Reflection of the Year 2011

I started this blog as a way for me to document what I do as a dedicated educator. I love working with students in FBLA and in the classroom. I do what I can to help them succeed. Unfortunately many people in my community and even my family do not seem to respect the work that I do and feel it is appropriate to bash educators. I am not looking to change anyone's mind on the role of education in today's society but this is a way for me to see that "yes, I am making a difference". It has been stated that teachers don't work that much and get paid too much. Since the end of last school year (June 2011) I have been keeping track of the hours that I have put into my job. At the end of December I have documented over 1,000 hours towards my job. The school that I work with I got my first pay check on September 15 of 2011 for this school year. I had put in many hours prior to the start of the school year and I will continue to do this because that is what is in the best interest of education and my students. How many hours have you put in? Do you feel respected? I hope to continue to keep up on documenting hours and putting in blog entries. Happy New Year.

Google Ninja 1st Meeting

I meet with 4 great co-workers today who are going to help me pilot and rollout Google Apps at the high school.  I can not even express how excited I am about working with them.  I have a great mix of content areas (modern language, science, english and of course business).  I had use first start using a google doc and collaborativly writing what some of our goals are for using Google Apps for the school.  Then we went through and tried to categorieze them as immediate, intermediate and long range goals.

We did not have a lot of time on this but we got a start on it.  I also tried to give a couple Google tips that I have learned to help them hone their Ninja skills.  I do believe everyone did learn something with my tips.  I have been going through the Google Apps Certification test to make sure that I have the skills needed to lead our school down the Google Path.  So I took our goals and put it into a Word Cloud using a Spreadsheet Google Gadget.  Here is what our word cloud looks like.

I hope this document continues to grow and evolve as we look for ways to engage students in more of a digital lifestyle in school.

Tech Tuesday Training - Skype

My school has "Tech Tuesday's".  This is where teachers offer to do trainings on a variety of technology topics.  I have done one already on Animoto this year and this week I offered a session on Skype.  I got new computers in my lab at the end of last year.  One of my requirements for the computers were that the monitors have built in webcams (for Skyping and other technologies that may come up).  I also had Skype installed on all the computers so if students have Skype accounts they can contact anyone they need.

I have used Skype with my classes when I have been home with a sick child and students have Skyped with me for help on a problem or for me to give directions.  I set up a couple of colleagues to assist me with Skype (so I knew someone would be online to chat with).  Jessica Brogley a former teacher at Seymour and Sandy Heiden (Library Media Specialist for high school).  I had one teacher from the district attend that had never used Skype before, and other great friend who came for moral support (thanks CeCe).

I think the session went fine, got new an account on Skype and she called someone.  We did end up demonstrating how to have a conference call via Skype and had 6 people talking.  I also showed the people how to sign up for Skype in the classroom.  One other great tip I like about Skype is the ability to share computer monitors to see what the other person is doing on the computer.

Here is my question.  Out of the 50 teachers in the high school only 1 came (the other for moral support too).  Was the topic not relevant to them?  Do they not see the need to learn technology?  Do they not like my presentation style?  Did they already know the content?  These are all questions I have but don't have answers for.  It is easy for me to say well I won't do that again, or should I?

Google Apps Certified Test #2 - Doc

Whew!  I just took my second test and it was harder.  I already new I would struggle more because I had to read the content over 3 days (non-sequential).  The site said it would take 4 hours to go through and it did.  I read the last 2.5 sections tonight and told myself I need to take it now, before I forget I what I read earlier this week.

I passed the section but I was not happy with a couple of the questions.  There were specific questions on the Doc List view (which I could find some information on the search bar of the site, but it was not directly linked to the table of contents of the section).  Also it gave directions for the old view of Google Docs and I have been using the new version for well over a month.  So did I get information wrong because it is presented wrong??

I also had questions on drawings.  I did not find an specific trainings on Drawings from the table of contents, but when I searched I did find some specifics relating it to Chapter 7 in Module 4 (but again not in table of contents).

But I passed.  Now I have to schedule to get through: mail, calendar, sites and other tools.  The are all estimating 3 hours to go over materials (other tools is only 2).  So I have 11 hours of studying to do and 6 hours of tests to complete.

Google Apps Module 4 - Docs

So I started my 2nd section of Google Apps.  It is the longest section in the training material but the one I will get hit the hardest with questions.  I have made it through the general sharing explaination (did you know you can share a document with up to 200 people, but only 50 can edit it at a time) and docs.  I am saving spreadsheets, presentation, and forms for later.

I will say I learned some really cool time savers that if I had not decided to go through this training I would have never know.  I love learning this stuff.

Did you know that there is a addon to work with Microsoft Office and Google  Docs that you can download.  You can work in office and in docs at the same time.  I have downloaded it but have not tested it out yet.  You can bet I will do that Thursday!  It is called Google Cloud Connect.



Also a nice time saver I learned is that in using Google Chrome or current Firefox you can drag from your desktop to google documents.  You don't have to click upload.  WAY BIG TIME SAVER.  That is a two thumbs up for me.

This module does say it will take 4 hours to go through and I don't have that much time at night to devote to it.  So I will be chunking it to get through it all.  I hope to take the test within a week, so I don't forget it all.

Tools - Mathematical equations

Tools - Mathematical equations

Looking for a way to use Google Docs when you are writing equations?  This site will help you use it.

Accounting II Independent Study

I know I can say I am a teacher because of my high school accounting teacher Mrs. Nancy Nelson.  I had never been in a class where what ever was explained I "just got it".  When I went to college it took me a long time to decide upon a major.  Accounting or be a teacher (my mom was elementary ed).  Half way through my sophomore year it hit me, I SHOULD TEACH ACCOUNTING!  What a ride it has been.

I tell me classes every year that I am a teacher because of accounting.  But I also remember my senior year of high school I could not take accounting II because it was only offered the same hour as band.  How could I choose between the two.  I had been in Band since 5th grade but I LOVED accounting.  Mrs. Nelson talked to me and said I could take it independent study.  Work on my own reading the book and complete the assignments.  She gave me a general calendar (but I went ahead a little) and I took tests when I got to them.  I was in such appreciation of Mrs. Nelson making this accommodation for me that I do the same thing for my accounting II students. But now I offer accounting II as an independent study during the hour that I am teaching Accounting I.  I know they have a lot more questions than I did and that  is OK.  As a teacher I go through and record every section of the book for students to watch to learn how to complete the assignments.
I know not all students watch it, but I make it there available for them.  I do the same thing in Accounting I, when I teach a section I record it and publish it to the web for students to watch when they are absent or to review prior to the test.

This does take me time, but I hope it is empowering students to take command of their learning and use the tools available to them.

Thank You Mrs. Nelson for inspiring me to be the person that I am today!  Your confidence in me has taken me many places !

Here is one of my videos for Accounting II;

Sick Days

So I am reflecting back on the month of November.  I was not in school on any Friday in November.  I know that sounds bad.  Let's recap where I was.

November 4, Midwest Google Summit (PS greatest conference ever)
November 11, FBLA National Fall Leadership Conference - where I had to present
November 18, Home with a sick kid who was puking.

Now my post deals with Sick Days.  I had to take two the week of November 15.  My oldest son puked Sunday, so we stayed home on Monday, then again on Thursday night.  This was right after I got home at 9 p.m. because of parent teacher conference.

