Enlighten...The Monthly Newsletter of Engaging Technologies October 2009
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Dictionary Day Oct 16th
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Dictionary Day is October 16th, the day of Noah Webster's birthday. Don't forget about our
fun review game with clickers
that you can use in any subject area to celebrate the day!
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CPS User Tip
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Use CPS Clickers to pose a controversial question. Poll the students and then discuss the results and have students defend their reasons for picking their chosen answer. Repoll the students and view the results.
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| Become a Fan |
Be sure to visit Engaging Technologies on Facebook!
Join
a discussion about whiteboard or clicker activities, start your own
discussion with a question that you might have about our products, or
upload your own photos of students using our products.
Facebook also provides an easy method for you to communicate your great ideas for using our products, that we can then transfer over to our website so that everyone can access them. Just post them on our wall! Share our Facebook page with YOUR friends, and we'll have an even larger pool of ideas to draw from!
Let's see if we can get that fan club number going up, up, up!
 Become a fan of Engaging Technologies on Facebook! |
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Greetings!
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It's hard to believe that first quarter is almost
drawing to a close. Our calendar the first 7-8 weeks of school has been packed with training sessions, and schools everywhere
are doing some fantastic things with clickers!
I worked with several
English teachers this past month on having students use clickers to provide
peer evaluation on student works. They displayed the student works via a document
camera and had the class make corrections with the Interwrite Mobi. Awesome, awesome, awesome!
We are also excited to announce that we now have a contract as the exclusive provider to the K-12 market of the Livescribe Pulse Pen in Kansas and Nebraska. These are a fantastic resource for administrators, educators, and regular classroom students, but even more important is their usefulness for special education and ESL students.
We are also trying to beef up the resources on our website and you'll be
seeing some noticeable changes in the coming months that will hopefully
make our website an easier and more comprehensible resource from which to glean information.
Please DO take the time to send us any neat or creative ideas
you have for using our products. We'd love to pay them forward through
our website and share your ideas with others as we travel throughout
Kansas and Nebraska.
Sincerely,
Dustin Frank
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| Never Miss a Word With the Livescribe Pulse Pen |
It is our goal that the product line of Engaging Technologies reflects who we are as educators. We want to make sure that we only market those products that we feel make an important impact on student engagement and achievement. Therefore, we are very excited to let you know that we are now the exclusive K-12 market providers in Kansas and Nebraska of the Pulse Smartpen from Livescribe.
The Pulse Smartpen is the brainchild of CEO and Livescribe founder, Jim Marggraff, who is probably best known for creating the LeapPad and the LeapFrog FLY Pentop Computer. Mr. Marggraff has taken that technology to new heights and a new audience with the Pulse Smartpen.  The Smartpen combines all four modes of communication - reading, writing, speaking, and listening - in a simple, low cost, and convenient format of pen and paper. While taking notes during a lecture or discussion, the smartpen records the conversation and digitizes the handwriting, automatically syncing the ink and audio. By later tapping the ink, the smartpen replays the conversation from the exact moment the note was written. Notes and audio can then be uploaded to a PC, where they can be replayed, saved, searched, and shared - perfect for allowing home-bound students or students who were absent from class to hear AND see the lecture or assignment explanation. Visit www.edlivescribe.com, a blog by our colleague and mathcast whiz, Tim Fahlberg, for examples using the Pulse Smartpen for talking tests, math and chemistry pencasts, a makeup spelling test, and AAC talking pages with pictures. For more information on the Pulse Smartpen in education, visit Livescribe's K-12 Education page for instructional videos using the smartpen for: - In-Class Observations
- Parent-Teacher Communication
- Reading Fluency Data Collection
- Teacher in Your Pocket
This pen provides a fantastic opportunity for every student to never miss a word again. However, it also opens the door to many possibilities for administrators and educators in the workplace, special education students and resource paraprofessionals, and ESL learners and educators.  CLICK to hear what teachers and students have to say about the Pulse SmartPen in education! We are looking for a few dedicated educators in Kansas and Nebraska that would be willing to "test drive" a Pulse Smartpen in their classroom and share with us actual benefits of the smartpen to the students in their classrooms, the administrators and educators in their district, or to the engagement between home and school. If you would be willing to "test drive" a Pulse Smartpen, especially in the area of special education or ESL education, please contact us!
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EInstruction Announces 3rd Annual Video Contest - Get Your Entry In!
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EInstruction's third annual video contest began on September 22, 2009, and it's not to late to get your entry in! To enter, just go to www.eimakeover.com and submit a 2-1/2 minute music video, either a parody or an original song, demonstrating how technology improves a classroom. The video must mention eInstruction® at least once and feature a minimum of two eInstruction® products for at least 10 seconds. Prizes will be awarded in three categories: Grades K-5, 6-8, and 9-12. The three grand prizes include an Interwrite DualBoard, an Interwrite Mobi classroom system, a 32-pack CPS Pulse student response system, ExamView Assessment Suite, ExamView Learning Series, and professional development. Finalists will be selected by November 10, 2009, and winners will be announced in December. This year's video contest is being sponsored by Dell, Study Island, Texas Instruments, SP Controls, FableVision, and 3M. Not really sure what this is all about? Check out the winners of last year's contest! |
GOOD NEWS: Two Promotions Extended Through Year-End
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The GOOD NEWS is that two promotions that we offered in 2009 have been extended through the end of the year. Download the printable flyers below and take advantage of these special offers while they last!
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BAD NEWS: EInstruction Software Updates Put On Hold
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And for the BAD NEWS...we are sorry to say that the updates to our eInstruction software - CPS, CPS for PowerPoint, Interwrite Response, and Interwrite Workspace - that we were expecting to be posted for download on the eInstruction website at the end of September have been delayed until possibly the end of October. The September date was provided to us by eInstruction, so we apologize if we have promised something that did not come to fruit.
Einstruction assures us that the product development team is working diligently on additional technical troubleshooting and testing to offer a solid product to our customers, so we will let you know as soon as those updates are available. These updates will add important funtionality to our suite of eInstruction products, so your patience is much appreciated.
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Masking and Unmasking Answer Submissions on CPS Remotes
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Jessica submitted the following question on our website:
"When students enter in their alphabetical response such as A,B,C, or D,
it shows up on the clicker pad as a* instead of the letter. I've never
had trouble with this before when giving a student-paced fast grade
lesson. I went to delivery options and tried changing options there and
still it shows up as a* when an answer is clicked. On the computer
screen, it shows up as a letter response, but the students need to be
able to see the answer that they are clicking. Please help me! Thanks."
Have you ever had this problem? Find out how to make those pesky answers appear and reappear when YOU want them to here...
Do you have a question that you need answered about any of our products? Click here to submit your question!
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Super Resource For Interactive Whiteboard Activities
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 Visit the site TeacherLED.com for some very well-done interactive whiteboard activities. I've provided just a sampling of links to some great activities at this site, but there are many more. Although mostly math, there are a few alphabet, spelling, and map activities too.
Letter Dice: With a click of a button, you roll the letter dice and have a board of letters just like the game Boggle. Challenge your students to make as many words as possible before the bell rings!
Circuit Math: Great for upper elementary or junior high students, this challenging circuit board will test their skill at 2 and 3-digit addition. This is a great activity for using a Mobi in a station setting.
Isometric Shape Exploder: Teaching volume any time soon? This resource is a great one for those learners that need a little visual boost!
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