Original Content: Show AllSince TICAL is a portal, most of the resources you'll find in the database live elsewhere on the web. However, TICAL has created the following original content for use by our registered members.
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Curriculum Integration | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| Advancing Knowledge with Technology Master teacher Gayle Britt shares three approaches to using technology that have proved effective in her middle school classroom. | |
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| Amazing Leaps and Bounds The National School Boards Association T + L conference brings many shining leaders to share their visions for a 21st century education. One leader from Baltimore County Public Schools was named a 2008 “20 to Watch” honorary— one of 20 emerging leaders in education technology. In this Radio TICAL episode, TICAL’s director, Rowland Baker, got a chance to sit down with Ryan Imbriale, the assistant principal at Perry Hall High School. Ryan shares his triumphs, such as his role in helping to integrate multimedia projects school-wide. He also discusses his concerns with some policies that can inhibit progress. | |
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| Assistive Technology 101 TICAL cadre member Stephen Vaughn provides a straight-forward overview of assistive technology for principals and other K-12 administrators. As area director of San Bernardino County's Desert/Mountain Operations, Stephen's responsibilities include special education. | |
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| Based on a Review of Relevant Research Looking for a quick path to relevant research on technology and education? Here is a shortlist of excellent research summaries. You'll find this very helpful in updating or creating a technology plan to meet requirements of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation or applying for grants (e.g. EETT). | |
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| Becoming a Connoisseur of Technology Integration Here you'll find the PowerPoint, handout, and additional references for Michael Simkins' presentation, "Becoming a Connoisseur of Technology Integration," presented at the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) Annual Conference and Exhibit Show, Anaheim, California, March 19, 2007. | |
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| California Middle School Standards Matricies and Electronic Learning Resources (ELRs) This Excel® template is designed to help administrators and teachers quickly find an ELR by English-Language Arts standard as well as providing you an easy-to-view representation of the standards. The California Learning Resource Network (CLRN) has gathered several ELRs. All of these have been reviewed for effectiveness and relevance to their appropriate grade level and content standards. This template will help you integrate technology in a standards-based curriculum. | |
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| Cell Phones on Campus: Are they driving you crazy? In this Radio TICAL episode, TICAL cadre members Bob Blackney and Kelly Calhoun share their perspectives on the kinds of things we need to consider in crafting campus cell phone policies. | |
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| Discovering Their Own Way—Students Using Technology to Help Their Community In this Radio TICAL episode, hear Lindsey and Morgan, two high school seniors from a small rural farming community in Harrisburg, Arkansas share how The Environmental And Spatial Technology (EAST) Project has prepared them to be life-long learners and active community members. They also discuss projects they have worked on including a water conservation project that resulted in saving the farms thousands of gallons of water. | |
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| EETT Spotlights Looking for some good examples of what teachers and students are doing with the support of funding from the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) program? These examples, compiled by the California Department of Education, include models of professional development and technology integration. | |
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| Exemplary Uses of Technology in Education David Weksler has been involved in educational technology at the grass roots level for years. In this Radio TICAL episode, Michael Simkins picks his brain about how far he feels we’ve come—or not come—in terms of integrating technology in truly exemplary ways. | |
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| High School Diploma Student Course Plan This Excel® template is designed as a keep track sheet for students in alternative high school diploma programs. These programs include Adult Education, Continuation, Independent Study, and home schooling. | |
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| Horizon Report - Summary of 2007 Edition This summary of the 2007 Horizon Report was prepared by TICAL Cadre member Sandra Miller and TICAL staff member Jason Borgen. Michael Simkins narrates. The report describes new and emerging technology that can be used as tools for learning. | |
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| Laptop Learning How does teaching and learning change when students are provided with their own laptop computer? In this narrated presentation, Damian Bebell shares how some researchers answered this question with the help of students and teachers at South Elementary in Andover, Massachusetts. | |
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| Learning and Living in an Online World Internet use has changed. Increasingly, our students are using the Internet for social purposes, not simply to look up information or buy things. School administrators have to worry about more than filtering out inappropriate content; they have to add cyber safety to the course of instruction. In this episode of Radio TICAL, Susan Brooks-Young offers ideas for how you can meet these safety challenges without giving up valuable instructional uses of the Internet. | |
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| Leave No Child Technologically Illiterate In this first Radio TICAL episode to feature members of TICAL’s Arkansas leadership cadre, Karli Saracini interviews Cathey Wilcox on the topic of technology literacy and the No Child Left Behind requirement that every student be technologically literate by the end of eighth grade. | |
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| Making Sure Technology Happens in the Classroom One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 14 minutes long and focuses on how to foster integration of technology with curriculum and content standards. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Pioneers on the Oregon Trail Eleven years ago, Jim Scoolis took the helm of Monarch Grove Elementary School in Los Osos, California. Designed to be the district’s “technology model,” the newly built school was fully wired and offered then state-of-the-art equipment. The only trouble was few teachers were using the stuff. In this Radio TICAL episode, Jim recounts the “journey West” he and is staff made as they moved from e-mail to simulations—and how they overcame the obstacles they encountered along the way. | |
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| Podcasting in Education In this episode of Radio TICAL, Arkansas cadre member Belinda Kittrell interviews fellow cadre members Tommy Tyler and Karen Eoff. Tommy talks about how Monticello School District is experimenting with podcasting to help meet the learning needs of more students. Karen describes Southeast Arkansas Education Service Cooperative’s TechCamps. | |
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| Preparing Students for Their Future—Not Our Past In this episode of Radio TICAL, Rowland Baker interviews Dr. David Thornburg. Dr. Thornburg is well known in the field of educational technology. In this informal discussion, Dr. Thornburg shares how he came to be involved in educational technology in the first place, and what he sees are the most pressing demands of the future including project-based learning and STEM education. | |