It is hard to prep and plan to be gone two days in one week.  I had to communicate with people in the building about "stuff".  I had a meeting schedule with student services on Monday to set up a online scheduling option for parents.  I know how hard it is to get them to both have a cleared calendar.  So my solution was I Skyped in.  Even thought I had a sick kid and I took the day off, I spend over 5 hours online that day with various people in the building.  I even Skyped in to my 1st and 2nd hour classes to give them directions and answer their questions.

Now on Friday I had the simialr problem.  I didn't have a meeting scheduled with anyone, but I knew students need to talk with me to answer their questions on their work.  I had to talk with my concession store manager about what to order for the upcoming Wrestling tournament.  We can't run out of hot dogs or buns.  I also had students Skype with me to answer their accounting questions.  I would say on Friday I only spent about 3 hour on Skype.  But still two days off of work and I still worked 8 hours.

My son was not feeling well but he was resting and watching TV and reading books so he didn't need a lot of attention from me.  Do all people put this dedication into what they do?  Why do people think I (meaning all teachers) don't work hard?

Working Hours

I had a great opportunity today to sell concessions at a wrestling match.  FBLA had plenty of workers for the event, but it makes for a long day.  I have several helpers talking about how they didn't eat dinner, tired, had to do school work.  I completely understand because I was in the same boat, I was at school for 13.5 hours.  But to me, I don't complain because this is what I choose to do.  I love teaching, I love working with kids.  I know that the activities and trips I do more outside of the classroom are the memorable experiences for them.  I would love to think that they get the same from my classroom, but some are disengaged or distracted because of "other things".

In the current climate Teacher are being blamed for the economic woes of the state.  I started this blog because I wanted people to see the amount of time and effort I put into my career.  I don't expect to receive anything special except the respect of you work hard at your job and you do deserve the money you are receiving and maybe even more.

The average american in 1 year works 2,000 hours.  I have been documenting the amount of hours I have been putting into everything for my career.  This includes: FBLA, Professional Organizations, meetings, and professional development.  I started keeping track in June of 2011.  Since June of 2011 I have worked at least 872 hours.  On average in one month people will work 160 hours, I got paid in September and my work contract started in the end of August.  So I have been working this school year for 3 months but I already have almost double the hours for a typical work period.

I am not complaining, again I love my job.  I don't like how people think I don't work hard.  Please respect me and my fellow hard working teachers.

Google Apps Test 1!

I have had a hard time coming up with what to write on my blog now that the school year is in full swing.  I am doing a lot of different activities and projects, but I truly believe that all educators do the same amount of work that I do, so why am I special.  A couple of items I do have on my burn to blog about would be the Google Midwest Summit (so awesome), so keep your eyes open for that.

That conference did inspire me to take a step to become a Google Apps Certified Teacher.  There are 6 parts to becoming certified and today I took part 1, Admin.  I have been using this the past couple of months to get our school ready to go Google.  I read through the training materials (on the site it said 45 minutes), of course I thought I would be able to breeze through it because I have been using it already.  It did take me that long to go through the materials.  No shortcut to get the information.  I also knew that I wanted to study the materials and then take the test in the same setting.  Since part 1 only said 45 minutes, I figured that would be the easiest of the 6 to get under my belt.

The exam is 60 question and they give you 90 minutes to take it.  I did use a full hour, because I didn't want to get tricked by all/none questions.  I reviewed 8 questions before I submitted my results.  I did change a couple of those answers so having the ability to mark questions I want to go over was VERY nice.

I clicked the submit button and waited to see if I passed.  I paid the testing fee of $15 out of my own pocket, because I believe it need to have this training to lead the staff in my building.  Maybe I will see if I can get reimbursed (probably not), but maybe.  They also stated that you can take the test over again only once if you did not pass it (and you have to pay for it too).

The results came and AHHHHH!  I passed with a 95% so I got 3 wrong out of 60.  Pretty good, now I have to carve out time to do the other 5 sections: Gmail, Docs, Calendar, Sites, Other Tools.  We will see when that fits into my schedule.  But it will get done.  I will keep you updated!

Fel 2.0: 100 Take-Aways From the Midwest Google Summit

Fel 2.0: 100 Take-Aways From the Midwest Google Summit: We all hope to leave a conference with a few things to tuck into our repertoire. I usually hope for at least one but hardly expect mor...

Tech Tuesday's - Animoto

Our district is having technology training on Tuesday's.  It is voluntary for people to participate.  So far I have attended a session on Google Search by Sara Berceau, very useful tool to assist students in using sites that have  the type of information required for the activity.

I facilitated a session on PowerGrade Book,  this was a required session for high faculty.  All faculty for 1 faculty meeting had to pick from 3 options for staff development.  I had almost 10 teachers in the room and I was glad to know that John Steltz was able to learn at least 1 helpful tip on putting in grades easier.  I know that I was covering materials too fast and did allow for discussion, but I just so much to share.  So next time I will pair down what I will cover.

Today I gave a session on how to create an Animoto video and to apply for a teacher account.  The teacher account give you access for 6 months to make full length videos.  Otherwise with the free account you can only make 30 second videos.  I had three teachers attend the session and they said they liked it.  I hope so.

School Board Meeting

In order for organizations at my school to fundraiser it needs to be approved at the September school board meeting, so tonight myself and other FBLA (Future Business Leader of America) adviser asked the board's permission to do a fundraiser.

This is the first time we have had to ask permission.  Prior to this year the school board has supported financial my students advancements to national FBLA level competition, but with dwindling budgets this is coming to an end (but amazingly sport kids don't have to pay - another topic).  My co-adivser Cindy did the leg work and filled out the paperwork for this to be approved and tonight we just shared with the board what we would like to do.

It is always good to be visible with the board so they know what the department is doing to help students succeed.  It will be more work for us this year to keep track of the fundraising packets from our students but it should cause less work in the spring for going to our National conference.

Presenting at State Conference-WBEA

I am the secretary for my state business teacher organization and our fall convention is coming up at the end of September.  I was asked to present on my use of Aplia for teaching Accounting online.  I am going to be working with a Cengage representative on it, but I am going to be giving it from the teacher's perspective on what works and some struggles.

It took me about 2.5 hours to pull my presentation together.  Because I had students video tape their statements about aplia and I pulled that together in a video for the presentation.  I then posted the video on YouTube to make it render easier for my presentation.  Usually I post all my videos on SchoolTube, but I am using Prezi for the presentation and YouTube just works better.

Here is my Presentation for WBEA Fall 2011

Aplia 2011 on Prezi

Grad School Class -Active Learning Strategies

As many teacher do I signed up for a grad school class for this fall.  This one credit class is being offered right in my district so I will not have to travel and some of my colleagues took it last year and raved on how they were able to use it right away in their classroom.  With that type of reviews how could I not sign up for it.  I did have to let the instructor know right away that the second night of class I would miss because I have a meeting for our Transcripted credit class at FVTC (then I also found out it was my son's open house, plus I was also scheduled to work a sporting event).  Talk about being overbooked.  I did find someone to take my sporting event duty {THANK YOU}  and I should finish my meeting in time to attend the open house.

