5 #iPad Apps for the Itinerant

Whew, over the last few days, it’s been horrible suffering on my Macbook. For some reason, the OS is clunky, slow, and though it has pretty pictures, I am definitely missing the command line. While playing around with my iPad, I’ve had to do some interesting jobs and stumbled on some apps that you may find of interest.

App #1 – SSH Mobile Free

For example, while at work (my previous job), after turning in my equipment, I realized I could tweak a setting on the server to improve performance for my team. Rather than go borrow someone else’s laptop, run Terminal in Mac or boot from my LubuntuLinux USB flash drive, I decided to see if I could do the job with the iPad. 

Sure enough, you can get the job done with the ad-supported SSH Mobile Free. It allows you command line access via SSH to a Linux server.

App #2 – Splice Video Editing

As I was looking for great ideas for an iPad intro activity for a staff development, I ran across Mark Wagner’s workshop activity that involves using Splice Video Editor (ad-supported but free). Although designed for the iPhone, the Splice app was surprisingly easy to use (that is, I found it to be an easy app for a video-challenged person like myself) to create content.

App #3 – Onion Browser

If you’re looking to surf the web incognito on the iPad, the $.99 Onion Browser app will allegedly make it possible. It certainly seemed to work as I tried it out with Check TOR and IPChicken.com, both of which identify your IP address. Not familiar with TOR?

Tor is a service that routes your data through a sort of tunnel composed of Tor-connected computers, allowing connections to be made more or less anonymously, though with a significant penalty to transfer speed. Until now there was no easy way to connect your mobile browser to it, but Onion makes it a snap.

You install it just like a regular browser and there’s some initial configuration of Tor, but after that it should be fairly easy to operate. You can manage cookies to control who tracks you between sites, and at any time you can create a “New Identity” that clears away every record and gets you a new IP address. (Source)

For $.99, it didn’t seem that big an investment. I’ve only used it once, and I look forward to using it in school districts I visit that have things “locked down.”

App #4 – Fileboard

Someone mentioned Fileboard in some blog post, so I thought I’d give it a shot (and, I added it to my must-have apps). I’ve since had time to play with it even more and find it quite useful when accessing documents from a variety of sources, such as Evernote, Dropbox, Box, and others. It simply gives you access to content

App #5 – SuperFiles Lite

Need to FTP a file from a web/ftp server somewhere? Then you have plenty of choices…but one of the few no-cost, ad-supported ones that actually works is SuperFilesLite. It’s a beautiful looking app that allows you to download content, delete content (file by file, not folder as far as I could see).

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Learning with the iPad

Learning with the iPad 

Goal
Provide students with engaged learning opportunities that not only transform delivery, assessment and differentiate the delivery of instruction, but change how students and staff create, collaborate, communicate, as well as develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills in a globally connected environment. Students and staff must develop new literacies–skills, strategies, and dispositions–that enable them to engage in the 4Cs–Creating, Collaborating, and Communicating as they hone Critical thinking and problem solving skills (Source: http://p21.org/overview).

Need
Students need increased differentiation to engage them, and educators need to be able to assess that differentiation in efficient and robust ways. New technologies and increased connectivity, the twin requirements for trans-global communication and collaboration make old technologies increasingly obsolete. Essentially, education leaders (e.g. teachers and administrators)  and students must employ technology in such a way as to redefine how they approach teaching, learning and leadership. This means a radical departure from what we’ve done as educators and students in the past, shedding preconceived notions of what a classroom looks like, feels like, and how it operates.

In fact, it is not enough to be able to evaluate web sites, synthesize information, but important that students and staff be able to create and craft compelling narratives—digital stories—that encompass, as George Lucas shares, the “language of images and sound.” Text is no longer enough, and new literacies require a level of fluency that teachers today have not yet grasped systemically in K-16 education.

What Success Looks Like
Success in this endeavor is defined in the following ways:

In the Classroom:

1. Classroom usage of iPads will reflect student creation of content, rather than content-consumption of instruction. For example, instead of watching math videos, students create them.
2. Students and staff create interactive videos of projects and  mini-lessons to increase differentiation and easily make them public online.
3. Students and staff  create and use online student surveys and audio/visual apps to voice their emotions, curiosities, and academic goals.
4. Students and staff employee district-hosted and cloud-based storage solutions, as well as websites such as Google Docs and Edmodo to create a faster feedback loop. Since these sites (e.g. GoogleDocs, Edmodo) utilize color coding, instantaneous feedback, and automatic student grouping, they facilitate data analysis.
5. Students and staff will develop multi-media presentations to communicate concepts and theories.
6. Students will increase research and global connections as they access information portals and network with other students in other places around the world to research curricular topics.
7. Students and staff will be able to use online texts enabling them to annotate and highlight materials for their personal reflection as well as writing research.
8. Students and staff will be able to share writing from rough draft to finish copy in a highly efficient way.
9. Students and staff will share presentations and respond in real time to presentations given by the teacher and other students.
10. Students and staff will interface data collection probes to collect experimental data in the laboratory setting.
11. Students and staff will collect, organize, analyze, and report experimental data, results, and conclusions in an efficient and professional manner.
12. Students and staff will participate in, as well as design, online quizzes and exams to test knowledge and evaluate understanding.

In the School Leaders’ Offices

1. Develop and implement online assessment tools that provide anytime, anywhere access to data for analysis
2. Evaluate student and staff performance in the use of technologies that facilitate achievement of the 4Cs (e.g. http://www.lengel.net/ipad/)
3. Enhance productivity in the use of online resources.

Online via the iPad
To support robust use of iPads as learning and creativity devices, the Curriculum & Instruction and Technology Departments will design an app that facilitate access to critical curriculum resources for students and staff alike.  Specifically, this involves creation of the following:

1. A “redefined” curriculum–blending in the new Technology Applications:TEKS and the 4Cs–that takes advantage of the iPad-based creativity tools and fosters new literacies among students and staff.
2. The creation of an EC Hornet iPad App that provides quick access to resources as they become available.
3. A robust wireless network to support mission-critical usage of network-based iPad apps (no “standalone iPads” disconnected from the network are allowed).
4. A robust document sharing solution via WebDav (WebDAV is a web protocol that enables file reading and writing via the web) that eliminates the need for students and staff to save confidential information via cloud-based storage (e.g. Dropbox, Box.net) and OwnCloud.

Implementation Phases

Although a timeline is provided to frame the implementation, one can observe the progression via multiple phases (shown below). Since this project has superintendent approval, seeking approval is not included below.

Prior Planning: Mobile Learning Team Selection (Start: May, 2012)

A) Develop a team of stakeholders responsible for ensuring implementation success. The team members should include the following:

1. Executive Planning Team – Facilitator: Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum & Instruction
1. Meeting Frequency: As determined by facilitator.
2. Members:
1. Instructional Technology Specialist
2. Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum & Instruction
3. Director of Technology
2. Technical Planning Team – Facilitator: Director of Technology
1. Meets weekly regarding Phase 1 technical items.
2. Members:
1. Network Specialist
2. Account Management Specialist
3. Instructional Technology Specialist
4. Director of Technology
3. Professional Development and App Selection Team – Facilitator: Instructional Technology Specialist
1. Meeting Frequency: As determined by facilitator
2. Members:
1. Campus-based staff as outlined via the m-Learning wiki at https://sites.google.com/a/ecisd.net/m-learning/participants

B) Establish an email group and wiki to facilitate information sharing among 3 teams. Schedule weekly meetings to discuss progress.

C) Revise relevant acceptable use policies and administrative procedures (Appendix B)

Phase 1: Acquisition

Acquire student/staff (424)  iPad devices for use in schools along with necessary peripherals, such as carts, bluetooth-enabled keyboard sets for classrooms, and iPad cases.

Phase 2: Technical Preparation

This phase has various technical components, including the following:

a) Setup of additional wireless devices in classrooms to support one to one, heavy usage;

b) Increased bandwidth through the adoption of new Internet Services Provider (ISP);

c) Preparation of RFP, bid review and selection of a mobile device management (MDM) solution;

d) Creation of a VLAN or separate network for iPads; WebDav Server to facilitate document sharing;

e) Setup of mobile EC Hornet iPad app through external company after image and web site development;

f) Set District wallpaper on iPads

g) Adopt iPad insurance plan

Phase 3: Professional Learning Planning and Curriculum Re-Design

This phase involves instructional design and outlining of activities for face to face and online professional learning for staff to take place. More details are provided in Appendix A: Professional Learning Plan. This includes available iPad-related conferences to maximize exposure.

Phase 4: Selection and Development of a Virtual Learning Environment

This phase involves selection of an virtual, or web-based, learning environment (VLE). There are various choices such as Moodle, Sakai, Edmodo, CollaborizeClassroom, Schoolology, and Project Share. For the purposes of the m-Learning initiative, the District has decided on Edmodo to serve as an online repository and learning interchange.

Development of the VLE focuses on the development of appropriate groups and activities that will support student and adult learning as needed.

Phase 5: Implement Professional Learning Plan

This phase will be marked by 3 opportunities for professional learning, occurring in June and early August, 2012. It will be sustained by regular webinars to be offered throughout the school year and on-site campus support as needed.

Phase 6: Traditional and Social Media Communications Plan

This phase is marked by establishment of media contacts, creation of relevant blog and entries, podcasts with key staff and students on a monthly basis to document the iPad-based experiential learning, as well as the use of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+ to facilitate information sharing via Real Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds.

Phase 7: Periodic Assessment and m-Learning Showcase

The Executive Team will develop criteria and metrics for assessing progress on the objectives outlined in this proposal, as well as require the sharing of student and teacher creations online for the public/community. Presentations to the school board will also be made that showcase student and teacher work. Teachers will develop web pages/wiki pages that document student progress and methods through the use of iPad-created videos and content.

Key Areas to Implementation Success

This plan considers 3 areas to be key to the implementation success of this Initiative. Those areas include the following:

Infrastructure and Technical Support

• Sufficient wireless access for iPad deployment
• Mobile Device Management (MDM)
• Email Archiving to ensure archiving of student and staff communications
• Single sign-on (SSO) to ensure ease of use for students and staff to multiple district systems

Professional Development Support

• Professional Development for ECISD Curriculum and Technology Staff
• Staff Development for ECISD HelpDesk staff to provide end-user support
• Presentation to appropriate personnel to disseminate information and expectations.

Communications and Public Relations

• Social Media usage and regular documentation of what is happening in the m-Learning Project.

Assessment and Evaluation

• Ongoing assessment–focus groups, monitoring online activity–during the process. Assessments will be jointly conducted by the Curriculum & Instruction and Technology staff.

Implementation Timeline

The following timelines outlines who will do what by when, as well as designates who is responsible for checking up to ensure work is done. It also outlines the decision-making.

WHO will do…	WHAT by…	WHEN	CheckUp or CheckBack
	Participate in Organizational Meetings	02/27/2012 02/29/2012
Ms. Mary Ray	Facilitate Appy Hour Training Sessions	03/05/2012 03/19/2012 04/02/2012 04/16/2012
	m-Learning Planning Meeting	04/04/2012	NA
m-Learning Team	Visit Eanes ISD to view their implementation	04/17/2012	NA
	Order new iPad, reallocate iPad 2 as needed	04, 2012
	Order InTouch 40 Tablet Cart from Spectrum Industries	04, 2012
Technical Team	Review MDM Solution Provider proposals and make recommendation selection	04, 2012
	Consider registration ($25 for TCEA members or $50 per non-member attendees) at the Eanes ISD iPadPalooza to be held Tuesday, 06/19/2012.	04, 2012
	Revise AUP to reflect Responsible Use Policy	04/30/2012
	Develop m-Learning Proposal	04/30/2012
Technical Team	Ensure wireless access points have been ordered, purchased and scheduled for placement.	05/05/2012
	Review m-Learning Proposal	05/03/2012
Executive Team	Finalize Professional Learning Plan (PLP) for Summer Session	05/05/2012
Executive Team	Finalize selection of PLP consultants from NorthEast ISD	05/10/2012
	Principals’ Leadership Seminar Proposal	05/11/2012
PD and App Selection Team	Make specfic app recommendations	06/30/2012
Technical Team	EC Hornet App	07/01/2012
Technical Team	WebDav Server Setup	07/15/2012
Technical Team	Prepare and provide training to district technicians on MDM for iPads.	0720/2012
	Finalize outward facing web site/wiki featuring recommended apps, workshop materials, video lessons/tutorials and Edmodo groups	07/01/2012
	Schedule webinar sessions and meetings for m-Learning campus participants	07/15/2012
Communications Team	Create social media accounts to facilitate sharing of information, ideas, projects online	07/15/2012
Executive Team	Schedule school board presentations	09/01/2012

Conclusion
Prompt approval and implementation of this plan will ensure successful implementation. While no plan can anticipate with 100% accuracy the issues that will arise, we can anticipate the support structures that need to be set in place. This plan seeks to do this, and your feedback is invited.

Questions/Suggestions?
Please submit questions you may have or suggestions for improvement to the following staff….

Appendix A – Professional Learning Plan

Event #1 – m-Learning Teacher Academy
The purpose of this Academy is to model effective use of the iPad, delineate expectations, and is organized as if the teachers were the students. Only Day 1 is proposed below since it may be helpful to spend Day 2 & 3 working on curriculum and apptivities.


8:00am to 8:15am Welcome and Introduction

8:15am – 8:30 am Predicting the Future
Defining expectations for today’s session, curriculum redesign
Divide into learning teams

8:30am – 10:00am Redefining Your Approach to Instruction

1. Read article–Redefining Instruction with Technology: 5 Essential Steps and discuss with learning team partners.
2. Create Your Own Video
3. Share Your Video with the whole team

Activity Instructions: Create a Video
Interview three colleagues and video record their response to, How might you use an iPad in your role as an educator?

1. Splice 2.0 Tutorial – Getting Started (Video)
2. Download the Splice App for iOS (Note: this is optimized for iPhone, but works well on iPad.)
3. Shoot some video!
4. Edit the video, export to camera roll, then upload to YouTube.

10:00am – 11:30am Mathematics and the iPad

1. As a learning team, read this blog entry, App-tastic Middle School Mathematics and reflect on how you would
2. Select some of the math apps and create a video of how you encourage students to create a math-relevant activity.

Activity Instructions: EduCreations Interactive Whiteboard
Model how you would use a math app as if you were a student in response to the video you created with your learning team.

1. Educreations Tutorial (Video)
2. Get the Educreations Interactive Whiteboard App from iTunes
3. Download math iPad apps relevant to the lesson you want to facilitate
4. Record process of using it
5. Share the video with others.

11:30am – 12:30pm Lunch

12:30pm – 3:30pm Curriculum Re-design

3:30pm – 4:00pm Session Presentations


Event #2 – iPadPalooza
Participants attend iPadPalooza then present back to the rest of the team on what they learned.

Event #3 – To Be Developed

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

Adding Videos to Keynote on #iPad @technolibrary @kathyschrock

Earlier today (and last night), I was clutching at the hairs on my head in frustration, wondering why I hadn’t invested in a Macbook instead of an iPad. The problem? I was trying to insert videos into the iPad version of Keynote.

At first, I tried dropping videos into iTunes and synching them. That didn’t work. I scoured the bowels of the iPad–using Linux OS–to see if I could find the directory where videos are stored. No luck. Then, thanks to a conversation I’ve been having over at The Blue Skunk Blog–where Doug is working hard to de-program me after years of desktop/laptop/netbook computer brainwashing (“You’re the only one for me”)–I noticed Carolyn Foote (@technolibrary) left this remark…notice the highlighted section:

After almost a year at our school with 1:1 iPads for juniors/seniors, I concur with your statements, Doug, but want to add more.
Not only has the iPad meant that the students have internet access constantly during the day, meaning (from a librarian’s standpoint) they have access to answers to their questions during any class and can do research “on the spot,” but ours have also become useful production devices. 

Our students are using the camera and Keynote pretty heavily in various classes. For example our American Sign Language class uses the camera to film short lessons and then installs the video into Keynote where they might be explaining a concept or illustrating a story with their signing. 

Our Latin class went out in the hallways and read Latin poems to random passers-by and filmed their reactions (pretty hysterical). Other classes have used them for creating Puppet shows, our Vietnam project videos, etc.
Our statistics teacher took them out in the parking lot with the sheriff where they put on “distortion drunk” goggles and then measured how well they could walk, documenting it in spreadsheets on their ipad while out in the parking lot.
Not only can the device be used as an ereader and content consumption device, but tablet technology allows it to be used easily for mobile learning in ways that a netbook device just wouldn’t work.
Our students also used it for composing storyboards for a video, using neu.annotate to annotate pdf’s from their class, read and highlight novels for class on them, and more.
And importantly for our students, they feel more organized.
The cost, the instant “on”, the lack of troubleshooting and tech support needed are also all big plusses for our students.

