Lake Wilderness Goes Green

Lake Wilderness Elementary teachers have made a building decision to “go green.” In an attempt to save paper and copying costs, teachers are trying a variety of strategies to communicate with parents and each other electronically. At their first meeting of the year staff learned how to convert a Word document to a PDF file and create distribution lists in Outlook; this allows parents to open and use documents sent through e-mail or uploaded to classroom web sites. They also learned how to use blind carbon copy (Bcc) in an attempt to maintain privacy concerns.

How to Save a Word Document as a PDF from Kimberly Allison on Vimeo.


How to Create a Distribution List from Kimberly Allison on Vimeo.

TMS Students Investigate Crime with Digital Tools

Students in Sam Atkinson’s science classes at Tahoma Middle School demonstrate their learning from the crime lab unit by making digital stories. Digital storytelling is the practice of using software and/or web 2.0 tools to create a multimedia project that tells a story. In this case, students add their own narration to PowerPoint slides that feature student-selected images to tell the story of the crime. Digital stories are a new way for students to share what they learn in a unit. You can learn more about digital storytelling by visiting the University of Houston’s Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling website.

Is a New Phone in Your Future?

Over the last few months several staff members have been asking our technology staff to help them configure their “new phone” so they can receive school email. If you have a phone or are getting a phone that supports Windows Mobile or an iPhone, we can help. Unfortunately, our network is unable to support Blackberries or the new Android OS.

We know that several of you may be in the market for a new phone this time of year. If getting your school email on your new phone is important to you, purchase an iPhone or one that supports Windows Mobile. Of course, you will also need a data plan.

Unfortunately, we do not have the resources to directly support personally owned phones and equipment; however, after the first of the year, we will be able to provide you with directions for how to set up school email on your Windows Mobile Phone and/or iPhone. Once these instructions are available they will be posted on SharePoint and you will be notified that they are available.

Tech Highlights Moves to the Blogosphere

For the past two years, Tech Highlights has come to you through your Outlook inbox. You can find past issues here. In an effort to publish highlights in a more timely manner, we're moving to this blogging site. This will also allow you to comment on the stories you read.

For the first few posts, I'll send you an e-mail letting you know that there's a new post for you to check out. (Our goal will be to publish once a week.) However, eventually you'll want to use the miracle of RSS Feeds to have the content come to you automatically. I'll show you how to do that in a later post.

For now, we just hope you'll enjoy the new format and bear with us as we learn how to best use this tool to communicate what's going on in the world of Tahoma Technology.

Let us know what you think. Use the comment link below to tell us what you'd like to see in these posts.

Learn how to use RSS feeds and your built-in RSS feed reader to subscribe to this blog by watching the video below.

Subscribing to a Blog Using Our Built-in Reader from 10Tech on Vimeo.