September 23

Today was a good day!  The northern half of Dickson county had a 1/2 day of school for CreekWood's homecoming game.  That meant that I was done with 3rd grade at 11:30 and could go work with the tech department in Dickson.  It didn't take long for Scott to find me some "stuff" to do.  My first task was to hook up 16 computers that were to be re-imaged.

Then Scott showed me how to do the re-imaging.  That took about 30 minutes.  Then we moved on to unloading a palet of "new to us" computers.  We moved 74 computers from the truck to the building.

Once done with that, I switched out the 16 re-imaged computers with 16 more that needed to be done.  I did another batch of re-images and called it a day.  I really enjoy spending time with the tech department, they are always kind and supportive. 

September 19

I so desperately want to get a full time tech job.  I really enjoy the trouble-shooting and the thrill of a "fix".  This week I've had calls concerning projectors, printers, and iPhone emails.  We don't have full time techs in our building, so word is out that I need any and all tech problems for this class.  I'll occasionally call Marilyn when I'm stuck or need parts.  She usually guides me and sends me stuff through school mail.  


Mrs. Greer, one of our fourth grade teachers, is "technologically" challenged and asks me to do any and every thing that deals with computers.  This week I installed her printer for her.  Simple task, pop in disk, run, click, click, plug up, and done!  You would of thought I hung the moon!  


I've worked on 3 different iPhones for teachers in the last 3 weeks.  Again, a simple job, but they really appreciate the ease of getting their personal and school emails on their iPhones.


My last project was for a teacher who's projector kept locking up when she tried to switch from document camera to computer.  I went in and investigated, called Marilyn and we diagnosed the problem with the Tripp-Lite switch.

I happened to have an extra in my room so I did the switch and Viola' it worked.  The teacher was thrilled and I was pleased.  I think Marilyn was pleased too, that was one more thing off her plate.  I mentioned to her that if she could bring me another one to keep for backup again it might help and yesterday she showed up in Charlotte with another working switch. I have to give her kudos for putting up with me and my phone calls, she's a great lady.  I'm looking forward to working with her over Fall break for a week, I'll have great things to post then!! 

Week of Aug. 29

Everyone at school seems to be getting into their routines and everything is running smoothly. I was asked by our Math and Reading Interventionist if I would look at her document camera because it was not projecting. That was a quick fix, she had just plugged the cable into the wrong output slot. I have found that this is a common error that I'm asked to look at quite a bit. My other big "Ah Ha" moment was after my 3rd grade team kept complaining about how hard it was to use Google Docs. Our principal likes our team to turn in ONE lesson plan together, so I have gotten the 3rd grade, 4th grade, and 5th grade teams to work on this through Google Docs. So they kept coming back on Monday saying they hated it, typing was slow, it took forever. It was when I went to check something else in a teammates room that I noticed that they are still using Internet Explorer. Scott Malugin has already downloaded Google Chrome on ALL Dickson county computers, but no one is using it. That's when it Clicked, IE is not compatible with Google Docs. So I sent out a mass email, explaining the difference and what they need to try and gave them a link for their home computers. SUCCESS!! The girls were thrilled with the ease and now LOVE GOOGLE DOCS!! So the lesson I learned: Don't assume everything is going to be hard or difficult, start with the basics and work your way up!! Thanks for reading, Tech On!!