I had the first meeting September 22 and it made my head spin.  good information but I had a hard time coming up with how to make it work for my classroom.  I asked questions and I got some assistance and advice on how to work it in a high school setting.

I was in class for 3 hours and then I promptly went to my room to try to incorporate some of those ideas into my classroom for the next day.  It took me from 8 to 11 p.m. but I pulled together two activities to use the next morning.  Now the activities were not that elaborate that it took me three hours, but I was also able to accomplish some other upcoming responsibilities.  I will save that for another post.

the two activities I did were numbered list.  I have the students the 7 steps to recording an accounting transaction.  These steps were cut into slips and as a group of 4 students had to put them in order and tell my why they choose that order.  I will admit that what I thought was the "right" order was disputed by the students thought process.  I agreed that what they had could be correct because they defended their thought process.  I liked seeing the students work in groups and it appears they enjoyed doing some moving and collaborating in a non-evaluated sense.

The second activity I did was a think pair share.  Two students worked on classifying a TAccount and then shared their Taccount with another pair of students and the groups had to agree or disagree with each other.  I did not have as much buy in from this activity but it was good to get them thinking out loud so I could hear what they know from accounting.

Google Webinar - Personal Experiences

I was in on a Webinar on Wednesday.  Deforest High School in Wisconsin shared with the group how they moved through being a Google Apps school.  It was really nice to hear from someone in Wisconsin on what they had to do to be successful.  I know Google Apps can really change how teachers and student share work and complete tasks, but if the implementation goes awkwardly then it can stop it before it takes off.  Luckily or unluckily this is falling under my task list for the year.  I have a great tech person to work with, but roadblocks are a big concern of my for faculty buy in.

Here are some of my notes from the Webinar:

Deforest has gmail for grades 9-12, switching to 5-8 in next two weeks.  They don't have a curricular need for email for grades 3-4.  They can lock down(walled garden) the lower levels to only email within the domain.  They have not had a problem with bullying online with email.  Teach the teachers how to supervise

No minimum age to make gmail available through google apps

Deforest uses graduation years as a way to group students.  This is a mirror for how they organize the network.  That way when students move up a year and need more apps, they become available easier than using the group 1st grade etc.

They use the domain name deforestschools.org.  They already owned the domain name.  They are going to switch over all teachers and students to gmail and get out of groupwise.

The use of calendars was huge for signup labs and communicating with parents/peers

These notes will help me to move forward on getting our school up to speed with technology tools, if I can get more teach buy in.  Does anyone have any advice for me on this?

PowerTeacher Gradebook Share Session

I gave a presentation to my peers today on tips and tricks for using Gradebook.  I had spend some time researching what are the new features to the program for this year and even went "old school" and created a handout for people to have when they left.  I was hoping they would use it for taking notes - don't know if they actually did.

One thing that I do know is that I had more information than time.  I don't know if I did a good job of prioritize what I should cover.  I did really enjoy the questions/tips from my peers, but I was worried that I was not going to get through my content and did not let their conversation develop into what could be a great peer sharing session.  That is one of my stumbling blocks on teaching technology I get stuck on getting through all the content I tend to stifle the conversation that can lead to good peer collaboration.  ** Mental note to work on that**

I did enjoy sharing my tips/tricks but I don't know if everyone there was wanting to learn or if they were there because they had to be one session.  I do hope that they walked away with at least one thing new!  The gradebook is a program that we are working in constantly and having a better way to work in it can really streamline your work efficiency.

At the end of the faculty share session I did send out a google form for feedback on which session they attended and what they learned.  I do hope everyone fills it out truthfully so in the future they can get what they need in a way they wanted.

I did learn while pulling together my handouts for this presentation that Word 2010 has a cool new feature for inserting screen capture images!  Check it out under Insert menu, it worked great and gave some very clear images.

FBLA Texting Competition

For Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) we plan activities for during the school day as well as after school.  Our September fun activity was to have a texting competition and ice cream social.  Our club treasurer was in charge of creating promotional materials as well as creating the phrases for the competition.  We had the phrases entered into a power point presentation and clicked through the presentation for each level of competition 

there were not fees for this event and it was a double elimination tournament.  Students really enjoyed entering in the phrases and just being together.  It was a busy schedule night for students at school so I would have hoped for more attendance, but the kids there really enjoyed the activities.

Working with the Library

I am finding it harder to keep up on the blog now that school is in session.  I am thoroughly enjoying my new task of working on technology for the school.  I have been meeting with our librarian and aide that work in the Library to see what needs to be done to get the facility up and running.  Over the summer all new carpet was installed and the distance learning lab was dismantled and an individual learning computer lab was installed.

The computers needed some updates to Java and Flash Player to make it up to par for what students need to do to complete their online learning.  The website is dependent on java and students do not have the privileges to download and run updates (which is a good thing).

Our library has 3 audio studios that have not been used a lot in the last two years so I am initiating conversations on what and how they should be used.  I am not trying to take space or equipment away from anyone, but if it has not been used in the last 3 years except twice by only teachers, can the space be put to better use.

Another piece of equipment that I have been working on organizing the the fax machine.  We had previously a standard fax machine located in the distance learning lab for teachers/students to use to fax documents.  The office staff did not want faculty/students coming in  use the fax machine in the office so this was set up.  But with the distance learning room taken apart, we need to find a solution.  Currently everyone is going to the office, but after some investigation all of our copiers are capable of faxing and scanning.  So I will be working with our technology department to use our current equipment to meet our needs.

More meetings to come but trying to move ahead and streamline work for several people

CISCO Academy Webinar

Tonight I was in on a Webinar learning about how the current structure of my CISCO PC hardware essentials class is going to change.  It looks like they are trying to streamline the management and organization of how schools/institutions use and manage their current CISCO courses.

Because of the limited amount of courses I offer this will change my one course and it was discussed at a much larger scale than is related to me.  I want to be kept up to date on changes but it was difficult for me to engaged because I am such a small role in their big cog of educating students on computer skills.

This is the recorded Webinar

Here is a video some of my student did in my CISCO course.  I really enjoyed watching students  develop the storyline for the video.

First day of Inservice

Wow here we are starting the 2011-2012 school year.  We had a wonderful speaker today to start the school year.  He talked about losing adultitis and having fun in the moment.  Trying not to live via your to do list but just live your life.  The biggest part I got out of it was if your life was a book/movie would it be a good one with lots of really good scenes or just jumping from one thing to the next.  I think I jump to much and I do not enjoy more moments.  I will work on that.  To learn more about this I signed up for a newsletter to keep me thinking and living young.  Here is the website Adultitis.  Some good laughs were had.

I am under some additional stress to start the school year as I will be missing the first two days due to the death of my Grandmother.  She was 91 and had a very blessed life and I am going to be with my family to help celebrate all she did for us.  But that leaves my classroom to start the year!  Yikes.

I love to use technology but I am concerned that my technology is not going to work and that my sub will struggle and the kids will misbehave.  I have come up with activities for two of my classes just a couple more to come up with.  But I am having them create a voki introduction of themself.  This will help me to learn more about them, plus they get to play with technology.  I am just crossing my toes that all the equipment works and kids can log in.  Here is my voki for one of my classes.


So I just looked over my hours for the summer.  Since school got out I have put in 270 hours of work that has been unpaid.  That is a pretty good chunk of time out of my so called vacation.  I will keep adding my additional hours put in to see how long it takes me to get to 2,000 hours.

