Issue 1, Volume 7 August 17, 2006     Thought for the Week Optimism is the father that leads to achievement. -- Helen Keller   Welcome Back! Welcome back to the 2006 - 2007 school year and the seventh year of the CPSB electronic resource - Tech Connect! The CPSB Technology Department had a very busy but productive summer. We conducted training sessions for hundreds and hundreds of school system employees in preparation for the beginning the new school year. We provided over 100 face-to-face and online classes to help school district employees improve their use of technology. Jim Crawford and his staff worked diligently to bring everyone up to speed on the new interface for the Pentamation financial system. Stay tuned for continuing system upgrades in this area. Blackboard training continues to be in huge demand as teachers, principals, and department heads explore the power of our online eLearning portal. The good news is this year we will be providing training, new computers and printers to all English Language Arts teachers in middle and high schools, and first and second grade elementary teachers. We also will be working with music and art teachers this year. We look forward to not only providing these classrooms with the newest, up-to-date technology but also providing support for the comprehensive curriculum. At the beginning of the school year, please remember we are a very small staff supporting almost 40,000 users in the district; and, we are running as fast as we can….everyone seems to need tech help at the beginning of the school year. Sending any and all tech help requests to tech.help@cpsb.org will result in your issue “getting in the line” and will assure you faster service. We routinely expedite emergencies from the online help desk system, but if you are not in the system, it is very difficult to get the proper support for your technology need. For the fifth year we held the annual summer Tech Camp for students at our Tech Center. This year the theme was Imagine, Discover, and Create! Over 100 students in grades 3 - 8 enjoyed a week of fun and intense learning with technology conducted by our technology department staff. The CPSB and Region V Technology Staff geared up and provided these students a great technology-infused adventure. Using digital cameras, the campers were spellbound as they went on a mesmerizing and digitizing Harry Potter adventure in photo-editing, movie-making, and podcasting at Tech Camp 2006 Check out the student projects at www.cpsb.org/techcamp. We have revamped Tech Connect this year and invite you to view our more concise, focused format. As you log on each Thursday morning you can expect to find waiting in your email inbox the latest in "technology happenings" in our district and current "tips and tricks" to improve your technology skills. We hope you will join us in celebrating the numerous successes we have in technology by emailing tech.connect@cpsb.org any information you would like to share with our colleagues in the district. Please share any suggestions you have and let us know what will help you in your specific job assignment. We will attempt to include your suggestions in our future issues.  We look forward to working with you again this school year. Let us know what we can do to help you and have a great school year! Sheryl Abshire, sheryl.abshire@cpsb.org CPSB Technology Department “Advancing Quality Education with Technology” Register Now for Administrative Workshops! The following workshops have been scheduled as part of an Administrative Workshop series to assist administrators with obtaining the necessary professional development hours that are required through LEADTech and/or the Louisiana Principal Induction program; however, administrators not involved in these programs are welcome to attend. You will need to register for these workshops through the Region V TLTC site at http://www.cpsb.org/regionv and click on Course Registration or go directly to the registration page at the following link: https://www.cpsb.org/techclasses/  If you have never taken a class, then you will have to create an account. Once you have an account, then click on Register for Tech Center Classes to select the course(s) you want. Administrative Workshop Part One: Electronic Portfolio This workshop will guide administrators through the development of an electronic portfolio using a template (for LEADTech or Principal Induction). Participants should bring their resume and any other electronic documents they have to include within the portfolio (i.e. a picture of yourself, faculty meeting agendas, PowerPoint presentations) Pre-registered participants will be sent an email outlining specific electronic documents that will be needed. Dates and times are listed below: Thursday, September 7, 2006 9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. Wednesday, September 13, 2006 9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. (This workshop will be offered twice, participants may come on one or both dates. If a participant chooses to come on both dates, the second date will be a work day.) Administrative Workshop Part Two: Excel for Administrators Learn how to enter data and work with rows, columns, cells, toolbars, shortcut menus, and format your worksheet to catch anyone's eye. Learn how to use a spreadsheet to manage several administrative tasks.  This workshop will be held Wednesday, September 13 from 1:00 p.m.- 3:00 p.m. Administrative Workshop Part Three: Creating Interactive Forms with Microsoft Word If you find yourself recreating similar documents over and over again, you may find that creating a template will save you loads of time. Create that document just once, save it as a template, then base new documents on that template. We will explore just where it is that Microsoft puts their templates, so you can make changes at a later date, if necessary. We will also use some of the Microsoft Word form fields, like check boxes and drop-down lists.  This workshop is slated for Tuesday, September 19 from 9:00 a.m.- 11:00 a.m. Administrative Workshop Part Four: Administrator’s Briefcase The purpose of this workshop is to provide school administrators the necessary resources to become proficient Internet users and provide principals quick access to the best Internet sites for their regular use.  To participate in this workshop, save the following date: September 19, 2006 1:00 p.m.