I immediately tweeted at Carolyn, “How are you putting embedding videos into Keynote on iPad?” (or something similar). She responded:

Sure enough, when I visited Kathy Schrock’s guide to Moving a Video into Keynote on the iPad, I realized how close I’d been to figuring this out but still so far. Sigh.
😉 

I encourage you to read her whole post, but I’m copying the relevant part to jog my memory here so I will have it in case of a bloggerapocalypse:

1. Go into the Pictures folder on your computer.
2. Create a folder (mine is called “_pics for iphone”) (Fig. 2)
3. Put the photos AND videos you want to use with Keynote on the iPad into this folder
4. Go into iTunes and choose the PHOTOS tab.
5. Chose to “sync photos from pictures” (instead of iPhoto). (Fig. 3)
6. Pick “selected folders”
7. Check “include videos”
8. Check the folder you created which contains your assets.

This approach works, although I was careful to only use MP4 videos. After following the steps above, I switched to iPad Keynote and went to a blank slide where I wanted to embed a video, then clicked on the add button (+):

As you can see from the slide above, there is a _pics for iPad in the list of Photo resources/assets. When I tapped on that, I saw the following:

I chose the video I wanted to drop in and then modified my slide:

And, that’s that! Thank you, Carolyn and Kathy!!!

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Do It Yourself WebDav for #iPad Document Sharing

Source: http://owncloud.org

In my previous entry, I shared the Otixo approach (thanks, Mark!) to getting documents off your iPad.  But that got me thinking about what would it take to set up your own WebDav server in your District so you’re not posting confidential documents off in the cloud (e.g. Dropbox, Box.net) and, in the case of Otixo (which makes it very easy to do this), having to upgrade to their paid service because they’re so awesome.

So, wouldn’t it be neat to setup WebDav for your own use in a school district? That would make it much easier to move documents on/off your iPad. Apparently so…here are some districts’ approaches to doing that:

• We’re in our second year using ReaddleDocs, in conjunction with a secure WebDAV share for distributing the files.
• We use WebDav to interact with our network for saving files [from iPads] if needed.
• Some of the ways our students are creating with iPads – They go home with classes of students for eReading where the students annotate and take notes.They are used in science classes where students create and update “Blabs” via Blogger  (science labs + Blogger). They are also used in science classes to input data via Google Spreadsheets and use spreadsheets as feedback forms. They are used in French, where students switch to the French keyboard to create slide presentations via the Keynote app. Student work created in the Pages and Keynote app is saved to the students network folder easily via webdav. And their work via computers can be uploaded to the iPad the same way.

How could school districts set up their own Do It Yourself WebDav for sharing documents among students/staff with iPads, and not have to rely on the cloud-based services at all, eliminating the concern of storing confidential student data in the cloud?

If you don’t want to mess with those instructions linked above, you could always give OwnCloud a try. It’s a self-hosted Dropbox-like solution. As they point out on their web site:

ownCloud is perfect for use inside your company. Your data on your servers, under your control.

If you have an UbuntuLinux server, you can get started with the instructions for OwnCloud setup here.

I’m still a bit hazy on the details. How are you using self-hosted WebDav to facilitate document sharing for your iPad devices?

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WebDav on #iPad – Getting Documents On and Off

In response to my previous blog entry, Exploring Workflows on an iPad, where I mention it’s hard to save documents off my iPad when using apps like Pages and Keynote, Mark Leeson shares the following suggestion:

Go to otixo.com and set up a free account that links Dropbox, Googledocs, Box etc to their webDav service. Connect Pages, Numbers, Keynote etc to WebDav via otixo and you have a perfectly fine way of uploading and downloading from those services. works fine for me and makes iPad a near laptop replacement now. 

Another possibility–as an alternative to using Otixo–is to setup WebDav using DAV-pocket Lab, a suggestion by Lucie DeLaBruere. And, of course, you can always setup WebDav on your own server:

WebDAV is a web protocol that enables file reading and writing via the web. A few cloud storage services support WebDAV (Source: Cheap Geek)

The benefit of connecting cloud based services like Dropbox, GoogleDocs to WebDav is that the iPad supports those and I can use Otixo as a go-between to save content to any one of those services. This is important because if you create something on the iPad, you want an easy way to get the content out. For example, I spent some time last night creating a presentation Common Goals, Uncommon Approaches in Keynote and I wanted to get it off the iPad to somewhere like Slideshare where I could easily embed it. Using Otixo, I was able to drop it off into GoogleDocs and Slideshare, and voila! here it is (PDF version):

Common goals,uncommonapproaches

View more presentations from Miguel Guhlin.

You can see from the screenshot below, there are quite a few featured cloud services…for example, I use Dropbox, Box.net, GoogleDocs, Picasa, SugarSync, and for those that use Microsoft SkyDrive, that’s also available!

New account on Otixo showing all the cloud-based services one can add.

For example, if I select Dropbox, I’ll get something that looks like this requesting permission:

And, then I should be able to interact with content on Dropbox. Here’s what the web interface looks like:

According to the help file in Otixo, here’s the process for accessing your cloud stored documents:

This document explains how you can view and edit a text document that is stored on any of your Otixo connected Cloud Services within Pages for iPad.

Editing documents that are stored on a network drive in Pages is a three-step process:

1. Download and open the document
2. Edit the document
3. Upload the document back to your cloud service

Download and open the document

In Pages click on the “Copy from…” button at the bottom of the screen, and from the menu select “Copy from WebDAV”.

If your Pages application has been configured to connect to a different WebDAV account, you have to click “Sign Out” to navigate to the server configuration screen.

Next enter the Server Address “https://dav.otixo.com” and your personal Otixo User ID and Password. Then click “Sign In.”

You will see the list of your Otixo connected cloud drives. Navigate to the file you want to edit and click on the document.

Otixo automatically converts GoogleDocs Documents into a Word format.

Pages downloads and opens the document – ready for you to edit.

Edit your Document

To finish editing, click “My Documents” in the upper left corner. This brings you back to the gallery of Pages documents on your iPad.

If you want to change the file name, click on the file name below the document. This brings up a text field where you can edit the file name.

Upload the document back to your cloud service

To upload the file to your Otixo cloud drive , click on the “Submit” button and from the upcoming menu select “Copy to WebDAV”.

Make sure the Server Address is “https://dav.otixo.com“.

From the “Choose Format” panel please select “PDF” or “Word”.

Next you will see the list of your Otixo connected Cloud Drives. Navigate to the folder where you want to save your file and click “Copy.”

Pages automatically converts the file back to the appropriate format and copies it to the destination.

This process works well, although there is a limit of 250 megs per month of content you can transfer via Otixo. If you want to upgrade, you have to pay $9.99 per month for the business. I haven’t tried doing this for a month, so we’ll see how that goes!

Another neat aspect of Otixo is that it allows you to access documents via FTP…that could be very useful on an iPad:

In regards to my original problem–working with GoogleDocs, saving files created in Pages/Keynote from my iPad to cloud, opening files stored in the cloud then editing them and saving them back to cloud–Otixo appears to be working quite well! 

Of course, as great as this is, wouldn’t it be neat to setup WebDav for your own use in a school district? That would make it much easier to move documents on/off your device. How could school districts set up their own Do It Yourself WebDav for sharing documents among students/staff with iPads, and not have to rely on the cloud-based services at all, eliminating the concern of storing confidential student data in the cloud?

The process doesn’t appear too difficult based on instructions above…I’ll have to give it a try and share my results here!

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

When the Culture of Openness Fails

“Hi, honey,” I asked my daughter on Thursday when I arrived at home, “how was school?”

“Well, Dad,” she started, “all my confidential information has been stolen.“

“What?!?” I sat down, a bit stunned that now, every member of my family–except my son–has had their confidential information compromised. As much as I believe in openness, I can’t believe how often unencrypted data finds its way into the hands of thieves, especially with identity theft so high.

“Yeah, one of the teachers at my school had information for 1,253 students on an external USB hard drive. He left the hard drive in his car and it was broken into.” One of the key points in the news article is a quote attributed to an  administrator that implies, because the school is under-staffed, that it’s OK to let staff take unencrypted data home to work.

Garcia said the teacher has been reprimanded but added that NESA has a small staff and the teachers, who are busy with instruction during the day, often have to take work home with them.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/education/article/Burglar-took-student-data-3512487.php#ixzz1tIGFRiJC

Furthermore, a valid criticism may be that the school district only advised parents to review their bank accounts, credit cards, etc. to check for suspicious activity. In the past, other school districts haven’t considered that an acceptable response to data theft. According to some, the school district (or any offending agency) should pay for Equifax and similar organizations to monitor credit accounts, providing periodic updates to students (many of them just starting college) and their parents about suspicious activity.

You know, as I reflect on this information, it occurs to me that the District in question has joined the Texas Teacher Retirement System (TRS), the Texas Comptroller in failing to properly encrypt confidential data for public school staff and students. Consider that my 82-year old mother (a retired educator of over 36 years), my wife (a public school educator), and now, my daughter, and I have ALL had our data stolen due to lack of encrypted data.

The problem, obviously, is that the folks in question who deal with confidential data in public schools are encrypting…maybe it’s just not a priority, and it should be. And, we only hear about the unencrypted data breaches because, as I recall, those with encrypted data that is stolen do not have to report it.

LifeHacker.com recently shared their response to the question, Do you really need to encrypt every file on your computer? A better question might be, Do you really need to encrypt every file on your portable media? Obviously in the case of the various organization staff members, the answer is a resounding YES.

Here’s my comment that I left on the LifeHacker site…why don’t you give AESCrypt a chance and encrypt every file you save to a portable drive? It’s easy to unencrypt, encrypt, etc.

Howdy! I would like to suggest another alternative–instead of using TrueCrypt (great solution)–consider encrypting individual files (or zips of files, if you prefer) using the free, open source, cross-platform solution, AESCrypt.com. It’s an excellent tool right-click for Windows, and command line for Linux and Mac. Here’s more info on it: [www.mguhlin.org]I really wish school districts would pay more attention to this kind of advice that you offer. Just yesterday, I found out that over 1000 students’ confidential data had been left unencrypted on an external USB hard drive. If that data had been encrypted, the school district wouldn’t have to endure having to pay for credit protection for students, their families, and the public embarrassment!

How are you protecting confidential documents in the context of K-12 public schools?

Exploring Workflows on the #iPad (Updated)

Some time ago, I’d shared that blogging on an iPad was a bit of a pain. The main obstacle I found was changing my workflow…interacting with content across various tabs in a browser, flipping back to the Blogsy app (which is now working great after updates and reinstall), etc.

My previous blog entry was written entirely via iPad, and includes images, links, and more. Here are some quick tips for facilitating blog entry development:

• Double-press the Home button on your iPad to get a list of currently open apps. You can easily switch back-n-forth between apps, such as iCab browser and Blogsy.
• Blogsy makes it easy to switch to HTML view to add links in code.
• It’s pretty easy to drop images in from a google search (just search and then drag the image in…it would be nice if it provided a caption with the image source!)

As a result of the new workflows, getting things done takes different steps, if not extra ones. To get the full benefit of the iPad, it appears you have to pay for the apps that will enable you to get things done.

For example, a roundup of Google friendly apps might include the following:

1. iMailG HD – This app has made handling email, G+, and calendars on the iPad a LOT easier. Although you have to pay $1.99 for it (it’s on sale at the time of this writing), it’s made handling multiple Gmail accounts quite easy, allowing me to archive the Mail app and uninstall the Gmail app that is available for free. Although this app also appears to work well with GoogleDocs, it doesn’t recognize my Zagg keyboard…making it worthless for doc editing.
2. Picasa HD – Although I was tempted to invest in iPhoto–and had it on my must-have list–I’m not sure that NOT having it will impair my work. I simply want a tool that will allow me to easily upload my images/pictures to Picasa (and G+ for iPad satisfies that auto-upload need in a way that SugarSync can’t quite live up to, although it tries hard) and delete them when necessary. Picasa HD is no-cost, albeit ad-based alternative…you tap on an ad once, and ads are disabled throughout your experience with that app. Of course, as soon as you tap away, upon returning to the app, you will find yourself facing an ad again. Repeat the ad-tapping process, and then you’re back to no ads until you switch away.
3. GoDocs – At $4.99, it won’t break the bank, and I wish I’d spent the money on this instead of Pages, which, while beautiful, blah blah blah, still doesn’t make it easy to share content outside of the Apple prison ecosystem. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised by GoDocs which makes viewing your folders, documents in GoogleDocs fairly easy and editing online workable…much better than trying to do it via the Web browser. The acid test, of course, is trying to edit a spreadsheet Gdoc, and GoDocs makes that possible. Sharing, downloading are also options. You may want to read this detailed review on it. Note that GoDocs is best for word processing, a little spreadsheet, but cannot really handle presentations.

What do you are you doing with your iPad? Is it a “laptop-replacement” tool (which is what I’m doing with it in addition to all the other neat stuff it can do)?

Update: You may also want to read these entries on how to copy and get documents on/off your iPad via WebDav:

• WebDav on iPad
• Do It Yourself WebDav

The Bus is Leaving – Saying Goodbye to Current Work Place

Please notice the zombie in the middle panel…more on that later!

Thursday (04/26/2012) is my last day in the San Antonio ISD as their Director of Instructional Technology & Learning Services (ITLS). I began in June, 2002 and I have accepted a position with the East Central ISD as their Director of Technology, where I will start on April 30, 2012.

As you might imagine, I was delighted to receive this work of art (above) from my team earlier this week. Created by Molly Valdez (Virtual Learning Coordinator) and designed by all my team–notice the signatures–you can see what they imagine what my life will be like in my new workplace! What a laugh to get to the last panel!

Note: Although my disclaimer at the bottom of every blog post shares that what I write in this blog doesn’t reflect the opinions of my employer(s), I also practice a “Don’t write about work” policy except when it’s to highlight awesome stuff. Today, I’m sorta breaking that rule to share what some of you already know–I’m leaving San Antonio ISD after almost 10 years of service (June 3, 2012 would have been my 10 year marker!).

It’s hard to believe I’ll be stepping out of my role as Director of Instructional Technology for the San Antonio ISD, and transitioning to a new role as Director of Technology for the East Central ISD!! When I think of everything I’ve accomplished in the San Antonio ISD, I immediately realize that it was impossible without an incredible team of folks, some of them who have passed away, retired, moved on to bigger and better things, or remain offering service to the SAISD community of educators.

Left to Right: Molly V., Tonya M., somebody walking by, Claude A., Josie Salas and thanks to teammates who couldn’t be included, like Diana Benner, Sue Harris, Tamara Holcomb, Laura Lopez, Sylvia Martinez, Greg Rodriguez, Larry Stegall, and Curt Zaumeyer (deceased) who have moved on to other positions or passed away.

I also couldn’t have done anything without a wonderfully supportive supervisor, Patricia Holub:

…and wonderful friends like Carol Frausto (Director of Advanced Academic Services) and many others:

When I first arrived in SAISD, I had a list of projects to implement and I tried to do them all before the end of the first 6 months (ok, 2 months). As far as I was concerned, “The bus was leaving and you better get on it!” (no, I didn’t know about Jim Collins at the time). As an educator, I’ve always believed that the people on the bus, in the classroom, on your team ARE the right people…you just need to help them align their strengths with the needs of the organization. What a phenomenal change in leadership style after learning how important it is to empower others to achieve greatness, and less about your ideas and projects.

Since that time, I’ve had wonderful opportunities to work with talented team members, such as Tonya Mills who presented me with this graphic design work…you have to appreciate our sense of humor as we anticipate the zombie apocalypse foretold in the chronicles of The Walking Dead:

 

From the Technology Department card….

Below are some of the kind words principals have emailed:

• Good Luck Miguel, you were TOPS in my book!

• Thank you for your dedication and innovative programs. Your continuous support on an individual bases has been well acknowledge by me and my colleagues .We will miss you and wish you the best on your new position.
• It has been a pleasure working with you. It is with mixed feeling that I say “good bye”, I  am so sad to have you leave, but happy that you have a new adventure beginning
• Congratulations are in order for your promotion. You’ve done a great job at SAISD and our students will benefit from the technological advances you’ve helped create. Best of Luck to you at East Central.
• You will greatly be missed.  I enjoyed working with you and your support for our campus was outstanding.  Every time I called, you were readily and available to address our needs and for that I am very grateful to you.  Once again, best of luck to you. 
• Congratulations! Thank you for your support!
• Best of luck, sir!  You will be sorely missed.
• Best wishes in  your new position, Miguel! THANK YOU for always helping me and my staff when we needed help. Your efforts are greatly appreciated!
• We will miss you Miguel.  Best wishes to you in your new position and Congratulations.  I wish you the BEST!!!
• Congratulations! We will miss you. Best of luck to you.
• Best wishes, you’ve always been very helpful to me.
• Miguel, I will miss you and thanks for your help.

A quick shout-out: I am also grateful to Josie Salas’ daughter-in-law, Valerie. She was kind enough to bake some awesome “upside down” cake (Josie flipped the cake container on her way into work, so we’re calling it “Angry Cake” by way of saying she was protesting) and brownies:

This completely blew my diet for today out of the water! Grr…

Here’s Josie looking angry, a prerequisite for angry cake (I really had to push her on this):

Thanks to all for your wonderful emails, gifts, and everything else! In truth, the gift of yourselves and what you have taught me is sufficient in itself.

And, finally, looking forward to my time in East Central ISD:

That’s me at the ECISD Board Meeting being introduced with  my family!

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

Jacobs Educators – Teacher Award Program (Plz RT)

http://education.indiana.edu/jacobs

Matthew sent me the following email, so I thought I’d share it and the information about this Teacher Award Program! Please pass it on to folks are may be interested.