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| Project-Based Learning with Multimedia: An Overview This 12 minute slide presentation presents an overview of the Challenge 2000 Multimedia Project. Narrated by the project's former director, Michael Simkins. In 2000, the project was cited as one of two exemplary educational technology programs in the nation by the U.S. Department of Education. (EETT) | |
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| Promoting Technology Integration School-Wide Learn about research on the diffusion of innovations and its implications for how to facilitate the diffusion of technology integration, or other reforms, across classrooms in your school. | |
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| Quick Take: Podcasts This 7-minute Quick Take discusses podcasting. You will learn what a podcast is, how to locate podcasts for teaching, learning, and professional development, and how to create your own podcasts. | |
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| Quick Takes: Mini-Notebooks This 4-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. Susan gives an overview of mini-notebooks and how they are used. She provides other resources to assist you in developing best practices for using these cost-effective mini computers. | |
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| Quick Takes: Web-Based Presentations This 5-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. Susan gives an overview of a variety of web-based presentations and how they are used. She provides other resources do that you and your students can create presentations on the Internet. | |
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| Showcasing Innovation In this Radio TICAL episode hear staff and Arkansas cadre members interview three recipients of the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) grant share their success stories. This episode was recorded at the annual EETT showcase in little Rock, Arkansas in the spring of 2008. Interactive whiteboards, distance learning programs, and using handhelds for one to one computing are highlighted. | |
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| Stepping Stones Across the Digital Divide Read about a unique program in San Mateo County, California that uses technology to foster educational equity among elementary school, Hispanic females. | |
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| Student Cyber Safety Concerned about cyber safety? TICAL Cadre members Gabe Soumakian, Skip Johnson, Sheila Grady, and John White share three specific web resources to inform administrators, teachers, parents, students, and the community on how to provide a safe and secure environment when using the Internet. | |
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| Technology in Fort Smith Michael Simkins shares his January 2005 visit to Fort Smith Public Schools in Arkansas where teachers and their students are making some innovative efforts to integrate technology, especially handheld computers, to teach to state standards. | |
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| Technology Trends: Past, Present, and Future In 1995, TICAL cadre member Sandra Miller queried a broad range of experts about how, by 2005, technology was likely to affect the content of the school curriculum and the delivery of instruction to students. These thinkers included policy makers, futurists, and educators. Her analysis of what they had to say formed the basis of Sandra’s doctoral dissertation. In this Radio TICAL episode, Sandra shares three of the most important predictions and reflects on the extent to which each has—or has not—come to pass. | |
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| The Countryside Experience Becci Gillespie is superintendent-principal of Pleasant Grove Joint Union School District, a single-school, K-8 district in a rural area 25 miles from Sacramento, California. Rural for now, that is. Big plans are in the works to build a whole new community within the district, complete with ten to twelve new schools! In this Radio TICAL episode, Steve Kay interviews Becci about how she worked with her staff to increase their use of technology and her hopes of maintaining the good things about her small district as it grows to many times its current size. | |
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| The Knight's Vision on Reform In this Radio TICAL episode hear Sir Ken Robinson, an internationally-renown expert in creativity, share his visions relating to educational reform following his keynote address at the 4th Annual TICAL Arkansas Conference. He discusses the importance of bridging practice, policy, and theory to help promote creativity in the schools. He provides anecdotes and analogies to help us better understand the approach to standardizing and customizing education. He also discusses his various experiences with educational systems worldwide. | |
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| The Minnetonka Story: Using Technology to Personalize Education TICAL cadre members Bob Blackney (CA) and Marianne Hauser (AR) had the opportunity to visit the Minnetonka Public Schools in Minnesota in May 2007 to see how the district secured $45 million in technology funding and is using it to personalize education through technology integration. Bob and Marianne share what they observed and learned in these two quick-paced, narrated presentations. | |
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| Using iPods to Turn Students On To Reading (Part 1 of 2) The eCAP program at El Crystal Elementary School in the San Bruno Park School District is a unique take home audiobook program where 40 targeted students use iPods to listen to and read from several different literature books. In this TICALevision episode principal Skip Johnson and several teachers and students share the program and explain how the program has increased student achievement and motivation to read. Stay tuned for Part 2 to learn how to set up a program like this in your school or district! | |
Data-Driven Decision Making |
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| A Data-Driven Organization's Approach to Assessing The Quality of Program Delivery Jim Cox explains the difference between outcome and process data and explains how process information can be used to examine program delivery. | |
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| Classroom Walkthroughs and Observations In The Palm of Your Hand In this TICALevision episode, Kenny Pennington, principal in Monticello School District in rural Monticello, Arkansas demonstrates how he uses a handheld computer while observing a computer/technology teacher at the high school. Kenny shares the process to quickly record observations and how he engages his teachers in a continual improvement process. | |
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| Data Analysis with Excel Need to collect and analyze California Standards Test data? Check out these easy-to-use templates developed by Michael Nunn, consultant with CTAP 11, Los Angeles County Office of Education. | |
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| Data Teams In this Radio TICAL episode, San Jose Unified School District managers Bill Erlendson and Marcy Lauck share a new way to facilitate data-driven decision making. | |
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| Data-Driven Decision Making Cadre members Devin Vodicka and John White, principal in Los Angeles Unified, collaborated on this presentation which provides an overview of the basics, free resources, and links to useful resources to improve the use of data as a tool for improving teaching and learning. | |
