Ed Tech Weekly #10 - News from around the edutechosphere

EdTechWeekly#10
December 3, 2006
Internet messaging, edublog awards, northern voice and much more

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 JenM  JL are you REALLY there?
 dave  doug are you back?
 DS  yes, back in Victoria
 DS  sounds good on stream
 JenM  Hello, doug!
 DS  Hey Jen, and all
 JenM  JL is really not here.
 dave  https://skypecasts.skype.com/skypecasts/skypecast/detailed.html?id_talk=...
 dave  this is my skypecast
 dave  any takers?
 dave  http://www.jivesoftware.org/wildfire/
 JenM  http://pedersondesigns.com/2006/11/30/delicious-guide-for-educators-part...
 jschinker  yes! Thank you :-)
 DS  http://2007.northernvoice.ca/
 jschinker  The edtechtalk delicious tag list is getting long, so it's kind of hard to find the links after the fact now.
 dave  http://incsub.org/awards/
 JenM  http://www.online-educa.com/?a=0 http://tchlrn.ties.k12.mn.us/ties2006/main/details.asp
 JenniferW  yes, I have voted
 dave  yo jdub
 JenniferW  lol -- yup
 DS  http://www.darcynorman.net/2006/12/02/eduglu-reloaded
 dave  http://www.itdl.org/Journal/Nov_06/article01.htm
 JenniferW  International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning
 Chris Craft  Wow - Trilingual
 JenniferW  copy paste works great :)
 dave  http://blogs.zdnet.com/Apple/index.php?p=342
 JenM  http://del.icio.us/edtechtalk for:edtechtalk
 JenM  http://www.masternewmedia.org/new_media/new_media_tools/best_new_media_t...
 JenniferW  what is SMS??
 JenniferW  disregard I googled it
 dave  http://www.ectoprep.com/ecto2/Default.aspx
 Chris Craft  but i don't think google talk has a mac version, although it does do jabber, so it can function in ichat, just fyi
 JenniferW  skype 3 is pretty cool
 Chris Craft  simple message service i think
 JenM  http://www.lifehacker.com/software/google-spreadsheets/google-updates-go...
 JenniferW  yes -- thanks to both
 dave  http://www.click-a-teacher.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id...
 JenniferW  wow -- click a teacher looks intriguing
 JenniferW  firefox crashes one time per day at least
 Chris Craft  Performancing - crucial plugin for Flock - much better than the built-in blogging function - search extensions for performancing
 JenM  http://technosavvy.org/?p=451
 dave  http://www.guardian.co.uk/aids/story/0,,1961008,00.html
 Chris Craft  have you all spoken about edbloggercon 2007?
 dave  anyone wanna talk
 dave  nope
 dave  you wanna?
 Chris Craft  then i have a good one
 Chris Craft  please
 dave  lol
 Chris Craft  http://edubloggercon.googlepages.com
 Chris Craft  http://edubloggercon.wikispaces.com
 JenniferW  wow chris -- they have been working hard on the look of the page in the last 3 days
 JenniferW  yup
 JenniferW  can I post a link too???
 dave  of course
 JenniferW  cool --
 dave  you got audio?
 JenniferW  I am listening stream -- should I join skype??
 Chris Craft  http://www.google.com/support/bin/static.py?page=alpha_index.html
 JenniferW  sorry -- forgot about the delay
 JenniferW  coming
 JenniferW  http://www.lps.k12.co.us/schools/arapahoe/warriorportal/2020vision.wmv
 JenniferW  ther's the link - sorry I can't get into skype
 Chris Craft  that's a great presentation
 cathy e  Jen- I watched that...awesome
 JenniferW  it is great
 JenniferW  and LOL -- I am calling in
 JenniferW  sighs -- skype 3 is being weird
 Chris Craft  any discussion of psiphon?
 JenniferW  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psiphon
 jschinker  Where else did I hear about this?
 jschinker  I was wondering how they handle NAT traversal.
 jschinker  We're China in the schools
 jschinker  With the COPA regs and stuff, we actually have to keep our students from doing this.