Concession Room Set-up for First Home Football Game

Well the room is set up and ready for our first event on Friday.  Today I had to make sure that the candy was put away and ready to sell.  We put the candy in containers so every candy starts with 30, this makes it easier for clubs to know what their starting amount to calculate how much they have used at the end of the night.  I did receive an order for candy/hot dogs/nachos.  All the items get just left in the middle of the room so everything needs to be put away.  I also use this time to go through and dispose of items that are just left in the room from outside organizations using the room.

I was also lucky to haul down to the room 16 cases of water and 9 cases of Gatorade.  Once in the room I had to load up the cooler to be sure that they were ready and cooled for sale.  I was lucky to have a student walk by and ask if I needed help and I said "YES".  He brought the Ice Cream cooler back to the room and the Nacho Machine.  This saved me 3 separate trips to just get all the equipment in the right spot.  If he had not asked it would have taken me at least an additional 1.5 hours of work !  THANK YOU!

I did also fill out paperwork to pay the three different businesses that I received inventory from.  It is not hard but just takes a lot of time to do it all.  I know our auditors like how we do it, but it is cumbersome for the large amount of paperwork I do for this task.

I am find this job duty very thankless.  I work very had to maintain a high level of accuracy in billing and receiving of inventory but leadership and colleagues nit pick everything that is done without a thanks or appreciation.  I don't need constant positive reinforcement, but all I hear is the negative and it is getting very old.  I am seriously thinking of retiring my running this additional non-paid responsibility.

I know students get a lot out of running the business, but they also do not get respect from people.  I will be doing a lot of reflecting on this a lot this year.  Let's see how the school year goes.

32 Ways to Use Google Apps in the Classroom - Webinar

Working at school and I attended a webinar in which they discussed ways to use Google Apps for classroom teachers.  I am working with the high school for them to become a Google Apps school and my role is going to be to help roll out how to implement it for the building.

I had troubles getting into the webinar and having audio.  I tried for over 15 minutes to call into the conference call number but could not get it to work.  Very frustrating for me because I was so excited to listen to the ideas.  So here is a list of some of the ideas I got from the webinar

Google Docs

Journals, instead of bringing home

Translate Letter to parents in a different language

Parent Sign up Sheet

Science Experiment, then used a motion Chart as a Google gadget, Google lookup 

Flash Cards (Google gadget), use a center for classroom.

Forms:

great way to collection information, give immediate results.  Get some pre-assessment and the results and can use fluburu (? spelling)  to grade forms and Google spreadsheet.  They do recommend changing the template to make it more exciting.  

Ways to use forms:  student surveys, observations, online reading records, discipline referrals, collect information from parents/teachers, spelling tests or multiplication test, collecting science data, 

Calendar:

Sending invitation for meeting and including a Google document, show standards mapping, add fun calendars such as Brewers or Packer's schedule.

Gmail:

Methods translation to work with parents who are not using the same primary language, global pen pals, 

Talk:

Doing a video chat to bring in guest speaker or conference.  Meet with students to help with work.

Sites:

Website creation tool, you can edit and publish it live instantaneously.  embedding calendar, calendar or any other  apps is easy.  Can create e-portfolio, can create projects and reports, curriculum sharing.

Blogger:
Run classroom and use  for lesson plans, easily intergrates with forms and documents.

Google Moderator

Reflect on daily learning.  Students can read each other's reflections and vote up the responses that they like the best.

I will be going back and rewatching this webnair to get all the tips and you may see another post on this area.

Freshmen Orientation

Today was the day that all the incoming new students at Seymour get to obtain their schedules, pay their fees, get their picture taken.  Also perfect opportunity for new members for Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA).  I had been working with my state officer in preparing a speech to give to students and parents about the importance of being involved in activities while in high school.  We specifically do not tell them to join FBLA but what they can get out of being involved, this way every club in school is not trying to give a speech for them to join.

I went to school two times today because there was orientation at 1 p.m. and 7 p.m.  We had a display board to promote FBLA and handouts to encourage people to join.  We had  4 to 5 officers there to help answer questions and encourage students to join.  I did not have to do much but help the state officer practice her speech with a microphone and just facilitate the FBLA booth.  My husband was out of town so I brought my two young boys with and that always means for interesting times.  My oldest who has helped out with activities was walking up to parents and students handing out packets and telling them to join FBLA (as you can tell he is not shy), the younger boy was just content to run and play in the hallways.

It was about 5 hours of at school helping to get student involved in FBLA which is good exposure for the club.  Hopefully it will pay off at our first meeting.

Freshmen Orientation Speech

Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) is active at my school because I feel students can get so much out of that organization.  Today I was on the phone and texting my state officer getting her ready for the speech she is giving to the incoming freshmen to our school.  This speech is highlighting the importance of being involved in high school not just a join FBLA speech.

The entire officer team for Seymour FBLA will be there to help but our state officer is giving the speech in her uniform to make more of a presence.  I had not heard the speech in its entirety so on my way to and from Milwaukee today I called and listen to it over the phone.  I gave her some edit revisions and then set a time for later to have a Skype meeting to see her give the speech.  Again we tweaked the phrases and highlighted important details.  This use of technology is great for students to see business applications not just the social part of the tool.

Monday will be a big day for FBLA getting to meet and great the incoming Freshmen.  I hope we get some students excited about it.

Aplia - Online Working Papers

I was on a Webinar today to review the use of Aplia online working papers for Accounting.  I would say that I love using the online working papers vs the printed workbook.  The use of online papers has made the teaching and assessment much nicer for students and me.  When I give an assignment it automatically grades the assignment the moment the due date.  This immediate feedback is great because students don't have to wait for me to grade their assignments to find out how they did.

One part that I constantly am concerned about is if students go back and look over their work.  As a teacher I always felt better when I passed back papers to students because they then had an opportunity to look at what they did.  I know student can do that online but they often just look at the grade and not necessarily what they did incorrectly.  I think I need to just get over it, but one why I give power back to students is if they disagree with how Aplia graded their homework, they can print their work and write out using accounting terms of why they should get points back for their work.  Often students will do this so I know they do look at some of their work.

This webinar was a review for me of the basic setup and use of Aplia, but it is good to go over the basics that you might forget.  I am also giving a workshop at Wisconsin Business Education Association (WBEA) fall conference on using Aplia in high school accounting class in conjunction with Cengage representative.  So I now know I will have more information for this presentation.

This webinar lasted over 1 hour.

Google Webinar - Google Apps for Education

I watched a webinar today that was advertised through Wisconsin CESA as help for school to roll into the use of Google Apps.  I have watched one previous webinar and had our Tech Guru watch the integration one.  The one I watched today was truly an overview of what Google can offer a school.

One of the best points I got out of it was: Why not go to the cloud.  This is an interesting point, I have been moving to the cloud for a while, just for the pure fact that I don't want to carry around a flash drive, burn a CD, or email back and forth a file and remember which email as the most current version.  I have to take a backseat and think about the rest of the people in my building.  I need to think more like them, but it stumps me.  I just love to use technology to make my life easier.  I know I sometimes get sidetracked trying to find an easier way of doing a job, but in the end I will do tasks more efficiently 

Just this week I met the new Principal at our elementary school.  I got a quick introduction and then she asked the Tech Guru a question on how to link files from the server to her Ipad, she got the response of it can't be done.  Then I  pipped up and said, use dropbox.  It is free and works great.  To me this is second nature, find a solution to the problem.  With my new role of tech integration at the high school I will need to consider lots of fears that people have in technology and embrace the role of bring them along.

