Tech eNews 9-30-2011

Topics for this Tech eNews 9-7-2011

1. Still Space in Many Tech PD Courses

2. Retrospect Warnings About Backup

3. Thank you to Kim Dillon, Rochelle Aiton, and James Bennett

4. Gause Lab Coming Soon, Courtesy of WSD Tech Levy Funds

5. Les Brown on Vacation from 10/3 – 10/20

6. Sean and Anthony’s Building Schedule

7. WESPaC Downtime Schedule on For District Employees Page

1. Still Space in Many Tech PD Courses!
The new Course Descriptions and Sign-up sheet are available for the 2011-2012 Tech PD classes, on the WSD Tech Website. Registration is first come, first served, so make sure you sign up soon! The Cicero class is full, but all other classes still have space. You can register via e-mail by sending Lester.Brown@washougal.k12.wa.us an e-mail with your choices, or you can print the list, and return that to Les Brown at Excelsior. If you choose to register via paper, please make sure to put your name on the sheet.

2. Retrospect Warnings About Backup

Laptop users, your attention, please! If you are getting a pop-up from the Retrospect Client Application telling you that you are not getting backed up, please let Sean or Anthony know so they can check out your computer. If you have been getting this error for a long time, your files are not getting backed up, and it’s critical that you let us know.

3. Thank you to Kim Dillon, Rochelle Aiton, and James Bennett

A big thank you to Kim Dillon, Rochelle Aiton, and James Bennett for their work planning and co-facilitating the first three Tech PD Classes this year. The feedback from all three classes was overwhelmingly positive, and participating teachers learned some great new skills to take back to their classrooms.

If you are interested in co-facilitating Tech PD classes on a topic you love, please let Les Brown know.

4. Gause Lab Coming Soon, Courtesy of Tech Funds

The WSD Tech Committee has allocated some of our Tech Levy funds to purchase a new computer lab at Gause elementary. Gause is the last building without a dedicated computer lab, and many teachers have requested this to support their curriculum uses of technology. The lab will also support EasyCBM testing, as well as online MSP testing for grades 3-5 in the Spring.

A list of the people who make up the tech committee is available here: 2011-2012 Tech Committee Members.

5. Les Brown on Vacation from 10/3 – 10/20

Les Brown will be out of the office between October 3^rd and October 20^th. If you need Tech Support, please contact Sean and Anthony when they are in your building (see schedule below), or call the District Office at 360-954-3000, and they will connect you with someone who can help.

6. Sean and Anthony’s Building Schedule

Sean is at Jemtegaard from 7:30 AM to 10 AM, Hathaway from 10 AM to 12 PM, then at Gause from 1 PM to 3 :30 PM, and at Excelsior from 3:30 PM to 4:40 PM.

Anthony is at WHS Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday mornings from 8 AM to 1 PM, then drives up to Cape and CCMS, where he’s available from 1:30 PM to 4:30 PM. On Tuesdays, he works 8 AM to 11 AM at Cape and CCMS, then is at WHS in the afternoon, except for a 1 hour meeting at Excelsior from 1 – 2 PM.

Their schedule is posted on the WSD Tech Website as a printable .pdf.

7. WESPaC Downtime Schedule on For District Employees Page

If you find yourself wondering when WESPaC will be offline for their monthly weekend long updates, you can find a schedule of this on the For District Employees Page. To get started, visit the “For District Employees” page, which is linked in the upper right corner of the WSD Site.

If you have a suggestion for something else that could be added to this page (check first to make sure it’s not already there!), e-mail Les Brown and he’ll look into adding it to share with everyone.

Washougal Teachers Learn to Use Google Sites to Create Webpages

Two groups of Washougal educators attended optional, district-sponsored classes on creating web pages using Google Sites on September 22 and 28, 2011. These hands-on classes were co-facilitated by Washougal High School Teachers James Bennett and Rochelle Aiton, with assistance from Director of Technology Les Brown.

Participating teachers were led through the process of creating an account, customizing a main page in Google sites, adding feeds from subpages, integrating a Google Calendar, linking to external sites, and adding attachments via the File Cabinet feature or Google Docs.

Hathaway Teacher Lisa Kaaihue said, " I really appreciated all of the choices and variety of features the Google Sites class offered for developing Web pages. I have used other sites to create web pages and felt this site offered the most diversity of features."

For more information about these classes or other staff development initiatives, please visit the Staff Development page of the Washougal School District Website.�

Pictured are Gause Teachers Wendy Morrill and Allison Such.

