Terry's Tech Tips

Continuing with the ' These are a few of my favorite things ' theme, I have a few cool things to share about Google Slides!  If you aren't using Google Slides yourself, these are great tips to share with students working on a presentation in your class! #4  Google Slides Themes - Use Slides Carnival! Whether you are creating your own Slides for the classroom or having students create Google Slides presentations, the themes available within Google Slides themselves are....well, BORING!   Slides Carnival is a website that provides all kinds of beautiful Slides themes for free!  You can look at all their themes, or search by category. Once you have selected a theme, just click ' Use as Google Slides Theme '. You will be directed to ' Make a copy ' of the Slide Deck.   Now you are free to change the Slide Deck as you wish!   A few things I really like about the Slides Carnival themes: Prebuilt presentation -  The theme pages ar

I always think of the iconic Sound of Music song ' These are a few of my favorite things ' around this time of year.  Maybe because it is a happy song, or maybe because the end of the year is a time to reflect on small things that make you happy! 3 things that make me happy with Google Drive! #1:  Emojis can be included in your Google Drive Folder names! If you recently attended one of the ' Organize your Drive, Organize your Life ' offerings, you likely got really excited when you discovered you can color code your folders!  Now, you can add icons to your Folder names as well!  They can help you quickly find that folder! Navigate to one of the following free emoji websites (there are probably others!) recommended by Richard Bryne, author of the Free Tech for Teachers blog. Get Emoji Copy and Paste Emoji Image courtesy of FreeTech4Teachers.com Then, Control + Click on your folder and select ' Rename '.  Paste your emoji w

Introducing the ability to print 504 and IEP Plans for multiple students! Last year, the Math Department spent time outlining desired features/changes to make Aspen more user-friendly.  The CCHS Tech Leaders spent more time fleshing out the Math Department suggestions.  The most desired upgrade became the ability to print multiple IEP and 504 Plans.  Brian worked with Administration to hire an outside consultant to implement this change! Printing 504 or IEP Plans for Multiple Students Three places in Aspen allow access to print multiple 504 or IEP Plans for students: Staff View - Student Top Tab Staff View - Gradebook Top Tab > Rosters Side Tab This is nice if you want to create a set of reports for each of your blocks.  (It will require you to run the report a few more times but might make reading/sorting easier) School View - Student Top Tab In all three places, go to: Reports > Ed Plans > 504 Plan or IEP Form Th

History of Changed Assignment  Scores As of last weekend, Aspen now provides a history of changed grades for assignments.   While in the GradeBoo k tab, Scores side tab, make sure that your Grade Columns are set to any assignment category (Not Post Column Term or Post Column Progress.) Click on an individual assignment cell.  Select Options>Current Cell History or click Control+H .    Any changes will appear in a popup window.  From there, you can change the grade back to a previous grade, or leave it as is.  Note that a history of grade changes made prior to December 1st will not be available.

It can't believe it is already Q2 Progress report time!  It seems this year is flying by! I thought I would share a few tips to help ensure your Progress reports run smoothly: Portal View Icon  While in Staff View >   Gradebook > Scores side tab, the Portal View icon (located in the Q2 column) opens up a new column displaying the grades parents and students see when viewing the family portal. Grades in the Q2 and Q2 Portal View columns should match.  Discrepancies between grades in the two columns are caused by assignments that are not set to ' Public '. Note that the score entered in the T*Prg/T*Grd column is the score that appears on the student's transcript and in the Academic side tab for that course. Assignment Visibility Icon   Located in the last row of each assignment heading, the first icon shows the visibility status of your assignment.  Why an icon so critical is so SMALL is beyond me!  (The next icon locks the column so

I keep hearing about the great sessions people attended at the Mini EdTech Camp .  I am really glad that teachers found it valuable!  There were so many great sessions to attend, and we are fortunate to have so many talented instructors on our faculty. One of the Mini EdTech Camp sessions, Tell Aspen Who's the Boss , covered a tool each of us uses every day.  A couple of quick preference changes provides you more data, more efficiently.  I thought I would share them with everyone!  (Thank Anthony Beckwith for first noticing them when Aspen was updated a couple weeks ago!) Information Delivery (Thank Brian Miller for this gem!)  Scrolling from page to page in Aspen can be a pain.  Who easily remembers the alphabet anymore?  Change your preferences so you see 999 records per page, reducing the number of pages to scroll through! While logged into Aspen, click on your name, and then the Set Preferences option.   Under the General tab  (your default view), look for Lis