March 24, 2014 - LAST CLASS 94 minutes
 Office Yoga Break:  Students are always reminded to not spend too much time sitting in front of computers.  Breaks should be taken at least every 30-40 minutes.  For our break today we practiced a simple yoga stretch for your ankles and then everyone had a chance to get up and move around the room some.  Students were also encouraged to share their work and ideas with each other during this gallery walk activity. Closure to Computer Class: Students were reminded that computers are constantly changing and that they have to learn to adjust to new programs, new hardware and new ways of using technology all the time. We are all constantly learning to adapt to new technology.  Students were also reminded that this was their only required computer class here at Council Rock and that should they wish to learn more about computer technology they should look carefully at the High School Program Planning Guide for the many elective classes that incorporate computer skills.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.6.8.M, 15.2.8.E) Technology Current Event Video:  For our last current event this year we watched a TED Presentation by Gary Kovacs, the CEO of Mozilla, about how internet users are tracked.  He demonstrated how many companies were following him and his daughter when they were online during a typical day.  During the presentation he demonstrated how a free download for Firefox called Collusion can be used to find out who is tracking you online.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.4.8.A, 15.5.8.J, 15.9.8.L, 15.9.8.M) March 20, 2014 0 minutes* *Class was cancelled today due to the PSSA testing schedule March 18, 2014 92 minutes* Google Earth Tour Quiz:  As a follow-up to our previous tour on Google Earth students were challenged to list everywhere they had gone and what they had seen on their tour of the 3 dimensional visual imagery in Google Earth last class. This activity helped to demonstrate the effectiveness of using 3D spatial references, such as the virtual environment of Google Earth, to augment memory.    QUIZ:  Where I went on Google Earth Today  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.4.8.A, 15.6.8.M) Internet Moment:  As students finished the Google Earth Quiz they were asked to visit the website OnGuardOnline.gov and try some of the games in the Video & Media section. Some of the games were:  Phishing Scams,Invasion of the Wireless Hackers, Cyber Criminal & Invest Quest. Finish First Aid Posters:  All students had time today to finish this project and print a rough draft in black and white.  Each student also had a chance to review their rough draft with the teacher before printing their final draft in full color. Students were reminded that they can use NoodleTools.com to help them with the MLA formatted works cited on each poster. Everyone finished this project today. Click here to enlarge the project description.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.A, 15.3.8.B, 15.3.8.E, 15.4.8.G, 15.3.8.H, 15.3.8.S, 15.3.8.X, 15.4.8.B, 15.6.8.L) Office Yoga Break: Students are always reminded to take breaks from the computer and their gaming systems and to get exercise. Today we practiced a simple yoga stretch, a seated twist, and students got up and moved around some afterwards. Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with two short videos about 3D printing technology.  In the first video the reproduction of a tool was demonstrated.  The second video explained how 3D printers can be used to reproduce living body parts.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.6.8.M, 15.4.8.A) * Class time was shorter today due to the PSSA testing schedule March 14, 2014 22 minutes* Internet Moment:  Today we explored Google Earth and discussed how a 3 dimensional virtual environment can be used to augment human memory.  We started by discussing what spatial memory is and how it is used to make modern video games so engaging.  Students were then introduced to the memory palace or method of loci as an effective way to use 3 dimensional visual imagery to help a person remember large amounts of information.  We then went to Google Earth and began a tour of the earth, the sky, Mars and the moon. The whole class followed a specific list of locations.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.4.8.A, 15.6.8.M) Google Earth Tour Quiz: Next class, as a follow-up to our Google Earth activity, all students will take a quiz to see how much of the virtual tour they remember. Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with a short video from "Stuff to Blow Your Mind" about Constructing a Memory Palace. * Class time was shorter today due to the half day schedule March 12, 2014 91 minutes  Office Yoga Break:  During long classes like this one students are always reminded to take breaks and get exercise. Students shouldn't spend more than 30-40 minutes in front of a computer without taking a break. For our break today we practiced a simple office yoga stretch for your hips.  After the stretch students did a gallery walk to share their work with each other. Check Grades:  Since most of the assignments for this class have been graded and entered into the gradebook students were asked to log into the Home Access Center and check their computer class grades today. Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with a TEDx presentation by Alexa von Tobel the founder and CEO of LearnVest.com.  