Category: Blog

The goal of the maker movement is to empower students to tinker, invent, create, innovate, and make their ideas take shape. Making doesn’t need to have a designated space, but it does need to foster the maker mindset of learning through doing, experimenting, and experience. It’s about creating a maker culture that provides students with open-ended challenges and opportunities to produce something, often for a purpose.

To increase STEM awareness and opportunities through project-based learning and maker activities, Wayne RESA is looking to build a 2019-2020 cohort of 24 teachers/media specialists from 12 different districts throughout Wayne County to build and/or expand the maker culture in a school. Selected sites will be awarded $3800 to purchase Maker/STEM materials and a year membership to National Science Teachers Association (NSTA). Each site will submit an application for TWO educators to be a part of our first Maker-STEM cohort. If selected, these educators must agree to be a part of the cohort and commit to participating in three face-to-face days of professional learning. Each member of the cohort will also be part of the RESA Makers network where ideas and resources can be shared. Wayne RESA Application Deadline: Friday, May 17, 2019

Wayne RESA Makers Application

The REMC Classroom Maker Ambassador Program is looking for two teachers from each REMC to be a part of the 2019-2020 cohort. Participating teachers will commit to at least ONE training and earn $400 through REMC Save to spend toward classroom maker tools, along with access to a network of peers implementing maker in the classroom. REMC Application Deadline: Friday, May 3, 2019

REMC Classroom Makers Teacher Ambassador Application

Please forward this information to anyone that you think might be interested

Please note that on May 3, 2019, the Technology Department will change the default length of time voicemails are saved within our voicemail system.

The Technology Department recently discovered that several voicemails did not reach their intended destination because the intended recipient’s voicemail box was full. Conversations with district staff revealed that many individuals use Gmail to listen to their voicemails and do not log into the voicemail system to delete their voicemails. While convenient to process voicemail within GMail, deleting a voicemail message in GMail does not also delete the voicemail from our voicemail system.

Beginning May 5, voicemails can only be saved in our voicemail system for a maximum of 30 days. Voicemails that are older than 30 days will be automatically deleted from our voicemail system. This change will help keep voicemail boxes from filling up and will restore storage capacity in those voicemail boxes that are already full. Unless a staffer has deleted them, voicemails will remain available in a staffer’s GMail account and this change will not affect any voicemail saved in GMail.

If you have any questions or believe your voicemail messages are not reaching your GMail inbox, please submit a service request that includes your room # and extension.

Tech support scams are an industry-wide issue where scammers use scare tactics to trick users into paying for unnecessary technical support services that supposedly fix contrived device, platform, or software problems.

Please browse Microsoft’s overview for how tech support scams work and what you can do if you fall prey to one!

Kapwing is a free video/image editing tool that allows you to create and edit gifs, memes, add subtitles, add audio to video, etc. The end product will have a little kapwing watermark on it but is not very obtrusive. Click on the link above to find out more about this awesome tool.

LANSING – The Innovative Educator Corps (IEC) is seeking applications for new members who teach in Michigan and help prepare their students for 21^st Century careers in innovative ways.

An online application for the IEC’s second cohort is available at http://tinyurl.com/IEC-Spring19 April 1-May 5, 2019, the Michigan Department of Education (MDE) and program co-sponsor Genesee Intermediate School District (ISD) jointly announced today.

Learn more…

Having trouble with printing from the Chrome web browser? Try using Ctrl + Shift + P to print. This will take you to the Windows print dialogue (instead of the Chrome print dialogue), where you can print using Find Me Printing. Please see the tutorial below for additional information and images. If you have any trouble, feel free to submit a service request.

Administrators, just like teachers, your plate is full, and if your plate isn’t full, you are spinning multiple plates at a time. The promise of technology can be real when it saves you time and frustration in ways that it can keep you organized. The following Google Slide deck was presented at MACUL 2019 and contains GREAT ideas and tools to help you in your important roles in our schools.

Keep in mind that your local friendly Tech Integration Specialist (Matt Smoot or Rick Coughlin) can be sequestered to your office by appointment to assist you with any of these tools you think would help you! Visit the deck here: goo.gl/WLndyc

Google Slides has launched a new feature to make presentations more accessible for everyone with automated closed captioning. When you present with Google Slides, click the CC button in the lower left corner or press the Ctrl or CMD+Shift+C shortcut to enable closed captioning. Then keep your laptop close by, and as you talk, your mic will pick up everything you say and add it as closed captioning on the bottom of your presentation. Here’s the Google Support page on this feature: https://support.google.com/docs/answer/9109474?hl=en

Google Slides closed captioning supports spoken English, using Google Chrome on a Mac or PC for now, and captions aren’t stored at the moment. You can, however, record your screen while presenting then save the finished video with your captions recorded as well. And soon, Google hopes to expand closed captioning to additional languages and devices to make all presentations more accessible. Check out 6 Ways to make the most of captions in Google Slides for more ideas on why this is so important!

This is PERFECT for a blended learning tool in your classroom! Using Screencastify or WeVideo to screencast automatically takes your whole group lessons and allows you to employ them in a blended or flipped learning environment. Want to learn more about Blended and Flipped learning, this site is a great place to start: https://www.blendedlearning.org/basics/

Google has partnered with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt to launch The Crown Jewels Caper, the first in a series of Carmen Sandiego games in Google Earth. It plays just like the old Carmen Sandiego PC games you remember: visit different landmarks, talk to the locals, and figure out Sandiego’s next destination from their clues.

Though the game is made for promoting the animated Netflix show, it’s still a great collaboration, combining the fun, adventurous aspect of Carmen Sandiego with the immense 3D map resources of Google Earth. 

While our youngest students under 13 do not have access to Google Earth on our network, it’s certainly worth checking out how you might use Google Earth as a resource on your interactive white board or SMART interactive flat panel in your classroom. If you haven’t visited Google Earth lately, you don’t know what you are missing!

The Be Internet Awesome curriculum gives educators the tools and methods they need to teach digital safety fundamentals. The materials developed by Google in partnership with iKeepSafe enable educators to bring the most critical teachings—and the excitement of Interland—into the classroom.

Included in the curriculum are lesson plans for the five topics, with activities and worksheets that were designed to complement Interland.

https://beinternetawesome.withgoogle.com/en_us/educators