Technology Memo #2

1. Staff Meeting Sign-up – Here is the link for today’s staff meeting. Click, submit, and enjoy the cascade of professional development credits that will be coming your way.

Elliott 09-10 Staff Meeting Classroom Management and Student with Special Needs

9/2/2009

3:00PM-4:30PM

Elliott Elementary

2. Staff Addresses – This is an oldie, but a goody. Everyone must update their information in Staff Addresses in Public Folders. I can tell if you have or have not by looking at your work telephone number, so please update it. This is important for the school to be able to contact you. E-mail me if you need help on this matter. Paras can e-mail me their information to update.

3. Extra Cords or Cables – You know those extra cords and cables that you use to decorate the inside of your closet? Well Bill and I would love to take those off your hands. Please send those down to us.

4. Website of the Week EPals – This is a district purchased e-mail service website that connects classrooms around the world. You can connect to other classrooms in the school, state, country, world, solar system, universe, time-space continuum, etc. Ms. Martinez’s class used it last year when entering a video contest (which some of her students won awards for). Mr. Sorrows is using it this year for Web 2.0 websites that require registration. E-mail me and I will create secure e-mail addresses for your students that are monitored by you. Nothing goes in or out without your permission. Besides being educationally useful, you will look cool to your students. And, really, isn’t that what education is all about.

Technology Memo #1

The first two memos of the year will have a lot of nuts and bolts type stuff, so please be sure to patiently read through my literary opus to see that you are up date with beginning of the year technology “to-do’s.”

1. Blackboard – Make sure that you have signed up for “Elliott Staff Resources,” “Elliott Staff Lesson Plans,” and “Elliott Day Card.” As of 8:34 AM I have made sure that everyone who has signed up for lesson plans and day card have been given rights to post their plans and day card. Since day cards are now on Blackboard, you do not have to e-mail them, just post them to Blackboard.

2. Birthday – Everyone likes to be special on their birthday, so make sure that you add your birthday to the Campus Calendar in Public Folders and add “Elliott Faculty” to the “Invite Attendees” spot. Make sure to click “Recurrence” so that your birthday shows up on the calendar yearly. If you would rather that I do it, just send me your birthday and I will add it to the calendar, but that means that I get to have a piece of your birthday cake (see staff handbook for clarification on this matter).

3. Staff Addresses – Everyone must update their information in Staff Addresses in Public Folders. I can tell if you have or have not by looking at your work telephone number, so please update it. This is important for the school to be able to contact you. E-mail me if you need help on this matter.

4. E-mail Signature Good, E-mail Stationary Bad – Add a signature line to your e-mails by going to the Options arrow and clicking “E-mail Signature.” This will save you time when writing e-mails. On the other hand, do not use e-mail stationary like colorful designs in your background. This takes up valuable space. If I see that you are using one, I will send you a polite, non-threatening, form letter on how to remove the stationary. It doesn’t make you a bad person; it just makes you an e-mail-space-taker-upper.

5. Website of the Week – I was going to highlight the changes that I made to the Elliott website over the summer, but instead I want to highlight one of our new staff members. Ms. Roa created a blog on Friday that is absolutely top-notch! She used Google’s blog site, www.blogger.com to create he blog. She has games, facts, pictures, surveys, and more. Blogger is really easy to use because there are so many easily accessible widgets, applications, or whatever they’re called to add to your blog. Blogs can be used for parent communication (spelling lists, announcements, class projects), research (links), and a plethora of other classroom uses.

Paper Free Elliott

Feel free to post ideas for saving paper and maximizing technology in the classroom. My goal is to save time at the copier, save paper, increase student enthusiasm, and to make the classroom more efficient.

1. Use student H drives to save compositions and other work that can be produced on the computer. Ask your self, would you rather rely you or a student to keeps track of one of the tens of thousands of pieces of paper in your class or would you rather access that document from your desktop?

2. E-mail a Power Point presentation to teachers/students or drop a Power Point into students' H drives. We are all used to giving a Power Point presentation and printing copies for the audience or not giving copies at all and making the audience rely on memory. Why not send it or give it electronically before the presentation? Your audience will be able to take ownership of the Power Point to make it fit their needs. Students can add notes and pictures to it. Teachers can elaborate and type ideas for lessons instead of filing it away.

3. This is from Diane Mikkelson. When you organize you file cabinet and get rid of old papers, use them as printer paper. This also sets a good example for your students and they will look to save paper for you as well.

4. Create a blog to post directions for your classroom. Instead of printing and re-printing reading groups rotations, group assignments, etc. post them on your blog and teach the students to go to your blog when they need directions.