B Cruz

July 24, 2008

I definitely did not waste my time taking the class, "How to Use Excel as a Database." I hope to use it right away by creating letters for parents and name card labels for my students or any organization of information. Any short cuts I can learn to help me save time is a god-send. I really think it is important to keep up with technology. Exel is a program I have sort of put on the backburner because I wasn't familiar with all the tricks of the trade so of speak. Now that I have learned some more advanced techniques I don't feel so itimidated with the program.

I believe I will be able to use it as a very manageable tool. Mr. Howard Martin assisted the class and myself in creating a database file so that I could use it during the school year. I created a letter, certificate, label, rubrics, etc. as well as some spreadsheet ideas for classroom activities. The advanced features and functions of the Excel program will assist me overall. I would recommend this class to my colleagues.

July 30, 2008

Today the day went by so fast in this training because I was very involved in each step of making instructional templates to use for my Business Ventures and Keyboarding classes. Although the instructional book (included a CD too) I was provided with was related to only science activities I will have no problem creating and implementing templates related to the subject I teach.  Again it was a pleasure to have Howard Martin as my instructor. He is so good at explaining how to use technology that it almost makes me feel like a pro. Plus he has a great sense of

humor. Here is an example of one the templates I created.

 Tower-Employee Characteristics.ppt  

 MiniBookTemplate-Entreprenuer.ppt

August 7,  2008

One thing that I have been very frustrated by is the fact that I couldn't show students educational videos in the classroom. In Arturo's class Technology Tools that Stick in the Classroom there were various websites that were shown to us. The website that will be useful to me will be Teachertube.com so that I have access to good educational videos that I can download into my PowerPoint presentations.