Chromebook Announcement at FETC 2012

Today I had the amazing opportunity to participate in the Eye Opener Keynote and a press luncheon at FETC 2012 where Rajen Sheth, Group Product Manager for Chromebooks, announced that three districts, including mine, will be going 1:1 with Chromebooks in the 2012-2013 school year.  Not only were these events a real honor to be a part of, they were a lot of fun.  It was the first time that I had been involved in something of this magnitude at a major conference and was made even more special by sharing it with Jason Markey (@jmarkeyAP), Mikkel Storaasli (@LeydenASCI), and our new #googleschool friends from Council Bluffs and Richland Two.  After the events, it was incredible to see things I had said being tweeted, blogged about, and quoted in various publications.  This was definitely an experience I'll never forget and cannot thank the Chromebook team enough for this opportunity and for all their support with Leyden Community High School District 212's digital evolution.  The following are some links to the video recap of the keynote and the articles that have been published so far:

• Keynote Video: http://youtu.be/duE2BM-5b_A (skip ahead to the 15:38 mark)
• Google Chrome Blog:  http://goo.gl/gClFc
• CNET:  http://goo.gl/l5PTs
• the Journal:  http://goo.gl/5kjqO
• TechCrunch:  http://goo.gl/YpkVi
• Huffington Post:  http://goo.gl/uHhcS
• 9To5Google:  http://goo.gl/xVxaN
• SiliconFilter:  http://goo.gl/GtnWl
• VR-Zone:  http://goo.gl/jtZWn
• The Guardian:  http://goo.gl/zbtQ1
• TG Daily:  http://goo.gl/x3wi5
• Engadget:  http://goo.gl/yTAFU
• Hack Education:  http://goo.gl/bqfgD
• ZDNet:  http://goo.gl/9Am4P

I'm Talking Chromebooks at FETC

I'm currently at FETC 2012 in Orlando with Jason Markey (East Leyden Assistant Principal - @jmarkeyAP) and Mikkel Storaasli (Asst. Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction - @LeydenASCI) and will be participating in some presentations talking about Google Chromebooks.  Here's my schedule so far.  Please come hear more about how Leyden CHSD 212 is using Chromebooks, what are plans for the future are, and to just say hello.

Tuesday, January 24
1:00-3:00 p.m.   Chromebook Classroom -  a Technology Solution Seminar in room S230C
5:00-7:00 p.m.   Working at the Google booth

Wednesday, January 25
7:30-8:15 a.m.    Eye Opener Keynote-  Scaling Technology in Education:  Building on the Web in room SA1
                          (The URL for the keynote webstream is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmfe-HiTzpc)
12:00-1:30 p.m. Press Roundtable
2:30-3:30 p.m.   Working at the Google booth

Thursday, January 26
12:00-12:30 p.m. Working at the Google booth

Create Animated Movies With Xtranormal

I really got a kick out of this movie and it was a great reminder about the animated movie making tool available at http://www.xtranormal.com/.

Ode to #Pencilchat: Technology Integration in the Classroom
by: MiddleLevelEd

Updates to Flubaroo grading script for Google Apps

A few months ago I blogged about Flubaroo, a phenomenal FREE script that you can easily implement with your Google Forms and Spreadsheets to create automatically graded student assessments. I just learned that Flubaroo has recently released some new features.  Check out the Flubaroo blog post to learn about these new features and, if you haven't already started to use it, check out the following overview video:

New Features - http://goo.gl/aFGYT

Overview Video - http://youtu.be/QJ60szcUbBE

Global and Digital Citizenship

An important task I've been working on lately is the updating of our district's technology policies.  As we prepare to move to a 1:1 environment next year with every student receiving a Chromebook, there are surely a number of policies and procedures that will need to change.  During my efforts, I was re-examining a variety of the digital citizenship resources that I've been collecting and stumbled across a recent post on the Committed  Sardine blog from Andrew Churches about Global and Digital Citizenship.  I have long appreciated Andrew's "six tenets of citizenship":

1. Respect yourself
2. Protect yourself
3. Respect others
4. Protect others
5. Respect intellectual property
6. Protect intellectual property

You can read more of Andrew's work on digital citizenship on his Educational Origami wiki.  One of his latest projects is the side-by-side comparison of global and digital citizenship.  Click on the image below for the full pdf version.  Please note that this is only a draft and Andrew is seeking comments and feedback.