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| Data-Driven Decision Making and Electronic Learning Assessment Resources (ELAR) Many vendors are offering various technology tools to support data-driven decision making. In this short article, John Cradler provides a nice overview of just what's necessary for data-driven decision making to be successful and how CLRN's reviews of electronic learning assessment resources (ELAR) can help administrators with the task of choosing among competing products. | |
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| Data-Driven Organizations: What Do They Look Like? Jim Cox shares his vision of what constitutes a data-driven organization. He takes the reader beyond standardized test scores and the importance of causal information. Although this article was written several years ago, the information presented still holds true today. | |
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| Dropping Out of School is One of the Key Social Challenges of Our Time This pdf matrix lays out what the California Department of Education (CDE) is currently doing and planning on doing to improve dropout reduction in California. Written by the Middle & High School Improvement Office and Educational Options Office under the Secondary, Postsecondary, & Adult Leadership Division, the matrix is designed to provide you with specific programs offered by the CDE and research linking to additional information including locations on the CDE website for best practices, dropout prevention, and much more! | |
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| EdTechProfile's Radio TICAL Interview EdTechProfile is one of the statewide educational technology services (SETS) funded by the California Department of Education and provided free of charge to California public schools. In this episode, Steve Kay talks with Brian Dunsmore, EdTechProfile’s director, about ways you can use EdTechProfile in your technology planning process. | |
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| EETT Spotlights Looking for some good examples of what teachers and students are doing with the support of funding from the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) program? These examples, compiled by the California Department of Education, include models of professional development and technology integration. | |
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| Fighting Data with Data: The educational and political benefits of disaggregated data In this article, Jim Cox discusses how school administrators can respond to external criticism of test scores with additional data gathered at the site or within the district. Although this article was written several years ago, the principles discussed still hold true today and are worthwhile for school administrators to review and share. | |
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| How A Data-Driven Organization Deals With Aligning Assessment Measures to Local Standards (One of the greatest barriers to becoming a proactive Data-Driven Organization) In this article Jim Cox explains how to determine whether or not an assessment tool and the curriculum being taught are actually aligned. | |
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| How to use Electronic Learning Assessment Resources (ELAR) Web site This tool was designed by the ELAR staff to assist you in navigating the Web site. It was prepared for beginning to advanced users of data-driven resources in hopes of helping you make decisions based on data. This document is broken down by concept, where to find the resource on the site, and a direct URL link. | |
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| Identify Program Elements to Improve Student Achievement (AOP Form) The Analysis of Process (AOP) worksheet will assist you in the identification of elements of a school program that can help you improve student achievement. This tool is referenced in the article "A Data-Driven Organization's Approach to Assessing The Quality of Program Delivery" written by Jim Cox and available online in Portical's Expert Opinion area. A template for the worksheet and a sample are available in HTML and PDF formats. | |
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| Instructional Program Summary This Excel® template is designed to help administrators determine the instructional hours being spent in each content area. This template will also graph the data so you can see how content areas (Language Arts, Reading, Math, Science, and Social Studies) are prioritized by your teachers. | |
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| Just for the Kids-California (JFTK-CA) Best Practices This 15-minute presentation will explain the many resources and specific practices collected from high performing school across the country found on the free, online data and school improvement system called Just for the Kids-California. You will be walked through the Best Practices area of the Web site and even be shown how to assess your own school, district, and/or classroom to assist you in data-driven decision making. | |
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| Just For The Kids-California (JFTK-CA) Presentation Locating beneficial resources to help display data can be a daunting task. TICAL cadre member Sandra Miller shares many ways this free resource for California schools can display data and provide best practices. After viewing this presentation, you will be ready to use your site's data for key decision making. | |
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| Managing Assets and Data In this Radio TICAL episode, Dan Neville, Technology Specialist with Arizona’s Kyrene School District, shares how his district is using technology for more effective asset and data management. He gives examples that range from wireless devices that improve the accuracy of textbooks and equipment inventories to tools for collecting data from lots of sources in one place for analysis and interpretation. | |
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| Measuring 21st Century Skills "There is a gaping hole in our educational system for measuring those things that lend themselves less to immediate and direct measurement.” So says Certiport President and CEO David Saedi. In this interview with TICAL co-director Michael Simkins, David describes a formative assessment tool his company developed for use with employees that might serve as a model for developing similar tools in K-12 education. | |
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| Organize and Chart Student Scores An Excel template that can be used to enter and analyze student assessment data. For more information on how this template was first developed and used, see Using Technology to Make Sense of Data by Dan Ryder, here on the Portical web site. | |
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| Senate Bill 1384 Senate Bill 1384 directs the California Learning Resource Network (CLRN) to establish review criteria and a process for the identification and review of electronic learning assessment resources (ELARS). TICAL cadre member Chris York provides a quick introduction to the legislation and its implications for administrators. You'll also find a link to the full text of the legislation. | |
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| Survey Templates Ready to Administer Using Google Forms These Microsoft Excel files were created to provide you quick access to surveys you can administer in your school or district using Google Forms (a subset of Google Docs). You can either obtain a direct copy of the survey to send to your participants immediately OR you can load the original spreadsheet into Google Docs and create the survey from the spreadsheet. | |
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| Technology to the Rescue: Managing Student Performance Data In "Technology to the Rescue: Managing Student Performance Data," Dan Ryder relates how La Honda-Pescadero Unified School District in California uses readily available technology to make sense of data from hundreds of student writing assessments. | |
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| Tracking Arkansas Legislative Bills and Information TICAL Arkansas cadre member Phoebe Bailey developed this simple step sheet to help you take advantage of the General Assembly web site to locate and track pertinent legislation. | |
