Getting Smarter

For many years computers have been used as an engagement tool for TAFE Outreach. In the late 1990’s I started teaching in Outreach Western Sydney Institute using a set of laptops. At the time the access and use of personal computers was relatively new and recognised as major change in society for employment, education and entertainment. In the late 1990’s teachers were recruited from Information Technology or Business Services and delivery included curriculum from those areas. Mainstream Information Technology ran introduction courses such as Computers a First course which included basic computer operation, word processing, spreadsheets and database, the Outreach programs were structured in a similar format as they were seen as a pathway into information Technology or Business Services. As the digital world has changed programs were adapted so that powerpoint replace database, the battles for internet access in for off campus computer programs has continued but the essence of Outreach computer program has remained the same as a pathway to Business Services or Information Technology.
Assessing such programs alongside the current literacy debates including new literacies and looking at technology applied in learning elsewhere in TAFENSW for example, in ABE and ESOL I seek to interrogate the efficiency of these programs. Issues These programs have emerged as pathways to Information Technology and Business Services, thus the teachers are often from those disciplines. While some have extended their teaching repertoire some have not seen the need to and have managed to continue on teaching the program tweaking it to maintain currency with available computers and software. While this may be appropriate in the context of Business Services or Information Technology, it may have limited the capacity and efficienct use of resources in acheiving greater learning.
Anecdotally it is easy to see patterns in computer classes where groups get comfortable with step by step learning, they can be keen to continue on in the class but not to move on. The practice of teaching step by step skills, which aligns comfortably with compliance and competency based training, rather than encouraging ongoing curiosity and learning to learn, intersects with ever changing versions of software and the perception perpetrated of the need to keep retraining. This can be appealing for teachers wanting to continue programs in a known environment. This may contribute to social participation but is limited in terms of dynamic participation that enriches lifes and can lead to further study or employment.

US Article - Can Apple Save Education

Via: OnlineEducation.net

Mouse Skills

Do you need to enhance your mouse skills? Then have a go at putting a jigsaw together online.

JigZone is an online Jigsaw Puzzle where you choose the level of difficulty from a simple 6 piece cut to a challenging 247 piece cut.

Go on - get in there and try it ok!

An old Favourite "internet4classrooms"

This is an excellent online tutorial site that can be used in a variety of ways. I have used it with classes who have additional challenges in learning and for motivated learners who want some extra work. I have been coming back to this site for 10 years. It is tried and true!

Basic Computers and Internet

Hi - This the BCI Wednesday class at Ultimo TAFE with Outreach. Our teacher is Lesley. Today we are looking a blogging using blogspot. Blogs is an on-line journal tool and blogspot is only just one of them.
We have put up some pics of us, we have edited the image and put up the original and the edited version.
Blogging with blogspot is so so easy. It is user friendly and I would use it again and again.
Next week we are creating our own blog and putting up stuff that we learnt in class.
Here is our class.
If you would like to know more, send us an email at nswtox1@gmail.com ok and we will get back to you soon. bye for now.

Cropping Pictures or Images

We thought that we might post our cropping of an image to share with you all out there in cyberspace.






So we started off with this picture....but ooops....its not quite what we want....derrrr....crop it....

Fingers Crossed

Wow.Look mum no hands!!!

Serious Business

We are a committed class and loving our course. We just hope it continues. A fun buch working at our own pace without pressure. Play is the best bway to learn. Go crew!

Connie of Ultimo

Baby Steps

This is our first attempt at blogging with the trainer wheels still on. We hope it works.

Tina and Jay

Ultimo Basic Computing and Internet Class

This is Lesley's class sitting down in downtown Ultimo checking out how blogs and things work. We have had a good look around and we are checking how it works or not.

Lea's 10 Steps to Success

Lea’s 10 steps to getting on the road with computers is great resource generously provide by lea from orange. She has been using these with lots of success – I am sure she would like some feed back. Lea has also said you are welcome to modify them to suit. In this zipped file there are two folders, one with Leas notes for the exercises and one with the exercises.

Web Wise

I have found this site very useful for review/revision. Can also work well to supplement presentation, allowing students to work through it at their own pace.
BBC has some fantastic resources in this section, I have used another one with kids for first aid, I think it is called programmed learning, they all wanted to get 100% so kept doing it till they did! Maybe not a great technique for learning and understanding on its own, a step in the right direction!!

