Matthew Barfield has published some informative Promethean vodcasts… check them out!

My educational colleague in Virginia, Dr. Karen Richardson, has been named the new executive director of the Virginia Society for Technology in Education. Both of us are board members for VSTE, and Karen was recently selected to lead the organization through this role starting this summer, after Dr. Daniel Arkin’s retirement.

Karen has had a wide variety of experiences in education including classroom teaching in middle school, high school and, now, higher education. She also has extensive experience with teaching and learning online. She is a certified online instructor for PBS Teacherline and CaseNEX and has both developed and taught content for these organizations. She is teaching an online Master’s level course for Virginia Commonwealth University. These experiences, as well as her recent doctorate in Curriculum and Educational Technology from The College of William and Mary, provide a unique, insightful perspective on public education, particularly in Virginia, which will be of great benefit to VSTE and its membership.

Karen has been to Goochland more than once in her role as a professional developer for VITAL. For teachers not sure what VSTE is–membership is free and the organization is doing great things. Visit their website today and sign-up for membership. I know I’m glad I did back in 1999!

Don’t click this link.

(Rotates the entire webpage in Safari 4.)

I tried for the first time this afternoon to record a professional development session. I used a wireless microphone and ScreenFlow from Telestream.

The class was on MIT’s Scratch, and six teachers from Goochland participated at GES library media center. I’m currently going through the export process now. I will likely share it online, but restrict it to Goochland personnel only. It captured my voice and everything we did at the Promethean board.

We saw this technique being used and promoted recently at EdTech 2010 in Ashland, VA by keynoter Dr. Tim Tyson.

Most teachers love their Promethean boards and find uses for them throughout the day. The bulbs in projectors are expensive and there are ways you can promote their longevity.

1. Be sure to clean the two filters on your orange projector at least monthly to ensure the proper amount of air is being circulated through the projector for cooling. Your ITRT can show you how to access the two areas on the projector that require this regular maintenance.

2. When not using the projector for extended periods of time, turn the projector off. “Extended” periods would be 25 minutes or longer.

3. If you’re projecting in a dark environment without window or overhead light, consider running the projector in a reduced-brightness mode. This may be toggled through the remote. See your ITRT for details. If you run the projector in “Auto Brightness” mode, it will automatically choose the setting by using the projector’s ambient light sensor.