Blockbuster Video, Hollywood Video, Netflix, and video stores in general may become the video media outlets of the past. Over the last two years, video streaming has taken over the Internet with such popular sites as YouTube, flickpeek, & peekvid. Senior students in American Film Class are reaping the benefits of such technology right here in our schools! With the technological help of Mr. Jason Tallman, the district's Telecommunications Specialist (seated in the rear of the photo below), Mr. Tom Snizek (shown behind the computers in the photo below instructing some of his students) have recently set up a system to video stream the Film class curriculum of movies over the New Hartford High School network for film students to access anytime during the school day. Because ninety percent of the class is processed through viewing and critiquing of films, streaming of videos have made it extremely accessible for students to take notes during the film in class, and then watch the videos again at a later date to review key concepts and various filming techniques inherent in each of the fifteen films. The course, which focuses on classic films like Nosferatu, Dracula, Double Indemnity, Citizen Kane, Frankenstein, Singin’ in the Rain, & Stagecoach, make it difficult for students to locate these films at local video stores for further analysis. Though this is only stage one of what Mr. Snizek hopes to accomplish with this technology, there are limitless ends to the utilization of video streaming to guide student learning in the future. Eventually, Snizek hopes to have students be able to stream their own film projects over the network directly so their peers may view and critique their film projects anytime as well as view exemplar projects of the past. This will enable students to view movies in preparation for their final exam project by giving them skill in producing the highest quality of film in editing, storyline, camera angle manipulation, and other various filming techniques. To be on the cusp of this new technology is exciting and rewarding. Degrees of this technology have been incorporated throughout college campuses across the world and it's wonderful to see our students have similar access right here in New Hartford, says Snizek. He points out that with this implementation and further development of video streaming in our school, New Hartford students will undoubtedly be more prepared then their collegiate counterparts in the area of digital media use & production. If you have an idea on how to use video streaming in your currciulum, you should contact the Information Technology Deparmtent and see if they can work with you to create a state-of-the-art solution for you and your students like our Film students at the Hih School are currently benefitting from!

GroupWise is the email system we use here at school and it has some handy features that help you to get more out of the system if you know about them! Here are some proven tips that can help you get more of your GroupWise email experience! (Please note that the tips provided here are for the Web Access version of the program and may differ slightly for the client version of GroupWise.)

DELETING MESSAGES & EMPTYING GROUPWISE TRASH
Imagine if you kept every piece of hardcopy mail (forever) that you've ever received in your life. Your office or home would be uninhabitable. That's the situation that just about every organization including New Hartford faces with managing an e-mail system. The amount of email stored actually affects the ability to run maintenance programs and increases the potential for e-mail outages since backup times and the space needed are increased. This ultimately makes your mailbox sluggish!

The easiest way to take care of this problem is to delete any messages you don't need. Removing messages from the system involves more that just sending them to the Trash. You must remember to empty the Trash as well. Here are the steps to correctly remove messages from the GroupWise system & help your email system work more efficient!

1. Check off any messages you want to get rid of and then click on the Delete button on the GroupWise Toolbar, (see circled area in the diagram below.)
2. Click on the Trash icon in your folder list. Notice that deleted messages actually remain in your GroupWise Trash until you empty it!! This is something many folks forget about!
3. To empty your GroupWise Trash, either click on the Delete All Messages button along the GroupWise toolbar OR control-click on the Trash icon and choose Empty Trash from the pop-menu that appears.

AVOIDING PRINT PROBLEMS BY USING THE PRINT VIEW
Sometimes when you print a message you get only part of the message. This is probably because you going directly to the Print command from the File menu in your browser and the message is treated as HTML text from a web page rather than as a text file. Do this instead to fix this problem:

1. Open the message to view it.
2. In the menu icons at the top of the Mail Message window, click on the Printer icon, (see circled icon in the diagram below.)
3. The message will appear in a text-only printer friendly version.
   
4. Now click on the File menu and choose the Print command.
5. The message will print and correctly displays the message without missing some of the text!

SAVING A DRAFT MESSAGE
Have you ever been working on a lengthy message and "lost" it because GroupWise logged you out. This is because the system "timed out." This is a secuity feature that logs you out of the system when it thinks you forgot to log off. To avoid this problem, you should save a draft of your email as you are working on it. This will let you save part of it if the system times out or send the message at a later time if you want to work on it periodically rather in one sitting. To save a draft of a message, follow these steps:

1. In the message window of the email you are composing, click on the Save button at the toolbar at the top of the Mail Message window, (see circled icon in the diagram below)
   
   
   
   
2. A Folders window will appear and the Work in Progress radio button will be selected. Click OK to save your draft in this folder.
3. You can access the draft any time from the Works in Progress folder located along the left side of the GroupWise window.
4. To finish your message and send it, double-click your message from the Item List & you can continue working on it or send it when you are ready!

TeachersFirst is a web resource for K-12 classroom teachers who want useful resources and lesson plans to use with their students. TeachersFirst is a division of Network for Instructional TV, Inc., a not-for-profit learning technologies corporation which works with hundreds of schools throughout the United States. TeachersFirst is a free service with support is provided by corporate underwriters interested in encouraging improvements in the quality of American education. TeachersFirst is written and edited by experienced, professional educators. All of their resources are reviewed by teaching professionals with relevant experience & TeachersFirst's own units and lessons have been developed for actual classrooms, in consultation with practicing professionals or by the teachers themselves. The site, which is a large collection of original content, Internet resources, lesson plans, and tools is drawn from around the world and has been selected and reviewed by one of TeachersFirst’s reviewers, all of whom have classroom teaching experience. Throught their detailed review process, all resources are grouped by subject as well as grade level and searchable by keyword or phrase, so teachers can quickly find what they need, no matter what grade level or content area they teach!

One of the neatest aspects you will find about the site is that TeachersFirst concentrates on resources which can really be used in teaching. They provide professional content on topics which relate to classroom instruction and teaching issues, rather than attempting to include all the theoretical and advocacy information which is also available on the Web. They also know their audience is "teachers in the trenches," and they try to meet their needs wherever possible. This website is a awesome educational resource that is sure to help any teacher looking for creative and well planned ideas for their classroom. Check out the site to see some of the excellent resources it has to offer. You can use the QuickLinks above to see some of the key areas of this great site!

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Eager to learn about new ways to use Mac OS X even better? Come to our monthly OS X "Talk, Tips & Tricks" session. Find out more.

Below are select technology courses to be offered by the Teacher Center this month. To learn more, log onto My Learning Plan then click the links below for more details about each class and/or to sign up right now online!

Thursday, February 7
The Art & Magic of Digital Presentations - February

Monday, February 11
OS X "Tech Talk Tips and Tricks" - February

Tuesday, February 12
Introduction to iPhoto

Wednesday, February 27
SchoolCenter School: Exploring the New Features of Your School Website - February

Thursday, February 28
Intro to iCal

iCal Users
Download February Events