Topics in this edition of WSD Tech eNews for March 30, 2011

1. Tech innovation mini-grants

2. Have an idea for a Tech integration class for 2011-2012?

3. Phone & voicemail tips for WHS/Gause/EHS

4. Phone & voicemail tips for Hathaway/JMS/CCMS/Cape/DO

5. Cape/CCMS drop in time – Wednesday April 13th 2:45-3:45 pm

6. How does using School Dude help you?

7. Backups – what you need to know to survive a data disaster

8. Have a suggestion for a website that should be blocked or unblocked?

9. WSD Tech eNews Blog & archive

1. Tech Innovation Mini-grants

Thank you to everyone to applied for one of the Tech innovation mini-grants. A subcommittee of the District’s Technology Committee met and reviewed the applications, and has funded two projects.

Robert Yee, Art teacher from Washougal High School applied for a Tech innovation mini-grant to get handheld devices for use with his students. Rob’s Art students will use the 5 iPad devices they got to do research as they develop art projects, and to read online periodicals to see examples of real imagery to supplement hands-on materials.

James Bennett and Jay Jenkins, Science and Math teachers at Washougal High School, were also awarded a Tech innovation mini-grant. James and Jay applied for a set of interactive student response systems, commonly called “clickers” to use with their students. These teachers plan to use the “clickers” to do formative assessments in their classrooms gauging the need to re-teach concepts on the fly. They will use the clickers to keep students engaged and paying attention during content delivery. They note that the anonymous nature of the clicker system will allow students to respond to prompts without feeling embarrassed, and give a more accurate snapshot of students’ understanding.

The Technology Committee will discuss the idea of a third wave of Tech innovation mini-grants in their meeting on April 28th.

2. Have an idea for a Tech integration class for 2011-2012?

WSD Tech staff have started planning for the tech integration classes for 2011-2012, and we are looking for ideas! If you have a topic or class idea you’d like to see offered, please let Les Brown know, and he’ll include it in the survey that’ll go out in April. Course offerings will be based on the interest as expressed in the teacher survey. Teachers who participate in the Technology Committee as well as those who attended the NCCE technology conference will also be helping seed the topics for the survey.

3. Phone & voicemail tips for WHS/Gause/EHS

Have you ever wondered what all those buttons on your phone do, but were afraid to push them?

• The orange “Rls” button stands for release, and it hangs up on people. You can use this as a way to finish a phone conversation without the person on the other end hearing you physically hang up the phone by setting down the receiver with a clunk. It can also be used to end a call if you’re on Speakerphone, without picking the receiver up just to put it back down.

• Speaking of speakerphone, yes, your phone has speakerphone capabilities – just push the “Handsfree” button to talk and listen without getting a crick in your neck. You can push it a second time to mute your end of the hands-free conversation. To unmute, push it a third time.

• A handy trick for Redial: just push the Line 1 button twice, and it’ll redial the last number you called.

• Want to put your phone on “Do not Disturb” but don’t have a button for it? You can use the “Forward” button – push Forward, then type in 3199, then Forward again. This will send all your calls to voicemail. Or, push Forward, then 3701, and that’ll send all your calls to Rex Larson. Please don’t forward calls to Long Distance numbers – we get charged for the call time!

• You can use the “Conference” button to start 3-way calling – start a phone call with the first party you want to talk to, then tell them you’re going to conference in a third person. Push the “Conference” button, then dial the number for the third person, and wait for them to answer. Tell them that you’re going to connect them with the first party, and then push the “Conference” button. All three of you will be on the phone together!

• You can use the “Transfer” button to send calls to another staff person elsewhere in the district. Just push the “Transfer” button, then dial the number (internal or external, but not Long Distance). You can either wait for the other party to answer, or just hang up. It’ll send the caller to their phone, or voicemail if they don’t answer. Remember not to use this to send a call to a long distance number – we would incur long distance charges for that!