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| Use Ed-Data to Locate School Data Ed-Data is a Web site that both site and district level administrators will find useful. The downloadable tip sheet, found in Portical's Briefcase, will assist you in locating critical data related to your school or district, or data to compare your school or district to others. The file is available in html and PDF formats. This information is also valuable for writing grant proposals or for program evaluation. | |
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| Using Microsoft Excel to Collect and Analyze California Standards Test Data Need to collect and analyze California Standards Test data? Michael Nunn, consultant with CTAP 11, Los Angeles County Office of Education, has created some simple templates to help you. In a narrated presentation, Michael walks you through the steps to download the appropriate files and copy your data into them from the CDE website. | |
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| Using Technology to Make Sense of Data Using scores from a district-wide writing assessment as an example, Dan Ryder explains how to use a simple database and spreadsheet to manage and analyze student assessment data. | |
Financial Planning |
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| Education Technology K-12 Voucher Program: A short introduction A result of the state's Microsoft settlement, California's Education Technology K-12 Voucher Program is a major source of technology funding. TICAL cadre member Stephen Vaughn prepared this brief guide to help administrators understand some of the key features of the program. | |
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| Financial Planning 101 In this 9-minute narrated presentation, Susan Brooks-Young shares practical lessons learned about effective financial planning for school or district technology plans. Topics include laying the groundwork for sustainable funding, total cost of ownership, and value of investment. | |
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| New Programs Funding Calculator 2006-2007 was a great year for funding special projects, that is if you know the strings attached, how the funds are calculated and if you qualify. How does an administrator figure out what monies are available this year for technology projects? Here is a great resource created by our friends in the Arvin Union School District, Bakersfield, CA. Calculations, explanations and more can be found on this user friendly spreadsheet. Impress you business department with the amount of knowledge gained from this resource. Knowledge is power. Post 2006-2007, use this as a template for creating your own customized version with current year data. | |
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| The Minnetonka Story: Using Technology to Personalize Education TICAL cadre members Bob Blackney (CA) and Marianne Hauser (AR) had the opportunity to visit the Minnetonka Public Schools in Minnesota in May 2007 to see how the district secured $45 million in technology funding and is using it to personalize education through technology integration. Bob and Marianne share what they observed and learned in these two quick-paced, narrated presentations. | |
Operations and Maintenance |
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| Average Enrollment and Projection Template for K-3 Class Size Reduction Are you an elementary school administrator wondering how close the classrooms are from full capacity? This Excel® template will help you determine your school's compliance towards Class Size Reduction by calculating average daily enrollment (if your Student information System does not). It will also project the number of days that are needed to move students from one class to another in order to become compliant. This template will save you hours and will lower your anxiety in meeting requirements. | |
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| Bell Schedule and Instructional Minutes These scheduling templates contributed by cadre member Chris York will help create your bell schedule whether you are starting from scratch or already have an existing schedule to work with. Each Excel® template automatically calculates the passing or recess time per day, the amount of time school is in session per day, and the total annual minutes of instructional time. You can ensure you are meeting the state’s or district’s requirements. The template also gives you the option to enter your articulation/collaboration schedule and minimum day schedule. | |
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| A Collaborative Principal: In and Out of Program Improvement and a Recipe for Success In this Radio TICAL episode, Rick Fitzpatrick, principal at Rother Elementary School in Enterprise Elementary School District shares how his school has exited program improvement. He provides specific strategies he uses to facilitate the change process including gathering teacher input on a variety of topics and allotting frequent staff collaboration time. Rick also highlights his school’s continual analysis of data as well as celebrations that are held in the community. | |
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| Buying an LCD Projector Buying new projectors for your school or district? Take a look at this 2-page tutorial created by TICAL cadre member Bob Blackney. He provides you resources and expert advice on LCD vs. DLP projectors, brightness, warranty, bulb life, focal length, portability, wireless, management, and control. Once you are finished reading this you will have the expertise needed to buy a projector. | |
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| Cell Phones on Campus: Are they driving you crazy? In this Radio TICAL episode, TICAL cadre members Bob Blackney and Kelly Calhoun share their perspectives on the kinds of things we need to consider in crafting campus cell phone policies. | |
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| Creating Conversation Using a Principal’s Blog In this Radio TICAL episode, Jim Scoolis, principal in San Luis Coastal Unified School District and TICAL cadre member has recently started a blog at his school to help create conversation regarding homework, school policies, and other school related topics. Steve Kay, professor of educational leadership at San Jose State University speaks with Jim about his new medium of pushing his school through the 21st century. Jim shares the simple way he started and how he is trying to stimulate conversation amongst all stakeholders in his school. | |
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| Exploring Electronic Textbooks Starting to give serious thought to moving from traditional to electronic textbooks? TICAL consultant Bev Blaylock has collected several examples, case studies, and other resources you'll want to review. | |
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| Finding, Hiring, Training, Keeping a Quality Technology Staff Finding, hiring, training, your technology staff—and keeping them once you've got them on the job—is one of your key operations and maintenance challenges. In this Radio TICAL interview with Stephen Kay, TICAL cadre member Tim Landeck shares some of the ways he has successfully faced this daunting task. | |
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| Going Paperless In this Radio TICAL episode, Gabe Soumakian, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resource in Burbank Unified School District got a chance to speak with Stephen Kay for a second time regarding how Burbank USD is implementing several programs to assist their district’s 21st century vision. In this episode Gabe shares the various ways the district is transitioning to a paperless environment for documents, student and personnel records, and surveying. | |