Create a Creature - My Creature

This pilot intereactive program has been provided by The Learning Federation. You are able to access this great resource via your DET login under TAFE in TaLe under the section Discover or by clicking here.

Have a close look at body parts of small creatures such as a wolf spider, a beetle or a bull ant. Explore descriptions of each body part and its uses. For example, examine a scorpion's long tail to see how it is adapted to stinging prey. Build your own creature. Choose body parts to suit your animal's feeding behaviour, type of movement and habitat. This learning object is one in a series of three objects.

A good interactive tool from beginners to experienced. Worth checking out.

Computer tutorials that keep it simple..

Some no fuss computer tutorials starting with the basics. good information on fundamentals such as image formats, file management and creating music cds.

10 Steps to Productive Computing - Follow these ten simple steps and you'll actually enjoy being more productive.

Google maps 'n big brother

You have been introduced to Google Earth:

Google Earth puts a planet's worth of imagery and other geographic information right on your desktop. View exotic locales like Maui and Paris as well as points of interest such as local restaurants, hospitals, schools, and more.Provides directions, interactive maps, and satellite/aerial imagery of the United States.

The down side of Google earth is that is has to be installed on computers and is quite a big program.
Google Maps needs only an internet connection:

Google Maps is a Google service offering powerful, user-friendly mapping technology–including business locations, contact information, and driving directions–to anyone searching for results in the United States, Canada, and the UK (more locations coming soon). With Google Maps, you'll enjoy the following unique features:
- Draggable maps – Click and drag maps to view adjacent sections immediately (no long waits for new areas to download).
- Satellite imagery – View a satellite image (or a satellite image with superimposed map data) of your desired location that you can zoom and pan.
- Integrated search results – Find business locations and contact information all in one location. For example, if you search for [pizza in Sydney], locations of relevant listings appear on your map, and their phone numbers appear alongside.
- Detailed directions – Enter an address and let Google Maps plot the location and/or driving directions for you. Click any part of the driving directions to see a magnified map or satellite image of that part of the route.

To see what Google maps can do there is a great tour. I am amazed how intrigued kids are at viewing anywhere in the world, tomorrow we are going to check out the Eiffel Tower and measure the pyramids

Comeeko by Christina

Check out this site where you can make a comic strip out of your pics and share it. Thanks for the link Christina....

Comeeko lets you take your photos and put them into our photo strips.
Ever had a great night out with a series of photos?
What about a funny comic strip idea?
Comeeko makes it as easy as toasting toat to create your own photo strip!
You can also post your comeeko in your myspace profile, in MySpace comments, or in MySpace bulletins.

File Conversion online

This looks like a great tool. No need to download software to convert files. It will convert files up to 100mb.

Zamzar supports conversion between a wide variety of different file formats. We're adding support for new formats all the time - if there's a format that you'd like us to support why not contact us and we'll do our best to add it.

UK bank details sold in Nigeria

This article supports security issues when exploring financial transaction online

FREE Graphic Tools

A space to list your graphic tools!

INKSCAPE
PC Authority has this to say:

Inkscape is an open source drawing tool with capabilities similar to Illustrator, Freehand, and CorelDraw that uses the W3C standard scalable vector graphics format (SVG). Some supported SVG features include basic shapes, paths, text, markers, clones, alpha blending, transforms, gradients, and grouping. In addition, Inkscape supports Creative Commons meta-data, node-editing, layers, complex path operations, text-on-path, and SVG XML editing. It also imports several formats like EPS, Postscript, JPEG, PNG, BMP, and TIFF and exports PNG as well as multiple vector-based formats.

To download, click over the orange download area.

MULTIMATHS
Do you need to draw curves etc. Then check out multimaths. To download, click over the orange download area.

AUTOGEMETER
This software contains tools for drawing plane and solid geometric figures and curves. To download, click over the orange download area.

VICTORENGINEER
This is a free CAD tool that can be used for work, home, education etc.

Produce accurate engineering, mechanical and technical drawings, designs, plans, layouts and diagrams with this excellent, easy to use, free CAD and technical drawing software.

To download, click over the orange download area.

PHOTO POS LITE
A free photo image editor to edit your digital photos professionally. To download, click over the orange download area.

Have You Always Wanted To Learn Photoshop - Check Out These FREE Tutorials

I've always wanted to learn photoshop but have neither the time or money to undertake any studies and too my surprise other teachers (and students) were interested too. So here is the first lot and I will endeavour to keep adding more as it comes to hand ok.

