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There are plenty of examples of education customers who have made the switch to Windows 8, putting new touch devices into the hands of students to allow them to get the benefit of three different worlds in one device:
It's described pretty well by this slide below, that one of my colleagues uses. It shows that it's not about having an 'either/or' choice, but the ability to have both sides of the equation.
Over the last few months, there have been a number of case studies and stories appearing of educational customers who have made big bets on Windows 8 devices around the world. Some of the examples are:
Sadly, none of the examples above is from Australia. I know that there are schools who have rolled out Windows 8 touch devices to their students, but at the moment I don't have their permission to write about them.
So here's a plea – if you're in an educational establishment in Australia, and you'd be happy to have a chat with me about your Windows 8 story, then drop me an email and let's see if we can share your story here too.
After the Brisbane and Melbourne events, at the end of next week, we're running a pair of seminars in Sydney for schools too on Thursday 9 May. It gives you a chance to look at Windows 8 and Office 365 Education, as well as chat with Microsoft staff and colleagues from other schools. And there's specific sessions for school leaders, IT managers, and classroom teachers.
The sessions for IT managers and teachers start at 10:00AM on Monday 6th May, with a keynote from Travis Smith, and then the seminar splits to a hands-on workshop for teachers, and a deep dive session for IT managers.
The seminar finishes with lunch at 12:30, and a chance to get your hands on the latest Windows 8 devices from OEMs, and plenty of opportunity for catching up with colleagues from other schools.
Full agenda, and booking details for the Sydney IT managers and teachers seminar are here
We're running the leadership session "Leading Contemporary Learning in Schools" from 8AM to 9:30AM on 6th May too. This session is also hosted by Travis Smith, who's been a school leader himself.
He'll be taking a look at some of the key strategic opportunities and issues that schools face with technology adoption. It will include Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) strategies for schools, how to run sustainable 1:1 programmes, and emerging technologies.
Full agenda, and booking details for the Sydney school leaders seminar are here
I saw a tip today that would be really useful to PE/PD teachers, others who act as sports coaches in their spare time, and also parents like myself.
The question was:
Does anyone know of a Windows Phone app that allows you to play back a video frame by frame?
I’m trying to help someone improve their footy kicking technique by recording their action and showing it to them frame by frame.
And the answer was:
Video Coach for Windows Phone
Video Coach helps you help your athletes improve their form and technique with the use of your phone's video capabilities. You can take a video of your athlete ( or anything really ) and replay the video in slow motion, pause the video, step through it, step backwards, zoom. All this can be accompanied by a timer which will show you exactly how long specific actions took place.
And like many other Windows Phone apps, there's a free download for trial mode if you don't want to put down the whole $0.99 cents to buy it straight away!
Learn more about Video Coach for Windows Phone
At the beginning of next week, we're running a pair of seminars in Melbourne for schools, to give you a chance to look at Windows 8 and Office 365 Education, as well as chat with Microsoft staff and colleagues from other schools. And there's specific sessions for school leaders, IT managers, and classroom teachers.
Full agenda, and booking details for the Melbourne IT managers and teachers seminar are here
Full agenda, and booking details for the Melbourne school leaders seminar are here
If you're considering using Office 365 Education - which gives you web versions of Office apps, as well as SharePoint collaboration spaces, Exchange email, Lync communications and SkyDrive storage services – you'll probably love reading about the 'software boundaries and limits' – or what I'm going to call the "I get all this for free?" list.
You'll want to read the Office 365 service descriptions for SharePoint Online for yourself, but here's what I understood from a quick glance.
With Office 365 Education (the free service) this is what you get:
Which means with 10,000 users, we'll give you 5 Terabytes of storage to get started with
And the best bit I saw? The limits are exactly the same for Education as for our Enterprise customers, except that education customers get it free….
Read the full data "SharePoint Online: Software boundaries and limits"
If you've got any computers running Windows XP around your school, TAFE or university, then you've got less than a year to do something serious about it.