Also in the Webinar I got an overview of all the apps that are available, but one of the nicest features with Google apps is the single sign-in.  It alleviates the issue with student not remembering username and passwords.  They will always have access to their files instead of saving it to the network and not being able to work on it at home because they don't have the file or don't have the program.  The only limitation is they need to have a device and have access to the internet.  I did a survey with our school to see how much access we have to the internet, of course it is not everyone but it is getting better.

My next step in rolling out Google Apps is going to be looking over the agreement with CESA.  But I really don't see why we need to go with them when we are already signed up.  Again more research.  Anyone out there know why I should sign the Wisconsin state Google agreement vs just keeping with registered domain name I setup last year?

Concession Stand - Start of school year setup

Have you ever thought about the popcorn/soda or candy you get when you go to a sporting event?  I do, all the time.  One of my jobs that I do during my teaching day is to organize and stock the concession stand for the high school.  Our first home sporting event is August 26 (first day of school is September 1).  We have a home football game.  To me a home football games means about 200 hot dog/buns, and approximately 20 cases of water and G2.  Let alone the candy, soda, popcorn, ice cream etc.

In order for the room to be fully stocked I have to order at least a week ahead of time.  This is where the problem begins, because so many people are just use to items being available to them that they don't understand or just don't care to think about what happens behinds the scenes.  I work with 5 different vendors to get products in the room and the vendors deliver on different days.  But I usually plan on all my products being there by Wednesday of the week.  So planning events we look at the type of event football vs swimming and the teams.  The school closer to us tend to bring more fans than a school over 1 1/2 hours away.

I do have 1 student that helps me manage the room.  Every year I train someone new and I have had some wonderful student really take the initiative and do a great job of understanding the ordering and bill paying procedure of the school more than fellow teachers.  It is difficult to jump into this role in the fall for the students because it is so fast paced.  In one week we could have 4 different organizations selling which means we need to count inventory after each event, and prepare an invoice for bill and then get a new inventory count sheet for the next group.

I do all of this using Quickbooks.  It does a great job on tracking inventory (as long as students can count correctly) as well as a tool for purchase orders and customer invoices.  Prior to using quickbooks I did everything in excel with each event on a separate sheet and it worked, but not quite as efficient (I would never go back).

Well today was the day I went into school to get the first order ready.  I am always ready in August to work on this project but I have NEVER gotten concrete information on what events are happening or even who is working the events prior to needing the information.  I always have to beg to get the data I need, and I often get the look or comment of you can find it or it is not that big of deal.  This gets my goat.  I have long and often said I am doing my job well if you don't hear anything about the concession stand, because  that means people are happy with what is happening, but if something went wrong then they will hear about it.  I prefer for it to work seamlessly and effortlessly, but I have people who don't agree.

First of all I do not get paid or get a prep or even 1 class period a day to do this job.  I manage and teach a student on how to do all of the ordering, billing, and counting.  I have long been the advocate of the group that sells on Friday night also needs to be the group that sells on Saturday because I WILL not come in or make my student come in over the weekend to count inventory on who sells what.  I know there are people who think I am to narrow minded but I take extreme pride in making sure everything is balanced and comes out after every event.  They go with the philosophy of just divide it in half and that will be fine, but I know of the different cost and sales that can happen I know that one group could come up short money.

I know I need to just let it go when I have the same people complaining about the same thing year after year, but it is getting harder.  So maybe a new perspective this year?  I don't know.  I do know there are lots of times I am willing to say go ahead and manage it yourself.  We will see how this year goes.  I do have more flexibility in my schedule this year than last so that may help only time will tell.

I did put in 2 hours at school today (yes I even had to bring my two boys with and they had fun building box houses thanks to Cindy).

FBLA State Planning Committee - Attaining Sponsorship

Being an Adviser to Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) is a part of my career that is a constant.  I have had the pleasure of working with 4 wonderful students as they took charge of their future and became Wisconsin State Officers, now I am working on my leadership for the state of Wisconsin.

I was asked this spring to work on the state planning committee for Wisconsin FBLA.  Basically working with the committee we pull together the conference for over 2,000 students (and their always happy and deadline following advisers).  I knew a couple of people on the committee and I talked it over with my husband on whether I should take on this responsibility (he tells me all the time I work too much and too late).  I really felt that this would help me to be a better adviser and give more opportunities to the students at Seymour.  So I said yes.

So far I have traveled to LaCrosse to get a tour of the facilities and hash out with fellow members who is doing what.  Because someone new was on the committee that is always a good time to figure out what should be done where and with whom.  Not having a lot of background on who previously did what I said "tell me what you want me to do, and I will do it!"  I have been to several of these conferences to know and comprehend all the background work that needs to be done, but now I have the task of pulling pieces of it together with a great team.

I had a meeting with the state adviser on Thursday to go over my responsibilities and see her vision of where the organization can grow to.  We went over in detail each assigned duties, some seem relativity easy (contacting police department and inform them of our conference and schedule) and other daunting (securing sponsorship for events and prizes for awards).  This last task was the one that received the most of our time because it heavily relied upon for the continued growth of the organization.  But where does one start?  I can not focus my attention on smaller businesses, because they need to support the local chapters.  I need big businesses that hopefully still have money/resources to give to educational programs like FBLA.  The cold letter/phone call is so much hard to garner support.  I have been thinking through a flier to help showcase what FBLA can do, but I know that lots of businesses put money and resources into these items only for them to find the direct route to the recycling bin.

So what are your thoughts on how to solicit business?  What businesses to contact? Where do I get the list of large corporation in Wisconsin/Nation?

I did work 8 hours this day on this and reading my classroom.

Past Student E-mail

This is a post regarding an email I just received today.  I often wonder if I push students too much (yes they complain and say nobody else makes them do this much work -Except Mr. Swett).  Student will tell me that they sign up for classes that they don't have to do as much work in.  So therefore my classes have lower number and because I am an elective it puts my job in jeopardy.

I feel this email reinforces I am doing the right thing.  But how to get more students to realize it?  Any advice?

Hello Mrs. Grassel,

I’m not sure if you remember me from several years ago…but I took accounting my Senior year. I just wanted to share with you something really cool. I’m a 2 degree (junior) at the Air Force Academy right now, and I just started my majors classes this semester. I am a business management major, and one of our first required courses is financial management. Out of a class of about 20+ students, I’m the only one who has had any prior accounting classes. The coolest part…even after almost 4 years I still remember almost everything you taught…Our college course looks like it’s going to be exactly what we did in high school, just with a “college text”. Thank you so much for teaching passionately and well! 

Hope everything at school and home is going great,

Ben Fischl 

Makes me proud to be a teacher! :) 

FBLA Seymour Officer Make a Calendar & More Google Apps

It is so wonderful to work with students and see them excited for what they want to do.  Today was the day where Seymour officer plan their year.  I had prior today worked with Taylor (our president and current state officer) on ideas and thoughts for the year.  This was easy to do because we have spent over 2 weeks together this summer as well as the constant emails and text messages about projects.  Using gmail accounts I am hoping will make it easier to communicate, but I have to get the entire officer team use to login in and checking email (it is too slow and cumbersome, I will probably text them to check email).

