School Tech News Archive

Johnny Lee's Wii Tech Marvels

(Tuesday 29th April 2008)
Johnny Lee demos his amazing Wii Remote hacks, which transform the $40 game piece into a digital whiteboard, a touchscreen and a head-mounted 3-D viewer.

School ICT Planning

(Monday 28th April 2008)
The school ICT planning process should start with a consideration of learning objectives, then implement professional learning programs and infrastructure projects to support these learning objectives.

Anyone for Crabb Apple? (SMH)

(Monday 28th April 2008)
"It seems almost redundant to explain in detail the scene that occurred upon a recent homecoming; the spontaneous decision to make an apple pie, the prudent pre-heating of the oven to 180 degrees, the construction of the pie, the opening of the oven door, and the horrific discovery of a brown and blistered Apple Macintosh iBook." (Annabel Crabb)

Ubuntu 8.04 Update

(Monday 28th April 2008)
Those who are tinkering with Ubuntu and EdUbuntu will be interested in checking out this latest update. Ubuntu 6 & 7 users can upgrade through the Update Manager. (830 Mb!) See also Linux software info.

Open-Computer Mac Clones

(Thursday 17th April 2008)
The $US400 Open Computer from Psystar Corporation is described as "a low-cost high-performance computing platform" based on the OSX86Project - a hacker-based initiative aimed at maintaining a version of the Mac OS X operating system for regular PCs.

Paparazzi (Mac)

(Tuesday 15th April 2008)
Take screenshots of entire web pages - even the bits that you have to scroll down to see. Choose to save in a variety of formats, including gif, jpg & pdf.

HP Joins Mini Laptop Fray

(Thursday 10th April 2008)
Another of the world's biggest technology companies is clamoring to enter the growing market for pint-sized computers targeted mainly at pint-sized customers. HP executives say their new machines are an important piece of the company's effort to build market share in schools. See also Wazza's list of mini 'Netbook' laptops.

NSW Education Downgrades Microsoft (AFR)

(Wednesday 9th April 2008)
One of the nation's biggest users of personal computers, the NSW Dept of Education, is resisting Microsoft's attempts to upgrade users to the latest version of its Vista operating system, has extended it's MS licensing agreement for only 12 months (rather than 3 years), and is installing an Open Office derivative on 41000 computers to be distributed to schools this year.

xSUIM & ERN (pdf - 1.6Mb)

(Wednesday 9th April 2008)
Info from Dennis Ross about using the new xSUIM to import users from OASIS to a Mac OS X Server within the new NSW DET ERN organisational structure.

Liberals Join Criticism of School Computer Plan (ABC News)

(Monday 7th April 2008)
The Federal Opposition has joined school principals and the education union in their criticism of Labor's billion-dollar computers in schools plan. School principals are worried they will have to cover the extra costs of providing senior secondary school students with access to a computer. (See also: Federal Digital Education Revolution.)

Low Cost 'Netbook' Laptops

(Monday 7th April 2008)
The NSW DET is considering the deployment of low cost mini laptops, originally developed for use by children in emerging countries, to implement the Federal Govt's 1:1 computer access plan for senior students. This list includes some of the current commercially available products in this category.

Maine Learning Technology Initiative Studies

(Wednesday 2nd April 2008)
With all the talk about the Federal Government's Digital Revolution program for Australian senior students, this site may provide some useful background reading. Maine University has undertaken research into the Maine Dept of Education 1:1 laptop program, and reports on what difference it has made to student learning. (See also: Maine Education Dept MLTI.)

Learning Tools - Digital v Traditional

(Tuesday 1st April 2008)
A comparison of traditional learning tools and processes, compared to their modern-day digital equivalent. Also categorised within Bloom's revised taxonomy.