 JenniferW  I like that Wiki pedia is current
 JenniferW  instantaneous sometimes
 JenniferW  truly????
 jschinker  If kids could install it at home, and then use it at school, they could easily bypass the school Internet filters.
 Chris Craft  that is absolutely true
 jschinker  The need for port forwarding would make it much harder for them, though.
 Chris Craft  and with dynamic ip addresses, it would be virtually impossible to block
 JenniferW  I just got a site about bypassing myspace -- have you seen that one???
 JenniferW  meaning using myspace at school
 Chris Craft  well port forwarding is only requisite on the home router
 JenniferW  though the school blocks it
 jschinker  I haven't seen it.
 Chris Craft  the school user only types in https://home.router.ip.add:443 and then logs in
 JenniferW  http://schoolboredom.com/
 jschinker  We filter 443, though.
 Chris Craft  it is selectable
 Chris Craft  so i can choose any port i like
 Chris Craft  including port 80
 JenniferW  wow -- Chris -- you are talking a whole different language for me right now!! :)
 Chris Craft  that's ok, this is the language our kids speak
 jschinker  I understand what he's talking about. I still think it would be difficult for the kids.
 JenniferW  I need to learn that language
 Chris Craft  and i feel so behind
 Chris Craft  i don't think it would be tough
 Chris Craft  www.portforward.com i thinkl
 Chris Craft  gives you details of how to forward the ports on just about any router
 jschinker  My recent approach to filtering has kind of changed this, though
 Chris Craft  have you looked at dansguardian
 Chris Craft  there is no stopping kids when they want around filters
 jschinker  We're approaching filtering from the perspective that it's supposed to prevent students from accidentally accessing inappropriate filtering.
 Chris Craft  have you heard of the translation hack to get around them?
 jschinker  As Chris points out, we're not going to win the arms race
 jschinker  Students who want to get around it will -- that's where personal responsibility and supervision come into play
 jschinker  Great, Dave. Is your blog blocked in the schools now?
 Chris Craft  absolutely, and if there is a quality relationship in the first place
 JenniferW  NOOOOOOO
 jschinker  I tell the kids that if they can't get around the filter, they're not really trying.
 jschinker  It's only really good at blocking the adults.
 Chris Craft  that is absolutely true
 jschinker  No ed tech talk?
 jschinker  I was going to actually listen this week :-)
 jschinker  By the way, you were talking about safe driving two weeks ago.
 jschinker  The best way to get someone to drive off the road while listening is to mention their name when they're not expecting it.
 jschinker  :-)
 jschinker  Teaching kids respsonsibility is important, but it's not always practical.
 JenniferW  this is SOOOOOO cool
 JenniferW  I have some filter stories :)
 jschinker  Dave -- where's your blog url? I'll check to see if it's blocked.
 jschinker  US law requires filtering in schools if the schools get federal e-rate funding.
 dave  http://davecormier.com/edblog
 cheryloakes  hi, filters are my bane
 JenniferW  HI CHERYL
 cheryloakes  Hi Jen
 cheryloakes  Hello all
 DS  Hey Cheryl, good to see you
 jschinker  my name's John, btw
 dave  hi john
 JenniferW  JOhn -- I have a comment about that
 JenniferW  you have to have filtering LOADED --
 JenniferW  we never read that it had to be running
 JenniferW  so I had the filter loaded on the systems
 JenniferW  but I never turned it on
 JenniferW  and let the student's be the filter
 jschinker  We don't even do it in-house. but your point is taken
 JenniferW  and only 1 time -- did I have it broken
 JenniferW  and it was a day I was on vacation
 jschinker  We hijack port 80, redirect it to the proxy, and it gets filtered.
 cheryloakes  control can't lead to productivity, not in my house.
 jschinker  Port 80 is blocked, so they can't go out without being filtered.