Hi Miguel,
I know you don’t know me, but I have been following your blog for a few year and I thought you might be interested in this information.
I am writing to let you know about an exciting opportunity available for teachers. I am assisting with an award program at IU that is looking for exemplary teachers. See below for more info: 

The Jacobs Educator Award is supported by the Barbara B. Jacobs Chair in Education and Technology to recognize K-12 teachers across the United States who are using technology to support innovative inquiry-based teaching and learning activities in their classrooms. Each year a small group of exceptional K-12 teachers are selected who are at the cutting edge of integrating digital technologies into their instruction. 

Each selected Jacobs Educator will receive:

• $1500 stipend at the end of their one-year appointment,

• $1000 to be used to purchase technology resources to support their teaching, 

• Funds to support travel to Indiana University in order to participate in periodic events throughout the year.

More information is available at:
WEB: http://education.indiana.edu/jacobsFACEBOOK: http://facebook.com/jacobseducators 

I was wondering if you could help distribute this through your contacts. I attached a PDF announcement. It is a really great opportunity for teachers! 

Thank you,
Matt
Matthew Callison
Graduate Assistant, Jacobs Educator Award ProgramIndiana University School of Education
201 N. Rose Ave.
Bloomington, IN 47405
http://education.indiana.edu/jacobshttp://facebook.com/jacobseducators

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Apply Online – Which System?

Adapted from http://goo.gl/AQ3Ea

If you’re an American educator, then chances are you have applied for different jobs in various school districts. Aside from the value inherent in the process of getting to know who you are, what you’re about, how to format your education and jobs in ways that engage job recruiters, you may have picked up another skill–how to navigate the various job application systems available online.

Certainly, as a person who has applied for various positions in Texas school systems, I’ve had the chance to run across systems that manage web-based job application systems. If you’re a school district human resources department, picking the right system that’s easy for applicants, easy for district staff to access content via a hierarchical administration system.

Here are 3 systems school districts are using in Texas that I’ve come into contact with:

1. Aspex Solutions‘ Applitrack: This system is in use in quite a few school districts, ranging in size to under 1000  (e.g. Archer City ISD) students to over 50,000 students (e.g. Austin ISD, Dallas ISD)
1. Waco ISD’s Implementation
2. Get the complete list online (you’ll have to set the filters for Texas Schools)
2. NetChemia’s School Recruiter – A few school districts are using this product. I found it pretty easy to navigate. In the interests of full disclosure, my current employer is using it but I had nothing to do with selection, support, or maintenance.
3. Winocular – In my opinion, this is one of the less friendlier, albeit venerable, systems available. I’ve seen several school districts move away from Winocular to other solutions, such as Applitrack, etc.
1. Canyon ISD
2. Pearland ISD

What systems would you recommend, and do you have selection criteria?

 And, for those of you who are job hunting, here’s my list of places to find Education-related jobs in Texas:

1. TASAnet.org’s Career Center – This is one of the best sites around to find out about new jobs. While it doesn’t have ALL jobs available, you will find more here than anywhere else.
2. Texas Education Agency’s (TEA) School District Jobs – This is a collaborative effort by the Texas Education Agency and the Texas WorkForce Commission. Definitely worth checking out. For example, I did a search based on a zip code in my city. Unfortunately, the result just has you going to individual district/charter school job sites. Not strictly providing a list of jobs, but if you’re are hoping to relocate to another city, it’s worth a look.
3. Education Service Center Job Pages – includes web sites from regional education service centers that offer district employment networks, enabling one application to work for all the districts they serve, or at least, sharing open positions at school districts. Some of these include the following: 
1. ASCD Job Ramp
2. ESC-1 Employment Opportunities
3. ESC-2 Coastal Bend Application Tracking System
4. ESC-6
5. ESC-7 Jobs
6. ESC-9
7. ESC-10 Teacher Job Network
8. ESC-11 DFW Area Application System
9. ESC-12 
10. ESC-13 
11. ESC-14 
12. ESC-16
13. ESC-17
4. TCEA Jobs – Find technology and education related jobs online.
5. SchoolSpring.com – You’ll find jobs on this listing.
6. Indeed.com Search Engine – Easy to use search engine that enables you to type in your city and type of job you want. For example, here’s a search for Educational Technology as well as different one for education.
7. Texas Cares Online 
8. Teachers.Net
9. Education America
10. Texas NonProfits Job Search
11. JobNab.com

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MyNotes – Debunking the Digital Natives Myth

MyNotes:

JOLT – Journal of Online Learning and Teaching

• MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching
• Vol. 7, No.4, December 2011
• Digital Natives: Ten Years After 

• Apostolos Koutropoulos; University of Massachusetts Boston, MA 02125 USA a.koutropoulos@umb.edu
• The digital native became a rallying cry for change in education, (expensive) technological infusion at all levels of education, and broad-changes in institutions that are providing learning opportunities and environments to these digital natives.
• Other overgeneralizations put forth by authors like Prensky, is that the digital natives prefer images over text, they prefer games over “serious work,” they function best when networked, digital natives can’t pay attention (or they choose not to!), and finally digital natives have skills, with digital technologies, that they’ve perfected.
• most people prefer to do fun things rather than something that they perceive of as work.
• Prensky doesn’t provide facts or empirical evidence, just suppositions. When Prensky writes about his preferred method of teaching (2001a) he writes that he prefers to invent video games, but he never considers that this may not be the most appropriate method of instruction, and that it might not be the learner’s preferred method for instruction. Thus in the same article he talks about the needs of the learner, while at the same time ignoring the needs of learners by imposing his own preferred method of teaching.
• rensky’s technological determinism culminates in a biological determinism in part 2 of his introduction to the concept of the digital native (2001b). Prensky argues that the brain’s neuroplasticity makes it so that the brain adapts to the environment that it is in, so in a technology-infused environment the brain will adapt to better use the tools that are available in that environment. While this may be true, there are two things that Prensky does not take into account. The first is that as human beings our brain is continuously rewiring itself throughout our lives. We don’t fossilize at a specific state of our lives, but we learn to use the tools that are available to us, thus digital natives should also exploit that physical ability to learn to function in environments that don’t necessarily have the tools that they are used to. The second thing that Prensky never questions, in either article, is the need to impose radical change on our educational system.
• This, taken together with the, unknown at the time, numbers of technology use within the digital native population, means that we weren’t really talking about pedagogy, and what’s really good for the learners, but rather, perhaps, change for change’s sake, or the technological equivalent of “throwing money at the educational problem.”
• Oblinger (2005) for instance portrays a vision of technological utopia, something that supposedly exists today, where students are proactively using their iPods to learn, snap photos everywhere they go and use these tools for impromptu study meet-ups.
• First, experiential learning, another name for learning by trial and error, goes back at least to the early 1900s with the work of Piaget. Presky’s later proposals (2006a, 2006b; 2010) for using peer groups, allowing students to pursue their passions, and essentially going from a sage on the stage to a guide on the side aren’t new, but they go back to Piaget (Singer & Revenson, 1996), Vygotsky (1978) and even Socrates (Karasmanis, 2002), just to name a few. If Piaget, Vygotsky and Socrates thought of these notions, this means that these traits aren’t inherent to a population who grew up in a digital age, but rather these are traits inherent in humans as a whole, and everything else is just a tool that we can utilize.
• Another trait that is ascribed to digital natives is that they are multitaskers, moreover they are efficient at it, and it is technology that encourages this multitasking.
• Has the efficiency of multitasking been proven? And how much brainpower are we giving to each individual task?
• According to Tapscott (1999) digital natives are non-sequential with their use of information, going back and forth between programs and sources and their learning style is an outgrowth of these ingrained habits of seeking and retrieving information from the Internet. This marks a striking contrast to previous generation of students, who tend to acquire info more passively from authority figures (Tapscott as quoted in Barnes, Marateo & Ferris, 2007). Perhaps one of the bigger claims made is that this generation (i.e. digital natives) exists across the world and across socio-economic conditions, not just in advanced economies (Tapscott as cited in Jones & Healing, 2010).
• The devil is in the details and unfortunately the early literature on digital natives that built upon the work of Presky, Oblinger, Tapscott, Dede and Frand lacked that fine attention to detail; they seemed to rework the same old assumptions, and fit their data within the Weltsaschauung of the digital native proponents.
• digital natives are described as striving “to stay ahead of the technology curve in ways that often exhaust older generations,” and to achieve this they “rarely pick up the instruction pack to learn programming or a technique. Instead, spurred by our youthful exploration of the Internet, we tend to learn things ourselves, to experiment with new technology until we get it right, and to build by touch rather than tutorial” (Windham, 2005).
• Digital Natives may indeed start without looking at a manual, but when what they are using is not intuitive, they either get the manual, as is exemplified by the great numbers of computer game walkthroughs online; they will give up, as we shall see digital natives aren’t that great at adapting when compared to older students; or they stick to what they know, which means not experimenting and goes counter the claims of digital native evangelists.
• VanSlyke (2003) had originally questioned the global reach of the digital native, and Prensky, in a rebutal, disagreed with him stating that he expected children in much of the rest of the world to exhibit the behaviors of the digital native (2003). Research, however, has shown that the location does matter. In the US (Smith & Caruso, 2010) we see different levels of computer and web technology usage among the same demographic of digital natives in Australia (Kennedy, et al., 2010; Margaryan & Littlejohn, 2008) and than those in the UK (Stoerger, 2009). In South Africa, as well, we see that only 26% of the population might be described as having grown up digital (Brown & Czerniewicz, 2010).
• , this digital divide has spurred a Moral Panic, calling for radical change in education where arguments are articulated in dramatic language, with no empirical evidence or theoretical foundations, based only on “common sense” and personal anecdotes (Bennett & Maton, 2010). Anyone who resists or questions these calls radical change is said to be out of touch, lazy, or just dismissed as not having legitimate concerns (Jones & Healing, 2010).
• College students don’t represent whole populations because they tend to be from a segment of the population that has the financial capacity to afford to be able to go to college (Bradley, et al., 2008 in Bennett & Maton, 2010). As Brown & Czerniewicz (2010) framed it: it’s not about a generation but an elite.
• Only 36% of digital native students contribute to blogs, only 40% contribute to wikis, and only 42% contribute to video sites. Social games and social bookmarking sites are only used by 25% of these digital natives. Fewer that 20% of the students said that they used course lecture podcasts or videos (Smith & Caruso, 2010). Similar results were also found by the Corrin, Bennett & Lockyer in the Australian academic context (2010) and the Pew Internet Internet and American Life Project in the broader US context (Fox & Madden, 2006; Jones & Fox, 2009; Zickuhr, 2010; Rainie, 2011).
• over 80% of first year students reported a “slight confidence” and “basic skills” with presentation software and online library resources – sources that they were familiar with.
• only a minority of students felt like it was important to them to share and upload content.
• only 15% of the digital natives were “power users” and 45% were rudimentary technology users
• In Australia a study found that
• (Kennedy, et al., 2010). In a related study, more than 70% of Australian first year students never kept a blog, more than 80% had never produced a podcast and have never contributed to a wiki (Kennedy, et al., 2007). Similar results were reported by Corrin, Bennett and Lockyer (2010) indicating that only 23% of students self-reported as advanced computer users, 66% never had a blog, 69% did not maintain a website, video editing or creation was rare, and they seldom (31%) or never (41%) listened to podcasts.
• the digital natives are missing out on this rich environment because they have poorly developed information-seeking skills, in other words they consume from sources that they already know.
• the collected statistics from a variety of studies paint a different picture; the fact is that the average “digital native” entering college is not technologically sophisticated; this digital native is not a power user. Even in countries where there is more access to a computer and the Internet, usage of these technologies tends to be read-only, checking facebook or looking things up on Wikipedia (Selwyn, 2010; Margaryan & Littlejohn, 2008); in other words passive interaction.
• One final element to consider is student locus of control and the independence to experiment freely (and without consequence) with the technology. Kvavik (2005) found that in quantitative studies students say that they have the skills that they need, however qualitative data contradicts the collected quantitative data. Students only have very basic office suite skills, and they have difficulty moving beyond those basic activities; it would appear that these students don’t recognize that their applications have enhanced functionalities that they can use.
• digital natives are mystified by technology and some are afraid to putz around, to experiment, for fear that they will do something wrong and break the computer
• Educators are perhaps falling into the same trap as parents are; that is that we have a tacit expectation that kids will have spontaneous engagement with schooled interests spurred by the availability of the computer as a tool (Kerwalla & Crook, 2002),
• Looking at the research, however, we see that there is no one, monolithic, group that we can point to and say that those are digital natives. As a matter of fact, the individuals who would fit the stereotype of the digital native appear to be in the minority of the population.
• From a US context, in a post-No Child Left Behind USA, if our digital native learners aren’t engaged, they have no incentive to work around the problem and find a solution. In contrast, older learners, I would posit, are more engaged and thus do work at changing their approach in order to find solutions.
• Instead of having education professionals focus on the technology aspect of the debate and in certain digital native behaviors, which “common sense” has told us, are immutable, we ought to be focusing on proper pedagogy and exposing our students to information retrieval and critical information analysis skills that are in both the digital and the analog realms
• We out to teach our students to actually change their approaches to learning when what they are trying out is not working for them, instead of assuming that they possess this “Nintendo over logic” which enables them to modify their learning plans when things aren’t working out.
• we need to move away from this fetish of insisting in naming this generation the Digital/Net/Google Generation because those terms don’t describe them, and have the potential of keeping this group of students from realizing personal growth by assuming that they’ve already grown in areas that they so clearly have not.
• Learners don’t know what they don’t know (Christensen, 2006), but if they come to the table from a position of superiority, like they are better than the so-called digital immigrants (Roberts, 2005; Windham, 2005) they lose an opportunity to learn something that they don’t know that they don’t know, something that may be beneficial to them. Let’s resist “common sense” because common sense isn’t all that common.
• This work is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share-Alike License For details please go to: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/

Book Review – Shape Learning, Reshape Teaching #writing

Source: http://www.you-can-teach-writing.com/informal-writing-book.html

A few weeks ago, perhaps longer, Linda Aragoni was kind enough to share a free copy of her book, Shape Learning, Reshape Teaching: An English Teacher’s Guide to Using Informal Writing with Teens and Adults. Since I’ve been in the midst of a transition from one job to the next, I saved the PDF in an ultra-secret location and then promptly forgot where.

After a few days of peering through my encrypted storage devices, I stumbled upon Linda’s book and immediately copied it to my iPad for reading. Below, you will find my reflections on the book, recommendation for who should buy the book, and my notes (take-aways) from Linda’s book on writing. 

Reflection and Recommendation

The idea of learning a structure that facilitates “writing to learn” in the classroom–or anywhere–has great potential, and for more than just English teachers. One of the key points in the author’s foreword should have warned me that the content used to illustrate the structure might be less than engaging:

To foster deep learning and efficient teaching, all the writing students do in a class should be on topics that are authentic to the course. Just as students must to write about biology in papers for biology class, in English they should write about English topics. Far from being limiting, that requirement yields hundreds of topics that are timely, immediately relevant to students and often fun besides.

In the text, the author focuses on writing about English grammar in almost 100% of the examples. These examples are used to illustrate development of informal writing prompts that, page after page, focus on grammar instruction. As such, this narrows who might actually be interested in this book to English teachers.  Instead, Aragoni focuses on activities that are grammar-centered.

The book also ends abruptly, has several minor errors–such as omitting the word “to” in several locations–that suggest the book is still in unfinished format. Suggestions for improvement include re-editing the text, and crafting a narrative up front–an engaging story–of how to best approach informal writing prompt development in the classroom. I found myself hungry for more “story,” or insights into how students were experiencing the use of informal writing prompts. Those may appear in a second edition after teachers have had a chance to use it in the field.

Those criticisms aside, Linda Aragoni offers some specific ideas of why crafting of informal writing prompts can be helpful to teachers and students when done well. She also clearly elaborates on the procedure for developing informal writing. To get a balanced perspective, I encourage you to read some of the comments other reviewers have provided for inclusion on the book’s web site, not just mine.

Recommendation

Given the heavy grammatical focus of the text, this book would best be purchased by teachers of English or English as a second language. And, since that’s the intended audience, the book may find a treasured spot on those teachers’ bookshelves.

MyNotes:

Most of these notes are quotes from the book. Anything in square brackets are my suggestions for inclusion in the text for readability or notes about the text.

1. …rather than give a list of informal writing prompts teachers could copy and paste into their lesson plans, I’ve tried [to] show teachers how [to] develop informal writing prompts to shape student learning and reshape their own teaching.
2. Informal writing is a learning strategy, not a writing strategy.
3. Write to learn prompts are specific subset of informal writing prompts whose primary use is to help students master some important and difficult topic.
4. [The author defines the vocabulary she’s going to use through the book…I’m not sure if other words could be used to describe the concepts she’s introducing.]
5. I have reservations about having students use cell phone text messages for informal writing. ALthough many informal responses will be short enough for a text message,texting doesn’t lend itself to skills writing teachers should encourage, such as writing in complete sentences, avoiding texting shorthand, and proofreading work. I personally feel it is a poor use of time to require students to write without insisting on a basic level of writing performance; others may have a different perspective.
6. [Write to learn acitivities focused on grammar…ugh. I’m starting to have flashbacks to old style textbooks where the focus was learning grammar, then matching writing to the grammar lesson…for example, today we learned about adjectives; now, write a sentence with adjectives].
7. Procedure for developing informal writing:
1. Determine appropriate topics
2. Consider response technologies
3. Set participation standards
4. Establish a tracking mechanism
5. Make prompt retrievable
6. Test prompts by writing responses
7. Prepare students to participate
8. Use the prompts
9. Give feedback to students
10. Evaluate the prompts
8. [no conclusion or ending chapter]

Obviously, there’s a lot more to the book that’s not included in my notes. You can order the book online and find out what’s missing from my review!

