A day in the life of a technology coordinator

History was made

2009-11-10T09:32:00.000-05:00

What if no handshake happens when we try to connect? What if? Days prior to the first video conferencing project for our school to embark on, I was a nervous freak. When November 9th came, I had my normal morning caffeine jolt and headed to the video conference room that is packed with 40+ 7th Graders and their Social Studies teacher.

They only had a week to prepare but the room was filled with posters for clues, for scripts, and the students anticipation was way up high.

We connected 15 minutes before the scheduled VC just to be sure that we could connect and we did!! The middle school from upstate NY wasn't ready yet so we waited for them. Once the VC started, it was so good! No, it was great!

Our students presented clues the "old-fashioned way" by creating posters. The far-end students presented their clues via PowerPoint presentation. Let me see if you could guess who this Revolutionary War icon is:

NJAET 2009 Conference - Wealth of information

2009-10-14T12:14:00.001-04:00

At the NJAET 2009 "In Tune with Technology" Conference in Lakewood, NJ, I had the great time learning. It was a mecca of information. I registered the very last minute ( the night before) because I wasn't sure if I could come due to some scheduling issues.

Looking at the list of activities for the day was overwhelming. I wish I could clone myself so that I could be at every single workshop - hands on or not. So here is how my day went at the NJAET 2009 Conference:

8:00am Still driving on Route 9 South
8:30am Arrived and registered at the desk
8:40am Figuring out which workshop to attend while eating bagel with cream cheese and drinking coffee
8:50am Visiting booths and getting freebies
9:00am Listening to B. McLaughin talk about "Blogs, Wikis & Podcasts: What are They and How Do They Fit in my classroom"
9:25am Still cannot connect my laptop to the wireless network in the university; been troubleshooting for the nth times; wasn't the only one alone with same issues
10:20am Met Lisa Thumann for Session#2 "In Tune" With the 21st Century Student
10:25am University's tech people came to the rescue and provided laptop users with some sort of a wireless connection - yippee!
10:26am Tweeted that I was listening to Lisa Thumann
10:35am "Do not teach me with the tools from your past" - powerful presentation
11:35am Meet with my co-attendee at lunch
12:45am My co-attendee won a raffle - another yippee!
1:00pm Listening to Zumu's owner, Liz Niederberger's presentation on "Making Your Website Work for your school, teachers, students and parents"
1:30pm Liz' laptop lost internet wireless connections and borrowed my laptop
2:20pm Hands-On workshop for "SmartBoards and Digital Learning" presented by Lany Burnett of Tequipment.com.

Posters, pens and bookmarks and a tote-bag -- these are just a few of the freebies that I got. But what counts the most is the experience and the learning I gained from this conference.

Collaboration through Video Conferencing

2009-10-08T21:42:00.001-04:00

I proposed procuring a video conferencing unit to the administration last year. After thorough research on which unit to purchase, we got our Polycom HDX7001XL installed. Hurdles were encountered when I tried to do an equipment test during the first week of school with Sue J. Calvin of Berks County Intermediate Unit. Equipment testing is a pre-requisite for TWICE so we could start participating in various collaborating projects available. After tweaking here and there, the re-test was a success.

With memberships to these organizations and resource people listed below, our options for video conferencing and collaborating are innumerable:

TWICE's CAPspace
GlobalSchool.net
Oracle sponsored ThinkQuest
Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration (CILC)
Judy Bornstein of CMSCE (The Center for Mathematics, Science and Computer Education) listed us on the Peer-T0-Peer Video Conferencing Directory.
We are in the process of getting a bridge for AccessNJ so we could connect to content providers who use ISDN connection.

NEWSFLASH:

Our first middle-school VC project: Janine Lim has been instrumental in getting us on board on the first middle-school video conferencing project called HistoryQuest.
Our first elementary school VC project: Weather-Buddies

We are excited! We can't wait for more VC projects and hopefully get some lessons from content providers around the globe.

Was it too much to grasped in one seating?