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| Infrastructure, Hardware, Software and Technical Support One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 16 minutes long and highlights important things to keep in mind about the areas of infrastructure, hardware, software and technical support as you develop a school or district technology plan. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Managing Assets and Data In this Radio TICAL episode, Dan Neville, Technology Specialist with Arizona’s Kyrene School District, shares how his district is using technology for more effective asset and data management. He gives examples that range from wireless devices that improve the accuracy of textbooks and equipment inventories to tools for collecting data from lots of sources in one place for analysis and interpretation. | |
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| Operations and Maintenance Online Resources In this 19 minute narrated presentation, Techmasters, Inc. consultants Van Wilkinson and Bev Blaylock share online resources for a facility’s operations and maintenance department. Topics include technologies, emerging technologies, and web sites relating to leadership, software, and products. | |
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| Quick Take: Podcasts This 7-minute Quick Take discusses podcasting. You will learn what a podcast is, how to locate podcasts for teaching, learning, and professional development, and how to create your own podcasts. | |
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| Quick Takes: Web-Based Presentations This 5-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. Susan gives an overview of a variety of web-based presentations and how they are used. She provides other resources do that you and your students can create presentations on the Internet. | |
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| School Business Applications In response to a question from one of our TICAL members, we created an informal survey to get a sense of what applications are being used for school business purposes (e.g. accounting, payroll, purchasing, human resources) as well as how satisfied people are with the applications in use. We collected responses between July 19, 2008 and August 8, 2009. While only 32 people responded to the survey, their comments are quite useful. | |
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| Software Implementation Toolkit In this 15-minute narrated presentation, Jason Borgen summarizes the Software Information Industry Association's Software Implementation Toolkit to help educational institutions implement worthwhile software in a systematic way. The toolkit provides users with several worksheets that are beneficial for any implementation process. This presentation also provides you with a link to the actual 55-page document. | |
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| Student Cyber Safety Concerned about cyber safety? TICAL Cadre members Gabe Soumakian, Skip Johnson, Sheila Grady, and John White share three specific web resources to inform administrators, teachers, parents, students, and the community on how to provide a safe and secure environment when using the Internet. | |
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| Technology and H.R. For Gabe Soumakian, assistant superintendent of human resources at Burbank Unified School District, the human resources function is about more than hiring and processing employment; it's about building capacity and keeping skilled employees in the district. In this interview with Steve Kay, Gabe shares some of the ways he has put technology to work in support of human resources. | |
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| Web 2.0 Tools for Busy Administrators In this 11 minute presentation, author and consultant Susan Brooks-Young provides a quick overview of what Web 2.0 is and then shares a concrete example of how a group of educators in Northern California used an on-line group, a wiki, and a "web-top" word processor to help them complete a collaborative planning process. | |
Professional Development |
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| A Walk in the PARC In this Radio TICAL episode Steve Kay talks with TICAL cadre members Tim Landeck and Jim Scoolis about their experience as interns in the Palo Alto Research Center(PARC)program. | |
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| Based on a Review of Relevant Research Looking for a quick path to relevant research on technology and education? Here is a shortlist of excellent research summaries. You'll find this very helpful in updating or creating a technology plan to meet requirements of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation or applying for grants (e.g. EETT). | |
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| Building Capacity When Karen Eoff was setting up Tech Camps for the Southeast Arkansas Education Cooperative, her goal was to build capacity among staff and students to use multimedia tools to enhance education. At first, she was stymied; she could not find instructors for the Tech Camps. No one had the expertise she needed to lead this professional development experience. Listen to this episode of Radio TICAL to hear how Karen solved her problem by tapping pools of expertise distributed among her staff and students. | |
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| Certiport Monthly Feedback Form Developed by Certiport, a technology certification company, this form is a tool the company uses internally to develop critical skills and behaviors in its own workforce. Certiport President and CEO David Saedi has given TICAL permission to share the form as an example of one way to measure certain 21st century skills. | |
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| Classroom Observations: Digital data observation in the palm of your hand In this brief, narrated presentation, TICAL cadre member Kevin Silberberg discusses how a handheld computer can facilitate and even transform the process of classroom observation. | |
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| Classroom Walkthroughs and Observations In The Palm of Your Hand In this TICALevision episode, Kenny Pennington, principal in Monticello School District in rural Monticello, Arkansas demonstrates how he uses a handheld computer while observing a computer/technology teacher at the high school. Kenny shares the process to quickly record observations and how he engages his teachers in a continual improvement process. | |
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| Developing a Learning Community For One Laptop Per Child Implementation In this TICALevision episode, George Lieux, Technology Integration Specialist at Fort Smith Public Schools in Fort Smith, Arkansas shares a program that was recently implemented in the district. Several classrooms, from 2nd grade to 12th grade, received a mini-notebook (UMPC) for every student in the classroom. As the lead technology professional development trainer, George highlights how he trains the teachers virtually to model the use of the laptops and to promote project-based learning. | |
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| E-Newsletter Subscription Information Keeping on top of what's happening in education isn't easy, but electronic newsletters can be a big help. Click on this link in the Productivity area of Portical's Briefcase to learn more about various E-newsletters and how to subscribe. | |
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| Earn While You Learn (EWYL) How do practicing teachers acquire complex new teaching skills, such as those necessary to take full advantage of new technologies to improve student learning? The Earn While You Learn (EWYL) program at the Krause Center for Innovation is a model professional development program that provides one solution. | |
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| Get Into the Act of Closing the Achievement Gap In this Radio TICAL episode, TICAL’s Director Rowland Baker spoke with California State Superintendent Jack O’Connell and Administrator of the CDE’s Middle and High School Improvement Office (MHSIO) Rozlynn Worrall about Taking Center Stage—Act II (TCSII). They highlight this innovative web portal, developed by the MHSIO, that assists educators in lowering dropout rates, closing the achievement gap, and ensuring success for students in the middle grades. | |
