After teaching summer computer camp this year I had a little money to spend. I also had a computer that desperately needed updating. I have been waiting to purchase a Macbook Pro for a while and this was the perfect opportunity to do so. Did I spend more money than I should have, of course. Was my wife happy, not really. I am happy to say that she is talking to me again. I was a little worried for a while. I was able to get what I wanted for a significant discount as I really did my research before I bought.
Question: What does a culinary arts teacher and a technology teacher have in common? This sounds like a setup for a good joke. If you think of a funny answer please leave a comment. The only reason that I am asking is that in my school district we both have a Chromecast and we are having a hard time using it in our classrooms. Chromecast's don't like proxies.
To make a long story short, I brought in a wireless usb dongle and hooked it up to my computer in my classroom. I was able to use the wireless to connect to the Chromecast and the wired internet from the computer to look up web pages in Chrome. It did a great job of sharing the screen. I can't make it work with my iPhone 6 Plus. I can connect to it, but I can't play videos or do anything else that I would like to with it. I am going to continue to work on this as I see the Chromecast as a potential big player in classrooms. I can broadcast a tab in Chrome to it without having to connect my computer to the projector. I would love to work from the back of my classroom while teaching I love Black Friday! My wife would say that I love it a little too much. I agree with her. One of the cool tools that I was able to purchase was a Samson Meteor Mic. I had been looking at this one for quite some time. When I saw it on a lightning special for just $40 I bought it for school. The reason that I wanted it was that I was hoping to be able to connect it to an iPad and use it to record the audio to our daily news announcements that our students record everyday. I read that you could do this, but you needed three things; the microphone, an Apple Lightning to USB camera cable, and a powered USB hub(not enough power comes out of the newer iPads). I put these things together with my 4th gen iPad to see if it would work. It didn't. The iPad didn't allow me to stop recording the video. I pulled the cable out, but it didn't save anything that I tried to record before pulling the cable out. Needless to say I was a little disappointed. As I hung my head in disappointment I spied my iPhone 6 Plus on the floor next to me. Why not try that? It couldn't hurt so I tried it out. Success! It worked like a charm. But why didn't it work on my iPad? I think that I need to take some time and try it with different iterations of iPads and iPhones. I also think that my powered USB is a little chintzy. I think that I need to try it with a more robust one. 12/12/14 - I tried it with my iPad mini 2 and it worked just fine. It did need the powered usb.
The problem is that I have too many, and I still want more, gadgets! I end up with a great deal of technology that I like to use in the classroom and at home. I use to be really good at justifying it all, but as I have gotten older I have begun to realize the error of my ways. I do a lot of research before I buy anything. Most of the time my purchases are really great products. Every once in a while they are not. I will not buy something if it is not on sale, or not a good deal. I feel that in order to deal with my tech addiction that I need to write about it, or at least write about some of the cool, and not-so-cool, things that I have come across.
I have never been great at continually updating my blog. This is my attempt to write more. We will see if it works or not. I hope that it does. I always like to share tools, tips, and tricks with fellow teachers and others in general. Let's see if live up to my new pre-New Years resolution. So far, my favorite class I am teaching is Lego Robotics. Not only is it fun, but the tasks that the kids have to do are entertaining and challenging. I am using a project based curriculum that my district purchased from Carnegie Mellon. It is, hands down, the best curriculum that I have ever used and it is starting to change how I teach my other classes. Hats off to the people at the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Academy for putting together such a great program!
It has been a wild and crazy summer! I started with two, two-day tech day camps at the MISD. Then it was off to ISTE in Atlanta. It was my first time and it was awesome. I had a couple of weeks off until I went to Pittsburgh to learn a Lego Robotics curriculum at Carnegie Mellon. Then I had a week off to prepare for three two-day 21Things4Students Bootcamp teacher training's. Now it's time to get ready for the school year. This is the year that I try to turn into a consistent blogger. I have a lot to share and it is time that I started. Get ready for a great year!
