Three Programs You Need Now

Here is my first Tech Tip Blog Post. It deals with the basic practicalities of making your job easier. There are three programs you need right now, and they are all free. The reason that you need them is that they will allow you to work with others and will make life so much easier once you become comfortable with them.

The first one mentioned, Google Apps, is supplied by the District. It allows you to store documents, PowerPoints, and Excel files online. You can not only access them from anywhere there is an Internet connection, but you can also collaborate with others easily, no cutting and pasting, no e-mailing attachments, and all that other rigamarole. New Brighton’s start page to log in is http://partnerpage.google.com/nbasdcff.wikispaces.com. If you need your log in information, please e-mail me. We are setting up student accounts so they can have the same sort of access to their work. By creating accounts for the district we will be able to administer student accounts for such tasks as fixing lost or fogotten passwords. You can also set up a personal account at http://google.com.

The second is Diigo, a social bookmarking site. It allows you to store your favorites, or bookmarks online, so you can access them on any computer once you log in to the site. You can also share bookmarks with other individuals and groups. This allows you to have access to the research of others, once again without much effort. There is a group for New Brighton Teachers, and there are numerous other groups for educators. You can also create groups for your classes to give students access to approved bookmarks for your class in a secure setting, see me for details. The general site to create an account is http://www.diigo.com. Once you have created your own account, you can go to sign up for an educator’s account at http://www.diigo.com/education.

The third program dovetails nicely with existing programs in the district. Many teachers use Kidspiration and Inspiration software to create graphic organizers for use in the classroom. There is a free web-based, (online), program called Webspiration that allows you to do the same thing. Webspiration allows you to upload existing files to the Internet, download files to your desktop, and share your files with others, just by typing in their e-mail address. The people you share with must also have a free account to acces your files. You can edit the files together, or just pass them around by sharing. Webspiration also contains free clip art and media to drop into your graphic organizers to make them more interesting for the students. The program has many other features that I will not get into yet. This tool is available at http://www.mywebspiration.com.

The main themes that bind these three programs together, beside the fact that they are all free, is that they allow you to access information from anywhere in the world, and that they allow you to easily collaborate with others. Let’s face the fact that there is not enough time in the day to accomplish everything we would like to do. By working together, we make tasks easier and can accomplish more in the limited time we have. if you would like help setting up any of these accounts feel free to contact me at school.

Q & A with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd

Q: Why did Australia’s GDP hold up better than most in the developed world?

A: Mostly because of our trading with China, that has helped us recover from this global crisis.

Q: What are you trying to get out of the G20 summit?

A: The key of the G20 summit is for us to go beyond the trilateral Australia-China-U.S. relationship.

Q: What helps your economy during this economic crisis?

A:  Mostly the aggressive action we take spending money on infrastructure and also our trading with China.

Q:  Why do you think China should have greater voting rights in the IMF?

A: China has recently become more economically important and because of the they should have a greater say.

Q: Do you expect Australia’s GDP to shrink or grow in the future?

A:  I expect there will be some ups and downs. Our economy has been better than others because of our aggressive actions and trade with China, but it still is fragile.

reported by AUSTRALIA PRESS INC