Gary’s Blog

Many high schools, including vocational or trade high schools, offer a range of computer science, digital media, or business applications courses. The specifics of these offerings depend on the history and popularity of the department and the nature of the local business community. If an art teacher is hired who has special skill in digital photography, for example, the school may offer a Read More

Generations of students have created presentations using a series of programs that combine text, images, audio, and video (thus the “multi” in multimedia). Many trace the beginnings of this type of educational software to HyperCard and HyperStudio, programs that available were for Apple computers marketed in schools in the early 1990’s. Interest in multimedia grew when video cards, color displays, audio cards, and speakers along with the computing capacity Read More

When I was an undergraduate student studying biology, a botany professor shared with us an article from Science magazine published in 1890. The paper was presented to the Society of Western Naturalists by its president T. C. Chamberlin. It was very influential to me in 1985, but during a move some years later, I lost Read More

 I once coached a technology coordinator who was fond of saying, “I built what they asked for, it they asked for the wrong thing, that is not my problem.” He used it whenever the educators decided the system they wanted wasn’t exactly what they wanted and they asked him to modify the plans. I tried to get Read More

When I was a student, I was not a strong math student; my lowest grades were always earned in math class. I attributed this to the “D” I earned in math when I was in 4th grade. Despite this, I became a math teacher. My students (and their parents) frequently said I was among the best math teachers they ever had. I attribute this to Read More

To minimize the expense of one-to-one initiatives, some schools choose to participate in bring your own device (BYOD) initiatives. This finds schools encouraging students to bring devices they own to school, connecting them to an SSID, and using them for their schoolwork. This can pose several difficulties for IT professionals; security being the most important. Others raise concern about equity as individuals may not be able to afford their own devices or Read More