Washougal Teachers Learn to Use Research Databases with Students

A group of Washougal educators attended an optional, district-sponsored class on integrating research databases available from the Fort Vancouver Regional Library (FVRL) into their curriculum on Tuesday, September 20. The project-based, hands-on class was taught by Washougal High School Teacher-Librarian Kim Dillon and Director of Technology Les Brown. Washougal Community Library’s new Community Librarian, Chris Hughey, was introduced at the class and helped provide information about the databases covered as well as other services offered through the public library, including school and classroom visits.

Participating teachers were led through the process of brainstorming a topic, defining search terms, expanding or narrowing a research idea, and then searching and recording results from the following electronic resources: Britannica Online, Britannica Online for Kids, World Book for Kids, CultureGrams, Thinkfinity, and General One File. Access to FVRL’s research databases is free with a public library card. Finally, teachers learned evaluation strategies to help students become critical consumers of information. Feedback received was very positive, and staff members who participated were enthusiastic about the opportunity to share these high quality research databases with students. Cape Horn-Skye Teacher Jocelyn Aldridge said, "My wheels are already turning with ideas for my 2nd graders to use as we begin to learn how to write mini-reports this year. Who knew that all of this information was available, and that it is so easy to access?"

For more information about this class or other staff development initiatives, please visit the Staff Development page of the Washougal School District Website.

Les Brown discusses research strategies with Canyon Creek Middle School Teacher Kay Ball, and Washougal High School Teacher Sheila Good during a class held in the WHS Library. Brown, WSD Director of Technology, recently assumed primary responsibilities for presenting Technology Staff Development programs in the District. He is always interested in hearing from staff members willing to help present professional development topics and can be reached at ext. 3310.

Photo credit: Kim Dillon.

Topics for this WSD Tech eNews September 7, 2011

1. No Problem Too Small – Please Ask if You Need Help!

2. Still Space in Many Tech PD Courses (pre-registration ends 9-16-11)

3. TeacherWeb changes for 2011 – Move to Google Sites

4. No Netflix Streaming at School

5. Reporting SPAM email

6. Sean and Anthony’s Building Schedule

7. Changes to Read 180/System 44 Reading Intervention Software

8. How does Using SchoolDude Help You?

9. Changing a Link to Your Classroom Webpage on Your School’s Website

10. Who Resets That Password?

11. For District Employees Page of WSD Site Has Links You Need

12. Tech eNews Archive

1. No Problem Too Small – Please ask if you need help!
Sean, Anthony, and Les are here to support district staff in your work educating children. If you run into a technology problem, please don’t hesitate to ask us for help. We’re only able to help if you let us know you’re having a problem!

2. Still Space in Many Tech PD Courses

The new Course Descriptions and Sign-up sheet are available for the 2011-2012 Tech PD classes, on the WSD Tech Website. Registration is first come, first served, so make sure you sign up soon! You can register via e-mail by sending Les an e-mail with your choices, or you can print the list, and return that to Les Brown at Excelsior. If you choose to register via paper, please make sure to put your name on the sheet. Register by September 16th for best selection of classes.

3. TeacherWeb Changes for 2011-12 – Move to Google Sites

TeacherWeb has been bought out by a larger company, and their costs have increased. WSD Technology is no longer going to pay to provide TeacherWeb sites for WSD Teachers. WSD Teachers may continue to use TeacherWeb by paying for the yearly fee ($30) themselves or with classroom funds, or they can switch to the free Google Sites. One of the Tech PD classes this year will be a training on getting started with Google Sites. The money saved will be used to pay for the Tech PD classes, since the Title IID federal funds we were using in previous years to fund these classes have been cut.

4. No Netflix Streaming at School

Several teachers have asked recently about using their Netflix Streaming accounts at school to share video content with students. Unfortunately, this violates your End User License Agreement (EULA) with Netflix and may not conform to copyright.

To quote the EULA you sign when you register for Netflix, "...the Netflix service, and any content viewed through our service, are for your personal and non-commercial use only and we grant you a limited, non exclusive, non transferable, license to access the Netflix service for that purpose..."

This license does not allow you to use your Netflix account to show movies at school.

Regardless of the source of the video, note that you’re not allowed to show videos simply for entertainment. Also note that the same restrictions on sharing video that apply to a rented video apply to a streaming video (from the ALA fact sheet on copyright and video):

Classroom use of a copyrighted video is permissible only when all of the following conditions are met:

- The performance must be by instructors or by pupils.