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MyNotes – College Rape

Since I have a daughter entering college, this blog entry on Sexual Assault on College Campus caught my attention.

Here is what I sent my daughter to read:

You need to read this:

http://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/04/21/sexual-assault-on-college-campuses/

Based on the research, avoid the following:

1. Men that drink alcohol
2. Drinking alcohol while on a date
3. Leaving any drink or food unattended
4. 60% of the guys you meet
5. Fraternity boys

Quick facts:

• College women are most vulnerable to rape during the first few weeks of the freshman and sophomore years.
• 90% of all campus rapes occur under the influence of alcohol.
• Men are more likely than women to assume that a woman who drinks alcohol on a date is a willing sex partner. 40% of men who think this way also believe it is acceptable to force sex on an intoxicated woman.
• Alcohol use at the time of the attack was found to be one of the four strongest predictors of a college woman being raped.
• Almost 60% of the completed campus rapes that take place on campus occur in the victim’s residence

Where’s that order form for mace, krav maga, personal bodyguards?

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Hooking Up an Apple TV to Anything

Image Source: http://goo.gl/dQFF2

When the new Apple TV arrived, I couldn’t wait to hook it up…after all, it would magically transform…well, I don’t know. I just knew I needed to get one to fully take advantage of my iPad. Unfortunately, after digging to the bottom of a small box, I realized I was missing a critical component–an HDMI cable. At least, I thought that’s what I was missing.

A few questions started going around in my head:

1. Where can I get an HDMI to HDMI cable for less than Apple’s $19.00? 
2. If teachers are buying their own Apple TVs to put into their classrooms–presumably so they can mirror student iPads, as well as their own, is there an HDMI to VGA adapter?
3. If teacher buying their own Apple TVs wanted to connect that device to a television with component cables (red, green, blue), how would they do that?

INEXPENSIVE HDMI TO HDMI CABLE
I admit that I am a rank beginner with my iPad and Apple TV. I have yet to buy the HDMI cable, although I may have a chance this weekend.

Fortunately, there were a few folks online who had some suggestions for alternatives:

 288  somernewland: @mguhlin Check Amazon. Lots of cheap options!

 pwelter: @mguhlin I’ve used this on t.co/NgAmTiQ4 amazon has a Basics HDMI for $6 also that will work fine. 

6 foot cable for $9.99 via Amazon

Two other responses:

 126  drrios: @mguhlin I hooked up my Apple TV with an HDMI cable from Altex. Much cheaper. 153  mmongardi: @mguhlin I just bought an HDMI cable at an electronics store. So yes, you can do better than $19!

While it would be neat if all our classroom equipment had HDMI, chances are, they don’t. But we do have digital projectors…and older televisions with component video/audio.

HDMI TO VGA or Apple TV to Digital Projector

Ok, so here’s the problem–teachers are buying Apple TVs to put in their classrooms, but they don’t have any televisions with HDMI to plug into. Would it be possible to just use an HDMI to VGA cable that you could plug into a digital projector? The answer is NO, the cable below won’t work:

$0.99 HDMI to VGA Cable via Amazon – THIS WILL NOT WORK

Here’s why:

This is a good quality cable, but it does not convert HDMI to VGA. HDMI is a purely digital signal and VGA is analog, unless you have a device that can accept a digital signal via its VGA port this will not work. If you need to display HDMI on a VGA monitor this will not work for you. Probably cheaper to get a secondary video card.

Alas, it looks like a $100 converter box would be needed to go from HDMI digital signal to VGA analog on a digital projector, but thanks to the power of Amazon, it’s not that expensive:

$40.96 HDMI to VGA Converter Box

Ok, so to revise my understanding here…

The Apple TV via HDMI to HDMI would be plugged into the converter box, and the digital projector cable would go into the VGA slot. And, it works with Apple TV according to this comment:

I needed a converter to convert the HDMI out of the Apple TV2 to the VGA in of a projector so that I could project my iPad2 screen. Works perfectly for this solution.

I could actually stop right here since this pretty much solves the problem the teachers were having. 

However, for fun, what would it take to connect the Apple TV to a television with component video?

VGA to Component Cable

You would probably need the following:

1. Apple TV
2. HDMI to HDMI Cable ($9.99 via Amazon)
3. HDMI to VGA Converter Box ($40.96 via Amazon)
4. VGA to 3 RCA Component Cable PC RGB LCD HDTV ($3.60 via Amazon)

So, the way I understand it, you plug the HDMI to HDMI cable, one end into the Apple TV, and the other into the HDMI to VGA Converter Box. Then, you plug the VGA end of the VGA to Component Cable into the VGA slot on the HDMI to VGA Converter Box and the 3 RCA Component Cable end into the back of your television set (or VCR).

Do these 3 solutions work and what’s the cost (no shipping included) of connecting an Apple TV to…

1. HDMI TV – $10 = (HDMI to HDMI Cable at $9.99 via Amazon)
2. Digital Projector – $51 = (HDMI to HDMI Cable at $9.99 each + HDMI to VGA Converter Box at $40.96)
3. Television or VCR with Component Cable support – $55 =  (HDMI to HDMI Cable at $9.99 each + HDMI to VGA Converter Box at $40.96 + VGA to Component Cable at $3.60 each)

Given that you bought an iPad, an Apple TV, another $50 doesn’t seem that bad an investment…or does it?

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Explore Your PLN’s Purpose – When the Gods Ignore You #tecsig

What is your fundamental purpose in blogging, building a PLN, etc.?  One of the funniest movies I saw sometime in my youth included The Gods Must Be Crazy. There’s a connection to a topic that often gives me heartburn, if only for a millisecond–When the Gods Ignore You. To get in the right frame of mind, watch this clip from The Gods Must Be Crazy:

(BTW, did you know you can watch this movie in its entirety via YouTube.com?)

Often, when I consider professional learning networks (PLNs), and how they are supposed to work, I can’t help but laugh. Tim Holt (HoltThink) describes the process I’ve seen work a few times in this way:

Someone with an  community floats a question or has a problem.

The collective community can answer the question or help solve the problem

Rainbows and unicorns then appear.

Allow me to share the PLN Process–or, Six Steps to Self-Reliance–the way I’ve observed it from my own experience:

1. Problem Awareness – In my learning, I’ve encountered a problem that I desperately need to solve. This could be just about anything, whether technical, procedural, or informational. Having learned from my pantry searching experiences that you don’t find what you’re looking for until you admit to everyone in the house you can’t find it, then it magically appears (this is why public embarrassment is a blessing for politicians, right before they recant or make amends, and run for office and win in a landslide victory), I decide to take the next step.
2. Ask for Action – Encapsulate the help request into 140 characters, and post it on a social network (e.g. Twitter, G+, Plurk, Facebook) and hope for the flash of insight that will point one in the right direction.
3. Experience Benign Neglect – Wait, wait, wait…perhaps neglect isn’t the right word…it’s more about being ignored by those who aren’t interested in what you’ve asked. Hence the, “When the gods ignore you” title of this blog post. The gods? Oh yeah, that’s you, who know all about this…you know, the “node” on the network that serves as an online storage device waiting to offer me help at a moment’s notice from anywhere, anytime provided you’re awake and “tapped into the stream.”
4. Re-dedication to Problem Resolution – Begin again to search, but this time, with renewed vigor and determination after having re-focused my query. After all, getting complex questions down into 140 characters focuses your search to laser beam intentness.
5. Share Your Discovery so you can never forget it. You share the results of your research with a global audience, which, by the way, has been successful or an utter failure. By blogging it, or tweeting it, you put it out there so that someone will find it useful and remember, “Hey, this person solved that problem I had just begun to notice but hadn’t decided to do anything about.”
6. Achieve a Self-Reliance – This is the step where you realize while it’s nice to have a PLN, you’re the one who has to slog through your mind’s muck to achieve enlightenment. A million people retweet your discoveries, and you wonder, why the heck, if these people had questions about what you were also trying to find out, they didn’t speak up sooner, if only to help eliminate some of the dead-ends you had to knock your forehead against in the great maze of life. The problem is, you realize they were probably in the same situation you were–you didn’t know what you had until after you slogged through it.

Sometimes, the PLN process works exactly the way it’s described. When it does, it’s magical. I’ve given plenty of examples of this happening in this blog, and I won’t recite them.

However, I often wonder if the longer journey isn’t the more rewarding one. Ok, it IS the more rewarding since I find myself asking questions that seem to require this approach more and more. Tim Holt hypothesizes that “I believe that people with very large PLNs which require years (or a coup) to develop have a significant advantage over those just jumping in. “

I’m not sure this is the case. The factors that influence responses from your PLN don’t have anything to do with the size of your following. Rather, I’d like to suggest it has to do with how your PLN–regardless of size– perceives you.

For example, the people who compose the “MGuhlin PLN” are probably more interested in passive lurking, reading, and know that I publish stuff around a variety of interests. Simply, the majority of my PLN isn’t about responding to questions I ask, leaving comments, etc. Rather, for them, it’s about tagging along on a journey and hopefully learning something…they figure that if I’m writing about it, it’s pretty well developed, whether it’s a junk blog entry (no research) or something else.

Active commenters in the PLN probably move on to other people if they want active participation. I’d bet that my “active” followers are active in multiple areas, but for the most part, the rest are passive readers. When I say passive, that means they may forward my blog entries to colleagues as finished products or conversation starters, or curios, but do little more with them.

However, other bloggers have cultivated active PLNs that focus on active commenting and participation. These folks–Will Richardson, Dean Shareski, Tom Dembo, David Warlick, Dr. Scott McLeod, Wes Fryer– want to have active discussions (I don’t usually…I’m ruminating,share something, move on to another item of interest, skimming the surface). In fact, I’d bet that the secret to their success as vendors, education consultants flows from their ability to engage others in conversation. For them, the kind of blogging and sharing I do is the start of a vigorous conversation. 

For me, it’s pretty much over when I publish. I forget what I write as quickly as I put it out there, remembering it only if I need it for later. My blog is about creating an external repository of knowledge and reflections that I can mine much better than my memory. My brain is google-powered since I blog as much of what I learn as possible and can then search it. Is this a bad thing? Not really. But what is your fundamental purpose in blogging, building a PLN, etc.? 

Is your purpose to build a PLN that will result in action (e.g. spreading your message, answering questions) or serve as a network to facilitate information/idea sharing that becomes dated the farther it gets from time of origin? 

Of course, like anyone else, this sharing ranges from one end of the spectrum to another. Some days, I wish I had an active PLN. Other times, it doesn’t matter and I simply lack the time or will to make the time. Hmm…it might be fun to explore this in relation to the strength of weak ties.

Are the strong, more active PLNs examples of strong ties and cliques that are problematic? Which is more desirable? That’s a whole other blog entry worth exploring!

What are your thoughts about this? Am I way off? (I figure I won’t get many responses except from outlier commenters who happen to catch this blog entry by accident).

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Education On Air – Online Conference #free #eduonair

A new online conference–Education On Air!— has popped up!

Education On Air sessions on Google+:

• Conference Schedule

– List of sessions and detail 

• about how to participate and add to your calendar

• Presenters

– Names, websites & contact information

• Social Media

– Conference and session hashtags

• FAQs

– Frequently asked questions

• Feedback

– Your feedback on the conference 

• (coming after the event)

You do not need to register to watch the Hangouts On Air. Visit theConference Schedule tab to find sessions that interest you and add them to your calendar. All Hangouts will be live on the presenters’ Google+ Page on May 2nd at the appointed time. 

More details appear in this print version of a 1-page flyer, which I’ve sorta copy-n-pasted below as images:

Education On Air Conference

http://sites.google.com/site/eduonair

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Choosing the Right Career + InfoGraphic

“My son, during his junior year in pursuing Actuarial Sciences,” he paused for emphasis, “made $1000 a week during a summer internship.” He looked at me for a moment. “A thousand a week for being an intern without a degree.” Obviously, he and I were talking about career paths available to those who can do math.

Earlier today, a conversation with a colleague revealed what many educators now know–a degree in education, liberal arts, the humanities just sets you up for long-time suffering at the hands of state legislators. Like it or not, this is the sad reality. It’s why my colleague was quick to point out that his son majored in the Humanities, but also, Actuarial Sciences.

If, like me, you don’t know what Actuarial Sciences are, let me share this informative tidbit from Wikipedia:

Actuarial science is the discipline that applies mathematical and statistical methods to assess risk in the insurance and finance industries. Actuaries are professionals who are qualified in this field through education and experience. In many countries, actuaries must demonstrate their competence by passing a series of rigorous professional examinations. 

Actuarial science includes probability, mathematics, statistics, finance, economics, financial economics, and computer programming. Historically, actuarial science used deterministic models in the construction of tables and premiums. The science has gone through revolutionary changes during the last 30 years because of the proliferation of high speed computers and the union of stochastic actuarial models with modern financial theory (Frees 1990). 

Many universities have undergraduate and graduate degree programs in actuarial science, and these programs usually have highly specialized coursework schedules and series of exam preparation courses to prepare students for the actuarial exams and the insurance industry. In 2010, a study published by job search website CareerCast ranked actuary as the #1 job in the United States (Needleman 2010). The study used five key criteria to rank jobs: environment, income, employment outlook, physical demands, and stress. A similar study by U.S. News & World Report in 2006 included actuaries among the 25 Best Professions that it expects will be in great demand in the future (Nemko 2006).

As an English major, Spanish minor, I’ve found my ability to write and technical competence helpful in achieving my humble career goals. Fortunately, my daughter is able to do well in writing AND mathematics, and I’m grateful for her abilities.

My colleague pointed out to me that his wife had said to him, “ince this field is often dominated by Americans who are less than articulate, having a double-major in English and Math will pay off financially and professionally. The career path means you’ll be a CEO because of the actuarial sciences and your ability to communicate effectively.”

and, “if you can put aside your expectation of straight As, as long as you can earn a degree in actuarial sciences and pass the exams, no one will ask what grade you made.”

Certainly, good advice. In the meantime, check out this infographic that highlights the facts visually.

From: BestDegreePrograms.org

Image Source
http://www.uwec.edu/Admissions/facts/images/Actuarial.jpg

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The Smartest Person – @shareski #tecsig

One of Dean Shareski’s session titles that always left me wondering, “How did he come up with that title? That’s ingenious!” includes the one he shared with the assembled audience of technology directors at the Texas Computer Education Association (TCEA) Technology Education Coordinators Special Interest Group (TEC-SIG) Spring Meeting (view the agenda) earlier today!

The title? “When You’re Not the Smartest Person in the Room.” Below, please find my imperfect notes (I was trouble-shooting a problem back at work while listening to Dean, but I was happy to find that as work allowed me to be present, Dean would share an engaging tale or quote!):

Contact Info:
Web: shareski.ca
Email: shareski@gmail.com
Twitter: @shareski
When  you are thinking PD, it’s not done at 3:30pm when you leave the building.
Hashtag #tecsig
“If you’re comfortable with education today, you’re not paying attention.” (Source: Will Richardson)
In 90 seconds, write down 3 things that you’re not completely comfortable with (doesn’t have to be negative):

1. iPads in education

1. The idea that technology isn’t everyone’s responsibility

1. Learning isn’t 24/7

Others:
Privatization of schools through vouchers
Teacher as a customer service provider isn’t respected and supported.
Technology is a disruption, that says to us we can’t continue doing the same things we’ve done before, just better. How can we change things and do things in a fundamentally different way, in a disruptive way?
When I hear the word reform, it doesn’t mean the same thing as what educators mean. A few examples of disruption around the world:
Business:“When a 14 year old kid can blow up your business in his spare time, not because he hates you but because he loves you, then you’ve got a problem.” (Gordy Thompson) That idea is…how do we rethink this. He really likes what we do, but what he’s doing doesn’t work with what we’re trying to do. How do we do our business? That’s the question that’s being asked in Board rooms.
Government:Sharing what happened in Egypt, Khaled Said, posting of internet videos…primary interaction is online. “If there’s no social network, there never would have been a part. Without facebook, twitter, google, youtube, this wouldn’t have happened.” Technology has the paper to democratize knowledge and power. These are the kinds of conversations that high school civics classes are having.
Personal:Publishing isn’t a thing anymore…you click “Publish” and you’re done.
Dean shares his journey, his gateway to finding a whole bunch of people in his journey.Dean is sharing how Casey Hales–in New Braunfels–was commenting on his work in Moosejaw in Canada. How does this happen?
[Wow, it’s been 10 years since I started blogging at least. Unbelievable.]
smart people = magic happens = you
Dean asks, “Can I find your best work online?” I challenge you…why isn’t it? I find it frustrating, and that’s my expectation.
Who do you know?
Answers to the people on Dean’s Chart: Condeleezza Rice, Roger Staubach, Julian Assange, Krypton, Adam Strange , Rosa Hadwen (Dean’s mother in law)
(hehe…)

Mind Your Own Business Learning
…where kids sit in rows.
…where you hear, “eyes on  your own paper, no talking”
Is the kind of learning you want? Is watching screens really what we should be doing?
It’s a precious moment to have all these people in a building.
1 to 1 computing is great but not if it’s kids sitting by themselves. Maybe 3 kids to 1 computing device is better because of the conversation.
Unwrap what people mean. . .it all goes back to the idea of social learning. 