Photoshop 101 is a comprehensive resource comprised of free Adobe Photoshop tutorials, tips, and other information to help users achieve their potential. The tutorials are updated weekly from a number of different sources, and so we save you the time of looking for them yourself.

Tips & Basics Photoshop Tutorials

Outreach St George Chapter

We have all explored the concept of social software and the next step will be to develop our professional skills in its usage. Additional research and practical experimentation will increase our confidence and competence in utilising these tools with a specific client base.

What DVD+/-R media should you buy?

DVD +/- R Media
Ever wondered why "cheap" DVD +/-R blank media is , um, cheap? Replace the "he" in cheap with an "r".The major manufacturers of blank DVD media contract out bulk stuff (spindles of 25, 50 100 etc.) to a company known as CMC Magnetics in China. The packaging might say TDK, Verbatim etc. but the discs are rubbish. CMC has the WORST repution for media anywhere. Individually packaged TDKs, Verbatims etc. are probably the real thing, the ONLY bulk media worth using is Taiyo Yuden (considered the best by the "experts" and power users out there). They cost around $1 per disk in bulk and are available from JPL Displays in Melbourne (you don't need a Credit Card, direct deposit into their account at your local Commonwealth Bank - I think).

How do you know what you have got??
Download DVDIdentifier (FREE);
Install it;
Run it.
Insert your blank DVD into the drive and click on Identify.
Be surprised that your 16X Verbatim is really an 8X CMC!!!!
Take the blanks back to where you bought them from and get a refund.
Don't buy that rubbish again.

Tips on burning DVDs (found out the hard way):

ALWAYS use quality media, cheap blanks DO NOT LAST - I have stuff that is less than 12 months old that will no longer play in anything (Princo brand, really more CMC cr*p).

ALWAYS burn at half the rated speed of the blanks (or slower if possible). The slower the burn speed the higher the quality. If you have a 16X burner and 8X blanks then burn at 4X. Trust me!!!

ALWAYS use Custom Ratio when using DVDShrink to create "backups" of your DVDs. Automatic uses the least possible compression to fit data onto the disc, thereby writing to the extreme outside edge of it. This is where the dye is at its weakest, particularly with cheap blanks (see above). Use Custom Ratio to compress it a bit further, thus avoiding the outside edge. Ever watched a pirated movie only to have it go nuts almost at the end?

If so, all three Golden Rules above have been ignored!

Writing for the World Wide Web

If you are interested in writing for the world wide web, this is the place to go. On this site you will find tutorials, guidlines, information about standards and accessibility and a whole lot more. The web is changing constantly and this is the engine room, don't buy a text book, it will be out of date next week!!
W3C's mission is:

To lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing protocols and guidelines that ensure long-term growth for the Web.

Another great site for tutorials is htmldog.
To write html all you need it note pad, however for those of you who prefer to use an html editor there are lots of good free one out there. I recommend html kit from chami.com for pc users.

Standards-compliant,full-featured and multi-purposedevelopment environment for editing HTML and other Web-related file types.

Writing css is a must for standards compliancy, once again you can use notepad or an excellent free download is TopStyle Lite from http://bradsoft.com/.
Happy coding...

Teacher Click online turorials

Some good tutorials on Excel, Access, Dreamweaver and Flash. Could be used to supplement or give students independent work.

This site is designed to offer to the educational community completely free and high-quality software tutorials and online courses. With teacherClick you can learn how to use computers, Internet as well as office, graphics and web development applications.

Bathurst TAFE BAIT

Thinking of setting up a moodle for your class? Then check out Peter Shanks n co moodle at Bathurst TAFE Information Technology section. Peter attended the Dubbo Social Software Workshop and was kind enough to demonstrate their moddle with us. Thanks.

Great work Peter!

Document for alignment in Word

The is a word processing exercise for aligning text in Word

Blue Mountains Digital Photography Class

This is a class blog for my photography class, you will find heaps of information, great links to useful sites with tutorials and more.

Relationships - the database type.

A great little interactive quiz to test your understanding of database relationships. You could come out of this with a new car.

The Sequencer - crack it...

Having trouble getting the foundation tags down, do this a couple of times and you will master writing a bare bones web page in notepad

Community Computer Recycling

For communities interested in setting up computer recycling this might be useful.
Community Computer Recycling" is operated by Grant High School in South Australia to provide free computers (including software and basic training) to community organisations and people in need in our community. Students in the computer technician class gain practical skills through this program.

