LAFSD Tech News

#BecauseKids

EdTech News

Welcome to LAFSD Tech News! Each week this newsletter will share ideas, strategies, and suggestions for using technology in your classroom, as well as ideas to help teachers be more productive and, just maybe, find some extra time for themselves.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Let's Talk Tickets

Let me ask you this...when was the last time you had a student turn in an assignment without writing their name on it first? You're looking at one now, aren't you? You really want to return the stellar assignment to the right person, but you just don't know who or where they are.

Now, let's talk about our Spiceworks ticketing system. As the tech coordinator, I see all of the tech tickets that are submitted to your computer specialists. And every now and then I get to cover someone's tickets while they might be out for a day or two. So, on behalf of all of your computer specialists and myself, I have a request to make. Please put as much information into the Description as you possibly can. When writing your Description, imagine that the person reading it is brand new and has never been to your school. What information might you share with this person?

your name
your room number
specific information about what you need or what isn't working
what you've done already to try and resolve the issue
if it's a printer issue (like toner), include the Ray Morgan number (on the sticker affixed to the printer)

If you're requesting a change to a student's account or the creation of an account for a student, please be sure to include the student's name and grade level.

As for the ticket itself (a copy of which you can see below), think of the "Summary" like the subject line of an email. Just write something brief like "printer needs toner". Then in the "Description" you can write as much information as you would like. Try to think of any questions your computer specialist might ask you and include it in the Description. The more information you provide, the quicker we can get your ticket resolved.

Thank you for your help!

Wikispaces Is Closing!

Back when the Internet was young and I had fewer gray hairs, there was this wonderful wiki creation tool called Wikispaces. I used it for everything! From my 365 photo project to sharing links with teachers to collecting recipes. It made me very sad this morning to discover that Wikispaces will be closing its service. You can read more about it here:

It's Time for Us to Say Farewell

If, like me, you have created wikis using Wikispaces, you'll need to take action as soon as possible. Classroom and free wikis will cease to exist after July 31, 2018. For more information about what you should do before that date, click here:

Classroom and Free Wikis

Google Tour Builder

I love geography! I love looking at maps from all over the world and from all different time periods. I wear my geo-geek label with pride.

As a social studies teacher, one of my favorite activities to do with students was to use Google My Maps to have students create interactive maps that detailed the history of an area. One of my fifth graders' favorite activities each year was the Race Across the States assignment where they had to use Google My Maps to create an interactive map of an imagined road trip across the country. It was so much fun to watch them get excited about using Google Maps while at the same time discovering some amazing places in our country.

If you like Google My Maps and are feeling fairly adventurous, you should consider trying out Google Tour Builder. It's like Google My Maps on steroids! Tour Builder actually interacts with Google Earth, and there's a bit of a learning curve involved. But it's totally worth it once you get used to it. If you're interested in learning more, take a look at this HyperDoc designed for teachers to learn the tool:

Google Tour Builder HyperDoc

Topic Suggestions?