Google Earth on iPhone

Finally, it is here! I am currently downloading the Google Earth app for my iPhone. I am excited to try it out. I have used Earthscape on my iPhone and it seemed to work pretty well. But Google Earth is the mother of them all and it is free too.

Mathtrain Podcast on iTunes

This week, I was browsing podcasts on iTunes and saw that our Mathtrain Podcast had reached #4 in the Education:K12 category. Very cool. My students were very excited!

Funding Conferences

It still angers me that our school pays for teachers to *attend* conferences, but yet do not pay when a teacher is actually PRESENTING at a conference! My school does not seem to understand the value of having one of their staff members presenting at an international conference. Yes, it is great publicity for our school. But it is also inspiring to our students who benefit from an increasing global audience.

Forget all this focus on "teacher quality" and credential upgrades... we need to focus on re-vamping what our "Administrators" learn in Administration School! As I have mentioned before, administrators need to understand PR. They need to be savvy publicity agents. Sadly, many I have worked with do not seem to grasp the concept of proactive PR. They DO understand negative publicity, though.

Well, I am presenting at the ILC Conference in San Jose, CA this Thursday, October 16th. It will cost me over $500 out of my own pocket for flight and hotel. In the big picture, I don't mind... it's worth it. However, I am not wealthy and I will have a challenge paying for the other upcoming conferences.

But what is maddening is how difficult it is to get my own school to sponsor our project or help with any funding. Ugh!

Last year, as I struggled for funding, there was a staff e-mail sent out inviting 3 teachers to go to a conference in Northern California. The school offered to "...take care of the hotel, the registration, and the airfare..." for the 3 individuals, but they were short in finding teachers who wanted to attend. They sent out a mass e-mail looking for someone-anyone to attend so they could spend the money. What a waste, especially as I was burning a hole in my pocket as I tried to pay for a conference I was presenting at around the same time period.

Please Lincoln, help fund our project.

Suspension for a Mohawk

I understand dress codes as important sometimes. I taught in East Boston, and the color red was forbidden. That is because it was associated with a gang and students would go to all lengths to find creative ways to wear a piece of red to show their allegiance.

But a haircut? A student got suspension for a mohawk. That's so old-school that it isn't even a rebel thing to do anymore. C'mon, that is pathetic.

Old One was Better

I had the original 4GB iPhone for over a year. I liked it and the only real bummer was that it was such a small amount of storage for all my podcasts, music and videos.

So this week, I bought the new 3G 16GB iPhone. Now I have plenty of storage! However, the newer device is disappointing.

Of course, the casing is not as good as the first one. But there are other issues. For example, the 3G doesn't kick-in very often. And when it does, I am underwhelmed. Also, my old iPhone paired well with my car stereo for hands free conversations. But the newer iPhone sounds like tin, it echoes and even feeds back while in the car. This never happened with the older version.

Also, the screen should blacken while near my ear and light back up when removed from my ear. Well, this newer iPhone does the opposite. It blackens the screen when I remove it from my ear and then it is a challenge trying to hang up. OK, so maybe I need to visit the Apple store. But, I just wish my older iPhone was a wee bit larger than 4GB so I could go back to that one.