 JenniferW  I also was in ONE School campus
 jschinker  We're into an interesting debate in my district about overriding the filter.
 jschinker  It's accepted that the filter is always there. But what if sites are "incorrectly" categorized?
 jschinker  This year, we're just starting a process to have sites reviewed and reclassified locally, overriding the global settings.
 cathy e  In my district a lot of the filtering comes down to bandwidth. They filter things like downloading music so others have enough bandwidth.
 JenM  really? bandwidth is the reason?
 Chris Craft  for some, yes, the bandwidth is the reason
 jschinker  Makes sense -- Bittorrent can take down a network
 cheryloakes  same at my schools, bandwidth
 jschinker  Dave: in my district, your blog is blocked.
 jschinker  But it's classified as a "personal page".
 jschinker  That means it's probably blocked because your whole host is blocked, not necessarily because of the individual content of the page.
 jschinker  In our override procedure, all staff members can request unblocks.
 jschinker  But the committee that makes the decision is made up of the media specialists + a couple administrators
 cathy e  My teacher can get around most blocks with their network login and password
 jschinker  Filter changes apply to everyone though, and are more or less permanent
 sbrokvam  In my school, the filtering software only allows for two admins, both of whom are technical staff, not educators. Although they will take their cue from the program leaders and principals, it kills the immediacy and puts teachers off.
 Chris Craft  i agree with cathy, there should be a thawte-esque trusted access network
 cheryloakes  you were messing withthem!
 jschinker  Dave, you're right. We should deal with this when it comes up.
 cathy e  I agree- but parents have a fit
 jschinker  But doing it on purpose would upset a lot of people.
 jschinker  Filtering solutions are never perfect -- those opportunities are still going to come up.
 cheryloakes  a teacher at my school was confronted by a parent when the kids observed a slain deer on the Plymouth Plantation website. HM.
 cathy e  Principals don't like angry parents -
 JenniferW  yes, cathe e -- that is what I was thinking
 jschinker  And we should probably teach the kids how to use the Internet outside of school too
 JenM  where are the recent baby pictures? :)
 cheryloakes  We, in schools, have the kiddos for 6 hours a day, parents have them the rest, but we need to have parent training.
 JenniferW  jschninker -- that is EXACTLY what I taught my students -- that THEY will the filter
 JenniferW  regardless where they are
 jschinker  They have to be the filter. We have to teach personal responsibility
 jschinker  I'm really uncomfortable with "protecting" people from information
 jschinker  At the same time, we have to have filtering.
 JenniferW  Grins -- sometimes I need filtering lessons too :)
 jschinker  So I don't feel so bad that they can get around the filter when needed.
 jschinker  But I'd prefer that that comment not be mentioned on the audio :-)
 cheryloakes  Me too John, I think they are clever.
 cathy e  I think cause of parents
 jschinker  Yep -- we're liable for what we let kids access at school
 Chris Craft  so then who is liable for what they access without our permission?
 jschinker  And there's federal law that says we have to do it; I don't think it's even debated much anymore
 cheryloakes  There is some law, COPA for under age 13, we have to comply with.
 JenniferW  that the filter be loaded though
 JenniferW  does it say it has to be running?? I never saw that
 jschinker  I think we debated before it was a legal issue.
 jschinker  We had a better chance of winning the argument then,
 LeeAnn  The blocking in our case is to preveent chat and internet email
 jschinker  but now it's a moot point.
 dave  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_Online_Protection_Act
 LeeAnn  cyberbullying
 cheryloakes  thanks dave for copa
 sbrokvam  From the principals point of view, in schools where kids have free periods and access to labs during free periods, there's more of a chance of them accidentally or otherwise accessing inappropriate content. With a multi-religion, multi-cultural parent/student body, our director just doesn't want to take any chanches.
 LeeAnn  and physical fighting
 sharonp  what is the skype address for the talk tonight??
 LeeAnn  comes from it
 JenniferW  sharon -- I found it through skypecasts through google
 LeeAnn  little ability to track the conversations
 sharonp  okdy doke
 DS  https://skypecasts.skype.com/skypecasts/skypecast/detailed.html?id_talk=...