Windows XP is more than 12 years old now, as it was launched in 2001 - and like all good things, it's coming to an end. In less than a year in fact. Windows XP officially ends it's supported phase on April 8, 2014 – which means that after that time we'll no longer issue security updates or provide tech support.
You might think that it seems a bit sudden, but we have been warning about the end of life of Windows XP for a while (I nudged gently last year), and Windows XP has been around a lot longer than most other technology you and your students use every day (like the iPod, Xbox, iTunes, 3G Phones, LinkedIn, Skype and Facebook – all of which have been invented since Windows XP).
There's no shortage of advice designed to help you move to later versions of Windows (and almost every education customer in Australia will already have the licences for later versions of Windows), including Windows deployment guidance, Jumpstart programmes, and the excellent Springboard series on TechNet.
And if that isn't enough incentive, think about what you might lose when your old XP systems become unsupported and don't get security updates. Not only a greater risk of malware, but the fact that some systems come to a halt (take a look at where you're still running Windows XP and it's likely to be 'mission critical' systems like Point of Sales in your uniform shop/campus store, or some backend system that's running a key piece of software like a student reporting system, which will cause eruptions in the office if it stops).
There's plenty of technical advice, but my main piece of non-technical advice is: Get started on your plan before it's too late to get finished on the implementation before 8th April next year.
Read more on the end of Windows XP support
Good morning Queensland schools. Hope you enjoyed your break
I know, work intruded a bit with some planning and prep, and you were only just starting to wind down and suddenly it's back into another semester.
Whilst you were away, we planned a few things, so I thought I'd give you a quick post-holiday run down of things you might have missed.
It's okay, nobody else minds, it's just between you and me, as lots of other states are having a similar break this week.
We're running two different workshop/seminars on Friday for Queensland schools, with a chance to catch up with new stuff, and most importantly to hear Travis Smith bring together his passions for learning, school leadership and technology.
There are two opportunities to catch it on Friday 19th at our offices in George Street:
School leaders can drop in for the "Leading Contemporary Learning in schools" session, at 8AM, for 90 minutes of strategic talking, debating and discussion. This is the time where Travis puts his own experience as a school leader on the line, and talks about the pedagogical direction to investing in new technology, and the ways to avoid leading a white elephant project. He's a great speaker, and loves nothing more than a good debate, so it'll be a good way to end the week.
Travis has been a classroom teacher, a school leader, and worked in the Education faculty at Monash University, so he's got a pretty broad perspective, and he's brilliantly entertaining too.
For teachers and IT managers, there's a 'Teachers and IT Managers in Schools' session a bit later on the same day, from 10AM until after you've had chance for decent lunch, which includes a session of Travis's wisdom, followed by some deeper sessions for teachers and IT Managers. The teachers session will be a hands-on workshop, whereas the IT Managers will get to geek out on management, security, usability, cloud and devices.
Good news, this session includes plenty of Travis's wit and wisdom too.
Although you've got until 15th June to get your students into our World Championship for Microsoft Office (yep, seriously) it's probably about time to get started with them. I once met one of the World Champions, and it was amazing to see the impact it had on her. Anyway, one of your students could be the next World Champion of Microsoft Excel. Or Word. Or PowerPoint. So find out how to enter, and see if you can be waving one of your charges off onto a flight to Washington in July this year. Find out more on the Microsoft Office World Championships here.
Seriously…There’s a World Championship for Microsoft Office, and it's been going for 13 years.
