The TWAIN blog

I am sitting in a Region 20 webinar about the updates to Project Share. Here are some tidbits:

* The Commissioner of Education is waiting for a certain number of Project Share users in Texas (no one knows the magic number) before releasing state-wide press about the system. But the number is growing!

* PBS is now a partner and we should all expect to see information shared to our users about PBS but also info in PBS about the Project Share system. Cross-commercialization!

* So far, Project Share will be handling follow-up professional development on MSTAR 5-6 and 7-8; Algebra 1 EOC; Science TEKS K-12; Science 5-8; Biology EOC; ELA EOC; and ELPS. These were all offered as academies this summer and they should be holding some Project Share follow-up trainings for the users.

*TEA is moving away from calling it Epsilen and will now refer to it as Project Share.

*In September, email will not be required for setting up student accounts.

*You can access Project Share through a new link http://projectsharetexas.net – this is an easier face than the Epsilen login screen.

The plan for directing users to Project Share focused on forming groups first (1), then connecting to self-directed modules (2), and then participating in facilitated courses (3).

What we will start seeing:

Teachers will receive invitations to join training related groups. Administrators will be notified beforehand; but groups are starting to form right now so expect these soon.

M-STAR will start developing self-paced and facilitated online courses.

There will be a facilitated writing course for ELA EOC.

Online versions of face-to-face academies will become available soon.

ELPS will have a self-paced overview.

Region 20 shared some ideas for creating district expectations using PS:
1. Make sure your AUP discusses online collaboration, groups, and online learning with your teachers.
2. Each institution has a public Epsilen page – keep it updated as it is public!
3. Communicate with your teachers (and parents?) about the system and how it will be used. If you have parents accessing the system, explain to them how the system is used by your teachers. Start the dialogue in your community about this system.
4. Manage your staff accounts – keep it updated to reflect new staff.
5. Facilitate online training, e-portfolios, and participation in groups. Help your staff get used to the system.

E-Portfolio discussion: Some questions to consider if using the E-portfolio system in your district:
1. What is the district’s expectation in a teacher’s e-portfolio?
2. What role will the e-portfolio play in your schools?
3. Will you monitor e-portfolios? If so, how?

Susan covered different features of the e-portfolios and included information about access keys, uploading files and sharing resources.

*Started discussing groups and shared that this will be a webinar in itself because the group tools are so powerful!

Groups:
1. How can groups be used in your campuses?
2. What do you need to know about teachers starting their own groups? If a teacher sets up their own group, then the institution manager has no access to that group unless it is set up as an institution group. When a group is “institutionalized”, a new person can assume the role of leader of the group if someone leaves. If not, then the group sits without a leader because the institutional manager can’t make changes to it.

August 31, 3:00pm will be another webinar on Account Management for batch upload, account types and resetting passwords.

September 14, 3:00pm will be a webinar on setting up and managing Groups.

September 21, 3:00pm will be a webinar on managing reports for uploading files; as well as tracking performance in Project Share.

For years I have been really enjoying the use of Google Earth, Google Maps and the features of street view in all of these. The ability to zoom in to landscapes and streetscapes is really fun and interesting. It gives you the perspective of being on the street level and ability to interact by zooming into various locations.

Microsoft has created a demo of their new project: Street Slde which allows you to slide along street views and interact in ways that Google hasn’t adapted yet. It is really an interesting video and opens up some ideas about what is to come from future street interactions. I can imagine this adapting more with touch screens and even augmented reality apps for phones to provide the information about services and stores along the given path. Great way to get some advertising mixed in for product-placement.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktdhOv8E5lo

What do you think of this?

And now later I realize the embedding doesn’t work. Do I have to pay Edublogs to make it work?? Geez!!

Over the past week, I managed to slim down our district AUP while adding on a section covering Social Media. I took out all the “legal-ease” wording that made the document so heavy. I even added a coversheet that outlined each section with a brief one or two sentences on what that section basically said.

I then generated a presentation with voice-over that I planned to upload to our Atomic Learning site in order to provide a non-paper solution to explaining the AUP. It is done and ready to go.

But I am not satisfied with this.

It doesn’t do anything. It is still static. And all it does is still list what you can’t do on our company time.

So, I have another idea that I hope to do this week (in two days) and I want to know what you think of it.

I want to film what the network is and what it does. I want my AUP to educate on why we have guidelines and how each person represents a possible gateway to opening up our security to threats. That’s it. I don’t want it to be a “NO!” document as much as explaining security in the 21st century. A guideline rather than a policy list.

I want it to be fun, lighthearted and very short.

My first shot would be of the NOC and showing what servers are and what we store on them. Brief explanation of routing and switches while talking about the ability to broadcast in wires and wirelessly. Show case our email and content filters and explain how they work while sharing how to keep email addresses secure. Talk about CIPA and why we use content filtering.

I think this message would be better received than the list. Do you?

Other ideas to add to this video? Is it possible to do this in less than 5 minutes?

Gonna try!

I just finished reading an article about the Detroit Public School system trying a new approach by allowing a school to run without principals. According to the article, the teachers and the parents will run the organization of the school. The article cites some teachers sharing that this type of organization eliminates the bureaucracy and middle level roadblocks that stifle decision-making and results.

The initial three-years of this school will have an administrative position on staff who will help coordinate the teachers to take on the responsibilities of the administration. This role will phase out after three years and then democracy of the teachers will take over for all decision-making for the school.

I read this article and I feel bad for principals and administrators. I have to say that in my career as a teacher, a campus coordinator, and now a district director, I have never had to deal with principals who added to the roadblocks mentioned in this article. I worked (and still work) with principals who kept the bureaucracy out of my path so that I could be an effective teacher. I think by removing that level of administrative support, the teachers will learn how valuable their principals really are in helping and providing support to them. I definitely hope for the best for this school but I also hope their experiment fails.

Removing one layer of symptomatic blockage may allow for more creative classroom endeavor but that is only one symptom of a problem. Where is the real slow-down for change in public schools (Detroit or anywhere)?

I don’t know. I just don’t like the message of this article. What do you think? Am I missing something here?