Useful Reports for Teachers in PowerSchool

Reports.pdf Download this file

A quick guide to some of the different reports in PowerSchool that are useful to teachers.

Converting Audio Files for Free with Lona Music Converter

converting audio files with Lona.pdf Download this file

So your buddy sent you some audio files in a strange format... Or you downloaded some audio files from a website -- completely legally of course. You certainly didn't get the audio file from the Pirate Bay, because those guys are dangerous. Seriously, the whole fate of the entire free world relies on people not downloading torrents from them. Anyway, you have these audio files and they aren't in the format you want, so what do you do? Download Lona Music Converter for free from the App Store and you are off to the races. The PDF shows the UI and explains who the program works.

Enjoy!

Publicly Funded Private Schools Aren't the Answer

Ever since the Finnish education system as proved itself to be the world's best, the US has been trying to discover the secret to its success. Back in December an article in the Atlantic entitled What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland's School Success highlighted the biggest reason for Finland's success and the sad fact that people like Mitt Romney want to ignore the lessons to be learned. Finland has no private schools -- NONE! Not one. There is no competition pushing Finnish public schools to be better. Of course as Americans, we want to believe that competition makes everything better. The evidence that a lack of competition has improved education really doesn't interest us. It doesn't fit in with our American views. Rather than ignoring the obvious facts, possibly it is time to learn from the lesson. You see Finland doesn't have a system in place for wealthy people to opt out of public education; in fact, nobody gets to opt out of public education, so the simple fact is that everybody wants public education to work, because they have to use it. There is a simple solution to our problem and it isn't more competition; it isn't public money being spent on private schools, Mitt. The solution is that Americans need to wake up. We need to stop thinking that we have nothing to learn from other nations. We need to start trying something different, because what we have done in the past is no longer working. The future is going to belong to the countries who educate ALL of their children well, not just some of their children. Finland is going to be successful. The real question is -- are we going to be joining them?

PowerSchool 7.0: Taking Attendance and Demographic Information

Attendance.pdf Download this file

Some documents for help teachers new to PowerSchool take attendance and find contact information.

Google Calendar Desktop Version on an iPad

Personally, I dislike the mobile version of Google Calendar, because I have many extra calendars running at once and I like the week view, not the day or month views. In the mobile version of Google Calendar, you cannot choose the week view, so these screenshots will help you switch to the Desktop version. Look for the button at the bottom of the display. You will see it says Mobile Version or Desktop version. If you decide that the mobile version is your thing, you can use the other screen shot to find the button to switch to the Mobile Version.

Cheers and Enjoy!

See the full gallery on Posterous

Keynote to PowerPoint and Back Again

Keynote to PowerPoint and Back Again.pdf Download this file

As teachers transition to and from schools, they may need assistance converting Keynote or PowerPoint presentations to the other format; this PDF helps the transition. On a side note, if you are moving a Keynote presentation to a Google Presentation, I have found exporting the Keynote slides as images and then inserting them on a Google slide to be the simplest solution.

Cheers!

Migration: Pages to Word and Back Again

Pages to Word and Back Again.pdf Download this file

If you are moving from a PC school to an Apple school, or vice versa, you will need to transfer your documents from Word to Pages or from Pages to Word. This PDF walks you through the process in simple easy steps.

Enjoy!

Gmail Contacts on your iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch

Gmail Contacts on ipad.pdf Download this file

Several people were asking me about how to get their Gmail contacts accessible on their iPad, iPod Touch, or iPhone. There are really two answers to this question at the moment. If you have the Lion OSX, it is very, very easy to do by selecting the option in your device to sync your Google account. Once you have done it, the Cloud handles the rest of the work. But, what if you aren't on Lion? The attached PDF walks you through the much more lengthy process; although, it takes longer to do, it really isn't that painful.

Bertrand Russell Quotation

When you meet with opposition, even if it should be from your husband or your children, endeavor to overcome it by argument and not by authority, for a victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory. ~ Bertrand Russell

Someone, sorry I don't recall who, sent around a link to a list of Bertrand Russell's 10 Commandments for Teachers; this particular quotation reminded me of my previous blog post about my father, so I felt it was worth pointing out.