Category: Tech Team

Tech Team

Semester Reflection

| evak2016

Written by an IT support – Tech Team member about our progress during the first semester.

What are some things you have learned and/or tasks you have accomplished this semester? (Use videos, pictures, upload materials etc. as evidence of learning in your blog)

For the this semester, I have accomplished the same tasks I previously done years before: managing the WAVE during mornings and spare blocks; and collaborating with my team to post about events and news, and encourage students to see social media as a educational tool.

What aspects of your work are successful? Explain why.

Step 1 was introducing ‘rapidevent’ to the school community; step 2 was keeping it going, which took more creativity and organization than believed. But within the team, we have successfully created different ways of attracting attention to our page (as a school news source) beside just posting news, like: Teacher Throwback (guessing who is in the posted photo); just recently, senior shout-outs and a short Wednesday morning talk show made by the leadership group; they overall, help draw in students’ curiosity and show them more of our school community.

What aspects of your work is challenging? Explain why.

Having no material to post with is a tough issue to get rid of. Our social media team is usually reliant on students and staff to supply the information and sometimes photos we specifically needed.

What steps did you take to overcome these challenges / what adjustments did you need to make?

Therefore, we keep track of events and keeping our schedule open , therefore there would be no pressure for missing certain post deadlines. There are exceptions, but we gave a wider berth of time between each deadline: like Teacher Throwback; posting the activity every 2 weeks, therefore there can be time to contact teachers (usually with busy schedules) and gather photos.

Is there anything you can do improve? (with your approach to the project, or altering the project)

Using other tools and programs for creating posts, because so far, I had been using one application and its starting to become limiting to use. So, it’ll be interesting if I start using more short videos or animations to make the page on social media more engaging to our audience.

As Riverside continues to immerse itself into innovation and technology, what do you think Riverside can do to provide support and help for teachers and students? (Provide specific examples)

I have this idea to make time for different seminars to teach about resources they could use like, classes for streaming videos and youtube etiquette. The idea is the same as the micro-bit classes to introduce computer coding, but I thought expanding this is a good way to inspire students to try something new, potential use in their projects or start a new hobby.

Do you have any feedback or suggestions, as we move forward, that could help the Tech Team meet the needs of our school and staff / be more effective? (Provide specific examples)

So far, nothing comes to mind on what should change or improve. Everyone is doing great.

Tech Team

Tech Team Divi-Builder Review

| evak2016

What are the strengths? Things you found useful.

Divi-Builder offers many new options to design a blog that couldn’t never be done on the traditional editor in Edublog without tearing your hair out; as the editor is limited to only moving images around the post if you’re able to move them at all. With a fast enough computer, the plug-in allows for the blogger to make text boxes in the post, change the shape of text boxes, replace the background with colors, gradients, images and even videos, change font more easily, even inputting custom modules (polls, timers, videos, animations, etc), insert columns, input animations for buttons, links, and more that I can’t list here.

What are the weakness? Things that could be improved.

I mentioned above ‘with a fast enough computer‘ Divi-Builder is more efficient to use. The first issue I had with the plug-in is how slow it was when I enabled it on my laptop. The plug-in slowed the web=page so much, it reached to a point where I wasn’t sure what I clicked on. So to see faster results, its better to work on desktop or a gaming laptop for the time being.

How can this plugin be used in a classroom setting to enhance student learning? Would you use it and/or recommend it?

Overall, Divi-Builder is a huge improvement to editing in EduBlogs, and would allow students to experience what its like do web-design. Sure its without coding: however, it introduces new bloggers the concept of layout and consider what they want and what else they can include more on their blog with the help of Divi-Builder. I would recommend this plug-in for anyone who is invested in web-design or want more customize options.

Tech Team

Tech Team Year End Relfection

| evak2016

a) Describe your project. What did you do? How did you do it?

My group and I continued on maintaining Riverside’s main Instagram, where events and meetings happening or general info for student and/or staff to that they should know about, and often clubs, teachers, etc would send us what post they want the social media team (us) to make. Often we would make posts and stories about events we heard of and haven’t been requested yet to post, like intramural sports in the gym. For deciding on who is managing the instagram, each member is assigned a weekday of when their incharge of posting.

b) What problems did you run into? Were you able to solve these challenges? How did you solve these challenges? Is there anything you would do differently?