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| Getting Teachers to Use Technology Trying to make technology happen at your site? Motivating teachers to use technology can sometimes be a challenge. TICAL cadre members Jim Scoolis, Becci Gillespie, and Lisa Gonzales share tried and proven steps you can take to get more of your teachers using technology more of the time. | |
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| How To Be Part of TICAL's Interactive Leadership Community This document provides you the steps needed to sign-up, interact, and upload pictures and videos in TICAL's social network on Ning at portical.ning.com. | |
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| How to use Electronic Learning Assessment Resources (ELAR) Web site This tool was designed by the ELAR staff to assist you in navigating the Web site. It was prepared for beginning to advanced users of data-driven resources in hopes of helping you make decisions based on data. This document is broken down by concept, where to find the resource on the site, and a direct URL link. | |
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| Leading a Culture of Innovation The first Leadership 3.0 Symposium was held April 10-12, 2008 in Millbrae, CA. Sir Ken Robinson, world renowned creativity expert, delivered the keynote address. Watch the video excerpts. Some of the topics he discusses are human talent, unprecedented literal revolution, rethinking what it is to be educated, reform or transformation, who will "own" the 21st century?, and the power of human imagination. | |
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| Making the Most of a Tablet PC TICAL cadre member Stephen Vaughn provides a quick overview of the tablet PC and how you can use it to increase your personal and professional productivity. | |
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| Millennials in the Middle Trying to develop teacher buy in for integrating technology? In this episode of Radio TICAL, Dr. John Lincoln White, TICAL cadre member and principal of Mulholland Middle School in Van Nuys, California describes a multi-year effort to enlist his entire staff to integrate technology to engage his "millennial" students in standards-based learning. And it paid off! Since launching the technology effort in 2001, Mulholland has increased 205 API points. | |
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| NCLB Highly Qualified Teacher Essentials This presentation by TICAL cadre member Gabe Soumakian is designed to help administrators and teachers learn more about the Highly Qualified Teacher requirements under the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act. | |
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| Podcasting in Education In this episode of Radio TICAL, Arkansas cadre member Belinda Kittrell interviews fellow cadre members Tommy Tyler and Karen Eoff. Tommy talks about how Monticello School District is experimenting with podcasting to help meet the learning needs of more students. Karen describes Southeast Arkansas Education Service Cooperative’s TechCamps. | |
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| Principals, New Teachers and Technology In Principals, New Teachers and Technology, Bruce Duncan, Director of Technology at the New Teacher Center at the University of California, Santa Cruz, shares information on what principals can expect of new teachers in the way of technology skills and how principals can support new teachers as they learn to use technology in the school context. Includes specific examples from California's Beginning Teacher Support and Assessment (BTSA) program. | |
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| Professional Development in Technology: Key Principles One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 20 minutes long and focuses on research-based recommendations for designing effective professional development. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Professional Development in Technology: Strategies and Examples One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 9 minutes long and focuses on six practical strategies and three successful models for professional development in technology. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Quick Take: Real Simple Syndication (RSS) This 7-minute Quick Take by Derry Lyons provides a brief overview of a Web 2.0 tool known as RSS. Derry explains what RSS is and how you can use it. | |
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| Quick Take: Social Networks This 4-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. It explores the social networking phenomenon. Susan provides some common social networks including Ning, Flickr, and TeacherTube. | |
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| Quick Take: Blogs This 4-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. Susan gives an overview of a blog and how they are used. She provides other resources to assist you in developing a classroom, school, or special project blog. | |
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| Quick Take: Web 2.0 This 4-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. It provides an overview of various Web 2.0 tools that help users participate and interact on the Web. | |
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| Quick Take: Wikis This 4-minute Quick Take was created by Susan Brooks-Young. It provides an overview of how wikis are used to edit live content on the Internet. Susan provides examples and resources. | |
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| Quick Takes Use these 4-5 minute presentations to quickly gain a better understanding of the variety of tools on the World Wide Web including blogs, social networks, and wikis. | |
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| Quick Takes: Google Forms This Quick Take shows you how to use Google Forms, a subset of Google Docs, to gather survey data for your data-driven decisions. You will learn how to create your own Google Form and distribute an unlimited amount for free! | |
| School Leader Development: Building 21st Century Schools As part of Microsoft's Partners in Learning Program, this CD is a workshop treasure. Use this material with boards of education, groups of administrators, business officials and even students! You are actively involved in writing reflections on the material which builds a workable plan in the end. The goal? To help school leaders prepare our students for the world that has changed. Our students have changed, our world has changed. Have our schools changed? Participants are exposed to educational experts who speak on change, vision, curriculum, leadership, 21st century skills, and more. For a preview, contact Kevin Silberberg. | |
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| Step Sheets Looking for a tutorial on programs such as Microsoft Office? Chris York, Director of Technology for Del Norte Unified School District, developed these step sheets to help his staff be more productive. You can download and use them as well. Titles include: Beginning Word, Creating Tables, Mail Merge in Word, Excel Quick Start Guide, Using AutoFilter in Excel, Using Publisher, and PowerPoint 101. These tools are useful for administrators, office staff, and classroom teachers. | |
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| Streamlining Lesson Plan Collection Using Google Docs and the SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol) Model In this 9-minute tutorial, Jason Borgen steps you through setting up a Google Account, uploading the Excel SIOP lesson plan template, and sharing the template with all your teachers. Now you will be able to collect lesson plan submissions from your teachers on one paperless form, as well as giving you and your teachers the opportunity to quickly view lessons and assess which SIOP strategies are being used. The lesson plan template is also provided here. | |
