Thing #20

GoogleDocs will become a tool I use regularly, I hope. I love that you can create a document and never lose it, and that it can be changed online so that you don't have to keep up with the most recent copy of something. Another great feature is that you can view previous copies to see exactly what changes were made or who actually made the changes. I also like that documents can be public or private. This is still one of my concerns with some of the Web 2.0 tools----that anyone can see anything. I am looking for better ways to communicate with my staff and gather information, but there are times or discussions that need to remain confidential within our circle. I believe this tool can help me with some of that.

I created an Acceleration Form as a way to keep up with which students are in Acceleration. It will help me monitor what subject they are receiving tutoring in, who the teacher is, what days of the week they participate, when they enter and when they exit Acceleration. If I allow the classroom teachers and the testing coordinator access, then we can keep up with and formally document which students we need to monitor.

I believe this might also be a good tool to keep up with emergency staff information. At the beginnning of the year, teachers fill out a form with important information like: birthdate, children's names and ages, emergency numbers, cell numbers etc. This could be information they enter themselves and change when needed. Also, the entire staff could have access to the information. We would need to make sure it was information everyone was comfortable sharing or they could leave some sections blank. We are forever trying to find phone numbers for teachers to let them know something at the last minute.

I created a word document with upcoming dates for my staff. If I could send this to the whole staff, then I would not have to run it off and they could receive information at home during the summer or at night. I could also do this with the weekly newsletter.

Another idea is to use the form tool in order to ask a question and receive information back from teachers. It seems to work like a survey or poll. I have created one and sent it out to a few people so I can see how the information comes back and what it looks like.

I am excited about looking for more ways to incorportate this "thing" and will definitely be talking to others to see how they are using it.