Chris Avenir, student in Ryerson Univ. in Canada. Started a study group for chemistry group. They kicked him out of school. It was a prime example of disruption. It’s just a study group. Some of the reasons why he was told he couldn’t have one:
1) Learning should be hard
2) There is no structure of regulation for online behavior and that makes it incompatible with academic work.
3) It is our job to protect academic integrity from any threat.
“Bringing smart people together is an ancient and effective technique for developing ideas. The Net also lets smart people connect and communicate. But the Net brings people together in new and occasionally weird configurations–a weirdness.”
There’s not that much controversy with Wikipedia….
“The problem with Wikipedia is that it only works in practice. In theory, it can never work.”
The interesting part of Wikipedia are the discussion tabs. Find out how did they get there, negotiate the information. At the very top of the page, you’ll see warnings about the content. Does your newspaper do that?
“The smartest person in the room, is the room.” -Dave Weinberger

The big shift isn’t that content is digital. It’s that learning culture is participatory. (Source: Angela Maiers).

The best way to learn is to teach it…now we have many opportunities to do so online. 

The Ukelele Project 

Strangers – We have to get over the notion that strangers are bad.
“If your students are shring their work with the world, they want it to be good. If they’re just sharing it with you, they want it to be good enough.” Rushton Hurley

 Instead of thinking of the internet as 2 billion predators, what if we thought of it as 2 billion teachers?

What do we mean by learning? What are we talking about?
“The need to know the capital of Florida died when my phone learned the answer.” Student

Dean teaches “Smart Folks I Know”…I’m connecting my students to these people all the time. You need to be able to have these connections. your talent is important, but your connections are so much more important.

Community as Content (Dave Cormier)
“The community is not the path to understanding or accessing the curriculum, rather the community is the curriculum.”
(MG: This reminds me of Wes Fryer’s point that people are the curriculum).

Obvious to you. Amazing to others. from Derek Sivers on Vimeo.

“Obvious to you. Amazing to others.” Derek Sivers…watch the video above.
Are you holding back something that is too obvious to share?

Great stuff, experience! Thanks, Dean!

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MyNotes – Apple Briefing iBookAuthor / iTunesU Course Manager

Earlier today, I had the chance to attend an Apple briefing–excellent facilitation by Jill Vermillion–on iBook Author and iTunesU Course Manager. Wow, I can understand the excitement about creating, managing and sharing content using these tools! In spite of the stunning positives (easiest content development I’ve seen, and I’ve played with Sigil, LibreOffice, and Calibre), there are flies in the ointment, mainly the following:

1) ePub output is not available officially, which is a big oversight that Apple couldn’t have been aware of, not unlike Garageband’s early version being unable to export to MP3 directly instead of going through iTunes. Rusty Meyners (@rmeyners) pointed this out in tweets and caused me to ask the question directly of the facilitator.

2) These tools are designed primarily for individual content development.

3) In the Texas context, it appears that Project Share and Apple’s iBook Author/iTunesU Course Manager are competing for developers and audience. The Apple folks were careful to include the Texas Education Agency and Education Service Centers, as well as compliment them in their work thus far in developing/sharing content via iTunesU. Since creating courses in Project Share (e.g. OnTrack) seems to be a goal of TEA’s or the state legislature, will Apple be able to shift content development from PS to iTunesU/iBookAuthor? Care to venture any bets as to who will win that contest?

4) Number 3 aside, if Apple could come up with a Windows version of their software, then this would go a long ways to alleviate the issues. The problem is, I don’t honestly think Apple will develop a Windows version…it’s just not the Apple way. That means that Apple once again has created a beautiful product that only a small percentage of the world will be able to take advantage of…but the difference from previous situations is the iPad.

Aside: I am particularly grateful to Jim Baldoni (NorthEast ISD) for articulating some of these concerns as fast as they popped into my head and doing it so eloquently! I also have to give a shout out to Chryssie and Leigh-Ann (I apologize if I’ve mis-spelled names) from one of NorthEast ISD’s high schools. They not only sat in the front row, they showed off a “Triangles” course they’d been developing using iBook Author. Kudos to them for their fast work, as well as Jim’s leadership.

You know, this was my first field test of my new iPad 3rd gen and it came through with flying colors, enabling me to snap pictures of slides (I was front row and center) and take notes, a fact that didn’t go unnoticed by large school district Assistant Superintendent sitting to my left with a paper notepad. I think he gave up in disgust after awhile.

😉

Here are my rough-hewn notes…

Any typos, errors are my fault alone (Miguel Guhlin).  Note that ddoubingg of letters is occurring aas a result of Evernote not handling large images and text being enteered via bluetooth  keyboard (IMHO)).

Facilitator: Jill Vermillion, Education Content, Apple, Inc.

Learning in a Post-PC World

In two years, mobile users will surpass desktop users…probably around 2013. (Source: IDC Press Release 9/12/11).

College and high school students feel that tablets (e.g. iPads) feel these are useful to have and all of this contributes to the growth of iPad in schools. For example, there have been 1.5 million iPads purchased in US educational institutions, including 1000 one to one deployments.  Over 20K apps have been developed in the education category. 

Apple asks, why iPad? Some of the features that make it really useful include thin and light, multi-touch, retina display, ultra-fast wireless, instant on, and all-day battery life, built-in accessibility  (sensory, attention, motor control, communication, voice over, assistive touch, 3rd party apps and devices that work well with iPad,, Braille add-on,, ProloquoToGo for autism spectrum). Accessibility has resulted in awards.

Some of the education apps  include  The Amphitheatre, AArt Authority, Cell and Cell Structure. There are also apps tthat allow students to be creative, such as Sketchbook Pro, Keynote, iPhoto for iOS…

“We’re seeing the iPad completely change the way that certain subjects are taught. I am no longer pushing technology at teachers. They are demanding this technology in their classrooms.” (Fraser Speirs, http://www.speirs.org)

FFeedback from educators…1)textbooks are still an important way that education is delivered in the classroom; 2) While there is great video content, web, etc. but how do you curate it around learning standards/objectives?

iBook Textbooks:

Use iBook 2 app to create “gorgeous, full screen bookiinteractive objects, diagrams, photos, video,, fast, fluid navigation, highlighting and note-taking searching and definitions, study cards.”

Demo: How do we solve the great problems of life? Looking at an interactive ibook on biology.  .. .includes assessment. Jill is showing off interactive features, such as highlighting, ability to add digital post-it notes, and the ability to see nnotes/highlights aggregated iin one view [MG: I wonder how easy it is to export these to a 3rd party utility like Evernote, Diigo, etc.  Looks like the share button is up there…if you tap on it, you can email it, print it…you can’t share them with other students, though, which would be good for a group or creating a study guide per Jill]  YYou can also create flashcards, color coded notes can be used to differentiate between what shows up as a flashcard.  This feature integrates into iTunesU.

If you turn your book sideways, you can easily switch to text view, increase size of text, and all interactives are still interactive.

Collada (?) is the format for the interactive 3D stuff; various programs export the Colada format. “COLLADA is a royalty-free XML schema that enables digital asset exchange within the interactive 3D industry.”

iBooks Author

On one end of the spectrum, there is a printed textbook. That txtbook is scanned to PDF and then put on the iPad. But this isn’t very interactive. On the other end of the spectrum, there are beautiful, engaging books that were built as apps or enhanced ePubs. In those situations, you needed to have a programmer, development skills or be able to develop that skill.

With iBook Author, the goal is to empower anyone to develop a textbook. We hope that you, your district, organization will create content as a team.

Demo

[MG: Wow, this is really neat authoring tool. IIn the image above, you can see how  the  book chapters  are organized with all their resources bby the author  in folders. To start creating, the iiBoook author ccomes with a template 

You can easily  embed keynote, take advaantage of widdgets, 

Q: Can you export Epub format out of iBook Author?

A: Not right now, however, there is someone from ePub development on the Board (this is not exactly what Jill said, but as close a paraphrase I can remember and inaccurate…I inferred, even though it may not have been implied, that it’s a future feature).

This is part 2 of my notes on Jill Vermillion’s great preso on iBooks Author. Part 1 is image heavy and was causing weird stuff with text entry, so…it would be neat if Evernote would allow image resizing on screen!

These notes will be updated through 11:30am on 04/18/2012.

iBook Author features a “Preview” button that allows you to send a proof of the iBook to your iPad so you can see what it would actually look like. There’s also a PUBLISH button.

PUBLISH – A bit of confusion about this. You can share a book you’ve created and are just sharing it for free with colleagues, then you can just go to FILE menu and choose EXPORT to be greeted with several options:

iBooks – Create a version of your book that can be read using iBooks on your iPad. Books can only be sold through the iBookstore. Looks like there is ePub version too.

You can publish a book via the iBookStore for free (no charge), charge a fee, and you can setup two accounts to reflect your intent to sell book or make them available for free. If you have 

Question and Answer:

1) How big is an iBook file?

These are big files, including 600-700 page books. Apple is doing its best to compress without compromising the experience (trying to keep them under 2gigs).

2) Could you download a section of the iBook?

No, but Tom Burnett (Apple) suggests you write and publish your book in Chapters. 

3) Any tools to help track copyright, especially if you pull an image in from somewhere else?

No…this is something that is needed, great feedback. Jill provided a great response about copyright, how we should model this as educators, etc…it was a standard response you’re probably already familiar with.

4) Show Styles Drawer…includes lots of different styles for footnotes, endnotes, headings, copyright notice and references templates included.

5) I have content on my machine…how do I best get it ready to share as an iBook?

One of the things you might do is assemble everything into a folder. 

6) Creating interactive content?

Go to Collada.org. Also be sure to create accessible content.

iTunesU

It is the world’s largest online catalog of free education content. About 1000 content providers, and is available to K-12 school districts and state depts of education. Over 700 million downloads over the past 4 years that iTunesU has been available. This looks like a success but there are some missing pieces to the puzzle.

Not just a repository of content, but a way to connect and curate content to curriculum standards. The iTunesU–launched in January 2012–app was launched. You can create full courses with video, documents, apps, books, syllabus and assignments, instructor posts and updates, and there is iBook notes integration.

Demo:

Course Manager is built in…

Note the creative commons copyright functionality. 

Outline of course manager:

Materials view that makes it easy to curate a course:

ePub, web-based content, PDFs, etc. ..Add materials:

Of course, make sure you have the right to distribute content that you are adding as materials to your course.

Question: Is there a size limit for content being added from your computer?

Answer: Depends on your institution.

You can do 3 things with sharing…1) Put it on web, wiki; 2) Share locally; 3) Take URL and make it public on iTunesU.

iTunesU is being used to flip the classroom at Duke University where Jill came from. This is a great way, per Jill, to achieve flipped classroom.

Q: Can you export Epub format out of iBook Author?

A: Not right now, however, there is someone from ePub development on the Board (this is not exactly what Jill said, but as close a paraphrase I can remember and inaccurate…I inferred, even though it may not have been implied, that it’s a future feature).

Q: How many content managers can you have?

R: Two kinds of roles – administrator (gatekeeper…add users, give people access to course manager, and publish content publically) and contributor role.

Get started with iTunes U via https://eduapp.apple.com

In the future of collaboration, you can designate an owner…the authoring piece is an individual approach, while more than one person can preview. 

Q: Can two people be simultaneously working on a course?

A: That’s a good question. In my experience, in logging on with the same credential as someone else, you can be working on 2 different courses but not the same course. Other options include maybe using MS Word or Pages, then paste that in. Create offline then compile it in Course Manager, just like you would in iBook Author.

Q: Any ideas for courses you may create?

A: Jill suggested TEA develop content. Jim Baldoni pointed out partnering with Project Share to share content.

What about discipline specific courses?

Q:There’s no way to access these courses through a Mac?

A: You can see the courses through iTunesU in a limited view. You can see outline, course materials, but it is a limited view.

Q: Can this be accessed on any iOS device, not just iPad?

A: Yes you can. With iCloud, those courses appear along with notes and readings. Students can access all their coursework on iPodTouch at home or iPad at school.

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Epiphany of Experiences – #iPads in the Classroom

Adapted from Image Source at http://goo.gl/u9GYd

As I’ve spent more time on an iPad, I’m continuing to have problems imagining what iPad-shifted instruction would look like. iPad-shifted leadership is different and easy to imagine. My concept of the two hinges on my role now–as a technology administrator rather than a classroom teacher–so I wonder if that’s the disconnect. To alleviate that gap, that’s why I’m looking forward to attending the iPad Palooza in June, 2012, in the hopes of seeing how teachers are embracing iPads in the classroom. In a twitter conversation earlier tonight, I referred to this lack of vision as elusive.

“How can we better articulate what iPads are being purchased to accomplish in schools? It feels so elusive.”

For me, this tweet gets to the heart of the problem I’m having with iPads in schools–simply, I don’t get it. I want to explore why “I don’t get it–iPads in schools” for a simple reason. It’s not because I’ll be working on an iPad deployment, or because I want to justify the 64gig WiFi iPad I just purchased for my own use as part of my education consulting. It’s because a part of me fears that my past experiences with technology are interfering with how I use technology in the present and future. Does that make sense?

I tried to express this with a follow-up tweet:

elusive…prob because I’d rather have a netbook running Linux than an iPad, but non-techies would rathr hv iPad.

The reason I see a netbook/Macbook running Linux/Windows/MacOS as more valuable is for the following reasons:

1. The netbook is more functional and provides features that have become established as necessary in computing world–word processing, spreadsheet, database, image design/editing, video creation and editing, server setup/management (if necessary). Or, as 
2. The netbook provides greater value than the iPad because you can do a lot more of the traditional computing activities. Of course, if you don’t value traditional use of technology in schools, then the netbook value lacks worth. 
3. The netbook allows for greater management and control from those trying to support multiple devices on the network, as opposed to an iPad which is a “do your own thing” kind of device that requires you play according to its rules, and reshape your support practices around it.

Part of the concern is the idea that an iPad is not a laptop replacement…it’s a different animal altogether. But is that difference a game-changer? Or do we just want to think so due to the coolness factor? When I use an iPad, I have to “agree to not do certain things.” For example, writing a blog entry is do-able but involves changing my work patterns. I have to capture images first, edit them ahead of time, and then develop the blog entry and embed it. To put links into the blog entry, I have to switch to html view and type the code. In fact, the experience reminds me of composing blog entries in the old days of Around the Corner using Thingamablog, a java-based blogging tool.

The process on a laptop is a bit different. On a laptop/netbook, I’ll write the blog entry, then open some new tabs in the browser, grab a few images that I think are relevant to the theme of the blog post, and embed them where appropriate. 

While the blog process is a bit different, doing this on the iPad feels crowded, like I’m maneuvering in a space that’s too small, having to sequence my activities rather than be relaxed. It’s a personal experience and I relish the differences because they invariably result in a different product. It may not look like it, but the differences yield feelings that vary from my “stock” blogging experience.

It’s this experience that suggests to me that “old ways of doing things” are getting in the way of new ways of doing things. Maybe my interpretation of what’s happening is wrong. For learners who don’t have a traditional way of approaching computing–such as the requirement of a desktop getting in the way of adopting Chrome OS on a Chromebook, the lack of a desktop immediately turning my daughter off from using Chromebook–does the iPad allow them to develop new patterns of usage that result in experiences that are more productive, whatever the heck that means?

You know, this idea that the device leads to new productivity is one that’s haunted me with my own children. A few years ago, my wife and I saved up and bought them each Dell computers. I remember the exact moment when I asked myself, did I make the right choice of computer? That moment was when I watched a video from a colleague sharing how his two kids at a teacher conference were creating videos at the same age my children were. My kids were using their Dell computers to play games, word process, create slideshows…those kids with Macs were creating videos that resulted in a qualitatively richer experience. It’s easy to ask, What are your learning goals for the classroom, your own learning, for your organization? but less so to imagine what those changes will be when the technology you buy, the impact that technology will have on your patterns of experience lies unknown in the void.

Think different. When I bought my iPad, or a Macbook Pro for my daughter, I made a decision to reach for that elusive experience that I don’t quite understand, but hope that the device will help shift my patterns of use in a direction that will result in a qualitatively richer experience. . .help them achieve that epiphany John Seelye Brown talks about.

I’m not sure. I’ve taken a risk. It’s not unlike the risk my father took when he bought me an Apple //e and gave it to me, never having worked with computers himself, and that he never touched or tried to use in his lifetime. Can we make the same sacrifice for our children, to provide tools we might never understand, so they can achieve their epiphany of experience?

