geeks, nerds, et al

Perhaps I should clarify a couple of the terms I use, or at least share my definitions of them. It's probably fairly well established that the term geek is no longer derogatory, that it means a person with particular skills and knowledge in technology (or Science, Math, or some related discipline). Some of us, however, feel that there needs to be a broader term for someone skilled and knowledgeable in a number of disciplines, not limited to the aforementioned. For this purpose we have adopted the term nerd, and since many of us were nerds (in the classical sense) in high school, it's not too much of a stretch.

There are other terms that are being applied, such as dork (socially awkward), or invented, such as griefer (intentionally aggravates others). As well, you can take online quizzes to see which category you might fit into. In case you're not self-aware enough to have diagnosed this already.

a gadgeteer

I'm somewhat biased, of course, but I think it's important to have someone in your school who is somewhat of a gadgeteer. Not that they need to always have the latest stuff, but it is good to have someone in the building that people can chat with in the staff room about technology in education, the gadgets that the students are using, or just about recommendations for a laptop for them to buy for at home.

Usually this sort of thing happens naturally, that there is some geek (or nerd) who fills this role, but sometimes this needs to be encouraged.

classroom projector and speaker connections

Since most of us aren't using TVs in the classroom anymore, the question seems to be coming up often about how to connect speakers to play videos. Usually the teacher wants to be able to play videos from a DVD/VCR as well as from the computer, and perhaps from an iPod.

You could, of course, have a separate set of speakers for each of these purposes, but it's easier and cheaper to have one set. To do this, you can connect the DVD/VCR audio output to the speakers and the computer audio output to the audio input of the DVD/VCR.

To connect the computer audio output to the DVD/VCR, use a 3.5mm Stereo Plug to 2 RCA Plug cable connected to the speaker (or headphone) output of the computer.

To connect the DVD/VCR to computer speakers, you need another 3.5mm Stereo Plug to 2 RCA Plug cable connected to the audio output and a headphone "gender changer" for connecting the male end of that cable to the male end of the speaker cable. Instead of a "gender changer", however, you can use a headphone splitter which also allows you to plug in your iPod without unplugging anything.

Of course if you use speakers with RCA inputs, such as the Behringer MS16s, you can just connect the DVD/VCR audio output with the RCA cable that came with the DVD/VCR.

If you want to show videos from your iPod and your DVD/VCR has a second "line in" connection (other than the one you are using for your computer), you can use an iPod video cable that connects to the headphone jack or to the dock connector. Of course if you have a newer iPod these cables won't work, you'll need to buy an expensive one from Apple. Or plug your iPod into your computer with a USB cable and show the videos using iTunes.

As to video to the projector, computer video goes over a VGA cable and the DVD/VCR video goes over an S-Video cable, composite cable, or component cable.

That ended up being a longer post that intended, and a bit of a commercial for monoprice.com (one of my favourite online retailers), but hopefully there was enough information there to get you set up.

InteGrade Pro

In our district we use the marks program "InteGrade Pro". While there are user manuals and help files available, a colleague and I have prepared a document that summarizes some of the common tasks and questions.

review: Microsoft Notebook Presenter Mouse 8000

I've been using the Microsoft Notebook Presenter Mouse 8000, and I wanted to share a few thoughts on it.

First of all, being Bluetooth means that it has good range and can connect without a USB dongle if you have built in Bluetooth on you computer.

Good: laser pointer, lots of buttons, good range

Not bad: battery life, buttons, travel case

Bad: small for my hands, requires Microsoft driver to be installed

In general it's not a bad mouse and PowerPoint remote, but considering you can buy a wireless mouse for about $20 and a presenter remote for about $50, I don't know if this device is worth the cost.

an idea for publishing announcements

If your school is like ours, someone in the office assembles the daily announcements into a printed document, which is also uploaded to the website.  Important announcements are often also highlighted on the website or other places.

I've been mulling over an idea of using an RSS feed to automate this process a little more, and allow for the possibility of putting the information other places as well.

Essentially it would be a program that allows you to input current and future announcements, and select where they will be published to.  They could go to the print version, the website, a PowerPoint style flatscreen inside the entrance to the building, and/or the pixelboard outside.  I assume that there might be some editing of the print version required, and of course the pixelboard is not connected to the Internet, but there are people manually inputting those anyway.

Just an idea, what do you think?

digital pioneer

No post from me this week, instead I wanted to direct you to read a good post about "digital natives, digital immigrants, and digital pioneers" on Kathy Schrock's blog.

I've known that I'm too old to be a "digital native" but I've always considered myself a citizen of the country... perhaps digital pioneer is a good term for people like us.