integration class to pre-service teachers! Many of the courses that I have seen in college catalogs still emphasize using Word and PowerPoint, and there’s just so much more that these students need to be familiar with. Maybe these could be taught online. Who knows? It’s something to investigate though.

Delving into a myriad of new software programs and exploring all of the options (many of which are well hidden) has been another part of the job that I’ve enjoyed. I think I’d like to work parttime with a software company as a trainer for those folks who are just learning their product. I’m not sure how to even get started with that though, since most of my contacts are in the education field. Anyone have any ideas or contacts?

Then there’s my background in music to consider. The stereotype little old lady piano teacher doesn’t have a great deal of appeal, but I do love playing the piano, and occasionally the organ. Playing for weddings, funerals, and subbing for churches might bring in a bit of extra income.

Of course, I do plan to relax and de-stress a bit, play with the puppies, quilt, read, explore things on the computer, have lunch with friends, and travel. As a matter of fact, I already have a trip planned for September! That will be the first time in my entire life that I’ve been free to take a vacation in the fall!

I’m really looking forward to this next stage of my life and I am grateful for all that I’ve learned in the past 33 years working in education. Life is a great adventure!

fireworks image: “Harborfest_Fireworks_3″
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sunsurfr/494866647/

The absolute easiest way to add a hyperlink to a Notebook file is to copy the URL from your browser and then paste it into a Notebook page.  It’s also simple to add a hyperlink as a attachment to your file by clicking on the attachments tab, clicking Insert, selecting Insert Hyperlink, and filling in the required information. Either of these methods work great when you want your hyperlink to be easily available while using a Notebook file.

To add a hyperlink to any object, first select the object by clicking on it. Make sure you are in mouse mode (Click on the arrow tool. If you are in text mode, you won’t be able to create a link until you switch to mouse mode.)

Select link from the dropdown menu.

Your options are Web page, Page in this file, File on this computer, and Current attachments. Don’t use the “file on this computer” option unless you’re positive that the Notebook file will never be used on a different computer or on a computer that is not attached to the network server.

You may also select how you want to activate the link.  Selecting Launch by clicking Corner Icon will add a small blue icon to the corner of the object. Selecting Launch by clicking Object will open the link just by clicking on the words or shape. If you later need to edit this object, you can get back to the dropdown menu by right clicking.

I’m often asked to explain this thing called Twitter. After all, CNN is doing it, Oprah is doing it, seems everyone is doing it. Just what is Twitter anyway? It’s simply a website in which you can tell the world what you’re doing at any given moment. If you use Facebook, it’s very similar to the status updates. You set up a free account, fill out your profile, and start entering text. You’re limited to 140 characters per post. 

At first glance, it really does seem a bit silly to post what you’re doing for all the world to read. Twitter asks you to answer a very simple question: “What are you doing?” For most people, the answer would be “Who really cares?” After all, do we really need to know what everyone is having for dinner or what they’re watching on television?

However, Twitter has become almost a mainstream tool in the past several months. Why are so many people signing up for a Twitter account? Why should you consider it?

When you first begin adding your own status updates, it may seem as if you’re “tweeting” to the wind, especially if you have not built up your network. You can type and tweet to your heart’s content, but if nobody is following you, you probably won’t see a lot of use for this tool. So, you’ll want to find some people with common interests to follow, and most likely, they will follow you in return. That’s how you build up your Personal or Professional Learning Network (PLN.)

Go to Twitter4Teachers, select your area of interest, and click on names of people who have something in common with you. Take a look at their Twitter page, and if it looks as if they are posting items of interest to you, click on the Follow button. I’ve been told that you actually need to build up a network of 40-50 people before you begin to see the true benefits of Twitter, but it all depends on the quality of folks you choose to follow and how you choose to use your  network.

Twitter is an awesome source for discovering new resources on the web. Chances are excellent that when something new and interesting is released, someone on Twitter will broadcast it. It has become a tremendous source of professional development for many of us who are using it.

It’s also a great source of quick information. Have a technical question or need some opinions? Tweet it! If your followers are online, someone may just have the perfect solution for you.

