May 27, 2009

I taught a group of 4th graders interent safety today, and I thought it went well. I was surprised at how little they knew when it came to the internet, but they did know enough, I feel, to find some problems like all people do. I know this is a strange comment, but I find that most people can venture out into cyberspace and have no idea what can happen. I feel that people need to make themselves aware of some of things out there. I thought it went well, and I thought that I communicated well with them with a lot of reiteration. I came back here to mostly a quiet day so that is good. Tomorrow, I am off to the land of CFF at the IU. I need to have a cart ready for an interesting project which I will miss. We will be working with one of the most recalcitrant groups of innovators. Man, that is a mouthful. I will inform my loyal readers [sarcasm] about the results. tomiglio...........flick

March 26, 2009

Today I met with many teachers to go over their plans and talk with them about the integration of technology. I also met with our new literacy coach, we talked about the how we can combine our efforts to work together for our students. We know that our combined efforts will aid our teachers. I also had a call for the Centre Daily Times. The reporter wanted information about the trip to San Antonio. I was able to set up interviews with the students. Cool. I am so glad that they get to tout themselves through various avenues. Tomorrow, I am taking them to speak to a group of fellow educators and various IU persons. Later dud....errr...dude..........flick

February 23, 2009

Spent this day at the IU10 for training using photography. The district gets a free digital camera which will go to the elementary schools for their use. I believe we have enough at the secondary level, and they need to use the technology, too. The training was quite good in that it reinforced a lot of what I have amassed through the millenia of experience--in other words; I am old. The trainer is attached to Tool Factory, and he was quite good. He told the truth about the camera and the software. It was refreshing from that aspect. I despise people who come in to a training and make it sound like an infomercial. Of course, I had to deal with the school aspect and found out that tomorrow's computer fair may be off because of student initiative. It does not surprise me, but I am not happy with it. I knew I would have to deal with Janus, and I am prepared for that every day. That is okay because I have bought into this program and the people working on it. For all of my Portuguese readers.....Tchau........flick

February 20, 2009

The end of the busy week. It has been wrought with all sorts of interesting problems, but it has been a learning time, also. It looks like most of the virus problems are solved; notice I said most of them. I know how those boogers work, and it will be awhile before they are eradicated. I have been talking with teachers, and my next week is filled with Photostory and InDesign inclusions. The plans right now involve a small conference Monday at the IU and Tuesday a computer fair. I am also working with Janus people, etc. I also had to pitch in and work some tech problems to get everything as close to normal as possible. Well, I am off for a fun-filled weekend. See ya next week..............flick

February 18, 2009

Back from the IU...internet up, email up, and now web work has piled up, and I need to get to work on that. As a matter of fact, this will give all of my anxious readers who thought I fell off the face of the earth a chance to get back to their daily reading routine and find out about the life of CFFFlick. Okay, so it is only a few million readers out of the billions out there, but I will cater to the loyalists. I worked hard to get all of the embedded learning material up-to-date as well the wiki and other things online. I also had a ton of email to peruse as well as other matters because we are still fighting the virus here at PV. I really think it is important to learn about virus creation so one can fight it better. I do wish those people who created these things would put their talents to work in a more positive light. We will get there. I have been out and about into the classrooms and am watching people do great things. I love it...........flick

February 16, 2009

Another week and still no internet, etc. I know that it will be fixed, and I am still catching up on other things. Again, it is still neat to observe my colleagues and their innovations. I love it. I have nothing new to report and nothing witty to say (I know that there is a first for everything). I have a CFF meeting at the IU tomorrow, and I am taking one of my teachers to it so I can share with the group some of the things she is doing. I love my teachers taking chances and going outside their comfort zones. I have done that for years, and no, not always successful. I sometimes have learned more from my failures than from my successes. Well, off I go..........flick

December 12, 2008

It sure has been a busy day. I got to meet with the social studies chair and talk over CFF and my duties. It did go well. I also did a presentation in Media 1 with Photostory. I modified the presentation I did last week, and I thought it went better. I sometimes have to get out of the old teacher stereotype and engage the students more myself. I did that this time, and I was pleased with the outcome. I also finalized plans for the Promethean representative to come in and work with the present CFF teachers concerning problems and questions about the boards. I hope that they become prepared and utilize the time to aid them. The rest of time I had to deal with small problems to allow teachers to work with the technology. It was good getting back into the classroom teaching and modifying the lesson. I have some things to contemplate over the weekend, and on Monday, I will going to the IU to do some training and to showcase some of the student work. Have a good weekend everyone, and I will tell you about the training.

April 3, 2008

Meetings is a word that does spell out the character of my day. The first meeting involved writing the CFF grant for next year. I have worked on some grants, but the involvement of this one is quite extensive. We are considering getting Macs for this phase of the grant. It would include some changes to the network, but I have always liked the dual-platformed concept; I even feel the tri-platform as even better. In the afternoon, I attended a CFF meeting at IU10 in Philipsburg. The meeting gave CFF coaches a chance to network and look at work from the various schools. We also had a the opportunity to talk with our regional representative from PDE. We expressed some of our concerns with her, but we also told her of our triumphs. It is sometimes difficult dealing with bureaucracy, and when one deals with a person face-to-face, it is somewhat comforting, although there is always that cynicism developed innately through years of dealing with the government. Being out all day means that I will have to do a lot of catch up tomorrow. It is the law of the West. The weekend is around the corner.