Wow! The Time Flies!

I can't believe that it is almost time for Christmas break! This year has flown by for many reasons but let's take a minute to look at the technology that we've added for use here at CC since last May.

Probably the technology item that has had the most impact on classroom instruction this year is the installation of several new Epson Brightlink and PowerLite data projectors. The interactive features of the Brightlinks have definitely been a big hit with teaching staff. These were purchased with Title find monies and the plan is to add even more projectors with some of this year's Title funds. Other items purchased with Title funds are a site license for ExamView, curriculum software that works with the interactive projectors and wireless remote presentation devices.


Our new Ruckus wireless campus with both private and public access was installed over the summer and is up and operational. Because of the ability to add the CCPublic segment we were able to open up the ability for teachers to connect their own personal laptop, iPad, or other device to the Internet and use it in the classroom. Student use is currently still limited to only the private network but we are hoping to be able to give more access after Christmas break.

We've also added Google Apps for Education. Each student and teacher now has a Google Apps account which allows them to create documents, presentations, spreadsheets, forms/surveys, websites, blogs, etc. Google Apps also allowed us to give each student a school e-mail account. Using Google Apps for Education allows students and teachers to create and edit documents from anywhere with a broadband Internet connection without having specific software installed on your Internet device. Users can also collaborate on documents and projects live from various locations. Several teachers have already begun using these new tools for various classroom projects.

This year we are expanding the use of Stoneware via DOGR Connect (affectionately called "Dogger" by most staff). Staff can access their network server space from any computer connected to the Internet as well as applications such as Infinite Campus, Outlook, etc. DOGR Connect is also being used to make school activity calendars available as well as various online forms such as work orders for maintenance. Stoneware is a powerful tool and more features will be coming later.

Going Beyond Everyday Google Search

We all know of Google. We all use Google, probably on a daily basis, to search the web for articles, images, and research for our classes and daily life. It's become the go to search engine for most of the world. However, did you know about all the enhanced searching that Google has/is developing? I found a post recently from another blog that I follow by Joyce Kasman Valenza. There are a wealth of other options for searching but many are buried in the Google Labs. Here are a couple samples of what's available:

Google Squared: creates a matrix of examples perfect for students looking for topic options or comparison projects.
Google Sets: List 2 or 3 similar items and this search engine will then predict what other topics would fit in the set. Great for getting a list of topics for students to research.

There are also other ways of viewing your search results. After hitting the search button on a topic, on the left side under All Results are some other options for viewing the topic. Wonder Wheel gives a graphical organizer sort of layout while Time Liner gives a time line of historical references for the topic.

Pretty cool and useful stuff!

Math Class Makeover

Interesting video about revamping your math class.



What do you math teachers think about this?

The Avalon Project

The Avalon Project is a free online resource created by Yale University. The site is a digital collection of original documents from various time periods from 450 BC through current day. It's amazing and would be a great resource for teachers and students in U.S. and World History courses.

Brightlink 450Wi Projector

CC is looking at purchasing additional data projectors for classrooms with some our Title funds. One of the new projectors now available is the Epson Brightlink 450Wi Interactive Projector. This high end projector plus pen combination integrates interactive functionality in one piece of equipment. All you need is this projector/pen combo and a wall or hard surface to project onto. Have you been interested in using an interactive whiteboard similar to the Smartboards we have in some of our classrooms? If so, this projector combines similar functions right in the projector. No need to worry about where you're going to put the whiteboard in your crowded classroom. You can see more at this link: http://www.epsonbrightlink.webengager.com/Education/

Would you use one of these new interactive projectors in your classroom or would a regular data projector work better for your situation?

Tech Smith Grant

As you may have read in the CC update newsletter e-mailed the other day, TechSmith, the creators of various screen capturing software, announced a grant that would award schools copies of their software for free. Both Catholic Central and West Catholic applied and were approved! Our grant includes 50 licenses each for both Camtasia Studio and Snagit as well as a 1 year subscription to Screencast.com Pro. The total for the grant is $11,000 per school. So what will this allow us to do that we can't do now?

Snagit allows the user to capture a copy of whatever is on your screen. You can capture a certain area, an entire window, or a scrolling window. Once captured, you can apply effects, arrows, text, etc. to further describe the item. You can then share this with other applications such as Office and it also auto-stores them for you. So, if you have a web page that you want to capture a certain screen of and include further explanation of you can, and then send that to Word to include with your assignment. Post the entire thing on Blackboard.

