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| Myles First graders have been working on book reports lately. That's right, book reports in first grade! To accomplish this task, first grade teacher Alison Keeler, (pictured below working with one of her students) along with Technology TA Kathy Donovan have been teaching Keelers' students to use  the visual learning application Kidspiration. Kidspiration is a visual learning program, geared to the young learner, which allows students to map out ideas with
pictures thus giving them a structure for thinking out their ideas. The children quickly learn how to select symbols within the application's library or draw pictures using the symbol maker to create beginning, middle, and end parts of their stories. To prepare their reports, students start with a Kidspiration template that Keeler and Donovan work together to create. Using the template, students are able to "talk though" the beginning, middle and end parts of the story while also provide details of the characters they have learned about. The advantage of using Kidspiration for this project is that it offers a way for children to visually explain ideas with detail without necessarily having to solely depend upon writing all the words out, which can become a frustrating roadblock for some young learners. Once a student has chosen or created their symbols, they can enter the text below it to explain, or use a writing tool which transfers students to the writing area that is a kid-friendly word processing layout. This project is just one example of how Alison and Kathy have worked together to use Kidspiration as a means of demonstrating student's reading comprehension. Kidspiration comes equipped with many templates that are well-suited for practice and application with the curriculum of the first grade computer classes. To learn more about Kidspiration and the sister application Inspiration which is geared toward an older age group, keep an eye on My Learning Plan for classes on using the visual mapping tool for writing projects with your students. |
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|  One of the often overlooked but most useful features of the Finder is the Get Info window. With this little feature, you can find out a whole lot of info about your files and perform all sorts of useful tasks such as checking file sizes, changing the Open With application, and much more. Here are some ways you may find Get Info helpful to you in your Mac OS X experience!
OPENING THE GET INFO WINDOW
Get Info allows you to see all sorts of information about a file. To open the Get Info window, simply click a file once in the Finder and chose File > Get Info or use the keyboard shortcut Command-I.
SOME USEFUL FEATURES OF GET INFO
Once the Get Info window is open, you will see there is a lot of particulars can be displayed. Each section of the window is broken down into disclosure triangles that you can open or close to access specific details about the file. Here are some specifics that you may find particularly helpful:
 General > Size. This can be useful if you are trying to see how large a file is in terms of upload to your website or sending as an email attachment & aren't sure how big it is. For example, email attachments are best under 4 MB and website uploads are limited to 10 MB on SchoolCenter.
More Info > Where from If you have a downloaded file & don't remember where it came from, Get Info does! Just look in this section for the URL and you can track down the exact web location of where the file came from!
Name & Extension This area can be used to rename a file easily or, more importantly, to append a file extension after you have saved and closed the file in its native program. This really great if you need to add the file extension and aren't even sure what it is!
Open With If you want to force a file to open with a particular program, you can change the setting with this drop down menu and this file will automatically open with that program if you double-click on it. For example, you can use this menu to make an Excel document open with Numbers or vice versa.
Preview If you have file that is a graphic, you can see a use this area to see a detailed thumbnail without opening it. If the file is an video, or audio file, you can play the media file right here without needing to open it in its native program!
USING GET INFO ON MUTIPLE FILES
If you want to see the info of many files at one time, you have a few options to do this. Here are two different methods and why you would want to use them.
Multiple Get Info Windows
If you select 10 or fewer items in the Finder and hit Command-I, you’ll get (up to) 10 distinct Get Info windows. This can be useful for making comparisons between more than one file or folder quite simple.
The Inspector...Get Info for Several Items at Once!
 If you select more than one item in the Finder & use the keys Option-Command-I, you’ll get a Multiple Item Info window also called an Inspector window. This is a single window that will contain file summary information for the selected items. It is also dynamic, this means if you Command-click on more files, they will be added to the selection and reflected in the Multiple Items window! |
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TEAMS Educational Resources is a website portal that has been created by and maintained by the Los Angeles County of Education. In its nearly 15 year history, TEAMS has transitioned from a simple website to provide online support to students in its online education program in their county to a massive resource where teachers, students, administrators and parents from across the globe can find free links to educational resources that have been researched, reviewed and evaluated by and for educators. Upon visiting the site, you will see that TEAMS is neatly organized and has done a fantastic job of breaking content into four specific, easy to navigate main sections: Students, Teachers, Administrators, as well as Parents/Community Members. This makes it very easy to find content that is appropriate for members of each particular group. For example, teachers and paraprofessionals in their section can find great ideas for use in their classroom. There are listings to hundreds of resources that are broken down by subject area as well as additional content topics such as computer technology and general teaching tips. Administrators resources includes links to information on standards, testing, and other information. Parents and community members will also find great resources for everything from discipline, internet safety, and providing homework help. Finally, the section for Students is packed with links to educational games, puzzles, homework help, virtual tours, and more.
 Overall, TEAMS Educational Resources website appears to be a fantastic resource for the educational community as a whole. In their efforts to find useful and appropriate resources, they work hard to carefully exclude sites that may contain inappropriate materials. They also work to update their links every two weeks, making every effort to keep all resources current. With so much to offer every group in the school, the site is sure to be useful with just a little exploring. Check out the site today to learn more or for even quicker access to some of the key areas of the site, just use some of the QuickLinks above!
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 | | SHARE THE NEWS | | |
 Know teachers who would like to read the New Hartford Tech Spotlight but aren't receiving it by email? Send them to the online version of the New Hartford Tech Spotlight to read about the latest technology happenings in New Hartford Schools. |
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| MISSED AN ISSUE? |
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| All the great issues of the New Hartford Tech Spotlight are now available online. Just go here to view the Past Issue Archives and find the issue you missed! Enjoy! |
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| SOFTWARE SIDEBAR |
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Stickies is a famous long-time application in the Mac OS for creating Post-it note-like windows on your screen for storing text notes, reminders, and other clippings. While Stickies has been included with the Mac OS for many years, it is still included and very useful at times in Mac OS X. With new features such as transparent notes, styled text and the ability to embed pictures and video in notes, Stickies is a nice little tool to manage snippets of info for a project. A sticky note in Mac OS X is easy to create (there's a system-wide Service shortcut, Shift-Command-Y, for that task) and one really powerful feature of the Stickies.app in OS X that let's any sticky note float over all other windows making it visible at all times. The next time you need to store some snippets of info or even media clips for handy access, look no further than Stickies, it may be just the right tool for the job! |
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| NEED COMPUTER HELP? |
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 Do you have a computer or printer not working in your classroom? If so, you need to fill out a ticket on New Hartford's Web Help Desk, the district's tech repair reporting system. Once you go to the website, simply enter your OS X name and password to sign into the system.
After signing on, you can report problems, view FAQs about common tech problems in the district, even track the status of your repair request! Go to the site and tech help will heading your way soon! |
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| TOP TEN THIS MONTH |
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Here are ten simple things educators can do on the web this month. Perhaps these can be springboards for a lesson or even some new "lifelong learning" for you, they are all keeping in tune with the Holiday Season and building upon the art of giving! Take a look and see what you can pick up & share with your students!
