The Last Post

Alas, the title proves that you can take the English teacher out of the classroom, but you can't excise his penchant for bad puns and double entendres.

This is not a lament.  And, it is certainly not a complaint.  It is, however, the last official post to the Tech Tips blog.  Today will the last day for the Elearning team.  If or when an Elearning department re-emerges, it will no doubt take a very different form than it has had over the past four years.

Google Docs Now Provides Free PDF Conversion

Just last week, I had a request from someone who wanted to convert and existing PDF to an MS Word file so that students could complete the forms that the document contained on the computer rather than with pen  and paper.

As luck would have it, Google just announced today that users will now have the choice to fully convert PDFs to Google Docs when they upload them.  Furthermore, they have added the ability to perform Optical Character Recognition on a PDF which began as a scanned document.  This is a huge announcement.

Tying Up Loose Ends and Putting Things on the Shelf

As most of you are probably aware, at the end of this school year the Elearning department - at least in the form it has taken until now - will cease to exist.  Therefore, I thought I would spend some time ensuring that those who have made use of some of our work in the past can continue to do so in the coming year.

Using Audacity and Photostory in the French Classroom

Qu'est-ce que c'est L'audacity?  L'audace?

I probably should open by saying, "Pardon my French."

I recently did some work with a grade nine French class in Audacity, an open-source sound editing software package.  The teacher had given the students a topic on which they were to create a short French dialogue/skit.  The skit involved incorporating sound effects, so they also listed these in their scripts.  My involvement began after the scripts were already complete.

Get Your Morning Dose of Java (Math Applets)

In response to my previous post regarding Igeom, the interactive Geometry applet, John Cazakoff of Shaunavon High School directed me to  mathopenref.com, a site which hosts a number of online interactive applets covering many common geometry concepts.  The site is an excellent supplement to the regular math classroom.  Its strength lies in its activities for plane geometry, but it does have some resources for cartesion/coordinate geometry and solid/3D geometry as well.

Each of the applets at mathopenref.com tackles a specific concept and is accompanied by an explanation of the concept illustrated.  In this way, it differs from Igeom, which is more of an open-ended erector set that allows teachers and/or students to create their own interactive systems.

Thanks, John, for bringing this resource to my attention.

Bill C-32 - Why You Should Care

Yesterday the Federal Government introduced Bill C-32, an attempt to re-write copyright legislation to acknowledge and deal with the age of digital content.  Why should you care?  Well, as a consumer - but more specifically as an educator - C-32 has some significant ramifications for everyday life.

Using Google Forms to Track Student Behaviour

I've blogged in the past about using Google Forms and Google Docs to create online forms which feed data to a spreadsheet, where it can be compiled, analyzed, and graphed.

Recently, I've done some work with a school to create an online student behaviour tracking form.   I think this is an excellent example of tapping the power of Google Docs for a very practical educational purpose.

 Here is how the system works:

Alberta School Opens the Door to Ipod and Smartphone Use

This morning CBC is reporting on an Edmonton area school which plans to experiment in the fall with allowing students to use Iphones and Ipod touches to access the Internet.  Students will be expected to disable the actual phone and texting capabilities of their Iphones and connect via the school's wireless network.  And the school plans to block certain web sites to rein in some types of connectivity.

I will be curious to see how this experiment pans out.  I have to confess that I'm somewhat ambivalent to the enterprise as it's being proposed.