Showing my Friday "beginners" class Blogging!

Well, they all seem interested and keen to start blogging, so next week I'll set them all up, then show them Wikis too.

Flashy Rewards

This is a reward game for those who might dream about custom building there own car. They can do colours, spoilers, all that sort of stuff. There are a variety of backgrounds drivers and music options to choose from.

Outreach Computer Uses

This is the survey results that was completed at last year’s Outreach conference about computer use

Video To DVD

This is a “how-to” for transferring Videos to DVD:

VID2DVD

Online Tutorials

Another great site for tutorials for computer software applications, great for supplementary or revision.
this site also has teacher support materials such as templates for lesson preparation.

Sample of Lea's Computer EX's

This is a sample of Lea's exercises to Launch newbies into this new world full of opportunities, frustrations and more... they come with very highly recommended by Anne of Orange.

Highly Recommended Microsoft Training

It seems Microsoft is really keen to help people use their applications… the excellent training packages that you used to have to pay for are now freely available on their site. (I guess the competition must be improving ) but great for us and out students!

The following tutorials for Excel, Access and Word are all interactive, use a friendly voice to lead you through the exercises, include activities as well as quizzes to help students self-assess their own learning. Obviously not a substitute for a teacher, but a great resource to help out in class!

You can find a list of the tutorials for each application here:

• Roadmap to Excel 2003 training


• Roadmap to Access 2003 training


• Roadmap to Word 2003 training

You can even download powerpoint versions of each tutorial if that suits your classes better! Have fun!

Seniors

What do you call 16 Seniors, 15 laptops, 15 USB Keys, no mice. all crammed into a tiny room with no whiteboard and no one listening?

Utter chaos, thats what! This is my off-campus class this semester, at Toukley Neighbourhood Centre and I am REALLY earning my money with this lot (I thought teenagers were difficult).

I dont know if they forgot their pills or had taken to many, but I certainl needed some at the end!

David.

Resources

The 2000 Stable by Hawking, McCarthy & Nikakis
Using The 2000 Stable textbook and looking for exercises for your students? Look no further. Downloadable exercises here.

* Office 2000 Stable - Word
* Office 2000 Stable - Excel
* Office 2000 Stable – Access
* The Internet and Using Email
* Microsoft Windows

The XP Stable: An Introduction to Microsoft Office XP by Hawking, McCarthy & Nikakis
Using The XP Stable textbook and would like some of the exercises. Download from here.
* Office XP Stable - Word 2002
* Office XP Stable - Excel 2002
* Office XP Stable - Access
* Microsoft Windows
* The Internet and Using Email

Australian Flexible Learning Centre
This is fanastic section on the Centre's website called Technologies for Learning. For example, What's new in e-learning technologies; How to choose an MP3 player; Free and Open Source Software and Courseware - A User Guide; W3C compliance made simple; etc etc.
Another section in the Centre's website is Teaching, Training and Learners which has great links to things including Top tips for teaching the technologically challenged; 10 tips for flexible learning; Project based learning - Progress report 1; etc etc. Enjoy ;>).

Leigh's Got an Idea....

Click title which is and load up the word doc. Read Leigh's blog post on grants - he has a pretty good idea for this Samsung grant (blogging, moblogging, digital story telling, podcasting, digi video, Internet distribution etc - for outreach students under 25!). Need some or all of NSWTOX onboard. App due August 31st. Leihg has good people ready and willing to help prepare the app.

Some Links For You (Free stuff)!

Free audio ripper (WAV to MP3 etc.):
Jet Audio

And another one:
CDex

Before Google Earth there was this freebie from NASA:
WorldWind

If you are considering using your PC as an HD-DTV capture device (and why wouldn't you?!?), then go to this site before you spend $$$ on the wrong thing:

Digital Broadcasting Authority

More to follow later.
David.

Interactive Activities for Computer classes

Some great interactive activities to use in computer classes, the ones I have seen are suitable for basic computer classes. Good change of pacers or refreshers!

CREATE YOUR OWN COMIC
Two ways to take part (1) - Create a comic to send by e-mail OR (2)Register with the Gnomz.com community, publish your comic online, vote for your favourite comic, create your own characters, take part in the forums and join the Gnomz community. Students may need to register first ok....happy comicing.....;>)

A Place for Computer X

This blog is a place where Outreach computers teachers can exchange information, ask questions, link to resources, perhaps get some lyrics together for our next meeting!!!