Or, am I just plumb wrong?

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Solving Problems – Regional Tech Directors Mtg Notes

(Here’s a quick snapshot I took of folks using my iPad…I converted it to a sketch using InstantSketch app which is free today or this weekend…nifty, huh? My main note-taking app is EverNote).

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend the San Antonio Regional Technology Directors’ Meeting. Of course, it was a fruitful meeting (not just because TCEA Area 20 Director, Dr. Roland Rios and Jennifer Faulkner (past Area 20 Director) brought fruit!). Special thanks to NorthEast ISD for hosting the meeting!

There were a variety of topics discussed, and below you can find my imperfect notes on the meeting. I hope to add audio to the notes later, but this should give you an idea for some of the topics discussed.

Key Performance Indicators for Department Performance Over Time

1. How do you baseline how you’re doing? What kind of system?
2. Percent up time?
3. Time to resolve helpdesk tickets?
4. Data from network…server snapshots, solarwind snapshots (syslogging) that goes into database, bring programs to graph over time.
5. Use Baldridge Model
6. SchoolDude – doesn’t have all the metrics needed to track response time, tickets closed each day, etc. There aren’t enough metrics in the application that we use.
7. Eduphoria has these metrics built-in…you can have it email you if something is taking too long.
8. SAISD uses WhatsUpGold…still use HEAT for work order monitoring, etc.
9. Eduphoria Suite is free through Region 20. There’s no seamless technical support experience. Hopeful that they will create a quick ticket feature.
10. What key performance are you using for Instructional Technology? Roland suggests keeping a repository of cool projects, as well as fill out forms, and have students present to the school board. GoogleApps for Education Domain. Virgil wants to know if you can do a mass change of passwords?

 

IMA Technology Funds

1. How long did it take to get the funds? Requested the funding after paying with local funds for iPads…but TEA (NEISD) said that you can not be reimbursed local funds using IMA funds. This has profound implications.
2. Steve (Boerne ISD) reports that it takes about a week to get the IMA funding.
3. A teeny fraction of money requested state-wide has gone to technology.
4. Can you fund people out of IMA?

User Provisioning

1. How do you do this? How do you maintain this information? Does your management talk to your Directory or do you do it by hand?
2. UMRA Solution – http://www.tools4ever.com/products/user-management-resource-administrator/
3. All user directories are in one giant box, user emails are on one server. As staff/students move from campus to campus, or grade level, they automatically move everyone up. (Poteet ISD)
4. Note to Miguel: check into Compellant

Inventory Management Software

1. What do you inventory?
2. Software solutions: Eduphoria
3. Give unique names (e.g. cemetary, ICU)
4. Put lego robotics kits in so that they can be reserved by campuses.
5. Is Eduphoria free?
6. OCS – free open source software. It will send a message from the machine since you can put an agent on it. You can see CPU, software installed. It doesn’t update itself, so at the end of year, you have to clean it out.
7. WASP/CAIN – Campus Inventory. Campus technician can go scan the barcode on the iPad, then audit the information. Judson ISD is right in the middle of doing this in connection with Eduphoria HelpDesk and incorporating the campus asset tag. HEB ISD is using this as well. With WASP, you can do projectors, etc.
8. SAISD uses Absolut Computrace. You buy a 3-4 year old license. Mainly purchased for the security piece, track it by IP address. There is a pro-rated guarantee. It does have the asset tracking piece, querying the machine, rely on Region 20 for annual inventory. Between both of those, we get a picture of what is at the schools. We’ve recovered several laptops that are stolen; Computrace works with our SAISD Police Dept. It costs about $70.
1. Virgil Kirk says we can replace two stolen laptops for the price of Computrace.
2. Remote wipe capability.
3. Mobile device management solution is available

Mobile Device Management

1. Discussion of various solutions. It appears some districts have chosen AirWatch, Casper, and Meraki Cloud Solution (available for free), Lightspeed (also offers)
2. How do you enable teachers to be able to add apps when they want to but prevent inappropriate use?
3. NEISD has created Gmail accounts to assign to specific.
4. What are the things you want a management program to do?
   1. Pushing out profiles
   2. Security
   3. Every campus can purchase volume cards and get apps. Centralize volume purchasing to gain volume discounts.
   4. The ability to push out apps?
   5. Lock people out from the App store (you can do that with the Apple Configurator)
5. There is a difference in issuing them and storing them in the cart. When you issue iPads out, apps are treated as consumables (e.g. Eanes ISD). iPads are designed for one to one.
6. Would management work if you kept your volume purchasing, campus-based?
7. How many volume purchasing accounts should you have?
8. Our business manager setup a software budget…special education has their own software budget (they would be setup with their own software budget and volume purchase card).
9. http://www.mguhlin.org/2012/02/mynotes-ios-headaches-tcea2012.html

 

Getting Video on iPad – flex:Player app

A representation of iPad via iTunes

As I look back on past blog entries I’ve written on this subject, essentially about how to get video onto your iPad without iTunes, I realize I definitely skipped over how easy it is to get videos–AVI, MP4, etc.–onto an iPad with iTunes’ apps.

By now, the process is probably obvious to everyone who’s been playing around with an iPad, but it wasn’t to me. When I compiled my must-have list of iPad apps, I mentioned several apps:

1. flex:Player (no cost) – This app allows you to view more than the standard video formats supported by iPad; flex:Player supports AVI, DivX, Xvid, VOB, MP4, MOV. 
2. AVPlayer HD ($2.99) which offers support for additional video formats including XVID, AVI, WMV, RMVB, ASF, H264, MKV

I’ve also experimented with a few others, such as OPlayer Lite (no-cost, ads), Video Downloader Lite. Unfortunately, while these latter solutions work, they involve ads or are limited in some way. The flex:Player app works the best…of course, I haven’t tried the AV Player HD app since it, well, costs money….however, AVPlayer HD does have the benefit of allowing you to add content via WiFi in case you’re on the go and don’t have access to your computer. There’s a nice review of it here and after reading it, you’ll probably add it to your app wish list.

Or, if you don’t want to spend $2.99 (join me in cheapskate heaven), once the flex:Player app is installed on your iPad, you can add content via iTunes:

Note the add button lets you put your own content, including AVI, MP4 video files.

What’s nice about the flex:Player app is that it allows for full-screen playback on iPad, no advertising. Here’s a screenshot from the web:

For now, the flex:Player app will be what I use since it’s 1) No-Cost; 2) Works without advertising…important requirements for apps to use on school iPads.

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Play with #KindleFire and Get Burned in School Settings? @edugamres @rmeyners

Considering deploying Kindle Fire mobile devices in your school setting? Be careful you don’t get burned. Of course, all these tablets are evolving, getting friendlier and friendlier to school settings–which usually involve top-down control.

Source: http://images.decalgirl.com/assets/items/akf/400/akf-flwrfire.jpg

Recently, one Texas colleague asked the following question:

Is anyone using Kindle Fires in the classroom? How are they using them in the classroom and what grade level, how are you deploying apps and what about viruses?

This garnered a few responses worth considering, such as this one from Greg Caldwell (Texas)

We looked into Kindle Fires and decided against them for the following reasons:
1) It is difficult to install 3rd party apps.2) You have to have a credit card on file even to download free apps. You are NOT prompted for a password when downloading apps. They are a “one-click” purchase. So, you have to have a credit card on file and one-click app downloads mean that students, teachers, or anyone else can download any app at any time and someone will be obligated to pay for it.3) There is no way to centrally manage them. Each individual device has to be touched to change anything.4) Dealing with Amazon’s customer service is like talking to a horse. They might understand a few things but get “off-script” and they can’t help you. Asking to speak with a supervisor or someone in the US does not help.5) Kindle Fires are designed to be a personal use item and do not play well a muli-user or enterprise environment.6) If you are looking for an e-reader, the low end Kindle works. If you looking for more, stay away from the Fire.7) One more thing I almost forgot, the Kindle Fire as well as other tablets will not handle Java. I don’t care what Steve Jobs said about Java dying, right now a LOT of the interactive content of online textbooks and other educational websites are Java-based and it will be several years before that changes.
For all the reasons cited above, as well as cost and other factors, we are staying with laptops. I can get a powerful laptop that will do everything students need to do with a full 3 year warranty for the cost of a low end IPad 3 or the “new IPad” or whatever it’s called.

as well as this one from Rusty Meyners (@rmeyners)….

I normally recommend against Kindle Fire for the simple reason that there are other more open Android alternatives that give more for the money, the best currently being the Lenovo IdeaPad A1.
1. Google Market (Play Store) Certified and no problem installing 3rd party apps.2. No credit card needed – only a Gmail or GAFE account.3. Multiple or group management is reasonable and getting better.4. Never had to call for Android or Google support – forums and wikis always suffice.5. Tablets are indeed a personal device, though Android has apps to adapt somewhat to multiple users.6. Any Android can be a Kindle reader except for the dedicated Kindle’s read-to-me feature.7. Not sure about Java but I don’t think any tablet fully replaces a laptop anyway. I do believe many Androids including the soon-coming 7″ Google tablet, easily out-feature Fire if a handier tablet form is called for.

Of course, my personal favorite is John Rice’s response (@edugamres):

It’s true the Kindle is a personal device and suffers from lack of enterprise management, sames as the iPad did when it came out. Apple has made improvements in this area and I think Amazon will too over time. 

While we haven’t used the Kindle in the classroom here, I bought Kindles for my kids at home and tackled some of these issues. First, I did not want a credit card tied to their accounts. Each Kindle has to be tied to an Amazon account (just like iTunes). For each kid, I set up a new Amazon account tied to their personal e-mail. 

I give my kids Amazon gift cards which they use to buy books or apps. But, one of the selling points of the Fire was the huge number of free apps and books on Amazon. To get those, you have to have “one click” activated. “One click” does not need a credit card, but it does need a physical address. Once I figured that out, it was easy to configure their Kindles so that they could download all the free stuff they wanted, and not have a credit card tied to their accounts.
So, for school purposes, A clean Kindle Fire with an active Amazon account that has no physical address entered, will not be able to download free apps or books, or any other apps or books. It occurs to me that this might be a good thing in some classroom situations. 

Also, a Kindle can be set up to be able to download free apps and books, but not be able to _buy_ apps and books that are not free. This also might be good for some classrooms or check-out scenarios.

Just like with the iPad, teachers and other users are figuring out work-arounds to get the device to do what they want it to do. One guy had the idea of setting up a trial (that is, fake) credit card number from PayPal, and using it as the credit card on his kid’s Kindle Fire. The kid can download free stuff, but pay items can’t be charged. That’s a different work-around than I took when setting up my kids’ Kindles, but it’s just as effective. 

Here’s details: http://www.dragonblogger.com/setup-kindle-fire-kids/
The same blogger found out about a child lock app that prevents accessing other apps on the device without a code number entered. So, that might be a classroom solution too. Read his comment section. The first comment was about a teacher running 5 Kindles in the classroom. The blogger notes that tying all the Kindles in the classroom to one account essentially syncs them in terms of apps or books available. 

It’s an exciting time in ed tech. Lots of new products are making their way into the classroom. The Kindle is still designed for reading and simple apps. The iPad is designed for video and higher end apps. The notebook is designed for multiple computing purposes. Each fills a role at competing price points, and each has value.

What do you think? Play with fire and you gonna get burned…or not?

Update: Consider the info shared by the National Federation of the Blind:

Baltimore, Maryland (September 29, 2011): The National Federation of the Blind commented today on the release of Amazon’s new Kindle Fire, which cannot be used by people who are blind.
Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, said: “Blind Americans have repeatedly asked Amazon to include accessibility for the blind in its Kindle product line.  The feasibility of including accessibility in similar products has been demonstrated.  The Department of Education and the Department of Justice have made it clear that Kindle devices cannot be purchased by educational institutions, libraries, and other entities covered by this country’s disability laws unless the devices are fully accessible.  Despite all this, Amazon has released a brand new Kindle device, the Kindle Fire, which cannot be used by people who are blind.  Enough!  We condemn this latest action by Amazon and reiterate that we will not tolerate technological discrimination.  The National Federation of the Blind seeks nothing less than equal access to all technology for blind people.  It is one of the most critical civil rights issues facing blind Americans in the twenty-first century, and we will do everything in our power to see that this right is secured.”

Thanks to @KarenJan for the NFB info!

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El Paso ISD Shares #iPad Implementation Notes

View interactive version online | Have Freemind? Get the MM document file

Special thanks to Tim Holt (El Paso ISD Director of Technology) for sharing his iPad implementation graphic organizer (Get the free, open source Freemind software that will work on Windows, Linux, and Mac) and notes. We’ve seen lots of different walkthroughs of how an implementation should happen.

NOTE: Since Tim was kind enough to send me the original file, if you still allow Java to run on your computer, you should check out the web-based version of the graphic organizer. I’ve uploaded it to a colleague’s server…it’s interactive.

Here are some other neat iPad implementation links that I’ve found helpful:

• Preparing Your School for an ipad Implementation – This is the best I’ve seen on the subject. – http://goo.gl/skCAU
• iPad Dos and Don’ts – http://goo.gl/slTMN
• THE Journal’s Primer on iPad Implementation – What’s neat about this article is that it makes the following assertions,  
  Schools desiring to implement an iPad 1-to-1 program must consider the personnel available within the organization. It is our experience that launching an iPad program requires a champion with sufficient positional power to command the attention of all constituents within the school community, including the head of school, faculty, IT staff, parents, students, and community leaders.Based on our experiences, successful schools will have a senior administrative leader driving this initiative. 
  and
  The total cost of an iPad 1-to-1 launch is greater than the cost of the device. Schools will need to consider cases, applications (apps), network improvements, security measures, and other related costs. It is our experience that an iPad 1-to-1 program will not, and cannot, be sold to constituents as a cost-saving initiative.
  and
  Schools must ensure that their network is prepared for hundreds of wireless devices.
  • Is the wireless network robust?
  • Has the school purchased enough bandwidth?
  • Will students utilize school servers or the cloud for document storage?
  • Are your servers able to host support software for your program?

• Finally, it’s critical to evaluate your iPad implementation…this link on 5 Reasons to Evaluate Your School iPad program is worth reading if only to get the idea across.

SHARE YOUR FEEDBACK ON IMPORTANT QUESTIONS

Of course, I encourage you to share more of your critical iPad implementation relevant questions via this GoogleDoc anyone can edit!

TIM’S NOTES

Below are Tim’s Notes, although I encourage you to view this as a graphic image since it is interactive via this web page:

• EPISD TLI GRANT IPAD ROLLOUT PLAN
  Start:Apr 3, 2012
  Progress:0%

  This is a basic overall roll out plan for the EPISD TLI Grant . Including the four areas that we are rolling out.

• Infrastructure
  Start:Apr 3, 2012
  Due:Jul 31, 2012
  Progress:0%
  Resources:Instructional Technology,Jessica Herrera
• Ordering materials
  Resources:Instructional Technology,Jessica Herrera,Literacy coaches,Tim Holt

  Need to coordinate the ordering of the technology so that rollout matches the timeline of the grant. There are specific venal times, and there are general deadlines such as “iPads will be on campus at the beginning of the school year.”

• Ipads
  Resources:Matt Cooper,Tim Holt
• Carts
  Resources:Tim Holt
• MDMS
• Apps
• Wireless hubs
• Vetting materials
  Resources:Instructional Technology,Literacy coaches,Sandra Garza,Teachers,Tim Holt

  There are many materials that are part of the technical part of the grant that are not part of the EPISD inventory. For instance,iPad carts or sync stations. iPad covers that protect the devices. Apps are also a major part of the vetting process.

• Apps
• Carts
• Covers
• MDMS
• Updating infrastructure for each campus
• Wireless
  This makes sure that each campus has the required wireless networking capability. Most campuses will need to update the number of wireless hubs in the hallways that the
• Electricity
• Connectivity
• Mobile device management software
• App vetting and choosing
  Each app must be vetted by teachers at the grade level . The apps are
• Community / stakeholder buy in
  Resources:Campus administrators,Literacy coaches,PTA

  The community needs to be informed in how the devices will be used in the classroom.

• Teachers
• Parents
• Students
• Curriculum alignment
  Resources:Curriculum and Instruction,Instructional Technology

  The technology needs to be aligned to the episd standards based curriculum. This includes the alignment of the apps to the curriculum and finding apps that do not simply replicate what. Already do in class.

• Early childhood
• Kinder -2
• 3-5
• 6-8
• 9-12
• Professional development
  There are several professional development stakeholders that need to be addressed. Admins,teachers, students and community members.
• Technology
  Resources:Curriculum and Instruction,Instructional Technology,Staff Development

  The technology training aspect is based on the SAMR MODEL and the iPad basics model of atomic learning.

• iPad basics
  Resources:Atomic Learning,Instructional Technology
• Apps
  Resources:Curriculum and Instruction,Instructional Technology

  Apps are based on the level. Each level has differ apps

• Project share Texas
  Resources:Instructional Technology

  All stakeholders need to be in PST

• Large group
• Individual site
• MDMS
  Resources:Jessica Herrera

  Network administration is in charge of this

• SAMR MODEL
  Resources:Instructional Technology

  The SAMR model is designed to demonstrate how to properly integrate technology into class lessons.