Here is a great handbook with lots of ideas for using Twitter in education as well as for tips and tricks for your personal use. I strongly recommend that you check this out if you are interested in learning more about Twitter. There is also a simpler guide written for K-3 Teachers that could easily be adapted by educators at any level.

If you set up an account, be sure to complete your profile with as much information as you’re comfortable with. At the very least, let folks know that you are involved with education.

After you’ve set up your network, you might want to use a third party tool for checking your timeline instead of the Twitter site itself. A couple of the most widely used ones are iTweet and TweetDeck.

Below are a few usernames of Salem folks who you might add to your network, but be sure to expand your network to include people with similar interests throughout the world. That’s when you’ll truly discover the value of Twitter.

elemtech
mthumphrey0
kristynshepherd
southreading1
rieflin
haseibert
scotthabeeb
dewayneharrell

(I’m sure there are others I’m not aware of, so you’d like to be added to the Salem list, please leave a comment. Also, if you go to these pages and notice that it’s been a while since the person has tweeted, that doesn’t mean they’re not using Twitter. They’re probably still checking their timelines to see what useful information they might learn from other users.)

So, you have created a fabulous PowerPoint that you want to share with your students, parents, or perhaps friends and family. You could always send the presentation by email, but what happens if it’s too large to send as an attachment, or what if the recipient does not have PowerPoint installed on his computer? There are several places on the internet that allow you to upload your presentation and then share it with others.

If your presentation is complete and you know you don’t need to do any further tweaking, upload it to Slideshare.net.  After it has been uploaded, you can edit the privacy settings and share it with specific people or make it public. You can even copy the embed code and make it viewable within your own web page or blog. You can also give others the option to download the presentation as a PowerPoint file to their own computer.

Here is a presentation within SlideShare on creating effective presentations:

If you want to continue working on your presentation, or if several people are collaborating on the same presentation, consider uploading it to Google Docs. Set your sharing preferences as desired. You may even want to start from scratch on Google Docs and bypass PowerPoint altogether. There are a few built-in themes, or you can upload your own background.

This year, all teachers in Salem are being asked to have some sort of online presence for posting student assignments and other class information. Many of you already have a web page or blog, and you do an awesome job with these! For those of you who are just getting started, here are a few options:

Salem provides web space for all employees, so this is probably your most reliable option. However, it can also be time consuming to create your own web site. For that reason, we do have some templates available to help you get started. Here’s an example of one that Mrs. Beamer at West recently created. If you would like to start with something cute but easy, let me know and I’ll send you more information.

For more flexibility, but a steeper learning curve, you might want to create your site completely from scratch. Katie Crotts at South has a really cute kindergarten site that you might enjoy looking through.

You can update your web pages from home by using either FrontPage or Expression Web. You can find those directions here.

Other options include creating a blog or a wiki. Edublogs is designed specifically with educators in mind, but the free version does include advertisements. This is a wonderful blog site, and they will remove the ads if you upgrade to an Edublogs Supporter account for $40 a year. With this comes the ability to remove ads for up to 30 additional blogs.

Google’s blog platform, Blogger, is very easy to use. The only issue with this site is the Previous – Next Blog links that show up by default at the top of the page. These literally take you to random blogs, many of which are not appropriate for school use. There is a simple script that can be added to the code to remove these links, so if you want to use Blogger, go ahead and get started. Let me know when you’re set up and I’ll help you get rid of the navigation bar.

Wikis are very simple and quick web pages. There are several options online, but my personal favorite is Wikispaces. If you go to this page, you can apply for an ad free wiki. Our India wiki is a good example, but yours does not need to be this involved.

There are also numerous web sites that provide space for web site creation. I have not used any of these, but if you’re interested, please check them out. Be sure to check for ads and make sure you can live with them if there are any. If you find one you really like, let me know and we’ll find a way to make it work for you!

Weebly

Google Sites

Bloust

Yola

ClassJump

SchoolRack

Hipero

I can’t wait to see what you all come up with!