-3:00 p.m. Office Scan News Alert For those of you who have the Office Scan icon next to your clock with a red (!), please do not panic. Office Scan was not updating; but being proactive, we corrected the issue early. So if you still have this issue, please reboot your computer and wait for it to update it for you. If after August 21 your office scan icon still has the (!) please email the Tech Help desk. As always, if you have any technology questions, email tech.help@cpsb.org. Want/Need Computers in Your Classroom.....Apply NOW! I-TEC Classroom Grants for 2006 -2007 are Due Tuesday, September 19, 2006 ... I-TEC - Implementing a Technology-Enriched Curriculum A Project of the Calcasieu Parish School System Technology Department You have the expertise, your students need the access, but how are you going to get 5 brand new computers connected to the Internet with a LCD projector to display work, etc??? Well, short of winning the lottery, the next best way is to apply for the Calcasieu Parish Technology Department I-TEC Grant. Fill out the application, cross your fingers and wait to be called to say you WON!!! If you have always wanted to apply for this grant, but could never find the time….well this year the grant is not due until September 19th. So, now you will finally have the time to write this very easy-to-complete grant! Visit this web link http://www.cpsb.org/resources/itec/application.doc and print out the application, NOW! Don't wait! The applications must be received no later than noon on Tuesday, September 19, 2006. Interviews will be held during the week of September 25th. Questions? Please contact Kim Leblanc via email at kim.leblanc@cpsb.org or call 437-1244. Outlook Attachments If you are new to Outlook 2003, then you may want this tip. When opening attachments in Outlook 2003, the default for an attachment in Word is to open in the Reading Layout view. This view displays your document like pages in a book. The pages are designed to fit well on your screen— and text is automatically displayed using Microsoft ClearType technology, which makes the document more legible. You can still mark up the document with suggestions and comments as you read, and you can send it back to the author as an attachment with all of your changes. However, it does not always layout the way it looks in the Print Layout View. To prevent reading layout view from opening automatically when you receive a Word attachment in email, you must change the option through Microsoft Word. So, first of all, open a Word document. Then on the Tools menu, click Options, click the General tab, and then clear the Allow starting in Reading Layout check box. Thawing Out That Frozen Computer If your computer freezes up, hold down the Ctrl key and the Alt key with one hand and press the Delete key with the other. This will open the Task Manager window. Click the Applications tab at the top and you will see a list your currently open program. If the freeze you are experiencing is caused by a malfunctioning program, you will see the words Not Responding next to that program. Click the program to select it and then click the End Task button at the bottom. That will close the malfunctioning program and will usually unfreeze the computer. At that point, it is usually a good idea to save your work in any open program and restart the computer. Repeat Characters in Excel Let's say you want to create a fixed column of special characters to format a report or add periods to the end of a text column to provide a Tab leader similar to a table of contents. To repeat a character in a cell, use the REPT function. The REPT function repeats text a given number of times. Use REPT to fill a cell with a number of instances of a text string. To use the REPT function, enter the following in a cell: REPT(text,number_times) where Text is the text you want to repeat and Number_times is a positive number specifying the number of times to repeat text. Looking For A Free Online Image Collection? Check out Pics4Learning! Pics4Learning is a free online image collection specifically developed for classroom use. The collection includes over 20,000 pictures donated by students, teachers, and amateur and professional photographers from over 50 countries. All of the images are copyright-friendly, so you can use them in student projects, web pages, conference presentations, or at parent night with no copyright concerns. Pics4learning also features multi-level lesson plans written in conjunction with thematic digital images. Each lesson includes a set of appropriate images, objectives, materials needed, a step-by-step process, software tutorials, and excellent online and print resources. Find images for your projects at www.pics4learning.com. ThinkQuest 2007 Competition Opens Competition just opened for ThinkQuest 2007!!! This competition, sponsored by the Oracle Foundation, inspires students to think, connect, create, and share. Students work in teams to build innovative and educational websites to share with the world. Along the way, they learn research, writing, teamwork, and technology skills and compete for exciting prizes. Students work in teams to build creative and educational web sites that explore globally relevant subjects. Teams, comprised of students between the ages of 9 and 19, are invited to compete to work on educational web sites focusing on their chosen topic area. The top 10 teams in each age division receive laptop computers and a cash award for the school. In addition, the top 3 teams in each age division travel to ThinkQuest Live, an educational extravaganza celebrating their achievements. A special award is also presented to the team best demonstrating global perspectives. Coaches can enroll their teams now; and, the official competition begins on or after August 15. Web sites must be entered by 3:00 p.m. April 16, 2007; and, winners will be announced June 14, 2007. For more information and complete contest rules, visit the ThinkQuest website at http://www.thinkquest.org. OfficeScan Pattern Update The latest OfficeScan pattern as of 8-16-2006 is pattern 3.639.00.  Please check your pattern by placing your cursor over the OfficeScan icon and viewing the pop-up window that appears.  If your pattern is significantly lower from this one (A HIGHER PATTERN NUMBER IS OK), Please email tech.help@cpsb.org regarding this or any other question you have regarding OfficeScan. Best on the Net!! -- Visit this site for hundreds of websites for teachers! We would love to hear from you about the best educational sites you have found on the web. Please submit, via email, the sites you feel merit inclusion. Send to tech.connect@cpsb.org. Please include the URL and a short sentence about the site.  Featured Sites: (These sites were submitted by teachers in Calcasieu Parish) New Teacher's Survival Guide http://www.glencoe.com/sec/teachingtoday/downloads/pdf/NewTeacherSurvivalGuide.pdf Several useful forms have been included with this New Teacher's Survival Guide, including late sign-in sheets, sample contracts with parent briefing guides, progress reports, homework checklists and grade sheets, and classroom set-up templates, along with guides for organization, student conduct, planning your first day, and more.   Back to School Ideas From Teach-nology http://teachers.teach-nology.com/themes/holidays/back/ Find lots of back to school resources, especially great for new teachers. It includes worksheets, activities, classroom management ideas, teaching calendars, seating arrangements, name plates, bulletin board sets, and more.  This site is good for all year round with its technology-connected lesson plans, rubrics, tips, printable worksheets, and more.   Teaching Resources For Multiage Classes http://www.multiage-education.com/multiagen-b/ Explore this site for a considerable bank of resources to use in multiage classrooms. Included are articles and suggestions to use throughout the school year, resources for curriculum planning across all subjects, specific lesson plans, classroom layout suggestions, management, organization, forms, student behaviors, and more. An official publication of the CPSB Technology Department If you have any questions or comments please e-mail the Webmaster. 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