We started the day talking about ideas and thoughts for the day and goals for the chapter.  We did a lot of talking at Local Officer Training in the Dells but three officers could not make it, so this was to be the time for the entire team to pull it together.  Unfortunately two officers did not show (I know they were out of the country early this summer but they had said they would be back by August 10, which is why we picked this date).  Anyway we had to work, so ides and projects were just assigned to them.  I took the ideas and dates and put them into the shared google calendar that I created.  Again I am hoping this will help them to realize time commitments.

Here is a screen shot of just one of our months that we planned.  We still don't have concession dates in the calendar because . . . . well I am not going to talk about it.  It makes my blood boil.  Anyway here is a screen shot.

Such is the day and life of an adviser of FBLA  I do really enjoy working with the students but you can see how my calendar is pretty busy and that does not include work assignments and of course family.

The day went very well, after I was done finishing the calendar for everyone the work for Freshman Orientation was completed.  We have a presentation to all incoming Freshman on the importance of being involved in extra-curricular in high school.  We don't just focus on FBLA, but all activities and sports and what it can do to help.

Also planned was permission slips for trips to Madison and Milwaukee.  The homecoming float design is done and I will have pictures after the parade (it should be fun).  We are having committees to work on all of this, so we have to get officers ready to have club members help with the projects.

I was at school from 8 to 4.  I did have a lengthy converstation with Andy our Tech Guru about Google apps and what he learned in a Webinar he did today, because I knew it was over my head.  He said he would do the serve side work, BIG SMILE.  He did give me some research on cost and size issues with a depolyment the size of the high school.  So I will be having more blog post on that topic.  I estimated that I would like to have it ready to roll out to the entire building at the start of 2nd Semester, but deploying and testing with students and staff during 2nd quarter.  I hope that is not too far off, but I also want to plan some training in there with my new Technology Coaching hours.

After work at school I came home and finished two photobooks I wanted to have done for FBLA.  I would say I have had 3 hours of work to create these albums for FBLA and tonight I can say they are ordered.  I will then have them for Freshman Orientation on August 22.  Here is a link to the blog post with one of the albums.

11 hours of work today.

Photo Book

Click here to view this photo book larger

Classroom Set up-day 2, technology coach?

So before and after my work today on Quickbooks I was also trying to setup my classroom.  Things that I know I still have to do, receive and put away all the ordered material.  Including stamping all the new books for Office 2010 that we are getting.  Separate books for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and of course Publisher.  That fun still awaits me.

I did have the privilege of talking with our district technology guru today (what a nice guy :) ).  I shared with him a problem that I noticed on my machine, and thought might cause some problems for teachers/staff unable to find a solution.  So here it is: when I click on my documents it gives me an error message saying it can't be found.  I can very easily find it by clicking on my computer and then clicking my drive on the server, but any spot in windows that says my documents use to go to my drive on the network now doesn't work.  Andy (the nice computer guru) changed some things (I know technical term) on the network in order to manage it better (YEA!), but this is what cause the problem.  The direct point to my files on the server location is wrong, so I think it will be wrong for everyone at the high school ??  So is it better to know and fix now, I hope so otherwise there will be a lot of tech support tickets going out on it.

I also talked with Andy about getting my computer up to Windows 7.  My entire lab is Windows 7 and I thoroughly believe I should be demonstrating within the same environment that that the students are working in. So we had a big discussion on Windows Licensing and and nice new automation to work with Windows using a KMS update (I am hoping that I am remembering it correctly) and how this great automation system is not working and he is working to determine what the issue is.  Good Luck!

After my quickbooks session I was then able to meet with my Principal and Vice Principal to discuss the schedule for next year and what it looks like for the business department.  My district has been great on maintaining high moral for employees through the issue happening in Wisconsin and to teacher unions, so I was nervous to find out what they really wanted from Cindy and I.

Reduced funding means reduce staff.  How is this happening?  Not hiring back all the retirees that left, some positions are going unfilled and others are being filled by half-time staff, but I always hear on how they are looking to best suit the needs of the students.  Cindy is going to be working a some capacity in the Middle School.  She has done this previously and is very willing and excited to do this.  The problem being is they don't know what she is teaching or even what grade.  Let me tell you this dose not sit well with her.  Cindy is a great planner and likes to have the time to think through what she will be doing and what is the best way possible to attain this.  I know she will be do a fantastic job, but I was really hoping that this meeting would alleviate some of her stress, alas not yet.

I had for most of last year meet with the principal for 1 prep period a week talking about technology and where we can go and what Seymour can do.  I know we missed weeks, but I can't say how much this has helped our communication.  Prior to last school year I didn't feel appreciated or valued for my knowledge or contribution to the school, so I am glad to have put the time in to build that relationship.  So what does that mean for my schedule?  I am now going to have time during the day to teach teacher technology!  Yippee!  I have lots of ideas, exciting (just hope I don't lose contact wit my FBLA kids).

I did ask for a statement or sheet from my principal and vice principal on their goals/vision or thoughts on what they would like to have accomplished during my time.  I have ideas, but I need to make sure that we are both on the same page.  So if you have ideas on how I can help get the technology train moving.  Let me know.  I know one of my first steps is Google Apps up and running for students and staff and the school (then training them on how to use it).

So busy day 6 hours on my previous post on quickbooks and 3 hours on this.  Don't forget you can click on the link on the right to see my total hours work today.  Current I am 221.5 hours since school got out.  That is over 5.5 weeks if you say you work 40 hours a week.

Quickbooks for Professional Organization

I have used the software quickbooks in my accounting class, because it is good for students to understand and be familiar with what is used by many businesses and organizations.  I do have 2009 loaded on my classroom lab and I used it exclusively for main tainting the school's concession stand inventory and billing.  It works great!  I did take some time to learn and sometimes I had to not think in terms of the basic debit/credit double entry accounting that I go over with the students.

Today I had the pleasure to work with a colleague to get quickbooks up and running for WBEA (Wisconsin Business Education Association).  Previously all our book work was done in excel (which can work, but just more cumbersome).  The hard part was thinking about what we really needed the software to do for the organization and what members are use to seeing.  The current treasurer Allie Holtzer is doing a fantastic job, but  we worked together along with Cindy Otto on streaming the work in order to be able to create budget figures for the budget committee and a profit and loss statement for our activities.

The fact that our fiscal period runs from July to June is very much in alignment with how school districts do their funding.  It works great, except that our convention is held in September and many people pay registration in May (unearned revenue for the current year) and also pay membership dues for the upcoming school year (again unearned revenue).  So why the big deal.  It does not show a true representation of the revenue and expenses for activities happening withing the fiscal period.  So the research begins, Cindy headed up how to initial record the unearned revenue (or even expenses) for the current fiscal period.  My job was to work on getting the chart of account set-up to make it easy to work with the prior year's budgets and with the unearned revenue and expenses (and also to be able to import a CVS or .xls file instead of typing them all in).