Getting people more people engaged to our Instagram page is the challenge the social media team always has, its one of the places where students and staff at the school to find school announcements other than the intranet. Originally, the social media team members had to find people and the information about events needed to make posts which can be hard and takes time, so this year in the beginning, we had an email account set-up so anyone can send the team the images and info for the post to make things easier. To increase more awareness about rapidevent, we took it a step further and create short newletters about expected events each week, and post about riverside students on the story, showing what cool or interesting activity their doing.

c)  What did you learn? Were you able to learn new skills or strengthen previous ones?

I practiced more on graphic design, like what should I include in the post, making it eye catching, or what info I should place in.

             d)Impact: How might your project positively impact the social and emotional well being of students/our school? What can be done to increase the impact of this idea on the school?

We as a team would continue to post school wide events, announcements and opportunities on Instagram to allow students and staff to have easy access and find what is happening throughout the week and beyond.

Desirability: What could you change to make your project more desirable to students, teachers, administrators, parents or the community?

Having a social media platform would allow for people who always check their Instagram or twitter to also see what is currently happen at their school.

Integratability: What would you change to make this idea easier to integrate into a school setting?

Create post about events, opportunities, sports, classes, and announcements happening in the school to ensure everyone is aware about it.

Feasability: Looking back what would you change, what would you keep?

Having to include more on the Instagram story about what students are doing in their classes and maybe their school related activities afterschool, so others can see what opportunities are available at riverside.

Tech Team

Tech Team Innovation

| evak2016

Step 1: Tech Team 

Take a moment to answer the following questions:

  • What aspects of Tech Team are successful? Explain why.

What stood out this year that is successful is the planning and creation of projects that would have students more engaged into events and activities at riverside, like the Wall of Pride, putting in newsletters on our social media, create a new Dear Grade 8 Me video, and overall keep pushing forward on what more could we do for the school.

  • What aspects of Tech Team are challenging? Explain why.

In the beginning of the year, it can come to the point where it can be challenging to ensure everyone has their technology work properly and that they know how to use certain programs. However, even in the middle of the year, it can be still surprizing how their are still students that still are not sure how to access Microsoft Office, log-in to the internet, etc, especially with new students and transfer students coming to the school. So making sure that everyone understands how to use their device(s) at Riverside can be a challenge.

  • What support does our school need from the Tech Team moving forward? Explain why.

To set-up a system that allows student to message to tech team directly if they have a device issue that they can’t solve on their own and are unable to visit the WAVE. There are chances that there can be a tech issue that we can’t solve or can’t access and need the help from those on the team or staff that know about the issue and offer advice.

  • What can we do to improve our support for our school?

More chances for the team to be in the library at the WAVE, or for those who arrive at Riverside during the year and didn’t have an intro technology at our school, we could offer to hold small sessions for those who don’t know everything about RSS tech.

Step 2: Research

Take some time to research various Tech Teams around North America. There are several schools using different variations of students in tech leadership positions. Look into them, and see what they are doing, how are they set up, how do they communicate, how do they improve their school culture around technology.

  • What are some things other Tech Teams are doing that we may want to apply at Riverside?

The common thing I found comparing different tech teams is that they had set-up networks that allows anyone to email them about issues they have or allow them to access a community/private forum to share different information about tech. Another was one team had set-up a website that shares about the team’s purpose, achievements and not only offer support to their school but also focus on allowing those joining to create their projects like in game and web development, robotics, video and film, media design, etc.

  • Has you research created any ideas that the Tech Team can implement here

Maybe creating a website for RSS Tech team to display current projects and plans for the school, like Instagram and twitter pages, info about the Wall of Pride, what are we involved with ,where to find us if students or staff need help.

Tech Team

Year End Reflection

| evak2016

What are some things you have learned and/or tasks you have accomplished this year?

Of Course there are a lot of things, subjects, and topics I have learned throughout the whole year, a lot of it I have incorporated into projects, assignment and tasks, like in most cases I have learned about film making, features in Office 365, in Windows itself or programs not included in Windows. The First half of the year I was in the Sound and Lighting team than later was moved to the Social Media team, however I switch closer to the end of the year so there wasn’t much for me at first. For this year I have volunteered for 2017 Digital Bootcamp, set-up-assist for Pro-D Day, often in the WAVE, and participated in SET-BC Super-natural Riverside Film Project, all of these involved to skills I have acquired working with devices.

What aspects of your work are successful? Explain why.

What was in common with most tasks and projects is problem-solving. It can be involved with everything you do in school, and outside of school. For example in Bootcamp someone has trouble getting on to the WIFI, or the Edu-Blog, on other days, a projector need to be set-up, or volunteering at the WAVE someone has trouble getting on to the WIFI, the Edu-Blog or OneNote, etc. Overall, troubleshooting and fixing/solving the problem was the most successful part of the work.