Camtasia Studio goes a few steps beyond Snagit and allows you to actually record exactly what is happening on your screen. You can create videos that demonstrate a process, an application, or an idea you want to share. You can edit your product and add text callouts, arrows, additional photos, music, etc. for a full featured video that can then be saved in several formats such as iPod, Media Player, Flash, etc. I'm sensing some training videos coming from my office!

Screencast.com allows you to upload and store your videos online. You can then invite people to view it, assign a URL, or embed it in your Blackboard course or your blog/wiki!

Would you use this in your lesson planning and creation? How would software that allows you to do these type of screen captures enhance your lessons?

Interested in Expanding Your Personal Learning Network?

Here are some great online resources for expanding your PLN with educators across the globe.

LearnCentral

Tapped In

Classroom 2.0

All offer discussions, online tutorials and webinars, mentors, etc. Social Networking with a purpose!

The Lost Generation

Are our students "The Lost Generation"? Watch this video:   Gotta love the reverse of perspective!

Rushton Hurley at MACUL

Rushton Hurley is my new favorite educator to follow for ed tech information. While at the MACUL conference this year I saw a large group of people standing outside one of the larger lecture rooms. It was jammed and people were still lining up to hear him. He's dynamic, fun and entertaining to listen to and has extremely good ideas and resources. He has taught at both the high school and college levels (foreign language - Japanese), been a high school principal, and has run an online school. His new project is Next Vista for Learning an online library of free videos for learners everywhere. There are videos here showcasing various careers and subject areas (Lightbulbs), tours of other countries (Global Views), and videos about volunteering (Seeing Service). The project is fairly new so the collection is growing daily. Here's an example of what one student created about the Boy Scouts of America an organization that the student was active in and felt strongly about. Remember this was created by a student of about 13. Wow! Rushton shares freely so if you're interested, sign up for his newsletter. Here is a link to one of the sessions that he held while at MACUL: Hordes of Free Tools from a Google Certified Teacher. Find anything you could use there? Any ideas of similar tools to share?

Student's Aren't the Only Ones With Their Heads in the Clouds

Cloudcomputing. What is it and why should we care? Cloudcomputing is a fairly new term on the technology horizon. The Wikipedia describes it as: "... Internet-based computing, whereby shared resources, software and information are provided to computers and other devices on-demand, like a public utility." Click here to read more from Wikipedia. Basically, it's a means to deliver the software and network access that you normally would have to be at school to use from any computer connected to the Internet. That means you can get access to your server space and other resources from home, a conference with available wireless, or while you enjoy a cup of coffee and a pastry at your local coffee shop using any wireless device. Doesn't matter if it's a laptop that's owned by the school, a Windows Vista or 7 Home Premium PC that you've recently purchased, or an iMac/MacBook Pro. Even your Internet-capable Smartphone can connect. Pretty cool!

Soon our secondary schools will be starting a demo of Stoneware, a cloudcomputing solution, that we are looking at implementing in the near future. Not quite sure why they picked a name like "Stone" to represent the Cloud but I'm not their marketing person so I digress! :-) Anyway, a few of your fellow teachers will be trying out this software and seeing how it works for them. Hopefully it will be a successful trial and we can begin adding additional users and a full implementation for staff for the upcoming school year.

Google Voice

Google Voice is a web 2.0 app that gives you a "virtual" phone number. You can hand out that number rather than your real number and then set the software to ring any or all your phones or go directly to voicemail. The product is currently in beta so you have to request to be included. Once you get the response you can apply for a number with a local area code and begin using the service. One nice feature of the product that I thought might be useful for a classroom teacher is that you can record a conversation. It does tell the caller that they are being recorded so they will know up front. You then have a record of exactly what was said by both parties. Might be nice for those phone conferences. Check it out and sign up for your Google Voice account at http://voice.google.com

Any ideas of how else you could use a tool like this in your classroom?

Macul 2010

Wow! What a whirlwind two days at the Macul 2010 conference in Grand Rapids. I learned so much but am now on technological overload! There are so many new tools but just not enough time to try them all out. So... I'm going to start listing them here and hopefully some of you will also give them a try and find a few new tools to use in the classroom! Please feel free to comment!

To get you started I thought I'd mention Evernote. This is a free app that works on all platforms of computer as well as mobile phones, and iPhone/iPod touch. What does it do? Evernote allows you to save things you see, save ideas you have, or save items you like and then find them again from any device you use. All for free. You can upgrade for a fee to get more storage space and additional features but the basics are all there for $0! Check it out here: https://www.evernote.com/about/learn_more/

How could you use this type of tool in your classroom? How could students use this type of tool?