The TWAIN blog

So tonight we had a board meeting and my thoughts wandered a bit. I was thinking about Google Voice and how to apply it for use in schools but I wonder how possible these ideas seem. Where else to post ideas and (hopefully) get feedback than this blog??

1. Meetings – A presentation tonight on Special Education referred to how the ARD meetings can be audio recorded and then give the participants a tape copy of the meeting. Now this is a district that serves a community that may not have Internet or even computer access in the home. So I can see why tape would be a necessary requirement. But what if Google Voice could record and transcribe the message of the meeting? Do you need audio of the entire meeting or could a summary at the end be the recorded message? I mean, how many people actually listen to the entire taped archive of the meeting? Is this something to listen to in my car while driving?

What if at the end of the ARD process meeting, the summary and major points were dictated via Google Voice. GV then transcribes the message and mails it. I know the tech isn’t there yet for perfect transcription but it’s pretty good. Especially if the voice sending the message is clear and speaking slowly as such a summary could be. A meeting itself may have too many voices going on at once and that could cause problems.

Apply this to any meeting and you can have a transcribed summary in your inbox before you get back to your desk?!

Actually, if you have an iPhone with 3.0 installed and VoiceRecorder, you can record the entire conversation and email it as an attachment. It might be too big of a file so I don’t see the point of archiving an entire conversation. But again, summarize and points of agreement by all in the group could be a good start. How about recording board meetings? I wish it could transcribe all that!

Perhaps in the future (and I know this is in development), the system will achieve voice recognition and tagging capability so that archived sound bytes are searchable….

Yep…it’s coming!

2. Security and Crisis Management – If I programmed a GV account to be the one number to contact all principals, security, and maintenance folk who needed to be in the loop should a crisis occur; then the system should contact all these people via email, text, and/or phone to any of their phones we have in the system. One call. One number. One message. Information sent instantly to all stakeholders who need it and sent to all their message systems at the same time. Seems like something to consider, right?

3. Work Orders – Our technology office could have the one number be our WO contact system for requests. I wonder if I could create GV account and then embed the phone badge on our website. If anyone is experiencing a technology emergency, they can call the one number and leave a message which is transcribed to all of our accounts at the same time. If anyone is in the local area, they can take care of the request. The system then archives all the requests as messages so we can still track them as work orders. Do you think this would work (or should)?

So…whaddya think? Possible? Impossible? Too much of a stretch? Too late for me to be up???

Nothing to add to this video. I think it speaks volumes.

Today was one of those days when a thought actually became spoken words to myself. “What am I doing here?”

I had “one of those days”. The kind of day that I wish I could do over from start to finish.

I went to San Antonio this morning for Tech Fiesta in a rainstorm. It was a 2-day event that I only was able to attend for one day…um…90 minutes. It was a small version of TCEA complete with an exhibit hall and a bag. I went to learn more about technology tools. I did get to see one of my favorite people, Miguel Guhlin, share about Moodle. I like Moodle. I want a Moodle. I am now encouraged to Moodle, thanks to Miguel.

Then, I received an email to my iPhone about something at work that I don’t want to get into here. It was something disturbing enough to me to get in my car and drive all the way back to work to deal with. It was one of those things that made me stop at home for the moment in my kitchen to say to myself, “what am I doing here?”.

I wish I could say that I handled myself well today and everything turned out good. But it was a day that made me wish I was back in the classroom. I often escape in my mind to think about what I could do as a classroom teacher now with the knowledge I have gained. I know I was a great teacher. I managed to be project-based, differentiated instructionally, and award-winning during my five years in the classroom.

While teaching, I also caused the other teachers in my department to turn against me and to dislike me because of what I was doing in my classroom. I shunned textbooks and would not show the movies the other teachers did. I refused to follow their calendars and lesson plans. I made learning real by involving my students with real clients (they were learning web design – they had to work with clients) and by getting them involved with real scenarios.

I never disciplined by regular standards. I informed the parents that I felt that they should discipline their kids and give me room to teach them. I kept parents informed of everything we did by mail, by email, by webpage, and by phone call. My principal informed a parent that he felt I “over-communicated” when she called to say her son didn’t know about a test date.

I never taught the same thing the same way and encouraged my students to learn more than I knew. I admitted when I didn’t know an answer. I even encouraged my students to have fun while learning. I threw paper at them (is that wrong now?) when it would get too quiet in the room because they were working too hard. I was the teacher who received the most “troubled” students but I did not have trouble with them.

I loved teaching. I still do.

And when I have a rough day, I wonder “what am I doing here?”. Is this something other administrators do? Are there moments when you think about the time you were in a classrooms? Do you go to conferences, read articles or blogs and marvel at what you would do with the tools now if you were teaching?

I have to admit…even on good days, I think about these things.

I am only certified to teach Secondary English and I have never taught it. I was hired out of college to teach technology classes and I had no idea what I was doing. I think I only knew Hyperstudio when I started teaching in a PC-only district. I had a collection of “Dummies” books under my desk! I was afraid when kids would come to me to ask questions. And they were 7th graders!!

I never taught English but can you imagine what kind of English teacher I would be? Would I last? Would my students pass the TAKS test or an AP exam?!? I can’t imagine a department chair putting up with me…..much less the campus technology person! And God help whoever the network administrator would be having to deal with mild-mannered me.

But can you imagine what my students would learn?? Can you picture what my classroom would be like? I can. And that picture brings tears to my eyes after a day like today.

Anyone else ever feel like this?

PS: Miguel – thanks for the real comment in person today about my blog. I thank you for that. I am not self-editing this one.

I have seen this image before in other places but finally printed it to hang on my wall and start talking about it. I am going to be adding this to other walls in my district and to spark more conversation. Interesting to not only apply this to technology but even to lifestyle. My trainer at the gym may get a copy tonight.

The image is originally from the Biocultural Science & Management blog. Located at: http://13c4.wordpress.com/2007/02/24/50-reasons-not-to-change/