WSD Tech News
Summer 2017
Summer Shares
The new ISTE Standards for Educators were released. They've been revamped and are great! They connect to some yoga poses - it's time to stretch ourselves. Take a look and set some goals. The updated ISTE Standards for Students were released last summer, but i'm sure you remember that!
I attended a half-day session around Global Education. Here are a few resources:
- Global Collaboration Day - September 21 (design your own collaborative event and invite other globally minded folks to participate)
- The Global Goals for Sustainable Development - incorporate these into daily classroom culture (follow #TeachSDGs)
- Empatico
- World's Largest Lesson - starts September 18
- Sign up for the Global Postcard Exchange
School Technology Updates
1. A reminder -
With the increase in Chromebooks and the elimination of computer labs in both buildings, there is no need for students to have a network login. There will no longer be desktops available for students in classroom spaces, only the ones assigned to teachers that are connected to projectors. Teachers should NOT log in and leave their desktop computer open for student use; that's not a safe, secure way to manage many of the confidential things available to adults on the network. And a reminder about that - teachers shouldn't do that for subs either! There is a sub log in made available to them when they check in for the day.
If students at WCS lose their Chromebook due to violation of the Acceptable Use Policy or TUGS, they will go to the library and borrow a laptop. They will be assigned a temporary login for that laptop only. This will enable us to keep track of their actions on that laptop.
2. The network was updated this summer and the initial password for adults to login to a desktop is Summertime15 . You'll be prompted to change that.
3. As you know, we are transitioning to a new website for CVSD and Williston. It won't be ready to launch by the start of school. There is a plan to have a temporary site up for a short term. Please remember: don't update the old Schoolwires site! Your teams or departments should be working on a new external site (many are using the new Google Sites) which we'll link to when things go live. Contact Bonnie with questions.
Brainpop - So Much More
SeeSaw PD in Your Pajamas
Tools to Support a Mindful Classroom
Recent Posts That May Be of Interest
- Getting Started with Twitter - self-paced learning module to teach you the Twitter basics ($25)
- Social Stories with Adobe Spark Video
- Smarter Google Forms to Save You Time (feature updates to Forms)
- Use TagCrowd as a Wordle alternative for word clouds
- 4 Tips to Help Students Start Blogging
- 10 Tips for Student Blogging
- BookCreator on the Web - this is one of my favorite iPad apps and now it's available on the web too. The full release will occur sometime in the next month, but you can try it out now.
BookSnaps!
Rather than encouraging our younger students to use SnapChat, we can create BookSnaps with some iPad apps. Let me know if you want to talk further about this engaging idea.
Digital Citizenship Corner
- Be Internet Awesome - Google released this new curriculum and interactive game. I may be using it with 3rd-4th graders. I don't recommend the game, but the curriculum resources are great!
Get in Touch!
Email: bbirdsall@cvsdvt.org
Phone: (802)448-4313
Twitter: @bonniebird