- The performance is in connection with face-to-face teaching activities.

- The entire audience is involved in the teaching activity.

- The entire audience is in the same room or same general area.

- The teaching activities are conducted by a non-profit education institution.

- The performance takes place in a classroom or similar place devoted to instruction.

- The person responsible for the performance has no reason to believe that the videotape was unlawfully made.

For more information about copyright and movies, please visit the American Library Association’s fact sheet.

I will be changing the content filter category for streaming media to make sure that Netflix is blocked starting Friday.

5. Reporting SPAM E-mail

If you get an unwanted commercial e-mail (SPAM), please don’t forward it to Les Brown. Simply forward it to SPAM@Barracuda.com and the company which filters our e-mail will analyze the message and change the filter to better catch that type of message in the future. Important Note: please do not do this with legitimate e-mail, as this type of change affects all users within the district. (for example, if you signed up for a eNewsletter from OSPI, and no longer want it, you shouldn’t forward it as SPAM since OSPI is not a SPAM sender, and doing this could start flagging all of their messages as junk mail for all users within the district).

Also, if a message you are expecting hasn’t shown up, and you’re worried it’s been caught as SPAM, you can use the Daily SPAM Summary e-mail to forward it to yourself. Just click the link at the bottom of one of the summary e-mails which says “View your entire Quarantine Inbox…” to go to a webpage that will show you an up-to-the-minute view of your own e-mail caught as SPAM, where you can forward the message to yourself.

6. Sean and Anthony’s Building Schedule

Sean is at Jemtegaard from 7:30 AM to 10 AM, Hathaway from 10 AM to 12 PM, then at Gause from 1 PM to 3 :30 PM, and at Excelsior from 3:30 PM to 4:40 PM.

Anthony is at WHS Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday mornings from 8 AM to 1 PM, then drives up to Cape and CCMS, where he’s available from 1:30 PM to 4:30 PM. On Tuesdays, he works 8 AM to 11 AM at Cape and CCMS, then is at WHS in the afternoon, except for a 1 hour meeting at Excelsior from 1 – 2 PM.

Their schedule is posted on the WSD Tech Website as a printable .pdf.

Les is at Excelsior from 8 AM to 4:30 PM.

7. Changes to Read 180 and System 44 Reading Intervention Programs

Staff who use Read 180 and System 44 need to use a new method to access both the SAM (management program) and the System side of Read 180 and System 44. Links for these two interfaces have been added to the WSD website under “For District Employees.” If you use either of these programs, and haven’t been e-mailed a new username/password, please contact Sean or Anthony.

8. 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.

9. Changing a Link to Your Classroom Webpage on Your School’s Website

If you move your website from TeacherWeb to Google Sites or another web host, you’ll need to have the link from your school’s webpage updated. In general, your building secretary is responsible for making these changes – so please start by e-mailing them your new link. To do this, go to your new website, and click in the Address Bar of your web browser, and copy the web address or URL, and then paste that into an e-mail.

10. Who resets that password?

OK, you’ve tried every password you’ve ever used since “the dog you had when you were seven years old,” and you still can’t get into that website/your computer/your voicemail/your e-mail/WESPaC and you’re wondering whom you should call! Here’s a quick reference:

- For Computer login problems, contact your building tech person (Sean or Anthony) or Les at ext. 3310

- For e-mail, contact your building tech person (Sean or Anthony) or Les at ext. 3310

- For WESPaC, Contact Boo Stevens at ext. 3011

- For AESOP, Contact Liza Linde in Human Resources at Ext. 3041

- For Sonitrol, Contact Liza Linde in Human Resources at Ext. 3041

- For help with voicemail passwords, Contact your building secretary, or Les at Ext. 3310

- For EDS (OSPI’s Data system), Contact Boo Stevens at ext. 3011

11. For District Employees Has Many Links You Need

If you find yourself wondering where to go to report an absence, needing the link to put in a maintenance or technology work order, wanting to find out about your PERS balance, info on your dental/health/vision insurance, or any other common district questions, check out the “For District Employees” page of the WSD website.

To get started, visit the “For District Employees” page, which is linked in the upper right corner of the WSD Site

If you have a suggestion for something else that could be added to this page (check first to make sure it’s not already there!), e-mail Les Brown and he’ll look into adding it to share with everyone.