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| Surviving an E-rate Audit In his first-hand account, Tim Landeck, Technology Director and TICAL cadre member shares his positive and negative experiences with e-rate auditors and provides some expert advice to those who may want to prepare for the audit. | |
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| Tblogical In this blog, TICAL Director Michael Simkins shares pertinent thoughts about technology and education--often with tongue in cheek. | |
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| Technology That Works—Past, Present and Future Michael Simkins, Devin Vodicka, and Lisa Gonzales collaborated to write "Leveraging Technology to Transform Our Schools" which appeared in the January-February 2009 issue of ACSA's Leadership magazine. This page lists links to the programs mentioned in the article. | |
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| The Countryside Experience Becci Gillespie is superintendent-principal of Pleasant Grove Joint Union School District, a single-school, K-8 district in a rural area 25 miles from Sacramento, California. Rural for now, that is. Big plans are in the works to build a whole new community within the district, complete with ten to twelve new schools! In this Radio TICAL episode, Steve Kay interviews Becci about how she worked with her staff to increase their use of technology and her hopes of maintaining the good things about her small district as it grows to many times its current size. | |
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| The Hedgehog and Technology In this Radio TICAL episode, Ceres USD superintendent Walt Hanline shares his passion for Jim Collins’ book Good to Great. Walt believes it is the best book related to his profession that he has ever read! In particular, he talks about the “hedgehog concept” and technology’s role as an accelerator. This is an example of when it makes sense to apply business practices to education. | |
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| TICAL's Top 10 Original Content for Principals This list of resources were developed by TICAL cadre and staff to streamline your leadership and management tasks. These resources are considered the most popular on the TICAL web site. These resources include time planning templates, cyber safety tutorials, bell scheduling templates, and much more. A print version is also available to handout in your meetings. | |
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| Time Planner Whether you’re planning a 90-minute staff meeting or a five-day workshop, this easy-to-use Excel template will help you allot time among the various topics and activities you want to include. Enter your starting and ending times; then, as you add each item, the worksheet automatically calculates how much time you’ve used and how much you have left. Contributed by TICAL Arkansas cadre member George Lieux. | |
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| Using iPods to Turn Students On To Reading (Part 1 of 2) The eCAP program at El Crystal Elementary School in the San Bruno Park School District is a unique take home audiobook program where 40 targeted students use iPods to listen to and read from several different literature books. In this TICALevision episode principal Skip Johnson and several teachers and students share the program and explain how the program has increased student achievement and motivation to read. Stay tuned for Part 2 to learn how to set up a program like this in your school or district! | |
Technology Planning |
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| Acceptable Use Policies One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 9 minutes long and focuses on why your school needs an acceptable use policy (AUP) and what it should contain. A printable version is also available. | |
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| Align Technology with School Improvement Join TICAL cadre member Kevin Silberberg as he makes a case for the importance of aligning the use of technology with your overall school improvement efforts. Use this short narrated presentation for your own leadership development or as a discussion starter at a principals' meeting. | |
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| Backwards Mapping Tool Backwards mapping can be a very effective strategy for confronting all sorts of educational challenges. This simple, Windows®-based tool walks you through the basic steps of backwards mapping from defining your end goal to developing a basic action plan. | |
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| Based on a Review of Relevant Research Looking for a quick path to relevant research on technology and education? Here is a shortlist of excellent research summaries. You'll find this very helpful in updating or creating a technology plan to meet requirements of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation or applying for grants (e.g. EETT). | |
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| Build Your Plan with the Technology Plan Template One of a number of documents you can download and use to lead your district or school through the technology planning process based upon California's Education Technology Planning Guide. This template developed in Microsoft Word provides you with an easy way to build your final technology plan using data from your data organizer in correlation to the Checklist of Components provided on Page 60 of the Education Technology Planning Guide. | |
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| Buying an LCD Projector Buying new projectors for your school or district? Take a look at this 2-page tutorial created by TICAL cadre member Bob Blackney. He provides you resources and expert advice on LCD vs. DLP projectors, brightness, warranty, bulb life, focal length, portability, wireless, management, and control. Once you are finished reading this you will have the expertise needed to buy a projector. | |
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| California Middle School Standards Matricies and Electronic Learning Resources (ELRs) This Excel® template is designed to help administrators and teachers quickly find an ELR by English-Language Arts standard as well as providing you an easy-to-view representation of the standards. The California Learning Resource Network (CLRN) has gathered several ELRs. All of these have been reviewed for effectiveness and relevance to their appropriate grade level and content standards. This template will help you integrate technology in a standards-based curriculum. | |
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| Developing a Learning Community For One Laptop Per Child Implementation In this TICALevision episode, George Lieux, Technology Integration Specialist at Fort Smith Public Schools in Fort Smith, Arkansas shares a program that was recently implemented in the district. Several classrooms, from 2nd grade to 12th grade, received a mini-notebook (UMPC) for every student in the classroom. As the lead technology professional development trainer, George highlights how he trains the teachers virtually to model the use of the laptops and to promote project-based learning. | |
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| E-mail Protocol and E-mail Etiquette for Effective Communication In this presentation cadre member Gabe Soumakian focuses on e-mail protocol and etiquette to improve effective communication. He shares proper ways to send group e-mails, manage your e-mails, and how to identify spam. | |
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| E-Newsletter Subscription Information Keeping on top of what's happening in education isn't easy, but electronic newsletters can be a big help. Click on this link in the Productivity area of Portical's Briefcase to learn more about various E-newsletters and how to subscribe. | |