• Administrators
• Teachers
• Literacy 
  Resources:Curriculum and Instruction,Sandra Garza,Texas education agency

  This is the training as prescribed by the grant

• Grade level
  Grade level specific
• Stakeholders
  Resources:Campus administrators
• Teachers
  Teachers will be trained on how the devices work as well as the new TEKS and the SAMR MODEL of technology integration.
• Administrators
  Admins will be trained on SAMR MODEL and what technology integration looks like using the samr model
• Community
  Parent and community: can we do video for channel 15.2?
• Students
  AUP CYBER SAFETY meets the needs of Erate
• Rollout
  Resources:Administrators,Campus administrators,Instructional Technology,Network administration,Staff Development,Technology services,Tim Holt

  How do we rollout the materials for the grant? Large group? No training no iPads?

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

Job Posting – Technology Coordinator

DISTRICT:	Pottsboro
STATUS:	UNTIL FILLED
POSTING DATE:	03/01/2012
CLOSING DATE:
POSTING NUMBER:	012847
LOCATION:	District Wide
POSITION:	Technology Coordinator
JOB DESCRIPTION:	Knowledge of computer network, hardware, and software applicationsKnowledge of computer applications development and implementationAbility to manage budget and personnel; coordinate district functionStrong organizational, communication, and interpersonal skillsAbility to implement policy and proceduresAbility to interpret dataKnowledge of LAN and WAN network design and installationKnowledge of network hardware and software applications including network servers, printers, and other equipmentAbility to work with multiple operating systems and network protocols (i.e., UNIX, MS-DOS, and MAC-OS)Ability to analyze and resolve computer network problemsStrong organizational, communication, and interpersonal skills
JOB QUALIFICATIONS:	Bachelor’s degree Microsoft Certifications (MCSA, MCSE) (include if applicable)
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:	1.    Assist schools and administrative departments to develop and implement plans to address technology needs, including evaluation of hardware and software and management of information relating to attendance, grade reporting, scheduling, demographic data, and budgetary information.  2.  Develop and implement district standards and specifications for hardware and software use.  3.    Develop and implement a districtwide computer networking plan.  4.     Coordinate support between the education service center and district staff including programming, application support, and end-user support.  5.    Manage, direct, and assign priorities and personnel to major projects to ensure attainment of district and department goals and objectives.  6.  Oversee the installation, maintenance, and repair of all computer hardware and software throughout the district. 7.   Ensure the timely and accurate reporting of the Public Education Information Management Systems (PEIMS).  8.     Assist with the implementation of staff development in the area of information management and technology; make presentations as needed.  9.   Develop and implement a disaster recovery plan.  10.   Develop and coordinate a continuing evaluation of information and technology services and implement changes based on the findings.   11.     Identify and resolve network hardware and software problems.  12.    Install and test network hardware, software, and upgrades.  13.  Perform routine preventive maintenance on hardware.  14.   Implement and maintain all system configurations.  15.     Coordinate and monitor system utilization; recommend improvements as needed.   16.     Develop and implement a district-wide security system for all systems; ensure network security by maintaining network, Internet, and E-mail accounts.  17.     Design and implement backup procedures to ensure that backup of all networks and workstations are performed on a regular basis.   18.        Oversee backups and restore district data as needed.  19.     Assist with development and implementation of a disaster recovery plan.   20.     Serve as liaison to software and hardware vendors to maintain appropriate product support.  21.     Maintain network design and configuration documentation.  22.       Provide assistance to end users to identify and correct equipment and software.  23.    Implement the policies established by federal and state law, State Board of Education rule, and local board policy in the area of information management and technology.  24.  Compile, maintain, and file all physical and computerized reports, records, and other documents required.   25.   Administer the information services and technology budget and ensure that programs are cost-effective and funds are managed wisely.   26.    Compile budget and cost estimates based upon documented program needs.  27.      Participate in contract negotiations for computer hardware, software, maintenance, and related services.  28.    Coordinate the purchase of all computer hardware, software, and supplies; initiate purchase orders and bids in accordance with budgetary limitations and district policies.  29.      Approve and forward department invoices and purchase orders to accounting department.  30.      Recommend the disposal and replacement of obsolete equipment when necessary.  31.      Prepare, review, and revise job descriptions in the technology department.  32.      Develop training options and improvement plans to ensure exemplary operations in the information services and technology area.  33.  Evaluate job performance of employees to ensure effectiveness.  34.    &
REQUIRED EXPERIENCE:	Two (2) or three (3) years supervision, management, or work related experience in information systems and network maintenance.
OTHER INFORMATION:	Work on-call and after hours
APPLY TO:	Pottsboro ISD Att: Superintendent P.O. Box 555 Pottsboro, TX 75076 PH: 903-771-0083 FAX: 903-786-9085
SALARY:	District salary schedule, commensurate with experience

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Job Posting – Instructional Technology Facilitator

Another one…

DISTRICT:	Farmersville
STATUS:	OPEN
POSTING DATE:	04/04/2012
CLOSING DATE:
POSTING NUMBER:	013098
LOCATION:	District Wide
POSITION:	Instructional Technology Facilitator
JOB DESCRIPTION:	Facilitate the effective use of computers and other technology in the instructional programs district-wide. Assist in the development of short and long range plans for integration of technology into the instructional program. Implement and coordinate the technology staff development and training program.
JOB QUALIFICATIONS:	Bachelor’s DegreeValid Texas teaching certificateMinimum of three years classroom experienceGT endorsement or willingness to become GT endorsedProven leadership skills Demonstrated ability as an instructional leader with both adults and studentsExtensive experience integrating technology into the curriculumSuccessful experience creating instructional materials to promote technology integrationSuccessful experience with technologies available for use in instructional settingsDemonstrated capacity to be self-directed, organized, and collaborative with all staff members Demonstrate ability in the research, development and delivery of innovative technologies
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:	Professional Development:1.        Conduct needs assessments to determine school-wide, faculty, grade-level, and subject area strengths and weaknesses in order to inform the content and delivery of professional development programs and technology interventions that have a direct positive impact on student learning.2.        Design, develop, and implement technology-rich professional development programs that model principles of adult learning and promote digital-age best practices in teaching, learning, and assessment.3.        Evaluate results of professional development programs, technology infrastructure, and instructional technology interventions to determine the overall effectiveness of a program on deepening student content knowledge, improving pedagogical skills, and increasing student learning.Teaching, Learning, and Assessment:1.        Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences addressing content standards and student technology standards.2.        Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences using a variety of research-based, learner-centered instructional strategies and assessment tools to address the diverse needs and interests of all students.3.        Coach teachers to engage students in local and global interdisciplinary units in which technology helps students assume professional roles, research real-world problems, collaborate with others, and produce products that are meaningful and useful to a wide audience.4.        Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences emphasizing higher order thinking skills (e.g., compare, contrast, classify); processes (e.g., problem-solving, decision-making); and mental habits of mind (e.g., critical thinking, creative thinking, and self-regulation).5.        Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences using differentiation, including adjusting content, process, product, and learning environment based upon student readiness levels, learning styles, interests and personal goals.6.        Model and coach teachers to effectively use technology tools and resources to continuously assess student learning and technology literacy by applying a rich variety of formative and summative assessments aligned with content and student technology standards.7.        Model and coach teachers to effectively use technology tools and resources to systematically collect and analyze student achievement data, interpret results, and communicate findings to improve instructional practice and maximize student learning.8.        Participate in a teaching and learning capacity at approved technology and curriculum conferences that enhance professional qualifications.Communication:1.        Collaborate with district and campus personnel to create the best methods for delivering technology integrated lessons to teachers and students.2.       <span font="" s
REQUIRED EXPERIENCE:	3 years teaching experience 3 years experience working with computer hardward and instructional software applications
OTHER INFORMATION:
APPLY TO:	send cover letter & resume to: wsullivan@farmersvilleisd.net
SALARY:	district teacher scale commensurate w/duty days
DAYS:	226
WORK HOURS:	FROM –   TO –
GRADE / STEP:
START DATE:	June 2012

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Job Posting – Director of Information Management Systems

DISTRICT:	Lewisville
STATUS:	OPEN
POSTING DATE:	04/05/2012
CLOSING DATE:	04/20/2012
POSTING NUMBER:	013106
LOCATION:	Bolin Administration Building
POSITION:	Director of Information Management Systems
JOB DESCRIPTION:	Please go to the followitn link for a current (read only) job description: http://lisd.net/ourpages/auto/2011/12/15/36703610/DIRECTOR%20OF%20INFORMATION%20MANAGEMENT%20SYSTEMS.doc
JOB QUALIFICATIONS:	see job description
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:	see job description
REQUIRED EXPERIENCE:	see job description
OTHER INFORMATION:	LISD employees DO NOT fill out the online application. Internal candidates (ONLY) send letter of interest/qualifications and resume to currany@lisd.net
APPLY TO:	http://www.teacherjobnet.org Follow instructions and attach all pertinent documents to the online application. Internal candidates DO NOT fill out the online application. Int. Cand. (ONLY) send letter of interest/Qualifications and resume to curray@lisd.net
SALARY:	Midpoint Salary $90,830, Experience Considered
DAYS:	240
WORK HOURS:	FROM – 8   TO – 5
GRADE / STEP:
START DATE:	July 2, 2012

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Job Posting – Director of Educational Technology (Lewisville ISD)

Looking for a Director of Educational Technology? Lewisville ISD just posted one.

DISTRICT:	Lewisville
STATUS:	OPEN
POSTING DATE:	04/02/2012
CLOSING DATE:	04/17/2012
POSTING NUMBER:	013076
LOCATION:	Bolin Administration Building
POSITION:	Director of Educational Technology
JOB DESCRIPTION:	Please go to the following link for a current (read only) job description: http://lisd.net/ourpages/auto/2011/12/15/36703610/DIRECTOR%20OF%20EDUCATIONAL%20TECHNOLOGY.docx
JOB QUALIFICATIONS:	see job description
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:	see job description
REQUIRED EXPERIENCE:	see job description
OTHER INFORMATION:	LISD employees DO NOT fill out the online application. Internal candidates (ONLY) send letter of interest/qualifications and resume to currany@lisd.net
APPLY TO:	http://www.teacherjobnet.org Follow instructions and attach all pertinent documents to the online application. Internal candidates DO NOT fill out the online application. Int. Cand. (ONLY) send letter of interest/Qualifications and resume to curray@lisd.net
SALARY:	Midpoint Salary $90,830 Experience considered
DAYS:	240
WORK HOURS:	FROM – 8   TO – 5
GRADE / STEP:
START DATE:	July 2, 2012

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Solving Real Problems

Education technology, whether it’s a smart board, blended learning curriculum, computer, or iPad, is merely a tool. It’s only as good as it can be effectively used to solve a need for a teacher. . .We need tools that solve real problems. (Read source)

A part of me balks at the idea of technology as a tool. Of course, I pandered to this perspective in my time…if we’re going to see technology as fundamentally transformational, expanding our definition of a tool as something simply external to the human body, then “tool” may not cut it.

You know, that’s a perspective worth playing around with. Even the idea of “mindtools” has been floated…but at what point do we achieve tool saturation? At what point is one individually over-run with available “tools,” in infinite variety and limited only by imagination? And, what are the fundamental needs of a teacher that can be met by the right tool? There seems an infinite amount of tools available for a finite amount of teacher needs. Even if you factor in that problems are as varied as the students, technology as a tool to solve real problems teachers have eventually makes students into problems. “There’s an app for you, apt pupil.”

In education, we’ve certainly seen a wave of cool technologies being “shoved down the throat of educators,” as one old colleague pointed out to me. In fact, I’m typing on an iPad right now, and I remember working on Palm handheld devices in the not too recent past (well, years ago, but still). I still remember one school district who, while cleaning out its storage room, stumbled on a whole bunch of Palm handheld devices–Tungsten Cs. “What?!? You found how many Tungstens sitting in their boxes, unopened?” was my shocked reply. Sometimes, it doesn’t matter what kind of tool you have, whether you have access to it, if management of the equipment isn’t up to snuff, then it just doesn’t matter, right?

Since I’m a writer, all you need to make a device useful to me is to attach a keyboard. For example, a Palm handheld wasn’t useful to me until the portable keyboard came in, same as the iPad. However, one of the powerful aspects of app-based learning is that tool-making is what we do as human beings…and, while I may not want to make apps to match the problems I encounter, I often don’t know–in true writer form–what my problem is until I meet the app that solves it.

Finding the app that solves a problem I couldn’t imagine before the app–a solution–is very similar to the writer who doesn’t know where s/he is going until s/he gets there by writing through the ideas. The key is, finding ways to write that will yield value…sometimes, the value is in the trouble of development, not the end-product, although that may pay off, too.

Is the iPad I’m typing on solving a problem I recognized myself as having, or a problem I wanted to have, a tool to use, a solution for a problem I didn’t have until I embraced the technology? Whew, what a convoluted mess. I clearly need to spend more time reflecting on this.

 

First Blog Entry on iPad with Blogsy

 

 

This is my first blog entry on the iPad, 3rd generation. I’m thoroughly astonished at how easy it is to blog on Blogsy app and Zagg keyboard. Adding an image wasn’t very hard to do…I pulled it in from PicasaWeb.

ATPE and the Texas Computer Education Association (TCEA) have teamed up to offer another useful and free professional learning experience for ATPE and TCEA members! Join us at 4:30 p.m. April 12 for Technology Tips for the Bilingual Classroom. During the webinar, TCEA Professional Development Director Monica Martinez will share useful tips for turning your classroom technology tools into resources for bilingual learners. For direct registration, click here.

Ok, enough playing around. Definitely worthwhile to check out my favorite must-have apps for iPad! Adding a link wasn’t too difficult either!

(how’s that for an even more than usual vacuous blog post? 😉 )

Oh, I also tried out Keynote…wow, it’s better than I hoped! You can actually embed videos, photos easily into Keynote slides. I’m going to give it a first run later and see how that goes…anyone else making Keynote presos with iPad Keynote App and sharing them online?

 

 

Part 2 of Introducing the New TA:TEKS @timholt2007 #tateks

Thanks to Tim Holt (El Paso ISD) for doing a phenomenal job on yet another in the series on the new TA:TEKS!

This is part two of a series on the new Texas Technology Application TEKS. This segment looks at the 6 Strands, which are based on the ISTE NETS-S.

Watch part 1 of the series.

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Roll Back Your PC To Problem-Free Days #edtech

Freedom Area School District Director of Technology Matt Scala is on duty at Thursday’s school board meeting, which took place with laptops replacing the traditional agendas and other documents. Source: TimesOnline.com Scenario:

“We’re issuing laptops to the school board members…but we need something that will allow them to make changes to the machine, connecting digital projectors and adjusting the display settings but allow us to restore the machine, perhaps remotely, when the school board members mess it up without losing their data.”

Wow, that’s a mouthful of a scenario, isn’t it? Let’s tear it apart and look at the facts:

1. Active Directory policies are set in this environment to lock machines down so they can’t adjust their display settings.
2. Since you can’t adjust display settings, when you connect the laptop to a digital projector, it won’t work as expected. The failure to meet school board member expectations has other consequences beyond that of a computer not working.
3. School board members will mess up their computer, whether by visiting a site infested with malware–and these days, that could be a school district web site–or being infected with a virus on a USB flash drive. How can we restore the computer while safeguarding school board member data (e.g. documents, files)?
4. The laptop needs to be managed remotely in case the school board member finds him/her-self in a situation where the computer is nonfunctional due to malware.

Coming up with a solution involves considering a variety of assumptions built-into the initial scenario, right? For example, you could start with the idea that AD policies are set too tight. It’s not only the school board members having problems, but also, any school district member who uses district setup technology.

What can we do to problem-solve this? What ideas are out there? My knee-jerk reaction was to adopt a new solution like this one, Rollback Rx:

But, is adopting another solution going to get the job done? It might in the short-run but what’s the long-term strategy for dealing with these kinds of issues?

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Pinterest the Tail on the Education Donkey #socialmedia #edtech

A colleague recently posted the following question–relevant to educators using Pinterest in educational settings–to a Texas listserv:

I am a big Pinterest fan, but I have seen some very questionable content. As in many other things, it is hidden in an innocent search. I have seen nudity, sexual depictions and even some images that could be stretched into child porn. I saw these images in searches under photography, nature and gardening and reported them but . . . This is certainly not the norm but I would not want to open it up to students in general.

As I reflected on the questions and issues raised here, I thought our approach to the flow of tools curious. In fact, not only curious, but funny. Every other day or week, a new tool pops up. At what point do you step back and ask, “Am I going to continue doing what I do when these new tools pop up?” While looking for a picture of a donkey for this blog entry, I ran across Ryan Bretag’s blog entry on the same problem, but in regards to MOOCs:

It feels too often we are playing pin the tail on the donkey — spin around recycling what we’ve always done and stumble towards a target that we can’t see nor understand.

While Ryan is discussing failed education policies, we could think of it differently for social media use. 

The parade of web-based communication technologies will continue. What approach will your district take? And, is the description below accurate? How would you fine-tune it?

On the first occurrence of web-based tools that people use for sharing everything about living/life (including the nitty gritty parts not socially acceptable for sharing in public, depending on your community’s perspective, moral outlook/compass, legality, etc.), school districts choose to block. These decisions are made at the top level with little feedback/interaction. Simply, the majority of the users are not involved.

