Month: October 2004

Kids today are connected. When they go home, they do not pick up the phone anymore. They get on the computer and IM eachother. This way, they can have group conversations and keep up with more people and more events at once. If one friend IMs 4 of his buddies about going to the mall, each can ask mom or dad at the same time, and within 2-3 minutes, everyone knows who is going and what time they can go.

We have the same connected enviornment for our classrooms. By using the WITS Notes pages, students and parents can stay connected to what is going on in the classroom. When teachers post assignments and events to WITS, everyone who needs to see them does automatically.

There is no IM section in WITS, but if the need arises, that can be created as well…

The Internet has broken down the walls of the classroom forever.

Friday was a really wild day – we had many teachers trying new technologies at the same time, and keeping up was tough, but fun. The day started with a straight forward class – Mrs. Downey came into the lab to use the textbook software, Intrigas y Avenduras. Because of our move to OS X, we had an updated version of the software that runs off the server. A few minor hitches, but otherwise it went just fine.

Mrs. Merlino came in next and wanted to use the new portable Interwrite tablets in class. These tablets allow the teacher to move around the class and write on the handheld tablet, with everything appearing on the projected image at the front of the room. We hooked up Mrs. Krieger at the same time with a tablet, and during the course of the next hour, they both found some awesome features of the tablets, and devised some neat ways to incorporate them into instruction.

A little while later, we needed to test out a Pocket PC handheld computer for the PE folks, so they will be able to do attendance on the handheld in the gym. It is important for them to be mobile and wireless, as their classes are all over the place at any given time. So far the testing has gone well for them.

Meanwhile, Mr. Trombley is ready to incorporate the SMARTBoard into his teaching, so we set him up with the portable SMARTBoard in his classroom. Look for him to be getting into its many uses over the next couple of weeks. His Friday afternoon mods 24-26 class got a brief taste of what is to come.

So…a wild day it was, but an awesome one at that.