2009-08-27T17:26:00.004-04:00

I just finished presenting to all the teachers the technology tools that we will be focusing for the upcoming school year. There were mixed reactions but I reiterated that this is the way education is moving forward. Our principal states that by withholding these tools to the students in the classrooms that we are actually not doing our part in preparing our students for the technological advancements in any field.

I am so glad that “reading” was one of the topics of the discussion and I could already see myself having a Wordle workshops for the teachers. I may not even have to conduct workshops for Wordle. Some may just start signing-up for it and start using it for their poetry, vocabulary words (not just in language arts but in Science, Math, Social Studies, Spanish etc). Reading is truly essential in any subjects and in all the different facets of life.

Here’s a SlideRocket presentation that I showed at the meeting. I hope you would find this useful too.

Summer Reading materials

2009-06-23T15:45:00.000-04:00

I missed the last week of school due to health issues. I wasn't able to say goodbye to the wonderful students and teachers and staffs, some of whom are retiring this year.

Recuperating now at home and posting on our school's site the summer reading materials. I always love summer reading programs. Prior to working for schools, I always encouraged my first-born daughter to get involved in the summer reading program at the nearby public library. Of course, it was a year-round reading program since she was not in formal schooling then.

This year, our daughters started early on with the Barnes & Nobles' Summer Reading Program where one free book is given for every 8 books read. Of course, there is a limited selection of free books. Nonetheless, it is FREE! My youngest, age 5, is already on her way to earning her 2nd book.

Reading Rockets provides insights on why children lose up to 3 months of learning if reading is not part of the summer routine. Reading is truly essential. Let us help encourage kids to read, read, and read.

Kids can also earn an autograph copy of books through Scholastics Summer Challenge Weekly Book Giveaway Program.

And for guidelines to make summer reading a success, check out Reading Is Fundamental (RIF). Not only do they gave great hints in making reading fun, they also have monthly calendar activity suggestions for reading and writing.

So create a love of reading! Pack yours and your children's books and head off to the pool/beach. Happy reading.

Resistance to change

2009-06-08T15:27:00.001-04:00

Our school remained loyal to Windows XP yet we saw the need to update to Microsoft Office 2007. Due to numerous activities after school hours and holiday breaks, it wasn't easy to plan a workshop for the teachers to introduce them to Office 2007.

Finally, on June 3rd, that workshop was conducted. It was a hands-on workshop so we used the computer lab equipped with 30 desktops and started the 1.5 hour-long workshop. It was the normal crowd I would say. Some of the attendees have been to the technology workshops that I have given throughout the school year. Others were first timers to my workshop. Nonetheless, the workshop proved to be valuable to all.

Office 2007 is here to stay, at least in our school so "resistance is futile" - nope, I am not a Star Trek fan. Just a fan for change. Good change.

Collecting dust

2009-03-29T00:16:00.006-04:00

I love it when teachers tell me that I try to make technology enjoyable. I love what I do. I love to hear when teachers comment that after attending my workshop that they feel that technology isn't that bad after all.

Today, I just finished a 1 1/2 hour of in-house workshop as a refresher course on using the SmartBoard. When I was offered this position for the school year 2008-2009, I was told that the school has a SmartBoard. I never worked with one before. Neither have I worked with an Interactive WhiteBoard too.

I finally got the SmartBoard workshop scheduled. I used a very short SlideRocket presentation and used the later part of the workshop for the teachers to actually touch the SmartBoard and play around with with. Though they felt that they "didn't want to mess it up", they ended up planning on integrating it in their curriculum.

The SmartBoard is now out of the closet and will not be collecting dust anymore. I truly hope that I am making a difference here in the lives of the teachers to embrace technology.

Beyond classroom learning

2009-03-18T20:16:00.001-04:00

Learning from experts has its advantages. Big advantage in fact. Though our school do not have Video Conferencing equipment as of yet, a lot of enthusiasm was created when we connected with Arctic Explorer, Professor Aaron Doering of the GoNorth! exploration team.

