Sunday, November 25, 2012
First up: Dropbox
The first piece of technology that I am going to introduce is dropbox. This is an app that you can download here for your pc/mac/tablet. So what does it do? Heh...well it is a long list! I will try to do justice to some of the uses this program has.
The basic idea with dropbox is mobile storage. What I mean is, anywhere you have access to the internet (which is almost everywhere now) you have access to a storage device. Dropbox allows you to store any kind of files (PowerPoint, videos, music, gradebook backups, etc.) you want for use on pretty much all of your devices. And yes I mean all. Dropbox has an app for iPhones, iPads, Macs and PCs. This means you can take your files with you everywhere without ever having to carry that obnoxious USB storage device.
All you have to do is go to droppbox.com and install the app on any device you want to use it on and voila! What happens is, anytime you update files that are saved in the dropbox folder, dropbox automatically syncs them with their "cloud" and stores them for access from any device. It is essentially like copy and pasting these files to the dropbox website, and then dropbox copy and pastes them to all of your devices for you.
So why is this useful for teachers? Again, I have found many uses for this. Let me just give you a few examples:
1) Since I hate keeping a hard copy of my gradebook in this digital age, I can keep backup copies of my gradebook in dropbox at all times. Since I can check it on my phone, I never have that moment where someone catches me away from my desk and wants to know their grade. I also use this to ensure that no student somehow gets access to my gradebook and alters their grades.
2) In my JAVA classroom, I have all of my students download this on day one. Why? Well, when they work on their programs at school, they automatically save them to dropbox. This way, when they get home, they always have their saved work from class. It also works the other way. When they show up to school and try to tell me they forgot their paper at home, since it saves their work at home too, it is always just a click away. No more dogs eating homeowork or flash drives.
3) Dropbox also has a feature that allows you to share a folder with another colleague. In this case, anytime one of you makes a change to something in this folder, it syncs with everyone who shares this folder. Well then, what happens if someone makes a change to something that you don't want? No worries...dropbox keeps older copies of files for backup purposes too.
4) Finally, many of the apps I will introduce in the future have a feature that allows them to sync with your dropbox automatically. This allows for much better usability for users.
Hopefully this helps and any suggestions you have, feel free to comment them!
The Ed Tech Introduction
Welcome to The Ed Tech Blog Spot!
This is a blog designed for two purposes:
1) This is a place for educators to come to find new pieces of technology for their classroom.
2) This is also a way for me to ensure that I try to keep finding new technologies for my own classroom.
First off, let me give you a little bio information. I am a fourth year teacher who began his career in a small rural area school just north of Kansas City, Missouri, and I am now teaching at Lynbrook High School in the Silicon Valley in California. I have spent a large number of hours in a variety of educational settings, including underprivileged inner city schools with marginal access to technology, and schools who thrive with a great number of resources and frequently place students in high ranking positions in companies like Google, Yahoo!, etc.
I am a Secondary Mathematics teacher and I also teach JAVA computer programming. Before I got into education I spent three years majoring in Electrical & Computer Engineering. This background really emphasizes my love for technology and my understanding that it really needs to be present in today's world of education to keep our product relevant to the students we teach.
Having said these things, my primary focus here will be to introduce technology that is either free, or highly inexpensive to add to an existing laptop or tablet (I use an iPad so most tablet apps introduced will be referenced from this perspective). Many people would be amazed at the number of things that are out there that can make our lives easier as educators.
My goal with this blog is to introduce a new piece of technology/app that I have found useful or think I may find useful in the future for my classroom. I hope to blog about a new piece of technology every week, but this may move to every other week depending on my schedule.
If you have any recommendations or suggestions about future topics please feel free to comment and let me know! Otherwise, I hope some people find this blog to be useful in some way!
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