Wednesday, August 24, 2005

 

Planning for Palm Basics Training Night

Isn't it wonderful when the network is down and we try to have a technology night? Let's hope things go a little more smoothly next week. To help prepare for our Palm basics training night, let's plan ahead on how to best use our 2 hour time slot to help the teachers participating leave feeling confident in basic handheld skills.

I'll start the basic plan for the session:

What else do we need to make sure we cover before Mike Curtis comes? What things do you think are most helpful in making you feel like a confident handheld user in a short amount of time? Share your ideas by posting comments to this blog.


Comments:
How to load the basic software on the computer and an explanation of additional software that needs to be used to retrieve email, powerpoints, word documents etc.

Explanation of Hotsync.

Explanation of program names that are displayed when going "HOME" and which ones are most important and how to get these programs from other handheld users if beamable and if not how to get them from the net. I'm still not comfortable with fling, palmreader, the other program that updates webpages automatically when you hotsync. KEVIN MORROW
 
I agree with Kevin's comments about how to load the basic software, etc. I also wonder about giving them a couple of good websites like LearningInHand where they can find good, free apps to load on their handhelds if they are interested plus check out some ideas for classroom use.

I think one of the most helpful things would be to give them time to explore and try out some things - while help is there. It's kind of like the SmartBoard, the more you use it the more comfortable you become with it. I don't think we want to overwhelm them by showing too many apps in one night - maybe just the basic/easy-to-use ones.
 
I know that from experience, the idea of limiting how many skills to introduce with the handheld is a good idea. As Kelly pointed out it helps to be aware of possible overload. By exposing a few main concepts like you mentioned in the Blog posting, we allow the participants to get a sample, practice and then they will develop more detail questions to ask.
The topics Kevin covered are great! I know they have been introduced to us, but I am not comfortable to teach these skills.
Thanx. Sheilla Dea
 
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