November 25, 2008

It is great when you hear an alumnus and former students is doing great things. I am adding to links at the bottom of the blog for you to view a speech given by a former student of mine who is now president of the graduate students at Clemson University. He is giving a speech on the state of the university along with the presidents of the university and the undergraduate president. All I can say that is I am proud of his accomplishments and his future accomplishments. He is currently working on his doctorate. Now, back to reality. I have been working on presentations next week, and they are going great. I am looking forward to working with the classes. I also have a problem with one of the boards seizing. I have updated the driver. I am now going to reinstall the software hoping that makes a difference. I also have been talking with teachers and getting ready for the installation on January 8th of the remaining whiteboards. Today has been a lot calmer, and I am thankful.

November 24, 2008

A very short week but if itoday is any indication of what it is going to be like, give me a long week any day. I found out today via email that part of our CFF is not up to date so I took it upon myself, after I checked out the responsibility of filling out this form, of course, to bring us up to date. It is not quite done, and I will finish it tomorrow. I also had to perform some menial duties and prepare for a presentation tomorrow and one after Thanksgiving. I also had to perform some duties with my workstation. Via email I found a disturbing site called Vexspot. The premise of this site is to thread anonymously about anything. I call it disturbing because I could not believe some of the vile comments I read about people in different school districts. I relayed the information to IT which blocked the site immediately. Many thanks to the listserv. Also, thanks to the listserv, I was able to look at Mikogo. This is a collaboration type software which will interface with Skype. I can conference with people I invite and show them my desktop. This could work with tutoring students on specific problems or with teachers. I like the looks of it, and will test it further. I must admit that I am looking forward to the Thanksgiving break. It is now snowing and all activities after school were canceled; maybe a delay tomorrow--we will see. Have a great evening, I will be back on the blogging circuit tomorrow.

November 21, 2008

Can you believe a two-hour delay? That is what happened today. It was good because I was able to get more done in the way of paperwork and prepare for the onslaught after the holidays. Another teacher approached me about doing some work with The Odyssey. I have taught the book so I asked her about what did she want the students to learn from the exercise. Every teacher has different concepts he/she wants the students to learn from any piece of writing. I will await her ideas. I also have been updating the wiki and should have most of it done by Thanksgiving. It is so hard to believe that there are so many sites on there, and I know there are more to go. I also will send the resource around to all the teachers so they know what is available. I did also create a tutorial for youtube users. It has been a good day. Now, I am ready for the weekend. Oh, a side note, with the IT person leaving, I am noticing an increase in teachers calling me to fix problems. I do not want this to take my time, but I know that I am going to have to help out in this area until we get a new one. I do have a problem with a board freezing. I downloaded the new driver, but it did not cure then problem. I am not sure if it is a Vista problem or not so i had her try XP to see if it worked better. I will post to let people know. Have a great weekend......... Do svidaniya!!!!

November 20, 2008

I look back and see that I have posted over 100 entries in my blog--I think that is amazing since I was hesitant about starting one. One of my teachers came and asked for a tutorial on Vista, and I said sure. As I look at the voluminous information, I have changed my mind and asked her what specifically she wants to know. I figure that would be much easier. I used today to play catch up on a lot of things from emailing to networking with people. Tomorrow I will be in the classroom working on several projects for teachers. I just got the classroom installation schedule for January 8, and I will have to construct a schedule to minimize disruptions. I guess we have to do what we have to do. I will send out links to my wiki and pvasd/shared to tell teachers what is available. Sometimes you lead a horse....aww you know the rest. Busy day and got caught up on a lot of things. Be back tomorrow....flick

November 19, 2008

I am going to being this blog with a little lesson in Roman mythology. Janus was the Roman god for gates, doors, etc. The district is partnering with PSU to help them obtain a NASA grant to build a satellite (JANUS-Joint Astrophysics Nascent Universe Satellite) to look into the deepest regions of our universe to find gamma bursts and study them hoping to find objects that were the first to form after the so-called "Dark Ages." I have gathered two students who will, with a team of teachers and the asst. super, construct a video to show the involvement of the community in this project. The video will be 3-5 minutes in length, but this video will take many hours for work. The students are excited about the project, and it will involve a lot of our students in grades k-12. A nice challenge and project for all. I also met with some teachers about working with technology and have scheduled times to meet with them and go over a plan. I also had a request to do a tutorial on Vista. I have begun to deal with the basics and should finish next week. I also am pushing for more of our teachers to become Keystone Technology Integrators. I feel this is an important attribute to have and will enable our teachers to network more. Finally, so I can leave you all with a smattering of what I do, I have talked with a colleague about getting a coaching certification to broaden horizons and take the classes with me. Check back tomorrow all of you CFFFLICK readers, err I mean reader, for more in the life of CFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFlick!!!!! Stan Lee, eat your heart out.