• Want to put a caller on hold, so that you can continue a conversation at another phone? Use the “Park” button. When you’re talking to someone and need to move to a different phone or room, just push the Park button once, then write down the 4 digit number that shows up on the phones display. Now push Park again. The caller is put on a system hold (listening to the wonderful Classical music we play) while you hurry to the other phone. When you get there, pick up the receiver, and dial the 4 digit number you wrote down. It’ll automatically reconnect you.

Here are some handy commands for your voicemail:

(you can press any of these at any time, you don’t need to wait for a message to end to restart it, for example)

• Press 1 to start listening, or to repeat an entire message

• Press 2 to skip to the next message without deleting the one you’re currently listening to

• 3 deletes the message (be careful, pressing 3 twice will delete the current message, and the next message too!)

• * (star key) rewinds 3 seconds, # (pound key) jumps forward about 3 seconds

• 74 will repeat a message with the time and date

• 7 Pauses playback, press 7 again to start where you paused

• 8 raises volume, 0 decreases volume

• to access your voicemail from home, dial you own phone number, then press # (pound key) when your message starts, then enter your password. All of the other commands are the same.

4. Phone & voicemail tips for Hathaway/JMS/CCMS/Cape/DO

Have you ever wondered what all those buttons on your phone do, but were afraid to push them?

• The “Rls” button stands for release, and it hangs up on people. You can use this as a way to finish a phone conversation without the person on the other end hearing you physically hang up the phone by setting down the receiver with a clunk. It can also be used to end a call if you’re on Speakerphone, without picking the receiver up just to put it back down.

• Speaking of speakerphone, yes, your phone has speakerphone capabilities – just push the “Handsfree” button to talk and listen without getting a crick in your neck. You can push it a second time to mute your end of the hands-free conversation. To unmute, push it a third time.

• A handy trick for Redial: just push the “Last #” button, and it’ll redial the last number you called. If you don’t have a “Last #” button, push the “Feature” button then press 5.

• Use the DND button to put your phone on “Do Not Disturb” which will forward all your calls directly to voicemail.

• While you don’t have a “Conference” button, you can still do 3-way calling. Just start a phone call with the first party you want to talk to, then tell them you’re going to conference in a third person. Push the “Feature” button, then press 71. The screen will ask you to dial the number for the third person, then wait for them to answer. Tell them that you’re going to connect them with the first party, and then push the “Feature” button, then press 71. All three of you will be on the phone together! (Don’t call Les asking where the 71 button is – it’s the 7 button, then the 1 button typed in a row!)

• You can use the “Transfer” button to send a call to another staff person elsewhere in the district. Just push the “Transfer” button, then dial the number (internal or external, but not Long Distance). You can either wait for the other party to answer, or just hang up. It’ll send the caller to their phone, or voicemail if they don’t answer. Remember not to use this to send a call to a long distance number – we would incur long distance charges for that!

Here are some handy commands for your voicemail:

(you can press any of these at any time, you don’t need to wait for a message to end to restart it, for example)

• 1 to start or skip back about 3 seconds, or 1,1 to repeat messages

• 3 to skip forward about 3 seconds, or 3,3 to skip to the end

• 7 to delete message

• 9 to save (start the next message)

• to access your voicemail from home, dial you own phone number, then press ** (star key twice) when your message is playing, then enter your extension number and password as an 8 digit string – e.g. 35001234. All of the other commands are the same.

5. Cape/CCMS drop in time – Wednesday April 13th from 2:45-3:45 pm

Anthony Collver and Les Brown will be at Cape and Canyon Creek on Wednesday April 13th from 2:45 to 3:45 PM to provide one-on-one help to staff who have technology questions. Teachers or other staff members interested in asking questions or getting help with specific problems are welcome to come. This is not a formal class or training, so there are no clock hours available.

6. How does using School Dude help you?

Besides keeping your tech staff happy (and who doesn’t want that?), using SchoolDude to report problems with your technology helps you! Once you’ve put in a request, you’ll get an automatic e-mail response letting you know it’s been entered. The system will update you whenever Les, Sean, or Anthony makes any changes to the work order. You can log back into the SchoolDude system to view the status of all of your tickets, which can be helpful if we’ve given you steps on how to resolve something. The SchoolDude system helps the district track time spent on problem machines. Also, if you’ve been having a problem with a computer, make sure you’re keeping track of it in School Dude. Problem machines are identified by the number of tickets assigned to them, and get replaced when we have the opportunity.

