by Scott McLeod | Feb 1, 2010 | 21st Century Skills, Law, Policy, and Ethics, Learning and Teaching, News and Events, Tech Tools |
On January 28, several students in the Van Meter Community School District demonstrated to Iowa legislators the work that they are now able to do as a result of the district’s 1:1 laptop initiative. Sandra Dop, the Department of Education’s 21st Century Skills Coordinator, wrote about the encounter:
When the legislators asked, “So what can we do to get out of your way and let you go?”, I nearly cried.
I will forever be proud to have witnessed it!
Will the legislators follow up their words with action? I can be hopeful, can’t I?
![School law feeds (and other resources) for Google Reader]()
by Scott McLeod | Jan 26, 2010 | Higher Education, Law, Policy, and Ethics, Tech Tools |
This is the message that I just sent my Education Law and Ethics students (the two cohorts are in Des Moines and Mason City, Iowa). Thought I’d share here too…
———
Time to set up Google Reader!
1. Watch this video:
2. Go to www.google.com/reader. Sign in with your new Gmail account info if need be. Once you’re in, click on the red ‘Add a subscription box’ (top left). Paste in the first URL below. Repeat for each of the remaining links on the list. When you’re done, you should have 13 ‘feeds’ in your subscription list (bottom left). Click on a specific feed name to see items from just that one. Click on ‘All items’ (top left) to see all 13 feeds mixed together.
3. My goodness, what have we done? Well, we’ve just saved you time by putting ten school law-related feeds into one place. Now you’ll be up to date on all of the latest school law news and you’ll only have to go to one location (www.google.com/reader) rather than thirteen! Try to visit Google Reader at least once or twice per week just to stay current.
4. Note that you can add other feeds to Google Reader too! For example…
5. Start looking for the letters ‘RSS’ and/or the little orange RSS symbol on web sites. Those tell you that you can add that site’s content to Google Reader, meaning one less place you have to visit separately on the Web. Use Google Reader to ease your personal, professional, and academic lives. See the attached file for ways you can supercharge your Google Reader experience!
6. Get in touch if you have questions / difficulty!
Google Reader Tips (click on image for larger version)
by Scott McLeod | Jan 19, 2010 | Tech Tools |
We all have technologies that are absolutely essential to our day-to-day lives. Here is a baker’s dozen of mine…
- Google Reader. It took me a while, but I’ve now organized all of my feeds into category folders in Google Reader. I now can simply click on a folder name, scan the post titles for anything that grabs me (I keep Google Reader in List view, not Expanded view), star anything that I want to read and/or blog later, and then click on Mark All as Read to clear the list. I’m currently staying on top of 434 feeds and it takes no more than 30 to 45 minutes per day. If I get behind, no worries. I just clear it all out and figure that topics will come back around if they’re really important.
- Google Chrome. Chrome is quite simply the fastest Internet browser out there, both in terms of page loading and initial startup. Google Chrome feeds my need for speed. Firefox seems to drag in comparison. Chrome’s new ability to handle extensions is rapidly eroding Firefox’s plugin advantage.
- MiFi. I replaced my wireless broadband USB modem with a Verizon MiFi wireless hotspot. Now, rather than only one computer having Internet access through Verizon’s cell phone network, my family can connect up to five devices, including laptops, cameras, iPod Touches, etc. The coolness of this struck me when we were driving East this winter as my wife checked her e-mail on her laptop, one of my sons played an Internet game on my laptop, and my daughter downloaded new apps for the iPod Touch, all at the same time. Nice!
- BlogJet. I don’t always have Internet connectivity when I want to work on a blog post. BlogJet is a powerful desktop blogging client that allows me to work on posts whenever I want. I like that it allows me to post to multiple blogs and it is much easier to use than TypePad, WordPress, or Movable Type. I also use BlogJet occasionally as a HTML editor.
- iPod Touch. We have two iPod Touches in our family. When I can pry one of them out of my kids’ hands, I’m increasingly using the Touch instead of my laptop. My two favorite apps are MobileRSS (an awesome RSS reader) and Kindle for iPhone. Although I’m still buying nonfiction books, I’m purchasing and reading more fiction on the Touch rather than buying paperbacks. I don’t have an iPhone because AT&T’s coverage in Iowa is abysmal; I often pair the Touch with the MiFi if I need Web access.
- SnagIt. There are lots of different screen capture programs out there, many of which are free. I have yet to find one with the functionality of SnagIt. I use it to capture images from the Web, Adobe Acrobat, PowerPoint, Excel, Visio, and so on.
- PhraseExpress. If you haven’t yet used text-expanding software, I promise it will make your life easier. Once you have it set up, you simply type in an abbreviation or short phrase and – presto! – an entire sentence or paragraph appears! I use PhraseExpress for all sorts of things, including customizing my e-mail signature and replying to all of the Did You Know? (Shift Happens) inquiries that Karl Fisch and I get.
- EverNote. I’m using EverNote more and more to take notes, capture snippets from the Web, etc. I’m sure that I’m only using a small portion of its functionality. I like that I can access my content from my laptop, the Web, and/or my Blackberry.