It was determined for unearned revenue to debit cash and credit an account classification of Other Current Liabilities.  Then on the first day of the next fiscal period do adjusting entries to get it out of the permanent liability account and into it correct income account. A similar procedure was set up for unearned expenses but   cash would be credited and a debit to an account classified as Other Current Assets.  This will then keep all current expenses and revenue within the correct fiscal period (cross your fingers).

The next big decisions was how to deal with the enormous amount of accounts.  For example we had 6 different accounts for registration.  So do we make accounts called membership registration, convention registration etc..  We determined the use of the class system would best serve our needs.  When any transactions take place you choose the account registration and then choose the class convention.  It is also much easier to create a profit and loss statement for every event or class we have.  We did have to make sure that we had matching other current asset/liability accounts to make the adjusting entries easier and the beginning of the next fiscal period.

We spent 6 hours working on just getting the software setup and being able to enter just a few transactions.  Now my friend Allie is going to back track and enter in all of the 2010-2011 fiscal period transactions into this new format, so we can have budget figures for next year and accurate financial statements for our upcoming convention

Organizing Classroom

So I went to school to get my room ready because of summer cleaning and new items being brought in.

The day started with logging into the computer and then doing updates on all the software that has updates for the summer.  I have been using Google Chrome more and I did download that browser and I worked on getting it setup and personalized to increase my productivity.

I was also able to go through and create gmail accounts  for the Seymour FBLA officer team and a created a shared calendar so that the officers will be organized and prepared for the meeting we will be having this week.I am continually thinking of ways to make the students more in charge of the organization but that means I need to be even further ahead.  I am getting there, especially because I have such great other FBLA advisers that share ideas (Jan I, Michelle M, Cindy O, & Jen W to just name a few of the awesome advisers that I some day hope to be more like).  I did take the html embed code for the shareable calendar and embed that on the Seymour High School's FBLA webpage.  I admit I don't update it often because I don't know how often it is referenced, but I hope this will help.

I of course did send a lot of emails, when don't I.  I was trying to coordinate a meeting with my administration for the upcoming school year.  Which makes me think of organizing the concession stand calendar and dealing with individuals that are not as passionate as myself for the endeavor. I am trying to remain calm!

I have yet to double check to see if my student computers are set up correctly.  I usually just check a few to be sure it is all there.  Nothing like planning a lesson and then discovering the software doesn't work and is not loaded.  Here is the dilemma if I login I have admin rights and it works but students logging with with fewer privileges it sometimes doesn't work.  I will have to come up with a work around for that.

The day was productive, but never productive enough.  It was nice to ride my bike to school (plus Gordon rode his bike to day care for the day and loved it).  I worked 6 hours and could have work a ton more.

I did go pick my my personal PC from the repair shop (botched unpartition of the C drive came up with a bad boot file for Windows) but when I went to set it up I discovered my LCD monitor was not working.  So of course I took it apart.  Here is what it looks like

Google Apps Webinar

I signed up at watched a Google Apps Seminar today.  It was for IT admins (which I am not), but I wanted to have an understanding of what needs to go into rolling out Google Apps for our school.  One thing I now know is that I need to know more.

The topics covered were: Organizational Layout, Mail Flow, User Provisioning, Data Migration, and Authentication

Organizational Layout:
Making sure that you have groups setup in order to set policies for different users.  For example students to use gmail but the teachers still continue to use exchange.  In order to do this it is important to have a seperate domain name for students.  Teachers would have seymour.k12.wi.us  but what should we give to students?  students.seymour.k12.wi.us  that seems logical but is a very long address for the students to remember and they already don't like to use email because it is so slow and cumbersome vs texting.

Mail Flow:
My understanding is that teacher email would be unaffected but I will need to research wether we need to have student emails archieved.  If they do then we may need to set up and use postini? I don't know our school's policy so research will be needed.

User Provisioning:
This is my biggest concern!!!  Who is going to update and maintain all the users. I know I do not want to type in 800+ users.  They did talk about using a CSV file to upload but then at the end of the year you need at add more users and delete graduating students and who is going to take the time to do that (not ME).  They did discuss the use of active directory sync to manage users and I strongly feel that is route to go.  I don't know how that will integrate with PowerSchool so again more research.  Another plus of active directory sync there doesn't need to be anyone with a work ticket to reset passwords when a student forgets it (which is all the time).

Data Migration:
Ok, by this point my mind was wandering.  But who is going to migrate the contacts/calenders?  Does it go to to the users to do?  Or does the IT department do  it.  There are pluses and minus to each.  If IT does it all data is migrated even if it is old and isnt' used, and you are only limited by your bandwith size. Users migrating means that they have to understand what to do, which is training.  I think we need to do more technology training, but not this type of training.

Authentication:
You can either authenticate using Google Authorization or SAML 2.0 SSO (I don't know what the second option is).  I like the thought of using Google Authorization because you can log in anywhere using any Google login site.  That means on your mobile device or any Google page that has a login.  I did get that the second options was for organizations that wanted to security and passwords on their servers.  It seems like more work to me.

The end of the presentation suppose to be about Wisconsin Google Apps for Education but there was a problem with the presentation.

Local Officer Training Day 2

Up to start the day at 6 a.m. after going to sleep at 1 a.m.  Boy do students love to be in a hotel room away from students.  We did have a productive night.  Our president had a great agenda put together for the day and we got through most of it (the rest we will conquer later).

Today started with a breakfast buffet provided with the registration (it was yummy lots of fresh fruit). Then into the opening session.  We were there for the session and watched students interact and then it was off to a meeting with just the business teachers.

Our DPI Consultant Jen Wegner is a very knowledgeable and enthusiastic supporter of education. She brought to our meeting some great resources.  Our meeting started by talking about the current condition of business departments in the state due to the decrease in funding and that a majority of our courses are not required for graduation.  That lead into Jen's first handout which was pulled together by another content area and was modified for Business & Information Technology (B&IT), Programs in Peril.  One of the biggest steps is to be Pro-Active, develop your professional support networks, be involved in district planning, and understand student motivation and interest.  There are 15 points on this document and as a non required teacher it really makes you think about your job and role in the entire education setting.

Then we covered the calendar for the upcoming year.  There were already lots of professional learning opportunities this July but still even more to come this school year.  Wisconsin Business Education Association  (WBEA) and DPI are teaming to offering spring updates.  They will be offered in 6 different locations around the state of Wisconsin and I made sure I got the date on my calendar to attend the one in Green Bay.  2011-2012 B&IT Calendar

Since the state of Wisconsin is in such peril for funding in for education every dollar is scrutinized and we discussed the use of the Career Technical Education (CTE) website which offers facts and data on the importance of all CTE (Ag, FACE, Tech Ed, and Business)  Here is a great video with highlighting the importance of all CTE 

Next we discussed the changing role of accounting in high school.  Do we teach accounting as it is in college or do we give an exposure to the area and then let them learn more at their high educational institutions.  Have a career research piece is important so students know all of the areas that they can do with accounting.  I am going to add more pieces to my course this year.  I have also made connections at Fox Valley Technical College (FVTC) with having transcripted and articulated credit.  But the rules and regulations are constantly changing and it is hard to keep up with their changing rules.

We then covered dates and important changes for Wisconsin Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA).  Have a state officer and working on the state conference planning committee I was already aware of many of these changes but still thinking about how to implement and have my local chapter have a successful year.