 LeeAnn  but ...then the bullying now takes place at home and the fights still exist from it
 LeeAnn  in school
 jschinker  Written in 1997 by polititians?
 jschinker  We just move everything in-house
 jschinker  We use Moodle -- kids can communicate with each other within the system
 jschinker  But they can't get out.
 dave  it has an rss feed
 dave  :)
 jschinker  It does diminish the ability to connect to other schools, but it does allow us to use the technology.
 jschinker  The rss feeds are (mostly) disabled on our system.
 sharonp  great accent - or attempt - Dave
 sharonp  wanna hear your Maritime accent
 jschinker  We did do a project with a school from England last year.
 jschinker  We just created accounts for the other school.
 jschinker  Wow -- I'm noticing the delay now.
 sharonp  am dying here - what an accent! lol
 sharonp  the true dirty south..?
 sharonp  the filter seems particularly high (to me) in the southwest
 jschinker  I'm in Ohio -- newly repainted blue (thank God)
 sbrokvam  Do any of your schools allow access to only selected domains, e.g. edublogs but not MySpace, etc., academically related forums, but not gaming ones?
 jschinker  But my community is very conservative
 jschinker  sbrokvam: I don't know. It's possible that we could be
 JenniferW  I am in California -- and though it is Blue -- I tend to be Red (conservative big time)
 jschinker  We use Secure Computing's SmartFilter. But we can override sites based on local policy
 JenniferW  sbrokvam -- blanket filters is what I see
 JenniferW  but that is just me -- and my experience
 sharonp  I work in a private school - which will unblock what I ask, but seems to block anything collaborative initially
 JenniferW  and word filters -- and topics
 sbrokvam  Ah, we've been thinking about switching filtering software - something with room for more filtering admins, so we can respond more quickly to requests to unblock
 jschinker  sharon: well put, and consistent with my experience
 jschinker  Why is the IT person the gatekeeper who decides what is and is not appropriate?
 JenniferW  Sharon - can YOU unblock??
 sharonp  we need a switch in filtering software too
 JenniferW  or do they UNBLOCK?
 sharonp  not personally
 dave  ETT is going to fly solo for a few minutes... must go serve child
 dave  keep talking!
 sharonp  I have to sweettalk the techies in charge
 sharonp  which I do so well
 JenniferW  so -- what is the timeframe of gettig things unblocked
 sharonp  5 min to half an hour
 JenniferW  ahhh okay
 sharonp  we had Town Hall meetings with the students this past week
 jschinker  hacking ?= problem solving??
 sharonp  number one issue - THE WEB FILTER
 LeeAnn  they have helped me out by giving me an outside ip address to use for times I want to be unblocked
 sharonp  (and my own son was the chief leader in that)
 LeeAnn  i log in do whatever and log out and log back into our regular proxy
 sharonp  my school blocked Firefox use for the first time this past week
 Chris Craft  blocked the website to download the program?
 jschinker  *groan* I can see that, b/c FF is harder to lock down
 sharonp  I was initially quite frustrated - but then in a mere two hours, a colleague told me a workaround
 sharonp  blocked ANY FF use
 sbrokvam  Is anyone allowing translators, e.g. babelfish? I don't know if the kids know they can use it to bypass filters, but our network admin thought better safe than sorry. Not particularly good for beginning language students anyway
 sharonp  not just the download
 dave  the teachers aren't suing the admins
 dave  the parents are
 sbrokvam  sharonp: Could people use the portable FF? On the thumb drive?
 sharonp  what?? no filters Dave while we were gone??
 jschinker  I do think this is much less of a problem than we're making it. I really don't get many complaints from the teachers or the students.
 sharonp  nope - no thumb drive for FF
 sharonp  the workaround = changing the name of the FF exe file
 Chris Craft  so the portable apps version doesn't work?
 sbrokvam  our teachers often hesitate to plan web tasks as they expect stuff to be blocked
 Chris Craft  or of course you can download the source and compile it as bonecho
 sharonp  nope - they blocked anything initiated by the FF exe
 jschinker  Our teachers do their planning at school for web projects, so they know what's blocked.
