"Bits and Bytes" -- January '98

Table of Contents

1. Pearls of URLs
   This monthly item will highlight Internet web sites which are considered "gems" by educators.
2. Notes and Quotes
   This regular column provides information on a potpourri of technological "tidbits".
3. Food for Thought: Some New Year's Insight
   Judith Dueck of Gordon Bell High School and Sally Metcalfe of Maple Leaf School passed along these two messages for your consideration.
4. E-mail: Tips, Tricks and Traps
   Brian Metcalfe describes how Divisional Internet users can find e-mail address for others in our Division, how educators can activate e-mail accounts for their students, how Internet users can avoid getting viruses through e-mail and how to verify e-mail virus hoaxes.
5. Have you hugged your "Snood" today?
   This article describes a "freebie" set of files that Brian Metcalfe created to help students learn classification skills using Tabletop Jr.
6. River of Sand - "An Internet-enhanced view of Mali"
   Rob Fiola passes on a request from Friederike Knabe of the Unitarian Service Committee of Canada who is promoting a special web site on Mali, Africa which will be interactive from February 7 to March 3.
7. Freebie Request Page
   The freebie this month include the "Snoods" file as described in the article above and a MEGA - FREEWARE web site for your perusal.
   

Pearls of URLs

Several years ago I challenged colleagues to pick the most cost-effective software they could buy for education which totaled less than $300.00. When you have limited resources or a limited budget, you have to select wisely. At that time, most chose AppleWorks and PrintShop. Today, I challenge readers to imagine for a moment, that if you could only have access to the Internet through a limited number of uniform resource locators (URLs), which ones would you pick? I will use this location in the future to share favourite "pearls" of other educators.

  Margaret Stimson's Info Zone at: http://www.mbnet.mb.ca/~mstimson/

  Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators at: http://www.capecod.net/schrockguide/index.htm

  NASA web site at: http://www.nasa.gov/

  The Global Schoolhouse at: http://www.gsh.org/

Brian Metcalfe - Editor - "Bits and Bytes"                                                  Copyright © 1998 (ISSN 1195-5864)
Last revision date: January 28, 1998                                                  Information has been shared with

Notes and Quotes

by Brian Metcalfe - Technology Education

Congratulations to Lord Nelson, Montrose and Weston Students!
Linda March's students of Lord Nelson School and Steve Broda-Milian's students at both Montrose and Weston are to be CONGRATULATED for demonstrating both their creative imagery and poetry. In the November '97 issue of "Bits and Bytes", I invited children to design both a picture and accompanying poetry that might be described as "The Holiday Season Through My Window". This event was a field test to see if we could link pictures and poetry together on the world wide web. Because these creative students and their dedicated educators demonstrated that this process would work, we plan to offer this activity as the "April showers bring May flowers" activity in the "Let's Get Connected" event planned for May 1998. Please check out the "Student Resources" off our Divisional web site at: http://www.wsd1.org/activity/9798/holidays/default.htm to see the creative talents of 166 of our students. Thanks to all the students and staff members for caring and sharing!

A "Snappy" Solution from Caroline McDowall As an itinerant employee, who goes from location to location carrying bags, binders records and disks, I have at last found an easy way to make the 3.5" disks stay securely positioned in those clear plastic loose-leaf binder pocket inserts. Slip an elastic band or two over the label area of the diskette. The rubber band increases the friction between the plastic diskette and the the pocket and keeps your data secure. Thanks Caroline!

"Paint Shop Pro" - Best Prices!
Single copies of "Paint Shop Pro" are available in Winnipeg for approximately $85-$90. Joyce Wong, of Sister MacNamara School, purchased "Paint Shop Pro" directly from JASC Canada. They can be reached via their web site at; http://www.jasc.com or by phone at (800) 622-2793. Joyce was able to get a school site license for 10 copies at $267.00 with each additional copy over 10 at $25.00. Thanks Joyce.

Computers for Schools & Libraries (Manitoba)
If your school is considering acquiring a computer(s) from the "Computers for School & Libraries" at: http://www.cfsl.mb.ca/ Please make certain that you request that the "DOS" and "Windows for WorkGroups" operating systems software be installed. Some schools have recently acquired computer hardware only to find that because they did not have the operating systems installed, the school has to pay a significant higher price to purchase the "full copy" of the operating system. Furthermore if the hardware comes with operating system software and you choose later to upgrade to Windows 95, the upgrade price is much less expensive than purchasing the full new Windows 95 product.

Manitoba Robot Games at the Manitoba Museum of Man and Nature - April 18, 1998
Are your students interested in building robots to compete in "Sumo Wrestling", "Mini-Tractor Pull", "Seek and Capture" or "Atomic Hockey" events. Contestants must register by April 3, 1998. For more information contact the Science Council Manitoba, c/o Mr. Herb Reynolds, 589 Roch Ave., Winnipeg, MB R2K 2P7 or e-mail: hreynold@mbnet.mb.ca

Quote of the Month
"The kind of knowledge children most need is the knowledge that will help them get more knowledge." - Seymour Papert

[Table of Contents]

Food for Thought: Some New Year's Insight

forwarded by Judy Dueck and Sally Metcalfe

I am the NEW YEAR. I am unused, unspotted, without blemish. I stretch before you three hundred and sixty-five days long. I will present each day in its turn, a new leaf in the Book of Life, for you to place upon it your imprint.