In the video she specifically discusses how poor personal financial decisions effect individuals.  Saving for emergencies, personal budgeting, negotiating salaries, planning for retirement and credit card debt was all discussed. March 10, 2014 104 minutes Internet Moment: Today our students were introduced to the "joy of statistics" by viewing GapMinder.org which is a free online resource where statistics from all around the world are presented in an easy to understand visual format. We looked at the "Wealth & Health of Nations" chart. As a demonstration of how the website works we tracked the life expectancy and income changes in the USA and China over the last 200 years.  We also looked at how 8th grade math scores and changing in Japan, Canada and the United States.  Students then had time to explore the website on their own. (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.4.8.A, 15.6.8.M, 15.7.8.A, 15.7.8.F, 15.7.8.H, 15.7.8.L)  Office Yoga Break:  During long classes like this one students are always reminded to take breaks and get exercise. Students shouldn't spend more than 30-40 minutes in front of a computer without taking a break. For our break today we practiced a simple office yoga stretch for your arms. Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with a video from the BBC in which Hans Rosling describes how Gapminder.org can be used to identify trends and misconceptions by looking at the data. March 6, 2014 44 minutes  Technology Current Event Video:  After finishing the full page ad project we watched an 11 minute whiteboard video about the universal principles of persuasion.   (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.9.8.A, 15.9.8.E) March 4, 2014 91 minutes   Finish Brochure Project:  All students had time to finish the copyright brochure project in MS Publisher today.   Students were also shown how to print on both sides of a sheet of paper and how to trifold a brochure.  Each student then had an opportunity to review a rough draft of their project with the teacher.  Everyone turned in this project today.  Click here to enlarge the project description.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.1.5.B, 15.3.5.A, 15.3.8.B, 15.3.5.D, 15.3.8.D, 15.3.8.E, 15.4.8.G, 15.3.8.U, 15.6.8.L)  Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today by watching some live streaming video from the Socadrome Parade of Bands, Trinidad & Tobago Carnival 2014.  February 28, 2014 104 minutes Internet Moment:  We looked at zoom.it today which is a free screen zooming service that is owned by Microsoft.  Students were then shown two other online examples of the  screen zooming technology:  The NMS Mosaic Project and the Deep Zoom image of Yosemite National Park.  Students had time to explore these websites.  Office Yoga Break:  During long classes like this one students are always reminded to take breaks and get exercise. Students shouldn't spend more than 30-40 minutes in front of a computer without taking a break. For our break today we practiced a simple office yoga stretch for your neck.  After the break everyone had a chance to get up and walk around and share ideas by viewing each other's projects. Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with a short video from SafeInternetBanking.be about an amazing mind reader in Belgium and how he knows so much about his clients.  We also watched part of a second public service announcement from the same organization. February 26, 2014 44 minutes Internet Moment:  Today we explored NewsMap.jp which is a graphical interpretation of the top news stories on Google News that was created by Marcos Weskamp, a self described software architect.  He is was also part of the team that founded Flipboard which seeks to bring the design experience of magazines to web and tablet technology.  Students had a chance to explore Mr. Weskamp's website and learn a little about how software engineers work with design and computer coding. (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.2.5.B, 15.2.5.C, 15.2.8.E)  Finish Basic HTML:  Today we finished creating a simple webpage using HTML code. Students added a background color, font color, font style, and inserted images.  The use of hexadecimal numbers to create specific colors was also explained. We finished the webpage by adding JavaScript from DynamicDrive.com and experimenting with it.  Click here to enlarge the project description. (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.S, 15.4.8.H) Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with a video from code.org about what most schools don't teach - computer coding.  This video featured many famous and not so famous people talking about how they learned to code. February 24, 2014 91 minutes Internet Moment:  Today we looked at two online resources for fonts. DaFont.com offers over 20,000 fonts that are either freeware, shareware, demo versions or in the public domain.  These fonts can be downloaded and installed but students were also shown how they can use the Snipping Tool to get images of the fonts they might like.  Students were also shown how they could make their own font using a website like YourFonts.com.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.E, 15.6.5.M, 15.4.5.A) Introduction to Web Conferencing:  Students were introduced to what a webinar or web conference is and what online education could look like for them in the future.  AnyMeeting.com was used to project presentations from the teacher's desktop to the student's screen and the use of webcams in a webinar was also demonstrated.      