I was looking for the case that holds my flash drives the other day and I starting thinking if I really needed these things anymore. I hope not, because i haven't found them yet! I have multiple Google accounts, a Dropbox, Copy, and Box account. I even have some storage on Amazon, I think. Never has there been a time when so much free online storage is out there for the taking. I have found myself using Dropbox for school. It is easy to use, installs on all my computers, and works with my iPad. I stopped taking my 1TB Transcend portable hard drive to school because I found my self just using Google Drive and Dropbox. I had my students sign up for Dropbox accounts under me and my storage room has expanded nicely. I think that if you add up all my space over my various websites I may have over 100GB of storage. Not a bad chunk-o-space! For free
That's great! But why don't educators take advantage of this stuff. If you are reading this, do you use online storage? Who, what, how much do you have? I want to know what you use and if your co-workers use this free storage. And what do you use it for? I am going to make it my mission to get at least 10 teachers in my building to sign up for Dropbox. Then I am going to show them how to use it for school and their lives outside of school, if they have them. You should do this too! Rant over! 1/15/14 UPDATE Today our county's internet went down...and I have nothing, except for the dropbox files that were already synced with my computer. I might not have my new stuff, but I still have something. My district is suppose to go back to work tomorrow after break, but we have a snow day! It couldn't of happened at a better time. CES starts tomorrow and I can't wait to see all the coverage. I hope to find out about some new tech gadgets coming out this year that I can use in my classroom. I'll post any cool ones I discover here. Until then, have a great week!
Spending some more time with each of the apps didn't change my initial assessment of them. I still think that Educreations is the best free app out of this bunch. I thought that I should share some of my thoughts about each app to let you know how I came to my conclusions.
Screen Chomp I like this app. It actually is the most visually appealing out of the three. It also had the most versatile pen set (three thicknesses and 12 different colors). Everything else though is sorely lacking, and that is ok. I love TechSmith products, but this one comes up a bit short. If they add a bunch of features and start charging for it I would definitely give it another look. Show Me This app is rather plain. It reminds me of a throwback Google webpage with its simplicity of design. You only have 6 colors to choose from unless you buy more (really?), and only one pen thickness. You do have better erasing tools and a redo button though. Where this app excels is the ability to search other peoples creations and explore them by subject. You can follow people and create groups. This really adds to the functionality of the app, but it isn't enough to push it ahead of the next app. Educreations For a free app, I was impressed. 10 colors with only one pen size, but is adds a text tool, dropbox integration, an undo and redo button, and an improved eraser tool. You also have some stock "paper" backgrounds like lined paper, graph paper, and coordinate grid paper. You can access your creations on their website and you can embed what you make on your own, or just link to it. A nice step up from the other apps. Go ahead and check them out to see if you agree with me. Leave me a comment if you do or don't. I would love to hear from you. I have just purchased two apps of the same genre, Doceri and Explain Everything. I can't wait to see if they are worth the money. I'll let you know soon. I was talking with my wife yesterday, who is also a teacher, and we were both lamenting about the fact that we wished their was more time in the day to get our work done. I know that if you are reading this then at some point and time you have felt the same way. I wish that I could provide a full and comprehensive review of each of the apps I am talking about today, but I will have to finish that review at a later date. I felt that it was more important to share my initial findings so you don't get led astray by an inferior app.
I looked at three apps that are used for teaching lessons and flipping the classroom. Each of the apps do relatively the same thing. These apps allow you to draw and write on a screen, import pictures, and record your voice.The apps are Show Me, ScreenChomp, and Educreations. After initially playing with each of them one stood out right away, Educreations. I am curious if you agree or disagree with my initial assumption. Please let me know. I will be following up in the next week or two with a detailed description of each. |
Doug's Dream
Welcome to my new ed-tech site. I hope to create a site where all educators can "beg, borrow, and steal" thoughts and ideas relating to educational technology and teaching. |