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| EdTechProfile's Radio TICAL Interview EdTechProfile is one of the statewide educational technology services (SETS) funded by the California Department of Education and provided free of charge to California public schools. In this episode, Steve Kay talks with Brian Dunsmore, EdTechProfile’s director, about ways you can use EdTechProfile in your technology planning process. | |
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| Ethical Use of Technology and Internet Safety For Your Technology Plan In this 10 minute presentation, Harvey Barnett shares information and resources about cyber safety and ethical use including plagiarism, copyright, and file sharing. These are important topics to include in your technology planning process. In fact, they are now required in California after the passage of Assembly Bill 307. | |
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| Get Started with the Technology Planning Process One of five documents you can download and use to lead your district or school through the technology planning process based upon California's Education Technology Planning Guide. This Word file provides you with a quick start overview of the technology planning process and what you need to consider as you begin the process. | |
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| Going Paperless In this Radio TICAL episode, Gabe Soumakian, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resource in Burbank Unified School District got a chance to speak with Stephen Kay for a second time regarding how Burbank USD is implementing several programs to assist their district’s 21st century vision. In this episode Gabe shares the various ways the district is transitioning to a paperless environment for documents, student and personnel records, and surveying. | |
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| Infrastructure, Hardware, Software and Technical Support One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 16 minutes long and highlights important things to keep in mind about the areas of infrastructure, hardware, software and technical support as you develop a school or district technology plan. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Learning and Living in an Online World Internet use has changed. Increasingly, our students are using the Internet for social purposes, not simply to look up information or buy things. School administrators have to worry about more than filtering out inappropriate content; they have to add cyber safety to the course of instruction. In this episode of Radio TICAL, Susan Brooks-Young offers ideas for how you can meet these safety challenges without giving up valuable instructional uses of the Internet. | |
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| Making Sure Technology Pays Off One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 12 minutes long and focuses on key research on the effectiveness of technology use in education and how to ensure technology makes an impact in your school or district. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Monitoring and Evaluating Your Technology Plan One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 13 minutes long and focuses on how to make sure your technology plan is implemented and works. A printable version and citations are also available. | |
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| Planning for 1:1 In this Radio TICAL episode hear Eileen Lento, K-12 education strategist at Intel, talk about some of the critical aspects of the planning process for moving to anytime, anywhere, anyway learning in a ubiquitous, one-to-one computing environment. | |
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| Planning for Funding and Budget Harvey Barnett explains key factors to consider when you develop a budget for your technology plan. | |
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| Planning for Technology A series of brief, narrated slide shows, in which Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate for WestEd shares key information and strategies to inform and guide your technology planning process. | |
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| Primer on Copyright Law and Fair Use In this narrated slideshow, attorney Melissa M. McGann explains just what copyright is and how to determine if a use of a copyrighted work is fair use or not. Part of TICAL's Legal Issues series. | |
| School Leader Development: Building 21st Century Schools As part of Microsoft's Partners in Learning Program, this CD is a workshop treasure. Use this material with boards of education, groups of administrators, business officials and even students! You are actively involved in writing reflections on the material which builds a workable plan in the end. The goal? To help school leaders prepare our students for the world that has changed. Our students have changed, our world has changed. Have our schools changed? Participants are exposed to educational experts who speak on change, vision, curriculum, leadership, 21st century skills, and more. For a preview, contact Kevin Silberberg. | |
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| Software Licensing In this narrated slideshow, attorney Melissa M. McGann explains how to ensure that the software in your district is used legally and ethically by staff and students. Part of TICAL's Legal Issues series. | |
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| Surviving an E-rate Audit In his first-hand account, Tim Landeck, Technology Director and TICAL cadre member shares his positive and negative experiences with e-rate auditors and provides some expert advice to those who may want to prepare for the audit. | |
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| Taking Control of Email Presentation In this narrated presentation Devin Vodicka provides a sequence of steps and offers resources that will help school leaders to take control of email, increase their efficiency, and improve their effectiveness. You will be free of email overload after you view this presentation. | |
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| Tracking Arkansas Legislative Bills and Information TICAL Arkansas cadre member Phoebe Bailey developed this simple step sheet to help you take advantage of the General Assembly web site to locate and track pertinent legislation. | |
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| Use the Technology Plan Data Organizer Step Sheet One of a number of documents you can download and use to lead your district or school through the technology planning process based upon California's Education Technology Planning Guide. This downloadable Word step sheet will assist you in using the Technology Plan Data Organizers included in the Technology Planning Tools area in the Briefcase section of Portical. | |
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| Using iPods to Turn Students On To Reading (Part 1 of 2) The eCAP program at El Crystal Elementary School in the San Bruno Park School District is a unique take home audiobook program where 40 targeted students use iPods to listen to and read from several different literature books. In this TICALevision episode principal Skip Johnson and several teachers and students share the program and explain how the program has increased student achievement and motivation to read. Stay tuned for Part 2 to learn how to set up a program like this in your school or district! | |
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| Web 2.0 Tools for Busy Administrators In this 11 minute presentation, author and consultant Susan Brooks-Young provides a quick overview of what Web 2.0 is and then shares a concrete example of how a group of educators in Northern California used an on-line group, a wiki, and a "web-top" word processor to help them complete a collaborative planning process. | |
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| What to do with all those morning emails? In our inaugural TICALevision episode, TICAL Director Rowland Baker speaks with Principal in Fresno Unified Jack Jarvis on how he manages email amongst all his other duties in Fresno Unified. Jack shares his simple strategy that is effective. | |