Check Grades:  Since we are at the halfway point in this class students were asked to log into the Home Access Center and check their computer class grades.  Students were also reminded that if they could not log in their parents had to go to the Newtown Middle School website and follow the directions at the bottom of the webpage to create a student account.  Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today by watching a short video from EuroNews about Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of HTML code and the world wide web.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.4.8.A) February 20, 2014 104 minutes Internet Moment:  Today we started class by visiting NBCOlympics.com to see what the online coverage of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia looked like.   Finish Font Guide Project:  All students had time today to finish the font guide project. Students were shown how to change the line spacing and print the final draft using a different network printer.  Click here to enlarge the project description.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.E, 15.4.8.G, 15.4.2.K, 15.3.8.X) Office Yoga Break:  During long classes like this one students are always reminded to take breaks and get exercise. Students shouldn't spend more than 30-40 minutes in front of a computer without taking a break. For our break today we practiced a simple office yoga stretch. Hour of Code:  Today our class participated in the Hour of Code. We started by going to the Favorite Links webpage that we had previously made in Word and viewing the source code.  Students were told that this code, a mixture of HTML and JavaScript, was the list of specific instructions that tell your web browser how to display the webpage. When students saved their Word document as a "single file webpage" Microsoft Word wrote this code for them.  We then watched the tutorial video below to introduce the online coding activity.  Students then went to the online Blockly Maze Tutorial to write JavaScript.   Introduction to Scratch:  After all students had time to complete the Blockly Maze Tutorial the class was shown Scratch which is a free online code editor that was developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  Students who enjoyed using Blockly, were told that Scratch would be the next step for them to try.  Technology Current Event Video:   We watched part of a TED Presentation by John Maeda, the President of the Rhode Island School of Design.  In the video he talked about how he became a graphic designer and how he used technology.  He also did a presentation about content & form that demonstrated the use different of different fonts to convey meaning. Students were encouraged to watched the rest of the video on their own.  (PA BCIT Standard: 15.4.8.A, 15.8.8.K, 15.9.8.A) February 18, 2014 0 minutes* * During our class time today all students participated in a rotation around all the Arts   Classes to learn about course offerings at our high school. February 12, 2014 91 minutes   Break:  Students are always reminded to not spend too much time sitting in front of computers.  Breaks should be taken every 30-40 minutes.  For our break  Publisher Logo Project: We started with an introduction to MS Publisher 2010 today. Publisher was described as a graphic design program which is used to express your ideas visually.  The field of graphic design was also explained. Students were reminded that learning basic graphic design skills will help them to communicate their ideas effectively.  Students then became familiar with Publisher 2010 by making a simple logo. We saved this project and shared them with the class. Click here to enlarge the project description.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.S, 15.4.5.G, 15.6.5.M, 15.3.8.X, 15.9.8.A, 15.9.5.L)  Font Presentation:  In this presentation the development of the two basic font families (serif & sans serif) as well as the best uses for each of them was covered. Students were also shown how they read primarily through identifying sight words and why it's so hard to spell and grammar check your own work. (serif & san serif) and the best uses for each category students proceeded to make a Font Guide in MS Publisher. The final student project should look just like the original. We also discussed the concept of WYSIWYG in graphic design on computers.  Click here to enlarge the project description. We will finish this project next class.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.E, 15.4.8.G, 15.4.2.K, 15.3.8.X) Font Conference Video:  As a follow-up to the Font Presentation we watched a short video from College Humor about a fictitious "Font Conference": February 10, 2014 104 minutes Class Blog:  Students were shown TodayInComputerClass.com and told that they can check here anytime to review what work was done in class.  We also discussed what a web log or blog was, how blogs developed into microblogs like Twitter and now mobile phone based apps like Instagram.  This website is the blog or web log for our class. Students were also told that their parents will be sent an email with a link to this website so they can also review what we are doing in computer class each day.  Assigned Seats: All students have an assigned seat/computer in computer class. Students have a responsibility to report any problems with the machine they have been assigned. In this way we all participate in maintaining our school computers.  