We then came to the sharing time.  OK, I admit I forgot to bring anything.  I will blame it on being at the lake for the 2 weeks prior to attending.  Michelle McGlynn and Jan Imhoff provided some great resources on classroom activities and Paul from Pulaski gave some handouts on running a school store.  Other great discussion was had about activities.  I always love hearing ideas and getting motivated for the school year.

The afternoon was left for us to work on projects.  I set up all of our officers with a gmail account and next I will be creating a calendar to share with the accounts so they know dates and responsibilities.

We left the Dells around 3:30 and drove home around 6.  So 12 hours on this great day of work.  The drive home students were energized and discussed ideas and projects for the year.  Watch out FBLA already has their homecoming float idea.

Local Officer Training Day 1

Having a state officer is a great opportunity for our school, it is also a time commitment.  A conference is being hosted to train Local Officers.  I had to make sure that the reservation for the hotel was completed as well as registration done.  This took about 45 minutes (including coordinating student travel and time frames).

On the first day of the conference I meet students at school at 10 a.m. and we got equipment and supplies from the business department.  We then had a 2.5 hour drive using the school vehicle to arrive at Wisconsin Dells.  Curfew for the night is Midnight.

During the day students learned about completing a program of work (planning for the upcoming year).  Setting goals, presentations skills and getting our local chapter officers ready to go for the year.

Prior to student arriving I worked on the computer getting caught up on work. Arriving at school at 8 a.m. curfew at midnight.

Hours logged   16 hours.

Office 2010

Technology I Love it!  Technology I hate it!  Ok, so which one is it?

The challenge of learning new skills and programs is so invigorating, but it is a constant upkeep of what needs to be learned and what is taught and what should be taught in my Business Classroom.

My colleague and I decided to switch our classroom to Office 2010 for next school year.  This change involves numerous impacts to teaching, because my classroom is a computer lab.

----Change -----
1. Articulated classes with FVTC (Fox Valley Technical College).  Currently we have articulated classes with FVTC for Word I & II, Excel I & II, Access I & II, and PowerPoint.  Due to the change at the technical school for their class offerings so we can not offer our courses the same way.  We had a choice of 3 credit articulated classes or individual 1 credit options.

I am so lucky that my colleague that took the lead on this.  She communicated with the college, text book rep and the online testing company we will need to use.  I would say to date I have put in 1.5 hours of work checking on work and discussing options with my colleague (I know that she has more than triple that amount of work)

2. New textbooks means new data for projects (as well as the time to get the price quote and have the school purchase the books).  Uploading files for classes Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint.  Each class would take a minimum of 45 minutes.  I tackled that project last year again I can't say enough about having someone to work with that is so AWESOME!  She said she would do this!  Thank you.  So even though I am not doing it I want people reading to understand what need to be done over 3.5 hours of work just uploading files that students can use in class.

3.  Learning curve!  I love to learn, but I know need to learn how to do what I already know with the new software.  There are lots of tutorials online, but also getting it loaded on a computer that I can learn at home. Plus making sure that my computer lab of 27 computers is updated to the most current software is also a step that must be checked.

4. Funding.  Working with our curriculum director we procured funds through Carl Perkins to purchase the textbooks.  This was numerous meetings and working with the CESA director for the funding to make sure all procedures were followed.

This post is different because it encompasses several days and discussions.  But this project started in April and is still a work in process.

Through out it all I would say I have 3 hour of work in.  But my great partner would have a minimum 10 hours on this project.

NLC Wrap Up

The National Leadership conference is over and it is so great that we had someone from Seymour on stage taking 4th place!  What a great reward for their hard work.

Wrapping up for the conference.  I had to go into school to verify payment for tours from all participants were received (what great kids, they were all done).  This took about 45 minutes (because of the paperwork that needs to be done to document everything)

Also needed to be sure that all the equipment was returned from the presentations.  Laptops, projectors, speakers, clickers, etc.  So far I am only missing 1 projector.  I will be texting the student to get that taken care of.  This follow up took about 30 minutes.

Writing of the press release so that students get recognized in the community for their hard work.  This took 15 minutes.

The Brat Fry that was held as a fund raiser still had numerous items that had be returned or put back to their proper spot.  I had removed them from my vehicle and placed them in my classroom, but it was a mess.  Luckly I had a student stop by and help me out.  What took me 1.5 hours was cut in half because of the help!  THANK YOU!!!

So this wrap up took 3 hours.

NLC - Day 7 Traveling Home

I have stayed in a lot of hotels for student activities and checking out multiple rooms with tax exempt status and paying with one check (yup not credit card) will cause problems.  I typically plan to spend 1 hour (minimum) checking out.  The line at the counter is long as the entire convention is checking out all on the same day and we are all checking out multiple rooms.  Luckily I don't have to do this too early because our flight home is not until noon.  I did arrange on Friday for our shuttle to the airport (we purchased round trip when we arrived -so I knew students had paid for it already and I didn't have to cover anyone running out of funds - yes has happened and I don't always get reimbursed).

Also the night before I had all students go in and check-in for their flight home.  If they were checking bags we paid for that using credit card to reduce problems at the airport.  We met in the hotel lobby at 9:30 a.m. and I had no problems checking out.  Thank you Hilton Orlando!

Shuttle was on time and we got checked in and through security without a hitch.  I was constantly reminding student about TSA rules and regulations.  I prepped the kids that we would eat lunch at the airport prior to our flight so they didn't eat at the hotel.

small plane from Chicago to Appleton

All flights were on time and great (not so lucky for Oconto Falls who' flight to Green Bay was cancelled in Chicago, nightmare anytime traveling, but try it with a group of teenagers who are all sleep deprived).  We did need to move briskly to our gate in Chicago because we didn't have a lot of time, but we made it.

A quick flight from Green Bay to Appleton and we were home.  All parents/rides were at the airport and students were able to get home safely.  Another successful trip for Seymour.  I was not able to get all equipment that day so know I need to coordinate the return on laptops, projectors, speakers, extension cords, remote clickers.  But that will be another post.

Last day of NLC only a 8 hour work day.  But I am home!  

NLC - Day 6

This day is much more relaxing.  The hard work is done it is now just wait until awards ceremony to find out places.  We start the day with a NorthCentral meeting where Seymour gets to vote on the new NorthCentral VicePresident.  The meeting starts at 9:15 a.m. and goes for and hour.  Following that it is DisneyQuest.  The entire Seymour delegation is going to play some games.  This activity will be about 4 hours and we pre-purchased the tickets and transportation

Upon getting back from there a quick bit for an early dinner and it is awards time.  This is where we find out how we did compared to the Nation.  The music is pumping kids are excited and all dressed up.  The awards program is broadcast live and parents back in Wisconsin watch to see if their child makes the stage.

All events are done in alphabetic order so that helps the students to know when to get excited and to notify parents on when to watch the live broadcast.

Seymour makes the state and places 4th in the Nation for E-Business.  So proud of their hard work and they get a $200 cash award for their efforts!

Seymour is 4th!  YEAH!

The awards program last around 2.5 hours and then we go back to the hotel.  The last night and kids hit the pool and the dance being hosted by the conference.  Midnight and it is curfew and bed checks.

16 hour day again.