7. Backups – what you need to know to survive a data disaster

If you have a laptop, Retrospect should be backing up your files. If you are getting a message telling you that you have not been backed up since some date, contact Les Brown immediately.

If you have a desktop, you MUST log out of your computer for your files to get saved properly. Open files are not backed up, and more than one person has lost e-mail recently by not logging out at night.

The district does only short term backups of your files for disaster recovery. It’s important to let your building tech support know quickly if you realize something is missing or corrupt. We can only retrieve items from about the last three weeks, which means you should also be doing your own backups. If you have important documents you want to archive, you should back them up onto CDs or DVDs. Sean or Anthony can help with this task.

8. Have a suggestion for a website that should be blocked or unblocked?

If your students accidentally (or on purpose) stumble onto an inappropriate website, let Les Brown know. He can add sites to the “blocked” list manually, which will prevent students from getting to them. Note that some sites with educational games are left unblocked because other WSD staff use them as part of their curriculum.

If you find a website that’s useful, but blocked, you can ask Les to unblock it. Note that certain websites like YouTube, FaceBook, or MySpace aren’t going to get unblocked for students.

9. Tech eNews Blog

If you want to read past issues of the Tech eNews, please visit the Tech Blog at http://wsdtechblog.blogspot.com/ and you'll find an archive of this and other Tech topics.

Topics in this edition of WSD Tech eNews for March 17, 2011

1. Thank you to teachers who facilitated tech classes

2. Change to Internet filter address

3. Air filter timer warning on projector

4. Wireless/wired network and student use

5. Jemtegaard drop in time - Thursday March 24 3-4 pm

6. Brainstorm or mind map with Inspriation software

7. Resources from tech integration classes on WSD Website

8. Need help? Please ask!

1. Thank You to Teachers Who Facilitated Tech Classes

A very big thank you to THANK YOU to Heidi Kleser, Rochelle Aiton, Kim Dillon, Jay Bennett, Cheryl MacIntyre, Trudy Tkach, Rebecca Woodings, Susan Nesmith, Philicia Weaver, Chelsea Meats, Scott Rainey, Ali Miller, Sean Elkinton, Rebecca Miner and Les Brown for all their hard work putting this year’s tech classes together. These teachers came up with some wonderful tech integration ideas and were instrumental in growing our staff development course offerings in technology.

The tech courses were a big hit! We had 177 participants total in the 12 classes. We offered a total of 24 clock hours to teachers who chose to participate in the 3 to 6 hour classes, and awarded 339 clock hours total in tech classes. About half of all district teachers took at least one tech class.

We will be sending out a survey in April to start the process of developing classes for the next school year. If you have a topic or idea for a class, e-mail Les and he’ll include it on the survey. If you are interested in co-facilitating a class, we’d love to have you participate! Just let Les and Rebecca know what you’re interested in teaching. We'll also be looking for any feedback you'd like to share about how we can make these classes more useful or better fit your needs.

2. Change to Internet Filter Address

For those of you using the bypass usernames and passwords to access the Internet filter, you may note that the address for the filter has changed. If you bookmarked the login/logout page, you’ll need to bookmark the new page, which is linked on the “For District Employees” page of the WSD website. Look in the left sidebar.

Remember – if you log in using your username/password to allow students access to a video, you must go back and log out when they’re done. Otherwise, that computer will retain access to YouTube and other streaming media sites for 24 hours. You can log out by going back to the login page (use the link above) and click the “logout” button.

If you don’t use one yet, teachers can sign up for a filter bypass which makes these sites available. To sign up for a bypass, please download the Filter Bypass Agreement from the WSD Technology page, and send it to Les after signing it. The bypass will let you into YouTube and other streaming sites, but does not bypass the filter for things like Facebook or MySpace.