- LastPass. This is a password manager and form-filler for my Internet browser. I like that LastPass keeps its files on the Web, meaning that my wife and I no longer need separate files on our respective hard drives.
- Readability. If you haven’t yet tried the Readability bookmarklet for your Internet browser, give it a shot. I use it far more than I expected to. It’s been a godsend to one of my older relatives whose vision is not what it used to be.
- Notepad++. Notepad++ is my favorite Notepad replacement software. I use it to get rid of unwanted text formatting, do basic HTML editing, etc.
- Readtwit. I stumbled upon Readtwit because of a tweet from Will Richardson. Readtwit turns your Twitter stream into a clean RSS feed. If there’s a hyperlink in the tweet, it also shows you the first 2000 characters of the target web page; this is incredibly useful. Try Readtwit for a week in your favorite RSS reader. You’ll be hooked too.
- Launchy. I’m much faster on the keyboard than on the mouse. Launchy allows me to launch programs, files, etc. with a few keystrokes. My wife: “How did you open that program so fast?” Me: “I can’t tell you all my computer secrets. Then you won’t need me any more!”
I use every one of these technologies nearly every day. They make my life easier, more efficient, and more effective. What are you using that improves your day-to-day productivity and well-being?
Related posts
by Scott McLeod | Nov 16, 2009 | Professional Development, Tech Tools |
Back in July I said that
I was concerned that we never seem to hold folks accountable for being self-learners.
I also noted that
In many job sectors, employees are expected to keep up with relevant technologies or risk job loss. When do we require that of K-12 and postsecondary educators? At what point do we say to them “No, we’re not training you how to use this. It’s easy enough for you to learn on your own. And if you don’t, we’ll find someone else who can.”
Many of you chimed in and shared your own thoughts on this topic. Apparently, now Dilbert has too:
When will we, as educational systems, redefine the job descriptions and expectations of educators to include their regular and effective incorporation of relevant digital technologies?
Related posts
by Scott McLeod | Nov 3, 2009 | 21st Century Skills, Communication, News and Events, Our Changing World, Tech Tools |
WHO TV (Des Moines) aired a special report, Are we too connected?, on last night’s news broadcast. Among others, they interviewed me and Dr. Michael Bugeja, Professor and Director of Iowa State University’s Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication.
I have interacted with Michael a couple of times. He’s a very good guy and a fun guy to talk with, but he’s also a nationally-visible technology critic who is interviewed often by the media. His technology skepticism is probably understandable given that his entire profession is struggling to reinvent itself because of the impacts of these new digital tools, but it’s also at least a little ironic given that he utilizes multiple web sites to publicize his work. He and I often fall on opposite sides of technology issues. I really need to read his book, Interpersonal Divide: The Search for Community in a Technological Age.
Here are a few quotes from the special report:
All this really does is send a message that someone somewhere else is more important than the place we are and the person we're with. [Bugeja]
That's not a loss of connection, that's a gain of connection compared to where we were before the technologies existed. [McLeod]
There's a time and a place in society for all manner of communication. Former platforms define those areas with real boundaries. But this has no boundaries. It blurs the boundary between home and work, between school and home, between church, temple, mosque and school. It blurs everything. Why? Because it's programmed for revenue generation. ‘We want to make money off you at any time of the day.’ [Bugeja]
Happy reading!
![School law feeds (and other resources) for Google Reader]()
by Scott McLeod | Oct 20, 2009 | Learning and Teaching, News and Events, Tech Tools |
Tomorrow is Wolfram|Alpha’s Homework Day. The company is inviting students to submit their homework problems to see if/how Wolfram Alpha can solve them. Should be interesting…
Will you or your students be participating?
![School law feeds (and other resources) for Google Reader]()
by Scott McLeod | Aug 8, 2009 | Communication, Leadership and Vision, Our Changing World, Safety and Security, Tech Tools |
Tom Whitby had an interesting idea: create a Twitter account for a school administrator that was pre-loaded with 50 people to follow.
Beth Still liked the idea and blogged about it. I have some hesitancy, however, about the concept, despite Tom and Beth’s good intentions and despite my inclinations to help administrators by making this social media stuff easy for them [and, yes, I’m now officially changing my mind about item #5 in the hyperlinked post]. Here’s the comment that I left on Beth’s blog:
Although I empathize with the sentiment behind this idea, I confess I have some hesitancy about it. Unlike being handing an iPod loaded with podcasts, which involves no identity infringement, I think most folks would prefer to handle their own online identities. Choice of whether or not to join an online service – or even specific online account usernames and/or Twitter IDs – is critical, I believe, for online identity formation (e.g., I wish I had a common username across services instead of being mcleod in some places, scottmcleod in others, and something else in yet others; I choose to use some online services but not others). What you choose for others may not necessarily be how they’d like to be represented. Also, third parties will begin treating those individuals’ online identities as authentic and representative, despite the fact that you, not they, created them. Your representation may or may not be accurate or fair to the person who has an online identity that supposedly represents her but instead represents your perceptions of her. It’s already tough enough trying to get a handle on the variety of ways in which we can be represented online without our permission. Despite the extremely good intentions here, I’m not sure I’d agree that this is a good thing to do.
