Stephanie Korn, a NO LIMIT! teacher in Sedro-Woolley, brought a recent NEA monthly publication to Donna Craighead’s attention about a teacher who uses handhelds in his classroom.
This teacher has a website with some very good tips, tricks, lists, etc. Under “applications” there are lists according to subject area. If you are not already familar with this site, you might want to check it out.
Margi’s - Presenter To Go - is a device which currently is supported by PC
computers and Mac computers running OS9. Margi is currently working on
this issue, and they say the answer is only weeks away! The tech folks at
Margi say an update will be on their website soon which will allow Mac
users to use Margi if you are running OSX version 10.2 or
newer. Unfortunately, there may not be a Margi answer for those of you
using OSX version 10.1. www.margi.com
One alternative is PitchSolo from Portsmith (now iGo). I have not used
this device myself, so I am requesting feedback from the PETC forum
regarding OSX compatibility. The people at iGo indicate there is no
problem, but this information came from the sales staff, as I was
unsuccessful reaching someone in tech support. You may want to investigate
this option, and I will provide additional information as it becomes
available. http://www.portsmith.com/products/presentation.shtml
One difference between the two: Presenter To Go doesn’t support
transitions between slides, but I have been told that PitchSolo supports
“limited” transitions.
by Larry Davison, Yakima ESD
Handheld Computing Magazine has a weekly downloadable one-page newsletter that covers issues about PDAs. This week’s issue compares the Palm and PocketPC operating systems. It’s a nicely done overview and is worth the read for those interested in comparing handhelds. You can download the PDF file at http://www.hhcenterprise.com/HHC_Weekly/wk0155h.pdf.
The New York Times has printed an article about the Maine laptop program, which has purchased one iBook laptop for every 7th and 8th grader in the state. Very controversial at the time, it appears to be very successful. One quote states:
“Attendance is up. Detentions are down. Just six months after Maine began a controversial program to provide laptop computers to every seventh grader in the state, educators are impressed by how quickly students and teachers have adapted to laptop technology.”
The entire article (”Laptops Win Over the Skeptics, Even in Maine”) can be read online at http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/05/nyregion/05LAPT.html . If you haven’t visited the New York Times website before, you’ll need to do a one-time free registration. It’s worth it to have access to the many interesting articles!
My recurring PDA upgrade nightmare
Tech Update - March 6, 2003
David Berlind relates in this article that he has been using PDAs for 10 years and he states that he is getting very tired of the torturous and expensive upgrade path that’s reminiscent of the PC’s early days.
He states that just about any PC or notebook bought today will have expansion slots. Then, much of the hardware and software you already own can be re-used. His major point is that the same cannot be said of (PDAs).
The author goes on to say that vendors force us to endure unnecessary expense
along the upgrade path. He gave many examples of how he has been unable to upgrade PDAs without having to spend a lot of money to increase the power of a PDA.
I am now using Mac OS X and wish to purchase a Margi-like devise since the Magi isn’t OS X compatible. Has anyone experienced success with another product? Also, which Microsoft Office compatible software do you prefer while using your Palm? Documents To Go isn’t OS X compatible either so I am shopping for that software also.
Conn?s response - Documents to Go v. 5.0 is Mac OS X compatible. The link below explains the incompatibility issues with earlier versions: