ICTeD Services

MacSchoolsNet #53 - iCloud, IOS5 & Education

If you are in Melbourne and want to attend email me! [Address on the poster.]

Go to http://www.macschools.net for more information.

MacSchoolsNet #52 - Mac OSX Lion & AirPlay

Looking forward to the next meeting on MacSchoolsNet! 

Format for the event is as follows:

Mac OSX Lion
Some key questions for education

• What are the benefits of Lion for teachers and students?
• Are there any drawbacks?
• Are there apps that don't work with Lion?
• What about Volume Licencing of Lion in schools?
• Is a download from the App Store the only way to get it?
• How can you use Disk Utility to repair a Mac if there is no disk?
• What if you bought a Mac just before Lion was released? Are you entitled to an upgrade?
• What are the features of Lion Server for schools?
• What are the benefits of Lion Server in a school?
• How will Lion integrate with the iPad / iPhone / iPod Touch?

AirPlay
Some key questions for education

• What are some of the ways AirPlay could be used in the classroom?
• Could an iPad/AirPlay and a screen challenge an Interactive White Board?
• What are the implications of using AirPlay for students to be able showing their digital creations to others so easily.
• Will AirPlay have great advantages for subjects such as music and multimedia?

See http://www.macschools.net/ for links to provide background for these questions.

MacSchoolsNet: First Meeting, 2011

The new website is now live http://www.macschools.net

First meeting is Thursday, May 26, 2011 4:30 - 6:00 [Venue and presenters to be decided]

De Bono’s Hats and iPads

This is the first of our "directed" unconferences.

We will have a couple of short presentations.
Members can then follow any of the directions below in discussions with other members. They will be able to respond F2F and via a wiki.

We will be looking at the educational implications of the iPad
Blue Hat Thinking - Process
• What thinking is needed in a school before purchasing iPads [or other mobile devices]?
• How do you win over school administrations?
• How do you win over teachers?
• How do you win over parents?


White Hat Thinking - Facts
• What are the costs of the equipment?
• What are the costs of the Apps? [Volume licencing etc.]
• How do you charge and synch them?
• What curriculum and technical resources are there?
• Can you lease iPads?
• What about insurance?


Green Hat Thinking - Creativity
• What are some ideas/activities for students using iPads?
• How can it be used by teachers?
• How can you use them for assessment and reporting?
• How can you use them for students with special needs?



Yellow Hat Thinking - Benefits
• What are the benefits for students?
• What are the benefits for teachers?
• What are the benefits for schools - especially in student engagement and student performance?


Black Hat Thinking - Cautions
• What are the difficulties and weaknesses of mobile learning?
• Isn't it easier to use desktops or notebooks than iPads?
• Will iPads work with the Ultranet?
• Won't the iPad2 will be superseded soon?



Red Hat Thinking - Feelings
• What do you think about education using mobile devices?
• How does mobile learning "sit" with how you teach at the moment?
• How to you feel about 21st century learning? Are you embracing it, or is it far too stressful, or is it somewhere in between these two positions?


References
http://www.debonoforschools.com/asp/six_hats.asp
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Red_Fedora.svg

MacSchoolsNet Meeting #50 - What's for the future??

Deb and I will celebrate [with members] the 50th meeting of MacSchoolsNet tomorrow afternoon.
This has been a great ICT PD network over the past 7 or so years.

For the archives the website is www.macschools.net.
Download a history of the network  Download MacSchoolsNet edit.
Our Mission Statement is
• Links ICT coordinators, technicians, teachers and others, who have  an interest in the Macintosh platform.
• Develops and delivers professional development for ICT coordinators, technicians, teachers and others. This is in two  formats, the first is the regular network meetings, which focus on specific issues, but in which a wide variety of issues are discussed. The second is the specific skill based ICT professional learning sessions or conference workshops. At these sessions, participants complete "hands on" sessions, with activities related to specific applications.
• Encourages and shares best practice in ICT pedagogy amongstmembers.
• Develops and maintains links [without endorsement] with Apple Australia, Apple Resellers and other commercial interests and uses these links for the benefit of members.
• Maintains this web site as resource for members, teachers, schools
and the wider ICT education community.

