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Monday, December 18, 2017

Student Data Privacy and Winter Reading List

Data Privacy Reminder
We all play a crucial role in student data privacy. Recently, a neighboring district had a data breach scare which comes as a reminder of how important taking a few simple steps can be.

We do not want this to happen in White Bear Lake. Please work hard to protect your passwords and lock your computer whenever you step away.

To lock your computer, simply press ctrl+alt+delete. Your computer will bring up the screen below. Select lock, and your device will be password protected.


On a Chromebook all you need to do is shut the top, and it will automatically lock.

The protection of student data is also why computers are set to go to the password screen after a certain amount of inactivity.

Winter Reading List
The cold winter months can be a great opportunity to grow as an educator. Below you will find some great professional reads along the innovation and educational technology avenue. Click on the title of the book to learn more about it!

by Heather Dowd and Patrick Green



by Dave Burgess


by Alice Keeler and Diana Herrington



by Trevor Mackenzie


by Katie Muhtaris and Kristin Ziemke


by Matt Miller



Please contact your Digital Learning Specialist if you would like additional information on anything mentioned above.

Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Want to check the status of your Bear Tech Ticket? A Freebie!, New options for taking webcam pics

Where in the World is my Bear Tech Ticket?





If you have submitted a Bear Tech ticket, and would like to know the status of the ticket or would like an update, you can log into Bear Tech and reply to your original ticket. This will send an email to the technician assigned to your request and trigger a follow-up.

Username: District email (example: Jane.Doe@isd624.org)
Password: Click “Lost Password” to set your own for the first time (or to change it)



Google Certification FREE!


Great news! The Google Educator Certification tests are being offered at no cost for a short time.

These certifications are designed for educators and classroom teachers who wish to demonstrate proficiency in using Google for Education tools. The Level 1 status indicates that an educator is able to successfully implement G Suite for Education into their teaching practice in order to enhance teaching and learning. The Level 2 status indicates that an educator is able to successfully integrate a wider range of Google for Education tools and other technologies in order to transform their teaching practice.

Steps to complete:
  1. Obtain voucher here. Exam vouchers will be emailed out every Friday afternoon. Exam vouchers will expire on 12/31/17. While supplies last.
  2. Trainings for the certifications are available at the Google EDU Training Center
  3. Once you have obtained the voucher, register for the exam here. Please register for the exam at least 24 hours prior to the time you wish to take it. After registration, it may take up to ~24 hours to create your test account.
  1. Create a Kryterion account or sign in if you've already taken an exam using Kryterion.
  2. From the home page, select that you want to take either the Google Certified Educator Level 1 or Google Certified Educator Level 2 exam. Please make sure you are registering for the proper exam.
  3. Register for the exam. You'll receive an email receipt for your registration.
  4. Look for an email from admin@myeducert.org with your exam sign-in credentials. This email will contain your exam log-in / username and password in the form of [YourKryterionID]@myeducert.org.
  5. Sign in to the certification exam platform with your exam sign-in credentials.
  6. [YourKryterionID]@myeducert.org and start your exam. Please remember that this is NOT your G Suite or personal Gmail account.
  7. Let us know when you have passed your test(s) so we can help you celebrate!

New options for taking webcam pics


Monday, December 4, 2017

Web Address Trimming, Visual Instructions, and Seasonal Coding Lessons

In today's Tuesday Tech Tips, I'm going to show you some tools to boost your efficiency and help teach coding in a fun new way.

bit.ly: The Free Web Address Trimmer


bit.ly is a free to use URL trimmer that takes long, ugly website names and makes them tiny. URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator--the fancy name for a web address.

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This is the bit.ly interface. That fancy bar graph is a representation of how many times my appointment calendar has been clicked since July. Neat!

If you have a link you'd like to share a lot, you can provide it in a hyperlink (did you know you can do this by highlighting text and pressing CTRL+K?) or you can type out the address. For example, my appointment calendar is https://calendar.google.com/calendar/selfsched?sstoken=UURfZnZnb2JzSjdhfGRlZmF1bHR8NTk1NDM4YTlhNDkwODY1Y2MyODExYTEyODM2ZmJjMWM.

That's not useful.

I headed over to bit.ly and pressed Create Bitlink. I copy and pasted the long address inside, typed TroyDLS in the Customize field, and now I've got a short, easy-to-remember link: bit.ly/TroyDLS

Elegant. Timeless. Practical.

Important: If you type www. in front of your new site, it won't work! And it's case-sensitive, meaning students must get the capital letters correct.

Visual Instructions: Using Google Forms and Pictures to Visually Teach

Do you find that you teach the same thing over and over again? Do you have a neat classroom activity that requires a little bit of student setup? Can pictures and videos help save you time?

How'd he do that..?
Consider creating a Google Form with a required question for every step of the process, then provide one answer as a checkbox to confirm that they did it correctly. You can add a picture or a GIF (Graphics Interchange Format, pronounced with a hard "G" like "Google") to your instructions. You can find them online that demonstrate a process or you can create your own and share them to your Google Drive using an iOS or Android app like Giphy Cam.

In this example form, I ask one question and provide a GIF of how it's to be completed.

Students check off each box as they complete a step. The beauty of the GIF is that it allows for students to watch a step over and over until they get it right.

I created a Google Form with GIF instructions to help our schools use the Google Expeditions Kit. There is a teacher version and a student version. Students can work on their own or in groups with a Chromebook or you can project it so that everyone can follow the steps at the same time.

Seasonal Coding Lessons: The Google Santa Tracker for Educators

It's Computer Science Education Week! That means students all over the world are learning to code in fun, new ways. And what better way to learn than with Santa Claus hims-elf?

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Teaching elves to dance using code? Count me in!

The Google Santa Tracker is a great resource for kids Kindergarten through 10th grade (sorry, South Campus, your students probably know the truth by now) with Geography, Computer Science, Language, and Social Studies lesson plans. Learn to code by making elves dance! Learn about holiday traditions around the world with an interactive map! Learn to say Happy New Year in Chinese, German, or Elvish!

A new activity is added every day until Christmas, so explore and check back often!

If you have any questions on how to use any of these tools in your classroom, don't hesitate to contact your DLS.

Thanks for reading and we'll see you next week!

Troy