November 18, 2008

I have been doing informal interviews with the faculty to find out the needs and desires with respect to their integration of technology, etc. I find their levels to be across the spectrum, and I am going to have to accommodate myself to their level. I do not think it will be too hard because I dealt with that last year and as a teacher all my life. I also had a teacher (So-called Deb Harry) who wants to do a PhotoStory project. I will create the tutorial, and we will be ready to go. She also gave me enough lead time to help her prepare, which is good. I also talked with the librarian who really loves the use of technology and is a strong proponent of it. She loved my wiki, and it is almost ready for updates. I know that I will also have to realign material to further meet some needs. She was also impressed with the amount of audio books, etc. that I have accumulated. It is a work in progress.

November 17, 2008

Trying to get gathered after a a five-month hiatus is more difficult than I thought, but I am getting there. I have met with almost all of the CFF teachers and got a sense of where they are. They are doing well with the integration of technology and are using it. There are still some hardware problems, and time is still an issue with all. They are also overwhelmed with some of the other initiatives. I am now going to meet with some of the new CFF teachers who will be receiving their equipment next month. I know that the Embedded Learning will begin in January, for those taking the course for Act 48 credits. I am talking with the teachers today at a meeting outlining my duties, CFF, and the resources available. I am updating the wiki and preparing other concepts for the teachers. Since the job is all encompassing, I must prepare for all curricula, which is something I took into account last year. I will look for other available material to help supplement and implement technology into the classroom. I love the challenge and look forward to working along the side of my colleagues within the classroom....flick

November 14, 2008

Oh, sometimes one has to go to a conference, and one wonders why one is there. The conference did not help me but the networking was invaluable. I believe that sometimes things happen for a reason, and I do hope that these contacts and conversations will work out well. I must say that the information I had at this conference was old hat, but I attended to get the new administration up to speed with the CFF program. I know this is a short blog entry, but I will reiterate that this blog will only deal with CFF and my job. CIAO!!!!!!

November 13, 2008

Today, I met with several teachers and surveyed them on their use of technology and my role with them. It was quite productive, and almost to a tee most of them talked about the time they have to deal with it to learn it and feel comfortable with its use. I know that this is a problem, and I talked about it in my last entry. We also have to deal with some hardware issues that need a resolution, and I plan to act as an advocate in that area. I co-taught a class today dealing with how to use Dreamweaver to create web sites for use within the classroom and curriculum. I foresee other problems in the area of hardware support, and I will deal with this issue as it arises. I just found out news that our IT person is leaving for another job. I do understand his decision and wish him the best. This will create a chasm here, and who knows when this ditch will be filled. The powers need to look at this position and create some permanence by being creative. Already I have to deal with uncertainty, but it something that comes with the territory. Tomorrow I am scheduled to deal with embedded learning in State College. I will update you on that. Happy Thursday.....

November 12, 2008

I'm back. I know that it is a scary thought, but I am back. My job has been changed to a secondary technology integrator; it is a full-time position. The powers approached me in August about making the position permanent, and I jumped at the chance. I feel that it is very important to have a person who is able to assist teachers and students with technology and not just technology for technology's sake. It has to be viable and legerdemainical; otherwise, one will get caught in a trap of entertaining or busy work....a la...ad nauseum worksheets. I have begun meeting with my second year teachers to find out what they need, and tailor the ideas for them. I feel one of my biggest roles will be to coach the teachers into using and knowing the software and the new OS. The powers continually introduce new concepts and do not spend the time teaching the one who use it and need to integrate it into their teaching. This policy is contrary to all teaching strategies. One must prepare all students for new concepts; this will smooth the transition and help the learning curve. I know that I will be bucking a lot of people, but I feel it is worth it. This will bring about less stress and help the educational process from top to bottom. I will be giving updates from day to day and talk about the good, the bad, and of course me, the ugly. It feels good to be blogging again, and I will keep it entirely with CFF and technology and education. Till tomorrow..........flick