Issue 2, Volume 9 August 28, 2008     Thought for the Week Procrastination is like a credit card: it's a lot of fun until you get the bill. -- Christopher Parker   Technology Integration Strategies School administrators and teachers! Are you seeking practical technology-integration strategies to improve student achievement? Then you may want to visit the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory website entitled, Focus on Effectiveness: Integrating Technology into Research-Based Strategies. There are twelve basic strategies linked to 30 classroom examples that demonstrate effective ways to apply research to using technology to engage learners and improve achievement. The approaches addressed include the following: thematic instruction identifying similarities and differences summarizing and note taking reinforcing effort homework and practice nonlinguistic representation cooperative grouping setting objectives providing feedback generating and testing hypotheses simulations and games cues, questions, and advance organizers To view the classroom examples and further research, go to the Northwest Regional Education Laboratory website at: http://www.netc.org/focus/strategies/them.php Technology K-12 Grant Program - Apply Now! Fill out the short online application, and you could win! Turning Technologies, LLC is offering the Turning Technologies' K-12 Grant Program which will provide TurningPoint Student Response Systems to 15 K-12 classrooms. The purpose of the grant program is to increase awareness and usage of student response systems in K-12 classrooms. It is open to all accredited public and private K-12 educators within the US. Selected applicants will receive a TurningPoint Student Response System which includes: interactive PowerPoint software, 32 Wireless RF ResponseCards, USB-based response RF Receiver, handheld RF receiver with LCD display, QuestionPoint, Web-based analytics application, compact carrying case with a color-coded Quick Start Guide, and more. Find out more at the web site: www.TurningTechnologies.com/k12grant  Deadline to apply: September 15, 2008. Update Your Email Info The opening of school is upon us and with it comes a flurry of email. However, those of you who transferred to a different school or department during the summer might be seeing email for your old location still coming to your mailbox. School and department mailing lists are generated based on information from your login account. When you transfer job locations within the CPSB school system, your email address will remain the same but the other information will still be set to your old location. This information needs to be updated to reflect your new location, and unless Tech Help is notified, this information may remain outdated and thus result in unnecessary email. If you have moved location during the summer, please send an email to tech.help@cpsb.org to let us know where you are now located. If you have transferred into a school office, please ask your principal to send the email about the change as this is a security measure when dealing with computer access in school offices. Can You See Me Now? For higher legibility of documents on screen, you can adjust the screen resolution of your monitor (for monitors that support more than one screen resolution option). The higher the number of pixels, the more information you can display on your screen and the smaller items appear. Lower screen resolution makes items appear larger and can benefit people with vision impairments. 1. Click Start then select Control Panel. **Be sure you are in Classic View (all Control Panel icons are showing).** If not, under Control Panel in the left pane, select Switch to Classic View. 2. Select Display and then click on the Settings tab. 3. Under Screen Resolution, select a screen resolution value by moving the slider arrow. [800x600 is the most common default setting.] [1024x768 provides a moderate boost of screen real estate.] [Computers with widescreen displays will have resolution settings designed specifically for widescreen format displays.] 4. Select OK and then select the Close button. Schedule Those Tedious Tasks Everyone has those chores they have to do every week or so that are boring and tedious. With a computer you can set up some of these chores to run automatically so that you don’t have to put up sticky notes everywhere or put a reminder in your calendar. It's called Task Scheduler and you can set it up to run on your computer. The way you set it up is as follows: Go to Start and then Control Panel. Open Scheduled Tasks, click Start, and click All Programs. Point to Accessories, then System Tools, and then click on Scheduled Tasks.   To schedule a new task: 1. Double-click Add Scheduled Task to start the Scheduled Task Wizard, and then click Next in the first dialog box. 2. The next dialog box displays a list of programs that are installed on your computer, either as part of the Windows XP operating system, or as a result of software installation.  Use one of the following procedures:   If the program that you want to run is listed, click the program, and then click Next. If you want to run a program, script, or document that is not listed, click Browse, click the folder and file that you want to schedule, and then click Open. 3. Type a name for the task, and then choose one of the following options: Daily, Weekly, Monthly, One time only 4. Click Next, specify the information about the day and time to run the task, and then click Next. Note that the information about the day and time to run the task vary depending on the selection that you made in the previous wizard dialog box. For example, if you chose Weekly, you must indicate the day of the week, the time, and if the task should run every week, every 2 weeks, every 3 weeks, and so on. 5. Type the name and password of the user who is associated with this task. Make sure that you choose a user with sufficient permissions to run the program. By default, the wizard selects the name of the user who is currently logged on. 6. Click Next, and then click Finish after you verify the choices that you have made. Labor Day – September 1, 2008 The first Labor Day holiday, created by the Central Labor Union of New York, was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882. The Central Labor Union urged labor organizations in other cities to follow their example of a "workingmen's holiday." The first municipal ordinances were passed during 1885 and 1886. The first state bill to become law was passed by Oregon on February 2l, l887. The URL: http://www.dol.gov/opa/aboutdol/laborday.htm  Find even more sites for Labor Day at http://www.surfnetkids.com/laborday.htm Math And Science Teachers...Apply For QSM Grant The Quality Science and Math Grant Program (QSM) was established by the Louisiana Legislature in 1992 for the purpose of providing materials and equipment to mathematics and science public school teachers. Only full-time public school teachers assigned to teach mathematics or science in regular K-12 education programs are eligible to apply for QSM grants of up $750. Grant funds must be used for the purchase of non-consumable instructional equipment and/or materials/education technology. The application deadline is September 12, 2008. The URL: http://www.seasystem.net/cgi-bin/qsm/ Worldwide Telescope Brings The Universe To Students' Desktops Microsoft has launched its answer to Google Sky: a free, web-based program for zooming around the universe from any internet-connected computer. Developed by Microsoft’s research arm, the WorldWide Telescope knits together images from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-Ray Observatory Center, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and other labs. Computer users can browse through the galaxy on their own or take guided tours of different outer-space destinations developed by astronomers and academics. The site lets users choose from a number of different telescopes and switch between different light wavelengths. “The WorldWide Telescope is a powerful tool for science and education that makes it possible for everyone to explore the universe,” said Bill Gates, Microsoft’s chairman, in a statement. Check it out at http://www.worldwidetelescope.org 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) Fun And Yucky Art Recipes http://www.canteach.ca/elementary/artrecipes3.html Gunk, goop, flubber, and slime... With two of these five recipes, you will need to make sure your PreK students fully understand that they are not for ingestion (though students should know by this age not to put everything into their mouths).   Grade By Grade Guide To Building Visual Arts Lessons http://www.getty.edu/education/for_teachers/building_lessons/guide.html Select any grade level, from kindergarten through grades 9-12, and find suggestions for creating your own visual arts lessons, complete with learning objectives, assessment criteria, and student activities. Each grade level is analyzed for specific development traits, with topics appropriate to that grade and skill level. A lesson template is also available for downloading.   Rhythm And Art Elements http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/content/2055/  Line, shape, and color are the three elements that students will focus on in this art lesson plan, with specific attention paid to conveying emotion or thoughts through any of the given techniques. Students will study various works of art, respond with thoughtful analysis, and match vocabulary terms to their observations. An official publication of the CPSB Technology Department If you have any questions or comments please e-mail the Webmaster. For Technical Support:  tech.help@cpsb.org Calcasieu Parish Homepage  Technology Department  Teacher Link  Best on the Net Tech Guides  Computer Purchasing Information  Tech Connect Archive