Students were also reminded to adjust the keyboard, mouse, chair and monitor to meet their ergonomic needs.  (PA-BCIT Standard:  15.4.5.D, 15.4.2.B, 15.4.8.F) Typing Test: All students took a typing test using TypingTest.com. Each student had 10 minutes to take the 1 minute test multiple times. Their best adjusted speed was recorded and graphed in an Excel spreadsheet. The average typing speed for this class was:  43.9 WPM  Click here for more information about typing speeds at Newtown Middle School.  We also discussed this graph:   Online Typing Activities: As a follow up to the typing test we looked at the typing speeds for the whole 8th grade in Excel and looked at graphs of past speeds for Newtown Middle School students.  Students were then given some time to find at least 3 online typing activities (tutorials or games) that they enjoyed. They were to then add these typing activities to their favorites or bookmarks list so they could go back and practice their typing skills in class when they finished their projects.  (PA-BCIT Standard:  15.6.2.L)Technology Current Event Video:  To finish class today we watched a short video from CNET about the Microsoft Sculpt Ergonomic Desktop Keyboard.  (PA-BCIT Standard:  15.4.8.C) February 6, 2014 - SNOW DAY - NO SCHOOL 0 minutes 61 minutes* Internet Moment:  Students were asked to compare three popular news aggregator websites:  Google News, Bing News and Yahoo.  We looked at their home pages, their features and their overall appearance.  Though the results were split, a plurality of our students said they preferred Google News when looking for current events online.  (PA BCIT Standards:  15.3.8.E, 15.6.5.L) Finish Basic Computer Knowledge Presentation:  Today we finished the presentation we started last class.  The origins of the Microsoft corporation were covered and the development of the Windows Operating System was explained.  We also discussed the importance of being careful about what you post online.  Students were reminded that last year 30% of college admission officers reported finding content online that caused them to reject a student's application.   Students were reminded that employers are using many of the same techniques to select candidates for job openings.  All students then had some time to check their current online presence by searching for themselves, their friends and their family members.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.1.5.B, 15.3.5.V, 15.3.8.T, 15.4.5.B, 15.6.8.M, 15.5.8.J, 15.4.5.A, 15.4.5.B, 15.3.5.T) Technology Current Event Video:  We finished class today with a video from 8nownews.com in Las Vegas, Nevada about the use of social media searches by colleges and universities.  (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.2.5.M, 15.2.8.K, 15.8.8.M, 15.5.8.J, 15.4.5.A, 15.4.5.B)  * Class time was shorter today due to the 2 hour delay schedule January 31, 2014 104 minutes Introduction to Basic Computer Skills Class: Basic rules and classroom procedures were explained. Students were specifically reminded that because technology is constantly changing they should get into the habit of helping each other out and demonstrating the ability to learn new computer skills through experimentation. All students reported that they had helped an adult with computer skills but they also need to get used to helping each other.  Setting up Student Passwords:  All students were given some suggestions to help them develop good passwords.  Some suggested good password practices were:  Come up with a collection of passwords to rotate through instead of just one, make a pass phrase instead of a password, mix number, letters and symbols together.  Student passwords must fit the following parameters (PA-BCIT Standard:  15.4.8.F):
CRSD Acceptable Use Policy: Students were shown how to access the CRSD Acceptable Use Policy online through a simple internet search.  They were also reminded that they are in a network environment where their actions on the computer can be easily tracked.  We also reviewed the policies concerning devices (such as cell phones and tablets) that student might bring into school. Pixlr.com Project: Students were shown how to use the online photo editor pixlr.com to edit a photograph.  Students then shared their modified photos using various district network resources and demonstrated basic skills such as drag & drop. The best use of the H:, S: & X: drives was also explained.  We also discussed professional digital photo editing with Adobe PhotoShop. (PA BCIT Standards: 15.4.8.F, 15.4.5.G)   Basic Computer Knowledge Presentation:  Today students were shown a presentation based on the student computer knowledge survey that they had taken.  This introductory lecture covers basic background information that every student should know about computers such as the development of desktop computers (Apple, IBM & Microsoft), different computer operating systems, internet connection options, developing computer devices (like smart phones and tablet computers) and protecting yourself online.  We will finish the presentation next class. (PA-BCIT Standards:  15.1.5.B, 15.3.5.V, 15.3.8.T, 15.6.8.M) Technology Current Event Video:  At then end of most computer classes we watch a current event video about emerging trends in technology.  Today's video was inspired by a presentation that was created by a high school teacher in Colorado, Mr. Karl Fisch. Here is a link to his blog:  THE FISCHBOWL for more information. |