On the second and third occurrence of a web-based tool, we institute a set of restrictive policies/procedures whose purpose is to thwart the pattern we see developing, but mistakenly believe we can stop. The decisions are made centrally with as little stakeholder involvement as possible or a token showing to facilitate approval process of policies/procedures.

After the 10th or so occurrence, we notice that it’s not enough to “set and forget” restrictive policies. As such, we decide to clarify what our reaction to these new tools will be. Instead of blocking, we decide to consider that not blocking and educating staff and students about what’s appropriate in a work setting may be a self-sustaining approach with occasional monitoring and reinforcement than simple blocking or restrictive procedures.


Some actual responses from Tech Directors:

If you block everything that “may” have inappropriate content, you might as well shutdown the internet. If a teacher doesn’t have enough sense to preview what they’re broadcasting to their class, then they probably should not be in the classroom anyway. Unblock and let teachers and students use this great tool. If it gets used inappropriately, it’s a teacher or student disciple issue and should be dealt with as such. (Another response from a Texas Tech Coordinator)

This is one tool that everyone can afford because it is free an even more important quality of resources now with hard economic times for public education.  But, I don’t believe it is something that should be used in the actual classroom because of something that might be inappropriate – at least with elementary

One of the things I keep pushing with staff is the use of social media as a platform for growth and PLC’s.  I’ve been really hitting them hard with Twitter over the years as a resource, but met with some resistance or general non-interest.  Pinterest users are 80% female, which happes to be the same demographic as most of my teaching staff.  Rather than try to convert them, I figure, join them and hit them where they are at.  (like Facebook)  Sure there are the occasionai off-topic walls like fashion, cookie recipes, or interior design, but we have started to use it to have a repository of articles in the Ed Tech world. 

As to Pinterest specifically, while I know lots of folks are using it successfully in K-12 and to facilitate adult learning, I haven’t taken the plunge yet. I already “know” more tools than I can use in the space of a day. What process do our teachers have for getting a better understanding of what’s out there, reflecting on what would work for them as learners/teachers, then sharing that?


I suppose my favorite response is this one:

I don’t have ANY of these issues in my district…the solution is very simple…and works for everyone including parents and board members..etc. We give the teachers the right to bypass for any service and they can also bypass for students who need use…they are just responsible for monitoring more closely while in that mode…Nothing is beyond the reach of our students if the teacher as previewed the content and found it to be useful for student use.  

Use is still logged and can be reviewed at any time….for instance had a teacher once who went to a strip bar site during class…very informative about this gentleman’s habits…but otherwise…no miss use or issues….they know they are responsible and accountable. Never have to respond to a request for opening a site unless it is something going to be used overtime, all the time.

At a time when reading the wrong books in school can cause a teacher to be suspended/terminated and potentially face criminal charges, what will YOUR district do about social media web sites in classrooms?

Image Citations

Image: 091010-205, a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-Alike (2.0) image from iamian_’s photostream)

Donkey – available at http://s3images.coroflot.com/user_files/individual_files/57788_0frYIVi_8k6rp8ldN1j82zK6_.jpg

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CTOs Role – 2 Stars and a Wish #edtech

In an earlier blog entry in my “The CTO’s Role” series, I explored a few tips for doing first things first. Since I wrote that blog entry, I had a chance to exchange emails with an esteemed colleague in another State about what she did upon first arriving to a school district as a CTO. 

Since I’ll be doing the same in less than a month, this kind of advice is precious to me. Obviously, the advice the person below offers goes along with a million other pieces of critical advice and wisdom. You could literally fill a book with all the great advice folks have to offer about your first day, first week, first month on the job…and someone probably has.

The advice offered by my out-of-state colleague below, though, fleshes out several of the tips (#s 1-3) offered in my first things first blog entry. Those tips essentially involve speaking to departments, campuses, and documenting the conversations. However, aside from some general advice, there isn’t much said in particular. My colleague provides very specific advice, such as the following:

When I first started here I scheduled individual conversations with every administrator and technology person, as well as a few teachers who were identified as very interested and “high end” users. I had good conversations and took lots of notes, and I also asked every one of them to identify “2 stars and a wish” – 2 things we were doing really well on and one thing we could do  (or do better) that would really impact their school. I mentioned their “stars” when I spoke at School Committee meetings or other events to make sure they heard that I valued their existing successes, even though they might be small, or things I didn’t think were necessarily stars. I managed to find something in them that I could praise. Then, I used the “wish” list so that during that first year I made headway (at least some progress) on every item. This is part of my building relationships strategy – people want to know you care before they care about what you know. So working on their wishes showed I listened and made what they cared about a priority for me, which showed I cared. 

People build relationships in different ways – some by chatting and going to lunch and connecting about personal topics, and others tend to work more through shared tasks. I lean more to shared tasks (but not exclusively) – I find I can connect with people faster that way and can let the personal relationship grow over time. That’s just me – you may have a totally different style, but given that’s my approach, the strategy of working on something together with each person gave me the opportunity to start off building relationships through my strong suit.

If you had to look at your departments and campuses as a CTO/DoT (a.k.a. Director of Technology), what would be the stars and respective wish that your department and campuses would identify?

2 Stars: What are two things the Tech Dept is doing really well? 

1 Wish: What is one thing we could do (or do better) that would really impact your work in the school district?

Another piece of advice offered by my colleague affirm the importance of building relationships. Below is an excerpt from what she wrote about that:

…when you come into a new district you want to leverage other relationships – seek out the teachers who are leading the way with technology and partner with them to bring others along; connect with the library-media people and make sure they are integrating technology and helping to carry some of the technology department water; get to be really friendly with your CFO (or whatever the business officer is called) so that you know when they have extra money or [have] unspent tech money or budgets are going to be frozen soon (etc). 

And be sure you are in the same bus going in the same direction with whoever is head of instruction – make sure they see you as a partner from the start and not someone to come to after they buy software that won’t fit their needs or answer their questions.

Definitely advice worth considering. I’ve often seen the highlighted section–where C&I buys something and then lets you know afterwards–and it can be destructive for school district morale and costly for taxpayers.

The bottom line for all of this advice is that it presents the opportunity to build relationships and connect with people about is important to them. It sends the message that you care about what they are doing. That is the message I want to send on my first day, first month as well as until I retire. Don’t you agree?

Image Reference

Star+Wish. Imaged adapted from http://goo.gl/s06kt

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Embedding YouTube with ViewPure @mrmadden77

Note: You may want to scroll down and pause the auto-start video somewhere down in this post…or go crazy.

Some time in the last week, I shared the following with colleagues on the Google-Certified Teachers (GCT) list:

A colleague recently posted this question, and to be honest, we’ve had the same question in my current district. Any suggestions/ideas?

Students from one of our classes have entered a contest in our Electric Coop. They have uploaded a video to Youtube and it will be seen and judged on content. When I go to see it (and hopefully put it on our website) I see content that shouldn’t be viewed by children next to it.  How can I avoid this?  We tagged the youtube video with the words: teen, Silverton, electricity, co-op, energy.

You’ve probably already heard of ViewPure.com–I’d heard of it, but forgotten to bookmark it, and so…it was lost to me until Robert Madden (@mrmadden77) on the GCT list mentioned it again.

Viewpure is a web service that removes all the clutter from YouTube video and runs it in a neat interface. You can also create a custom environment for video viewing, example you can generate personalized URL (ViewPure.com/[URL]) and also password protect your video.
Read more: http://www.callingallgeeks.org/3412/watch-youtube-videos-in-clutter-free-interface-using-viewpure/#ixzz1qwJg3Ea9 Under Creative Commons License: Attribution No Derivatives

ViewPure.com solves the problem of inappropriate content popping up…not that I could find any for this blog entry:

Take the URL for the video above, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zN07riWl3zY , and paste it into ViewPure.com:

Then, you’ll get something like this:

But wouldn’t it be neat to embed that ViewPure viewer on a web page, perhaps a Moodle or web page?

You can do it…simply take the URL provided by ViewPure and use the embed code from YouTube. Except, instead of using the link from YouTube, use the link from ViewPure…looks like this:

…which looks like this when embedded in a web page:

Of course, YouTube advertising will still show up. You can also adjust the code to get closer to what you want.

And, if you’re feeling really adventurous and edgy (not really), you can also customize the page that appears on the ViewPure site, cutting out extraneous stuff…but that’s a bit more risky and in danger of violating copyright that ViewPure has established. I’ve emailed ViewPure.com to see what might be possible…is this something that could be self-hosted by schools?

Some other write-ups on ViewPure:
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2011/03/viewpure-how-to-make-educative-videos.html
http://www.detools.ca/?p=6973

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

Free Autism Apps for #iPad Giveaway (TODAY 04/02/2012)

This news via the TCEA CAMPSIG email list (Lori Gracey):

A ton of apps are free or on sale today in honor of Autism Awareness day. 

• AutismTrack (Normally $49.99) – http://itun.es/iPK4Hf
• Take Turns – http://itun.es/iPK4H7
• Smurks – http://itun.es/iPK4HN
• Toca Store – http://itun.es/iPK4Tg
• Five Little Monkeys – http://itun.es/iPK84D
• ABA Sight Words – http://itun.es/iPK6H4
• ABA Flash Cards – Alphabet – http://itun.es/iPK6TT
• ABA Receptive Identification – By Class – http://itun.es/iPK6j2
• ABA Receptive Identification – http://itun.es/iPK6DX 
• ABA Problem Solving Game – Which Go Together? – http://itun.es/iPK6Dh
• ABA Flash Cards – Food – http://itun.es/iPK6Jp
• ABA Sight Words – http://itun.es/iPK6xq

Other free apps today are listed in the TCEA Tweets at http://www.twitter.com/tcea.

All the Milo speech apps which are normally $1.99 – $2.99 are on sale for $0.99 – http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/speech-with-milo-verbs/id405441288?mt=8

Thank you!


Note: You can also find Miguel’s Must-Have Apps listed here!

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

Job Posting – Instructional Technology Facilitator (Tx)

Farmersville ISD has an opening for an instructional technology facilitator on a twelve month contract.

More information can be found in the attached file or at http://farmersville.ednet10.net/employment.htm

DISTRICT:	Farmersville
STATUS:	OPEN
POSTING DATE:	04/02/2012
CLOSING DATE:
POSTING NUMBER:	013068
LOCATION:	District Wide
POSITION:	Instructional Technology Facilitator
JOB DESCRIPTION:	Facilitate the effective use of computers and other technology in instructional programs districtwide. Assist in the development of short- and long-range plans for the integration of technology into the instructional program. Implement and coordinate the technology staff development and training program. Other Duties: 1. Compile, maintain, and file all physical and computerized reports, records, and other documents as required. 2. Comply with policies established by federal and state law, State Board of Education rule, and local board policy. 3. Comply with all district and campus routines and regulations. 4. Other duties as assigned
JOB QUALIFICATIONS:	Education/Certification: Bachelor’s degree Valid Texas teaching certificate Special Knowledge/Skills: Knowledge of computer hardware and software applications Knowledge of technologies available for use in instructional setting Knowledge of curriculum design and implementation Ability to develop and deliver technology training to adult learners Strong organizational, communication, and interpersonal skills
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:	Professional Development:1. Conduct needs assessments to determine school-wide, faculty, grade-level, and subject area strengths and weaknesses in order to inform the content and delivery of professional development programs and technology interventions that have a direct positive impact on student learning. 2. Design, develop, and implement technology-rich professional development programs that model principles of adult learning and promote digital-age best practices in teaching, learning, and assessment. 3. Evaluate results of professional development programs, technology infrastructure, and instructional technology interventions to determine the overall effectiveness of a program on deepening student content knowledge, improving pedagogical skills, and increasing student learning. Teaching, Learning, and Assessment 1. Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences addressing content standards and student technology standards. 2. Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences using a variety of research-based, learner-centered instructional strategies and assessment tools to address the diverse needs and interests of all students. 3. Coach teachers to engage students in local and global interdisciplinary units in which technology helps students assume professional roles, research real-world problems, collaborate with others, and produce products that are meaningful and useful to a wide audience. 4. Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences emphasizing higher order thinking skills (e.g., compare, contrast, classify); processes (e.g., problem-solving, decision-making); and mental habits of mind (e.g., critical thinking, creative thinking, and self-regulation). 5. Model and coach teachers to design and implement technology-enhanced learning experiences using differentiation, including adjusting content, process, product, and learning environment based upon student readiness levels, learning styles, interests and personal goals. 6. Model and c
REQUIRED EXPERIENCE:	3 years teaching experience 3 years experience working with computer hardware and instructional software applications
OTHER INFORMATION:
APPLY TO:	http://www.teacherjobnet.org wsullivan@farmersvilleisd.net
SALARY:	district teacher scale commensurate w/duty days
DAYS:	226
WORK HOURS:	FROM –   TO –
GRADE / STEP:
START DATE:	June, 2012

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure

Desktop Virtualization – One CTO’s Response #citrix

Source: http://www.chriswolf.com/images/vdappliance.jpg 

Note: If images don’t appear below, please feel free to view this via EverNote. I have tried to correct the links and the images should appear. Thanks to Josh (comments) for noticing this!


Don Hindsley (catch him on Google+), a technology director about to retire in Texas schools, recently shared his response to the following question:

We’re ready to try our hand at desktop virtualization and would appreciate your advice on how to achieve the greatest results with minimum expense. VMWare?

Below, you’ll find his detailed response…thanks, Don!

In the summer of 2006, we installed a Citrix server farm that permitted us to virtualize the desktops for all of our students. They could access their virtual desktop anywhere here at school and also from home via the school website. It was great because if their computer (school or home) quit on them for any reason, they could just log onto any one nearby and pick up right where they were. No lost work, if they hadn’t saved lately. 
Second huge advantage: we only had five installs of any new software or upgrade. 
And third: we could easily show licensing compliance, because Citrix listed individuals and groups that had been given rights/access to the software.
Here is our total cost in 2006:

We purchased five Dell PowerEdge 2850’s w/ 4 GB-RAM and this set-up worked great for four years. Fall of 2010, we began to see a serious slowdown of the server farm because usage had grown beyond the number of simultaneous users we had planned for (150 max). 

We had to research and decide whether the 1) Replace 2)increase capacity, or 3) add another system and split users into two groups. 

We chose to install and run alongside the Citrix system a VMware setup (w/ View) because the product seemed to have made strides past where Citrix was then, AND we wanted to have both systems for our own learning and experience. 

This past summer (2011), we installed a full Cisco blade server (8-quadcore CPU’s, 384 GB-RAM) and two ½ blades. Also VMware vSphere Enterprise Plus, w/ View. 
Product list and costs are below:

It took us about three ½ months to feel that we had it all running consistently the way we wanted. We gor a late start because of the timimg of school budgets (We wish we could have started in June because then we would have been nearly ready for the start of school. As it turned out, administrative snafus with the budgeting delayed so the we started the installation at the beginnijng of August and were not ready to “turn it on” until Thanksgiving. The last entry for $25,000 (Professional Services) was assisting us, in person or on the telephone, in the configuration. 

So now we have the students on Citrix (150 simultaneously with great speed) and 100 seats for faulty and staff on VMware. 

Both system have their strong points. Right now, we really like the VMware the best. This spring, I am taking the Citrix servers dowm, on at a time, and re-installing the OS (server 2008 this time) then the latest  Citrix software, etc. . . for students (and the IT staff)  to experience the best of that, too. I think we’ll like Citrix better once we upgrade to a newer version. 

DON’T SKIMP ON HARDWARE  (you’ll be sorry with performance), and we’re glad we got View with the VMware.

You are Prey – Educating Principals and Others about GoogleForms

Source: http://www.the-techbox.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Google-Privacy1.jpg

Original Blog Entry

Vicki “CoolCatTeacher” Davis recently wrote a blog post, Why Schools Shouldn’t Use GoogleDocs for Anything Private, as well as responded via Facebook to this topic. I won’t spend much time on the problem, except to say that you can go read her blog entry and comments.

A relevant story from my experience–I had a frantic principal call me up one day. She pointed out that she’d filled out a GoogleDoc Form online, submitting information that would be considered confidential and sensitive. She didn’t know any better, and I moved immediately to notify Google and “turn in” the form’s web address/URL so that action could be taken. Then, I spent some time “closing the barn door” educating her on what may be submitted online, what to watch out for from these types of forms you get via email, etc. These kinds of conversations obviously need to happen in advance. 

I’ve often heard we should “hold their hand” when discussing principals…that time is over. We need to hold their hand with a definite end-point in mind, with the clear understanding that you either own your learning or you are prey.

Without reservation, I wholeheartedly support the use of GoogleDocs and Forms in school settings. But let’s remember FERPA, confidentiality, and to take responsibility for our own learning, as well as help others be better digital citizens.

Update (4/2/2012): Google sent me the following to share with you, asking for removal of the original item, citing confidential info.

Google is working to protect our users’ privacy, especially from identity theft. It is not a violation to ask for an email address. While our protection policies occasionally classify some forms as abusing our TOS when they are not, no data is lost and through a review process we can return legitimate forms data to users who created the form. Within a domain, forms are not classified by Google at all.

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure