I am not a Dinosaur - J. Ferraro

Why did the dinosaurs die out?  I have no idea, but when someone thinks your not keeping up with the times, they call you a dinosaur.  In my attempt to keep up with changing technology, I am not a dinosaur.

I can remember back in the 90’s having the opportunity to receive technology training at Moraine Valley Community College through the National Science Foundation.  Joe (Joey G) Geiger, Colleen Howard, John Flores, Pat Hennessy and I went to a two week training on how to use the Blackboard server for our classes.  If you don’t know most of the people I mentioned, 3  are still here and 2 are retired.  We were given the opportunity to use the Moraine Blackboard server for 5 years.   It was the first time Sandburg students had access to such technology for a high school class.  

Sometime later we switched over to the Moodle server for our classes.  Blackboard was done!  Jim Mattera had the server in his home. If Comcast went down at this house , our server went down as well.  Jim, Joe, Desi Vuillaume and I were the instructors using Moodle.  Moodle eventually grew in popularity with other faculty members, which resulted in the school having its own Moodle server.

About 4-5 years ago, our tech department switched from Moodle to Canvas.  It is amazing that all faculty now have access to using this server.  In terms of organizing lessons, and timelines for your classes, Canvas is awesome.   Pair this server up with the  Remind 101 app, and your students will have 24-7 reminders on what is happening in your class.  You are able to make quizzes that students can take at their convenience.  Peer editing projects on google docs can also be done.  The ability to connect students to links and download documents keeps every student up to date.  

That was a brief history of my attempt to keep up with technology.  Hopefully you are still awake after reading this blog.

Jack Ferraro

Carl Sandburg Social Studies Department

Twitter - @MrJFerraro