3. Air Filter Timer Warnings on Projectors

If your classroom LCD projector is displaying a warning at startup that the filter needs to be cleaned, please contact Sean or Anthony, or enter a ticket into SchoolDude asking for it to be cleaned. Keeping air flowing freely through the projector allows the temperature inside to stay cooler, preserving the life of the expensive bulbs. Please don’t reset the warning without first cleaning the filter!

4. Wireless/Wired Network and Student Use

Neither the wireless network nor the wired network are intended for student use at this time. You should not be sharing the wireless passwords with students, and they should not be plugging their laptops into our network. Some buildings are starting to run out of network addresses due to students connecting iPods or personal laptops to the wireless network. The current network setup does not provide adequate protection to the district’s network and computers if students connect their own devices. Please do not allow students to physically plug in computers or connect to the wireless network. Student laptops can be a source of viruses that find and infect district computers.

5. Jemtegaard Drop-in Time

Sean Elkinton and Les Brown will be at Jemtegaard on Thursday March 24th from 3 to 4 PM to provide one on one help to staff who have technology questions. Teachers or other staff members interested in asking questions or getting help with specific problems are welcome to come. This is not a formal class or training, so there are no clock hours available.

6. Brainstorm or Mind Map with Inspiration

Do you do whole class activities to brainstorm topics or create mind maps? If so, consider using the Inspiration software on your computer hooked up to your projector to help your students organize ideas. Inspiration is an easy to use graphic organizing tool. You can have a student act as a recorder, typing in responses to a guiding question using the “rapid fire tool.” Next, use the create link tool to connect related ideas around a central topic or question. Building out from your central idea, connect all of the ideas on the page. Once you’ve made all the connections, click the “arrange” button, and you’ll have an organized tree or diagram of the topic or question. Inspiration is in the Applications folder on the Hard Drive of your Mac, or on the Start Menu/Applications folder on your PC.

Inspiration can also be used to build quick timelines, character maps, or explain the food web. Find example lesson plans on the Inspired Learning Community webpage.

7. Resources from Tech Integration Classes on District Website

Have you taken a tech class over the last year, and wish you could find a copy of a handout or guide you received? Visit the District website for Staff Development, on the Teaching/Learning menu of the WSD website, and click the name of the class in the left sidebar. You’ll find the lesson plans developed by the instructors along with their presentation materials, related links, and handouts they used. Didn’t take a class, but you’re still curious? You can read through the lesson plan for many of the classes and get an overview of how the application or skills taught are useful to teachers.

8. If You Need Help? Please ask!

As always, Sean Elkinton, Anthony Collver, and Les Brown are all available to answer tech questions via schooldude, e-mail, or the phone from 8:00 - 4:30. Even if Sean and Anthony are not in your building, you can get help from them over the phone or via e-mail. Les is available to do screen-sharing if you’re on a Mac, too! If possible, please use the School Dude system to track your request. You can find a link to it on the District website, under “For District Employees.” Click on the link in the left hand sidebar to get started. Contact Sean, Les, or Anthony to get the password.

Tech eNews 3-2-2011

Topics in this edition of WSD Tech eNews for March 2, 2011

1. Need a video camera, check one out
2. Digital Collages 3-10-2011
3. Out of the office and want to check your e-mail?
4. Phishing? But I don't own a tackle box!
5. Wish you had Word/Excel/PowerPoint/Inspiration/Anti-Virus at home?
6. Millions from the Nigerian Lottery? I didn’t even buy a ticket!
7. New homefolder servers for Gause, Canyon Creek, and Jemtegaard rolled out
8. Still getting a pop-up about Sophos needing an update?
9. Need help? Please ask!


1. Need a video camera? Check one out from Les Brown
WSD Tech purchased a set of 5 HD video cameras for use by teachers. You can check out one, or the entire set if you’re doing a movie-making project with your students. Contact Les Brown to make arrangements. There are tripods available for all of the cameras, too.


2. Digital Collages Class 3-10-2011 by Ali Miller and Les Brown
Les Brown and Excelsior High School teacher Ali Miller are putting together a class on creating digital collages with students. This is a great way to integrate visual literacy into any classroom topic or unit. Photoshop is a powerful way for students to create posters to illustrate their understanding of a topic with others. This will be a fun, hands-on class, from 4-7 PM in the Excelsior High School computer lab. Pre-registration with Rebecca Miner is required.