Seven classes (although only 4 confirmed) packed our library/media center to participate in the live web chat with Professor Doering. Representatives from each class came up with questions that Professor Doering answered. We read questions from other schools as well and discussed it afterwards. Questions like "Have you ever fallen off the sled?" to "How do you prepare for such an expedition?" were posted in the chat room. The students left the library/media center with great big smiles and they were still talking about what they learned during the chat. They are looking forward for more of this distance learning experiences.

Breaking a Record

2009-02-12T15:06:00.005-05:00

Though quiet a number of my PreK to 3rd grade teachers took part in a collaborative project to celebrate Lincoln's 200th birthday, it wasn't until yesterday that we decided - together with the computer teacher - that the school would take part in today's attempt to break the Guinness World Record for simultaneous reading.

Today was momentous as the nation (and some countries like Germany and Japan) took part in reading the Gettysburg address "Four Scores and Seven...". I was working from home today - being it is my day-off - but I was up early and sending emails to my school administrator and the computer teacher to remind them on what steps need to be done for this event. Our school is equipped with a local TV station, wherein we have TVs in each classroom to view announcements made daily, usually at the beginning of each day. Students who are involved in this local TV station are in-charge of setting up the equipments on a daily basis. I bet they did an excellent job setting up the TV station for this event.

I can't wait to get to school tomorrow and hear all the great things that happened today. Now I am wondering, was the Guinness World Record broken? I just checked their website and there seems to be no word yet.

Wake up...wake up!

2008-12-19T06:21:00.001-05:00

One of the "I-am-not-looking-forward-to-this-responsibility" of being the webmaster of the school is getting a phone call 1.5 hour from your normal waking time. Today is one of those days. The weather isn't bad yet - in fact, there is nothing out there right now - but an alert needs to be posted on the school site ASAP.

I get paid playing

2008-11-15T16:21:00.000-05:00

All of our middle school teachers have their own laptop and projectors in a cart made by Balt. This week, I spent most of my time trying to install a surge protector that would be compatible to the laptop/projector cart that we already have. Previously, the teachers were only given the the normal surge protector that you could get from any home improvement store. Complaints about it not being long enough plagued my inbox. Finally, an order for a cart surge protector was placed.

I installed the surge protectors but one of the carts wasn't compatible to it so I had to ask our janitor to screw the holes on the aluminum cart. Oh well that's one job off my list of things to do.

The IPM board from Numonics is pretty old - acquired in 2006. After troubleshooting using wireless and wired connections, the software was found to be corrupted. So there I was in the middle school wing's hallway with the IWB and the laptop cart uninstalling and installing the newer version of the software. I really hate editing the registry but I had to so that the teachers could use it. Messing up the registry is one thing I hope would never to happen to me.

As I was testing the new version, one of the students was walking down the hallway and looked at me perplexed and asked "What are you doing?". I replied "I am playing. I get paid playing". The look in his face was a classic. :)

On the side note, one of my 3rd grade teacher is getting accustomed to using VoiceThread that she even created her first one (with very minimal help from me) to record her class saying prayers in Italian. I am proud of her and her students.

Pumpkins season slipped away so fast

2008-11-03T21:18:00.000-05:00

By October 6th, a 1/4 of the elementary teachers I worked with took onboard their first online collaborative project through Jennifer Wagner's The Pumpkin Seed Project. They did all the planning as to what activities they will use, where to get the pumpkins, what math skills will be enhanced, etc. etc.

I sat down with them one-on-one and showed them the VoiceThread tutorial. I helped them create a free (not so free as we have to pay a one-time activation fee of $10 per account) K-12 educator's account as well. From there, we tried uploading a picture, recording our comment and typing in our comment. The teachers were all optimistic and excited.

To make it easier, I scheduled them to do the VoiceThread recording on different days. On Day 1, four 4th Graders were picked via lottery to speak on behalf of the entire class. On Day 2, 50 1st Graders spoke - now they have to read their individual lines and at time I have to whisper the words to few students who still have difficulty reading some of the words. On Day 3, another group of four 4th Graders were chosen to record their comment. We also created a BubbleShare account to showcase the pictures taken during the project. One 3rd Grade class got involved too by submitting the results of the pumpkin seed count to Jennifer Wagner's site.