Our meeting tomorrow will really decide the future of MacSchoolsNet. Has it run its race? Will it take of other directions?

Addendum: So what happened?
It was a really positive meeting. MacSchoolsNet is taking a break until 2011. We will do 4 meetings a year. Less formal stuff and more cutting edge stuff!

MacSchoolsNet Meeting #49 The DEECD eduSTAR 10.6 image for Mac [My Edited Presentation]

What is the eduSTAR image for Mac? [Adapted from the eduSTAR website]

• Client Image 

10.6 images that is customised to cater for Victorian school environments. The aim of creating this image is to provide schools with a consistent ICT environment across schools, on Teacher notebooks, Student notebooks or netbooks and school owned computers in the classroom. 

This image provides an excellent core by providing an extensive set of applications that align directly with the Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS). Schools can use this as a base, and extend onto it by adding school owned applications. This reduces the time required by Specialist Technicians to produce a new reliable school image, and a level of consistency across schools that benefits Teachers, Students and Specialist Technicians. 

The eduSTAR Apple OSX 10.6 Image is pre-installed as standard on: 

• DEECD Apple Notebooks supplied in the Notebooks for Teachers and Principals Program (NTPP). 

• Apple MacBooks purchased through DEECD Hardware Panel 

• Can be downloaded by DEECD TSSP technicians 

What are the eduSTAR websites? 

• https://edugate.eduweb.vic.gov.au/Services/IT/ ITServices/eduSTAR/Pages/default.aspx [DEECD Login and password needed]

• https://edugate.eduweb.vic.gov.au/Services/IT/ ITServices/eduSTAR/Pages/WebcastsandTraining.aspx [DEECD Login and password needed]

What is on the DEECD Mac eduSTAR image 10.6? 

 

eduSTAR image for Mac 

Advantages - [As I them see]

• Useful in schools when there is limited Mac technical support 

• Exposes teachers and students to some great Free and Open Source Software [FOSS]

• Is a creditable starting point for schools to add to a Mac image.

• Shows continuing improvement of DEECD OSX images.

• Is a generic image for 1600 schools and all DEECD students & teachers

• Illustrates DEECD support for OSX

• You can purchase eduSTAR imaged MacBooks & iMacs from DEECD Panel Suppliers 

• The Dock items tries to emulate the Windows Common Navigation Platform 

Disadvantages - [As I them see]

• Only a 10.6.SOE. Schools often have a variety of Mac operating systems and Intel & PPC [so obviously, only useful for recently purchased Macs] However, hopefully there will be continuing eduSTAR images for Mac, so overtime there should be to a number of images for Mac OS.

• By the nature of things takes a long time to install initially you need to i. install 10.6, ii. then iLife ’09, iii. then the eduSTAR image.

• I had some issues cloning this image to other computers, admittedly the school is having issues with Net Restore [school issue nor a DEECD one!]. Couldn't clone from an external drive, which had a variety of Mac OS images on it - apparently the cause of that problem!. Could clone by using Carbon Copy Cloner and a firewire cable.

• The eduSTAR Mac 10.6 SOE image locks down the computer with a Local Admin account which only DEECD TSSP’s have the password, so you would have to ask them for it. [If you set up an Admin account in step i above, it will be replaced by the Local Admin account in step iii]. 

Other Resources: 

http://ictedservices.typepad.com/icted_services/2009/07/opensource-software-for-the-mac-in-the-primary-elementary-schoolclassroom.html 

http://ictedservices.typepad.com/icted_services/2010/06/whatsburning-in-elearning-2-open-the-door-to-open-source.html

If you do any good things with FOSS in your school, please let me know so we can build up some online resources 

Reflection

• Great to have David Terrens from DEECD ITD to talk about the background of the image in detail

• As it was a small group more of the discussion was about the future of MacSchoolsNet and how the next meeting #50 will be both a celebration an evaluation and a plotting of future directions