 sbrokvam  we have different filter settings for teachers and students
 sbrokvam  teachers can check out resources and then request to have them unblocked
 jschinker  Are you filtering by user or by machine?
 sharonp  so, my students were way ahead of me and had ALREADY changed all the FF exe files on the lab computers to - get this - internet explore.exe (I had such a GOOD laugh at that)
 jschinker  That seems unweildy
 jschinker  john
 sbrokvam  by group - i think it uses active directory
 sharonp  sbrokvam - isn't that just too time-consuming to have to anticipate the students' web site usage??
 sbrokvam  yes it is - we're working within the confines of directives from above
 jschinker  It's complicated. But I can see how it could be done.
 jschinker  In the user profile, direct them to different proxies.
 jschinker  Caching may be an issue, though.
 sharonp  I changed my FF exe name to Firfox
 sbrokvam  Do most schools allow access to YouTube?
 jschinker  no
 Chris Craft  we sure don't
 JenniferW  most don't
 Chris Craft  dansguardian
 Chris Craft  www.dansguardian.org
 jschinker  It needs to be the media specialists
 JenniferW  cybersitter
 sbrokvam  I read a lot about the potential educational value of YouTube
 jschinker  They're our information professionals
 Chris Craft  we don't use it in my district, but i have looked at it personally
 JenniferW  I am muted BIG TIME
 JenniferW  howling
 Chris Craft  http://208.65.153.251
 JenniferW  cybersitter worked well for us
 cathy e  I'm glad my IT person is in charge of the blocks and unblocks- if I had to wait for requests to be processed it would be forever.
 Chris Craft  that is www.youtube.com
 Chris Craft  see if that works, just to see if it's blocked by url or actually via dns
 jschinker  Here are our guidelines: http://www.bbhcsd.org/tech/filter/filter_criteria.php
 cathy e  We use lightspeed
 JenniferW  wowowow
 jschinker  Ours are all blocked by URL -- if the kids to dns lookups, they can just use the IPs and get to just about anything
 jschinker  Who are they? Scary, isn't it?
 JenniferW  You have just opened my eyes
 JenniferW  I didn't think of DNS/IPS
 jschinker  We had a case where there was a site about a teacher that a student had on Angelfire
 jschinker  Mine -- John
 jschinker  Brecksville-Broadview Hts. City Schools in Ohio
 jschinker  The case was made that there are situations where we might be teaching kids about things that are illegal.
 jschinker  So something that is illegal isn't necessarily automatically blocked.
 sharonp  Listen - for a while everything in "uncategorized" by web blocker was being blocked - just a minute - that means just about EVERYTHING!! And it was like that!
 Chris Craft  sorry guys, have to run, my 6 month old baby is getting fussy!
 sharonp  drove me nuts
 Chris Craft  thanks for a GREAT discussion!!
 jschinker  Look at the policy at the top
 sharonp  I love to rant about this
 jschinker  We have to live within the policy
 DS  John, is my site blocked? http://samlab.com
 sharonp  what I think is that it is incumbent upon we educators to teach our students how to be responsible users fo the Internet - how do we do that if EVERYTHING is blocked! My students are insulted by the lack of trust
 sbrokvam  The policies are from web 1.0
 sharonp  good point about web 1.0 - no opportunity for collaborative shared spaces - they would be filtered by this every time
 jschinker  It's open, but there aren't any links to it -- or there weren't
 JenniferW  jschniker -- do you have an AUP??
 Matt_Cronin  What's the middle ground between strict filtering and a wide open web?
 JenniferW  or was that the AUP??
 jschinker  Yes hold on
 JenniferW  and JOHN -- are you in the skypechat too??
 sharonp  My students point out that they can go home at night and look at whatever they want
 jschinker  I'm not in skype -- no microphone
 sharonp  so there they are - in the classroom WANTING to use the Internet and they give up - and wait to go home and do the work - this has happened to me too often
 dave  wrapping up soon...
 jschinker  They can't interact with people, and that takes a lot away from the usefulness of the web. But it's not that they can't do anything....
 sbrokvam  At the moment, it becomes a sport to bypass the filters, with some kids actually spending less time on what they're supposed to do than they would if they weren't restricted.
