Jul

30

Computers can be difficult

Filed Under Musings | Leave a Comment

Last week I helped my dad work through some of the new software that came with his slick digital camera.

The camera wasn’t a problem, he’d long ago figured out how to use that.

The computer wasn’t the issue. My dad is one of the most computer savvy people I know. Some of the things he can convince a spreadsheet to do would make your head spin. He’s a whiz with spreadsheets. He knows how to use a computer to its full potential.

No, for my dad editing his pictures was causing a problem. He couldn’t figure out what software to use or how to get started. It took an hour or so, but I helped him figure out which software he needed and got him started with the basics.

For me, it was a reality check. Over the past five years I’ve spent countless hours coaching the staff (and students) at my school on the use of easy and more difficult computer programs. Some of them catch on immediately, but with many I have to go over the same software several times on different days. It can be discouraging to review the same stuff over and over and over, but I was reminded how necessary it is.

Teachers are an intelligent bunch overall, but we still need ongoing coaching when we’re put in a new situation. As teachers, we review with our students when we’re covering something new. We try to find at least a couple of differt ways to cover every topic so we can reinforce material that we’ve covered once before.

It’s only natural that teachers need the same help. Schools need to find ways to teach the teachers, but that requires enough money to have a teacher devote at least part of his day to peer coaching. With school budgets being what they are, I can’t see this happening in a lot of schools.

In the meantime, I’ll coach teachers in my spare time and I’ll try to be more patient. Thanks for the reminder, Dad.

Jul

25

Weird conversions

Filed Under Math | Leave a Comment

This is a really cool tool but one I’d want to use with a fair degree of caution. Weird Converter, well, converts things. Just like you can convert metres to feet, you can compare how many cockroaches it would take to make up the Great Wall of China (213,333,760 or so if you’re curious).

This is a really cool tool for understanding relationships between things. You can use if for understanding (and developing) systems of measurement. Yet you want to do this carefully (maybe you could consult the site but not have your students look at it). Some of the items you can compare are not appropriate for school use. Even so, used with caution, it’s a great tool to help the students think creatively about how measurement works and how disapparte things compare to each other.

Jul

23

Choosing wonders

Filed Under Collaboration, General | Leave a Comment

I recently came across the CBC’s list of the Seven Wonders of Canada.  Ignoring the fact that I’m not sure that CBC got it right (the Sleeping Giant is a “wonder”? Am I missing something?), I was intrigued by their public voting to get different sites chosen.

I wanted to try a simple poll with my students to see what topic they’d like for an essay question on their exam. The difficulty, of course, is that I don’t know how to set one up. Well, I did some quick searching and found MicroPoll. With it you can create a very simple, easy to use poll that’s really easy to insert into a website or blog. If you lack a website, their is a page (with a really awkward address) that you can direct your students to where the poll is also posted.

I haven’t used MicroPoll extensively, but this quick little trial went well and I’m fairly impressed. It was nice to use and very simple.

The thing I can’t figure out is that it’s free for the basic service, and, frankly, that gave me all the bells and whistles I could want. How are these guys going to make any money?

Jul

20

Civilization on a budget

Filed Under History | 1 Comment

As a history teacher I’m always looking for ways to make the past seem more interesting. One of those ways is playing games, and for a course on Western Civilization one of the best games has been Civilization (whether versions I, II, III or IV).

Unfortunately commercial software comes with a price, and, as I always like to complain, school budgets are limited. That, of course, makes it difficult for a teacher to have all his students play the same game and compare results.

Well, it’s not perfect and it’s not as good as the commercial versions, but FreeCiv is a mighty good choice if your budget won’t allow buying the software. It is a bit clunky and the graphics aren’t as nice as the store bought version, but it seems to have similar game play (and, I think, identical commands) and feel and generally does what the commercial Civ does.

FreeCiv lacks the polish of the paid for version, but it also allows you to play online against other players in distant locations. I’ll admit I’m having trouble figuring out how to do that, but it looks interesting. I think it’d be fun to have a FreeCiv tournament involving multiple school over multiple provinces. There would be the fog of war yet also some chance for building ties between schools.

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