The students were thrilled to hear their voices recorded and played over when the VoiceThread came online. The teachers were filled with awe when the final results were posted online and found out that they just collaborated with schools from New Zealand, Italy, Nova Scotia, Manitoba just to name a few. Great accomplishments. I am so proud of the teachers who have taken a big step forward in trying out this online collaborative project. Most of all, I am glad that they trusted me and let me empower them with this powerful tool, this VoiceThread that is.

The Great Pumpkin Season is here

2008-10-15T22:30:00.000-04:00

My family and I went to Battleview Orchard in Central New Jersey this past weekend. It was a lovely sunny day. Fall is my favorite season of all. Time to make and bake apple and pumpkin pies. Yummy.

This reminds me of an ongoing project that I introduced to the elementary teachers a few weeks ago. The Pumpkin Project is an online collaborative project that is authored and moderated by Jennifer Wagner. The project is simple yet fun for the kids to do. Best of all, we will be integrating technology with this particular project for the first time in the elementary level.

Some of the teachers are already registered in this project as of October 6th. I am going to sit down with them and help them create a free educator account in VoiceThread and hopefully go through the tutorial so that they will become familiar with this tool prior to having their students record comments for this project.

They are so excited and so am I. I love online collaborative projects. Too bad we missed the O.R.E.O. Tumble project that ended last week. It was at the start of the school year and as many of you know, that is one period in the school year when you wish it is June already.

Road to great essays

2008-10-10T23:04:00.000-04:00

Our computer teacher was away on a trip so I was the substitute for today. The school purchased a web-based essay writing and scoring software called Writing Roadmap from CBT/McGraw-Hill. It was the 7th graders' first time to be introduced to this software today and I showed them the demo.

The interface is a bit easier for the upper grades to navigate but I have seen the lower grades having quite a difficulty on it. With much practice prior to the actual testing date before the Christmas break, I am hopeful that all students from all grade level will get used to the navigation tabs and prompts so that they would focus more in answering the essay and getting higher marks for it.

Essay topics vary from "My favorite thing" to "Definition of Success" and depending on grade level. The teacher may create his/her own essay topics as well and assign them to the students. If the student does not finish the essay (during practice sessions) during class time, the student may finish the essay at home since everything is web-based. The software provides through a graphical representation a holistic and analytical information once the student sends his/her essay for SCORING.

I am certain that this would help improve the students writing skills not just for the purpose of the actual testing date but writing skills in general. Truly this is an innovative way to help students enhance their writing skills.

Welcome!

2008-10-02T11:00:00.000-04:00

Let's get started.

So I am a technology teacher to teachers. The month of September flew by so fast as many would say but in my experience, it was much faster. The month of September was also a crucial month for me being the new technology coordinator of the school. Crucial because I did not want to be someone telling the teachers to use this or that technology and replacing the way they have been accustomed to. I wanted them to feel comfortable with using technology in their classrooms. Most of all, I wanted the teachers to feel comfortable in asking me for tech help.

Of course there were quite a few resistance and others insisting in the old ways. Luckily for me, the school's principal is pro-technology.

Integrating technology in the classroom takes a lot of research. Thanks to a few IT workshop presenters who I kept in contact with, I was able to find great resources to introduce to the teachers. One of whom is Judi Wolf.

I never worked with an Interactive White Board (from Numonics) but being a QA software engineer in my past life, it was a breeze to take the tutorial. I actually had so much fun playing with it and giving the middle-school teachers one-on-one tutorial to use in the 6th, 7th and 8th classrooms. Yes, each middle school classroom is equipped with an IWB. Those are great "bling-bling" (hardware) and make classroom discussions LIVELY.

The elementary teachers just finished 2 of 3 workshops yesterday. After that, they will have another workshop in a couple of weeks or so to refresh their knowledge of SmartBoards! It just keeps getting busier and exciting!