Last year students from 52 countries gathered to compete for the coveted title of Worldwide Champions in Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint. The competition attracted more than 285,000 unique candidates from 53 countries, and 113 student finalists participated in the final round of competition finals held in Las Vegas. This year’s finals will be held in Washington DC and already entries have passed 400,000. The last time we had a win for Australia was in 2006 when Tristan Horne from Kingscliff High in NSW won the global Excel competition. And last year Kathryn Hitchener a Year 12 student from Toowoomba Christian College came 8th in the worldwide Excel competition. There aren’t too many students who can claim “finalist in the Microsoft Office Worldwide Competition” on their resume and while it is true there can only be one champion, from an teachers point of view every student who participates can win. By achieving their Microsoft Office Specialist certification students can add a valuable credential to their resume, establish the basis for RPL in the case of further VET training, set themselves apart in a very competitive job market - and most of all give their own confidence, competence and proficiency a boost.
The 2013 competition qualification period ends June 15th, in time for the Australian National Championships on 27th June. And the winner of those will be packing their suitcase for the worldwide finals at the end of July.
For information and to enter the 2013 competition visit www.certiport.com.au.
In addition to the sessions for teachers and IT managers I mentioned earlier today, we're also running early-start sessions for school leaders in the next few weeks. They are a fast-paced 90 minute look at some of the key strategic opportunities and issues that schools are facing right now with technology adoption. They are being run by my colleague Travis Smith, who is an informed and entertaining speaker, so I can guarantee that it will be thought-provoking, as well as being a good investment of time. And because it finishes by 9:30, it's not going to eat significantly into the school day.
(Given the amount of discussion (and hype?) around BYOD, I've always appreciated Travis for his grounded views on BYOD in schools, and the need to stay absolutely focused on the teaching and learning, rather than the device strategy itself)
It's being hosted at the Microsoft offices in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney, and the details are below:
With the technology landscape changing at such a rapid rate, it's easy to get lost in the latest idea or tech fad. Come and hear about some of the issues that will define the future of technology in education, including:
Microsoft invites you to join Travis Smith, one of Australia's leading authorities on technology in education for this executive session. After a career in the classroom and school leadership, including the Education faculty at Monash, Travis has developed exceptional knowledge of the links between effective teaching, learning and technology. Travis is now the National Education Specialist for Microsoft Australia. Please join us for this opportunity to hear his thinking about education and technology and participate in our Q&A session.
The session runs from 8:00AM to 9:30AM on each of the following dates:
Brisbane - 19th April - Find out more, and register here
Melbourne - 6th May - Find out more, and register here
Sydney – 9th May – Find out more, and register here
We're running a series of Microsoft-hosted events for schools in the next few weeks, and the invite is open to teachers and IT managers to come along to any of them in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney.
The events are morning workshops, followed by lunch and an opportunity to chat with other schools - and a chance to see some of the latest Windows 8 touch devices.
The agenda starts off at 10AM with a combined session for both teachers and IT Managers, and then splits into individual sessions for each group:
Hear first-hand from National Education Specialist, Travis Smith, on how Microsoft is shaping the future of education technology, and giving both educators and their students a significant advantage in the classroom.
Teachers’ Hands-On Workshop This session will allow teachers and curriculum leaders to: Explore new ways to integrate technology in the classroom for enhanced teaching and learning Discover some of the new features of Windows 8 and Office 365 in an educational context Get some hands on workshop time with Windows 8 devices Network with other educators around technology in the classroom or… IT Managers’ Deep Dive on Windows 8 and Office 365 for Education We want to ensure that you are the expert when it comes to our new product releases, so this session will help school IT Managers to gain a better understanding of: Management, Security, Usability, Devices and apps for Windows 8 Making your school more productive and cost effective through the use of cloud technology How you can ensure your students have sustainable access to a no compromise learning device
This session will allow teachers and curriculum leaders to:
We want to ensure that you are the expert when it comes to our new product releases, so this session will help school IT Managers to gain a better understanding of:
Management, Security, Usability, Devices and apps for Windows 8
Making your school more productive and cost effective through the use of cloud technology
How you can ensure your students have sustainable access to a no compromise learning device
We finish with lunch and a chance for schools to network while checking out some of the latest Windows 8 devices.
Brisbane – 19th April – Register here
Sydney – 9th May – Register here
Melbourne – 6th May – Register here