 JenniferW  we must be getting close to our time limit at skypechat
 jschinker  AUP: http://www.bbhcsd.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=46&Itemi...
 jschinker  I have to say that this makes much more sense when I'm interacting live instead of listening in my car a week later
 jschinker  I may have to blog about it again.
 JenniferW  john -- thanks for being brave to show your links
 jschinker  :-) But what have we resolved?
 JenniferW  not much -- but we have created some great thoughts & ideas
 jschinker  Have we broken any new ground? I know the discussion was great.
 JenniferW  we should have a PART 2 of this
 JenniferW  so far -- we are plowing over already plowed ground
 sharonp  you know, I am embarrassed to share this (somewhat) but there was a time when my OWN son was charging money from his peers to get around tthe filter (I stopped this as soon as I found out)
 JenniferW  but sometimes you have to do it again
 jschinker  That was a victory -- the lawyers wanted us to get an opt-IN for each student every year
 jschinker  So -- who has a positive AUP?
 jschinker  Joyce! Good to see you're still around
 joycevalenza  hi
 cathy e  Is mike and educator
 jschinker  And Cheryl, I like the work you've done with Bob. You've been a big help to me
 joycevalenza  we are in a period of transition
 dave  HI JOYCE!!!
 joycevalenza  hey, dave!
 sharonp  good point
 sharonp  I think we need to revist this
 jschinker  Joyce: I sent your future of libraries podcast on ed tech talk to all of my media people.
 joycevalenza  thanks! maybe we need to create new models for 21st century
 joycevalenza  a wiki project?
 JenniferW  LOL
 JenniferW  always a wiki possibility
 jschinker  I don't think wikis will work w/teachers
 jschinker  I know -- that's a whole other conversation
 dave  there you go with the wikis
 joycevalenza  :-)
 dave  :)
 jschinker  Thanks, Dave. This is really fun
 jschinker  Was he selling unfiltered access to the adults, too?
 jschinker  *grin*
 sbrokvam  Did he [u]show[/u] them how to do it, or get them in without showing how, i.e. perserving his market?
 jschinker  Thank you.
 dave  cheers
 cathy e  bye
 cheryloakes  I was reading the paper John. thanks for your kind comments.
 cheryloakes  bye
 dave  bye all
 DS  thanks all-that was a lot of fun
 JenniferW  sharon and I are still skyping if you wish to join in -- let me know
 sbrokvam  Sorry, has the show started yet, because I can't open any of the files...
 jschinker  is there another show?
 sroseman  wonders if there is a show
 jschinker  ed tech weekly and ed tech talk are over
 jschinker  is there another show?
 sroseman  I guessed I missed it all
 sbrokvam  Oh, it says EdTech Talk#73 is on now
 sroseman  That it does
 sbrokvam  whereas the weekly was on an hour ago - i thought they were back to back
 sbrokvam  Oh, well - nothing for it then - back to work :)
 jschinker  I had the times wrong initially.
 sroseman  me too
 jschinker  I was thinking 8 and 9 local (EST), but it was 7 and 8
 sroseman  so
 sroseman  that's it missed the great show
 sbrokvam  So it was ETT, not ETW that was just on, with the discussion on filtering, etc?
 jschinker  Right
 jschinker  ETW was before that.
 jschinker  It was pretty short
 sbrokvam  Ah, well - the podcasts are good as well. Are they normally on at the same time?
 jschinker  ETT wasn't supposed to happen, but there was a good discussion going, so Dave decided to do one
 jschinker  This is the first time I've actually participated in real time
 sroseman  and the topic was
 sbrokvam  filtering
 jschinker  Usually I just listen to the podcasts
 sbrokvam  I can't really say I usually do anything - just discovered this last week
 sroseman  back to work
 sbrokvam  bye
 jschinker  :-) I'm off, too.
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