3. Out of the office and want to check your e-mail?
All WSD employees have access to web-based e-mail which can be accessed anywhere you have an Internet connection. Simply go to the WSD Website (you can search Google for Washougal to find us, or type in http://www.washougal.k12.wa.us ) and then click on the “For District Employees” link. The e-mail server is listed in the left hand sidebar toward the top.


4. Phishing? But I don't own a tackle box!
A recent e-mail with the subject line "Deactivation of Your Email Address" went out to many district staff. This is a good example of a "phishing" (pronounced fishing) e-mail. Phishing is a social engineering technique that computer hackers and spammers use to try to get your personal information. While the link in this particular e-mail was blocked, which kept our users from accidentally divulging their username and password, it's worth being aware that these types of scams are going around. To help spot these type of phishing attempts, be a cautious end-user: Look at the sender name and e-mail address the message came from. Watch for obvious spelling or other grammatical errors that indicate the message wasn't written by a district staff person. After you click a link in an e-mail, look at the web address it takes you to, in the address bar at the top of the Internet browser, it should exactly match the name of the site you're supposed to be using. When in doubt, close it out, and type in the address yourself.


5. Wish you had Excel/PowerPoint/Word/Inspiration/Anti-Virus at home?
Some of the software products that WSD licenses are available for district staff to use at home. Microsoft Office (the same version as on your work computer) is available for use on work-related projects at home. Inspiration, a graphic organizing and visual concept mapping software, is available for use at home with no work-related restrictions. Sophos Anti-Virus is available for use on your home computers for free. To get any of these applications, please download the Take Home Rights Agreement form on the District’s Technology webpage, and send it to Les after filling it out. Make sure you note which application you’re after. (WHS Only - WHS staff can also request Adobe's Creative Suite 4 - which includes Photoshop, InDesign, Dreamweaver, the full version of Adobe Reader, Illustrator, Flash, and Fireworks. These applications are available for use with work-related projects.)


6. Millions from the Nigerian Lottery for me? I didn’t even buy a ticket!
Keep in mind the saying that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is! When looking through your e-mail, you may find messages from people claiming that you’ve won the lottery in another country, even though you didn’t enter it. All you have to do is send them a “down payment” and you could have millions! There are many, many schemes going on to try to get access to your bank account, e-mail accounts, and your hard earned cash. Be a wary web surfer, and keep an eye out for offers that sound unbelievable, they probably are.

You should also watch out for fraudulent messages from banking or other financial sources, many would be identity thieves are trying to get you to click links in e-mail to get your username/password so they can empty out your bank account! It is far safer to type in the address for your bank or other financial sites (into the address bar) than to click links in e-mail to get there.


7. New homefolder servers for Gause, Canyon Creek, and Jemtegaard rolled out
WSD Tech staff have been busy over the past month setting up new home folder servers at Jemtegaard, Canyon Creek, and Gause. For Jemtegaard and Canyon Creek, the new servers will house student home folders, moving them off a server shared with staff. At Gause, the new home folder server replaces a server that's now 5 years old and ready to be retired.


8. Still getting a pop-up about Sophos needing an update?
Sophos, the Anti-Virus software WSD Tech licenses for your computers, recently released a major upgrade. If you are getting daily pop-up messages that the software needs to be upgraded, please make sure you've recently restarted your computer. If you've done that, please let your building tech person know. They will install the update, which will make the message go away.

9. And Finally - If You Need Help? Please ask!
Sean Elkinton, Anthony Collver, and Les Brown are all available to answer tech questions via schooldude, e-mail, or the phone from 8:00 - 4:30. Even if Sean and Anthony are not in your building, you can get help from them over the phone or via e-mail. Les is available to do screen-sharing if you’re on a Mac, too! If possible, please use the School Dude system to track your request. You can find a link to it on the District website, under “For District Employees.” Click on the link in the left hand sidebar to get started. Ask your building's tech support staff person, or Les Brown, if you need the submittal password.