The essential question here is whether it’s okay to create an online service account in someone else’s name, regardless of how good your intentions are. Beth says that she would let her administrator fill in his own profile. But she already would have made the account…
If you have thoughts on this, please leave them over at Beth’s post. It should be a good conversation!
by Scott McLeod | Aug 7, 2009 | Learning and Teaching, Tech Integration, Tech Tools |
The best-selling netbooks typically fall within the $300 to $400 range and their capabilities are increasing rapidly as manufacturers figure out how to include more features. For example, we are seeing larger or solid state hard drives, additional external ports, more included software, touch screens, and the emergence of tablet netbooks or netbooks with removable displays.
Netbooks traditionally have been positioned as laptop replacements and are selling briskly because they can do what we need most of the time. However, many K-12 educators feel that netbooks are not a good option for student 1:1 computing initiatives because they lack the capabilities of a full laptop computer.
I’ve been reading lately about attempts to get electronic book readers (e-readers) into the hands of students. I wonder if schools should be thinking of netbooks as e-readers intead, particularly as tablet-style netbooks and free / low-cost online or electronic textbook initiatives both become more prevalent. The cost of a netbook is comparable to a Kindle, for example, and has greater functionality than the typical e-reader (rather than lesser functionality compared to a laptop). A student carrying around a $400 tablet netbook could use it primarily as an e-reader and also as a laptop replacement. This dual functionality might make netbooks a smart bet for many schools, particularly as the cost decreases – and availability increases – of online and electronic textbook options. Savings on textbooks might offset or even pay for the cost of the netbooks.
Does thinking of netbooks as e-readers make them a more attractive option to schools rather than considering them solely as laptops? Do dedicated electronic book readers such as the Kindle or the Sony e-Reader make any sense for K-12 schools? Thoughts?
by Scott McLeod | Aug 1, 2009 | 21st Century Skills, Law, Policy, and Ethics, Leadership and Vision, Learning and Teaching, Our Changing World, Tech Integration, Tech Tools |
The Des Moines Register reported today that the St. Ansgar (IA) Schools have given up on their proposal to purchase a device that would jam mobile phone signals after confirming that such equipment only can be used by federal agencies. The district had looked into the possibility of buying a jammer because it was struggling with inappropriate student mobile phone usage. One of the school board members said:
I don't think they have a place in the educational environment. The educational environment is supposed to be about students learning and teachers teaching and teachers can't teach over a cell phone. If a student is busy on the cell phone they aren't learning. It's a distraction … and we need to minimize the distraction.
The interim superintendent also noted that he was concerned about students using mobile phones for cheating.
I e-mailed the interim superintendent a couple of days ago and asked him to consider a different, less hard-line approach, noting schools’ responsibility to prepare students for a digital, global era and that other districts have had success with more-accommodating strategies. Maybe I’ll hear from him sometime.
One of the comments to the Register’s article cracked me up:
Oh, For Crying-out-load. Just hang one of those shoe orginizers next to the door and require each student to check in thier phones on entering the classroom, then they can retrieve them after class. Just drop your phone in your slot and pick it up on the way out. Hey look, I solved the problem for less than $5.00
I don’t know if this is a fantastic idea or not, but it sure made me laugh. Sometimes easy solutions to our problems are staring us in the face if only we have the courage to think creatively. As we head into the new school year, who thinks their local school has an effective solution for inappropriate student use of mobile phones?
by Scott McLeod | Jul 10, 2009 | Professional Development, Tech Tools |
I had a Twitter discussion the other night with Jim Twetten, who’s the Assistant Director for Academic Technologies here at Iowa State University and also has quickly become one of my ‘go to’ people on campus.
Jim took exception to the fact that I had poked fun at the ‘Learn about Facebook’ training session that ISU was offering to faculty. I replied that I was concerned that we never seem to hold folks accountable for being self-learners. After all, Facebook isn’t an extraordinarily difficult tool to learn how to use. Most intelligent people (which university faculty generally are) could figure out much of it if they just sat down and messed around for 30 minutes or so. And of course the same applies to blogs, wikis, and many other technologies. They’ve gotten so simple that the learning curve just isn’t that steep anymore.
And yet many educators (K-12 teachers and administrators, postsecondary faculty, etc.) still are extremely unwilling to just sit down and try stuff. Our digital learners, of course, have little hesitancy when it comes to clicking on things just to see what they’ll do. That willingness to probe, investigate, and experiment helps them learn and master the tools.
As someone who does a lot of training and professional development for school administrators, I wonder how much I’m facilitating codependence. In many job sectors, employees are expected to keep up with relevant technologies or risk job loss. When do we require that of K-12 and postsecondary educators? At what point do we say to them “No, we’re not training you how to use this. It’s easy enough for you to learn on your own. And if you don’t, we’ll find someone else who can.”
It’s a fine line between helping and codependence. And when it comes to educator technology training, I’m not sure we’re always on the right side of that line…
