The debate has been going on since IBM introduced the personal computer in 1981. The PC used an Intel processor, an open architecture, and an operating system made by Microsoft. All of this was very different from the popular Apple II. Isaac and Ishmael went their separate ways, and the war began. The debate has continued for the last 25 years, and has really heated … Continue reading Why I Hate Macs

This is the first in a series of items about how existing podcasts can be used to supplement classroom instruction in various subject areas. One of the natural applications that comes to mind is in the area of foreign language. In many cases, we teach foreign language in an immersive environment. The German teachers exclusively use German in their classes. Sometimes, students become very frustrated … Continue reading Podcasts for Teaching Foreign Language

This past winter, our school district was bit by the podcasting bug. A lot of people were very interested in the technology, and immediately saw all kinds of applications for it. We could podcast our morning announcements. We could podcast board meetings. The principal could podcast messages to the students and parents. We could podcast staff development sessions. We could podcast physics lectures. We could … Continue reading Training Wheels

Bartleby is a suprisingly useful collection of resources. Named after the scrivener (or copyist) in Melville’s story, the site publishes classic books online as well as preeminent contemporary reference works. The collection includes several encyclopedias, dictionaries, thesauri, and fact books. It also has collections of quotations (including Bartlett’s). The 1914 Oxford Shakespeare and the King James Bible round out the reference works. The verse section … Continue reading I Would Prefer Not To

One definition of "Web 2.0" is the concept of an online computing platform. Instead of installing programs and running them on your computer, you simply go to a web site and use an online version of the program there. The idea of using a program on the web instead of installing it on your computer has several advantages. It’s much easier, because you don’t have … Continue reading The Online Office

In the Harry Potter books, the pictures all move. The people in the portraits can move from one painting to another. The pictures in the newspaper are moving. Even the trading cards that come with the chocolate frogs have animated pictures. I wonder, though, why they have a Daily Newspaper. Surely, if they have the technology (technology and magic are the same thing) to animate … Continue reading Harry Potter and the Magic Post-It Note

A couple weeks ago, we had Alvin Trusty in to speak to the staff about teaching with technology. He touched on a lot of different topics in his presentation, including the Ohio Academic Content Standards for technology, the need for teachers to keep up with new technologies, and several web 2.0 applications. Many of the teachers reported later that they were overwhelmed by the presentation. … Continue reading Overwhelming

More blogs about taste of tech. Technorati Profile Continue reading Technorati

It’s becoming increasingly clear that some things never go away. The Internet has always been that nebulous sort of place, where things change all the time. Sites pop up and disappear and reinvent themselves, and it’s never the same place twice. But it’s largely just an illusion. We’ve been converting to a new email system in our school district this school year. One of the … Continue reading 12 Copies

I found this by mistake, but it’s pretty neat. In Firefox, you can do tabbed browsing. Each tab can have a separate page in it, but they all show up in the same window. This makes it easy to visit multiple sites at once and switch between them without having dozens of different windows open. If you have two or more tabs open, though, you … Continue reading Schizophrenic Firefox

This is a test to see if I can post a podcast. As it turns out, I can. Here are the limitations, though: If I just post the podcast (like the high school people do for the morning announcements), I get the file just fine in my podcast receiver. I don’t see it on the blog though, so I can’t download it directly without subscribing. … Continue reading Podcast?

I finally figured out the problem with email notifications. I’ve been told many times by my most faithful reader that email notifications aren’t working, and that problem is showing up on other people’s blogs, too. I, on the other hand, haven’t been having a problem with it. As it turns out, the problem occurs when someone with a non-bbhcsd.org email address tries to sign up. … Continue reading Email Notification Problems