What aspects of your work is challenging? Explain why.

Troubleshooting and problem solving. Of course it sometimes wasn’t the most easiest thing, in sound and lighting it involves set-up, checking equipment to if in working order and fixing what wasn’t in working order, and while solving issues with devices, there are some devices I didn’t try that much, so I do it on the spot how to solve the issue the best way. For the social media team, I offered to design and make some posters for advertising about Tech team, though what can be challenging sometimes was generating ideas for designs.

For Tech team in general, advertising, reminding students about using devices at RSS can often seem there are some improvement on how we teach in the beginning of the year, like utilizing Edu-Blog, My-Ed, Office, etc. Like to have student remember what to do when using these programs and websites.

What steps did you take to overcome these challenges / what adjustments did you need to make?

What adjustment I could make is help to ensure and advertise that students follow the recommendations for getting a device to use for school or make references on tech help, before (if needed) they come to TT.

Is there anything you can do improve? (with your approach to the project, or altering the project)

Since of course that students don’t always use the one brand of device, what I can improve on is to have more experience with different devices, for example I need to know more about using IOS because I mainly like to use Android and Windows and rarely ever used I-pads or iPhones, therefore I can help to solve any real issues on different brands of devices like during Boot-camp or while volunteering. 

As Riverside continues to immerse itself into innovation and technology, what do you think Riverside can do to provide support and help for teachers and students?

One idea for our service is a group of us could make videos about giving advice, explaining steps for sign-ins, telling tips and/or showing useful features on technology. With this, the school’s YouTube channel would be viewed a lot more and students as well as teachers can be inspired to use technology.

Images

Office Apps

Tech Team

Tech Team Passion Project

| evak2016

a) Briefly describe your new and improved idea, by incorporating ideas and/or feedback.

The Sound and Lighting Team are responsible for setting up the lights and sound equipment for shows and events happening on the stage or the gym if needed, it makes a impact in our school and has always been acknowledged by our peers. So any changes required to make this idea more feasible are depended on further analysis throughout the year.

– What problems might I run into?

Since most stage events happen after school, not having enough available sound and lighting members to be there for set-up could be a potential obstacle. Best of what I can think of to solve this is see who can do what and when, so basically make a calendar of all the events, plan ahead and see who is free and who is not to attend and help set-up for said events. And ask members if it is possible to cancel what they have or see if they can find a way to resolve schedule conflicts.

– What skills do I need to complete this project? How can I attain these skills?

I would need to be able to problem solve, have critical and some creative thinking skills for when I run into obstacles or problems that are needed to be solved. Since its likely that this idea revolves around technology, I would have to learn more and expand on what I can do with computers.

Timeline?

I have been recently added to this project so I don’t know what to expect, what are the upcoming dates involving the Sound and Lighting team or what is the outcome. Though I do know that I would be getting training or an education to help complete the project and throughout the year I would keep an open mind.

 

Tech Team

Tech Team Edublog

| evak2016

Here are 3 the plugins that I have recently added to my blog.

Compfight Safe Image
Google Maps
3D Rotating Tag cloud

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CompFight – Is a quick way to search and insert images into the post. What is great about it is that once activating it, it added a new button on posts and by searching a simple word (ex. flowers or whatever is the topic of the post) instantly photo relevant to what was searched. The only problem is that its not directly getting images from Google, Bing or other browsers, its mainly has its own data base of photos.

Google Maps – is a plugin allowing to easily embed Maps into the posts, pages and sidebars, along with the options of labeling location, display local images and get directions. The benefit of having this plugin is that for research post about a place and with this, Google maps can be embed and displayed into the post instead of say, going onto Maps and screenshotting the researched location. Its similar to the ‘Add Document’ plugin if you know it. By clicking on the added button by the Add media, and Google maps would pop up and it would allow to add different markers on the map, then by clicking insert, it would place an embed code into the post. Before publishing, preview the post and check if its working.

3D Rotating Cloud – is a cool plugin to use to personalize a blog. Its used to make the simple soon to be long list of tags on the sidebar of the blog look more interesting and compacts the tags together so it doesn’t stretch down the sidebar when it does get long. Once activated and after adding the widget, in the blogs sidebar would be a literal cloud of spinning tags that moves when the mouse is over it. However, for it to work the device your on would require a Flash Player 9 or better, else it would remain as a list.