It remains for you to make of me what you will; if you write with firm, steady strokes, my pages will be a joy to look upon when the next New Year comes. If the pen falters, if uncertainty or doubt should mar the page, it will become a day to remember with pain.

I am the New Year. Each hour of the three hundred and sixty-five days, I will give you sixty minutes that have never known the use of mankind. White and pure, I present them; it remains for you to fill them with sixty jeweled seconds of love, hope, endeavour, patience, and trust in God.

I am the New Year. I am here - but once past, I can never be recalled. May you make me your best year yet.

   My New Year's Message To You

I have a list of folks I know, all written in a book,
and every year at this time, I go and take a look
and that is when I realize that these names are apart,
not of the book they're written in, but of my very heart.

For each name stands for someone who has crossed my path sometime,
And in that meeting they've become the "rhythm of the rhyme".
And while it sounds fantastic for me to make this claim,
I really feel I am composed of each remembered name.

And while you may not be aware of any special link,
Just meeting you has shaped my life,
more than you can ever think,
For once you've met somebody, the years cannot erase,
The memory of a pleasant word or a friendly face.

So never think my New Year's note is just a mere routine
Of names upon a list, forgotten in between,
For when I send a New Year's note that is addressed to you
It's because you're on the list of folks that I'm indebted to.

For you're part of the total of the many folks I've met;
And you happen to be one of those I prefer not to forget.
And whether I have known you, for many years or few,
In some way you have had a part in shaping things I do.
Every year when New Year's come I realize anew,
The biggest gift that life can give is meeting folks like you.

[Table of Contents]

E-mail: Tips, Tricks and Traps

by Brian Metcalfe - Technology Education

TIP - How can I find the e-mail address for someone in our Division?
As routers are slowly being introduced into our schools, many more educators and students are gaining access to the Internet and electronic mail. Over the past few years I have found that the collaboration and networking that can be afforded through the electronic mail medium has accelerated. No longer do I play "telephone tag" as much, and in many cases, I am able to communicate information in a more efficient manner.

However, I have acquired a great many e-mail addresses over the years and have built up a substantial list of "nick names" (electronic mail addresses such as "elvis@graceland.com") and utilize LISTSERVs (computer distribution mail servers which send questions and answers out to e-mail users which share a common interest e.g. K-12 educators, model plane hobbyists or canoeing & backpacking enthusiasts).

In order to begin to build up a list of e-mail contacts, it is important to have someone to which you can send e-mail. Many users will ask colleagues for their e-mail addresses or contact them by phone to acquire the electronic mail address. For example, suppose you have found an excellent web site for aboriginal youth and know of another teacher in our Division who could benefit. It would sure be nice if there was a directory of e-mail addresses for Divisional Internet users so that you could look up her name, find her Divisional e-mail address and e-mail her the web site information. In fact there is, and if you are connected to the world wide web, you can access this electronic e-mail directory by following the steps below:

1.   In your Netscape or Internet Explorer browser, enter the following Uniform Resource Locator (URL) in the "Location" field and press the <Enter> key.

                    http://mail.wsd1.org/address

2.   The "Email Address Book" web page will ask you to enter your "Email username" e.g. "bmetcalfe", "plogan", or "mllisi" (without quotes), together with your "Password". Next click on the "Login" button.

3.   If you do not proceed to the next "search" screen (shown below), it may be that your email username has not been listed in the Divisional database and you should e-mail the "addressbook@wsd1.org" for assistance.

4.   If you are successful, you will see a screen which indicates that the current database of all Divisional employees that have an e-mail account currently contains more than 1206 entries.

5.   One may click on the hyperlink "Show me the entire Email Address Book" to see all the Divisional e-mail addresses or "Type in the last name of the person you are looking for ..." in the field provided and click on the "Find Now!" button. For example, when I entered "Smith" (without quotes), I found that there were currently 8 different "Smith" surnames who have "wsd1.org" e-mail accounts in our Division.

6.   Once one identifies the Divisional e-mail address of the person they wish to send mail to, one may click on the appropriate e-mail link to insert the e-mail address into his/her browser's mail software. Others may wish to copy the e-mail address to their specific email software (be it "LabPop", "Internet Mail", "E-mail Connection" etc.) Eudora users can automatically add or append the e-mail address(es) selected by clicking on the link provided.

7.   It is important to Logoff this web site when you are finished, in order to prevent someone who is not authorized to search this database from doing so.


TRICK - How can I provide e-mail accounts for my students?

A number of educators who are using labs with Internet access through a router are eager to provide a mechanism so that students can correspond using e-mail. Many schools are adopting a conservative approach by initially providing e-mail access for a limited number of students. It is far easier to explore the e-mail potential as well as the management of e-mail addresses with a limited number of students before opening up the potential to all the students within a school.

All students in our Division will have e-mail accounts in which their "username" is defined by the 8 digits of their unique Divisional student I.D. number. Since we are using a central e-mail server, educators need not worry about activating and de-activating e-mail accounts whenever a student transfers in or out of their school. Rather, once a student's e-mail account has initially been activated and a password set, the access to this central site is ongoing and the student can send and retrieve her/his email from whichever school s/he attends in our Division.

Educators at schools with routers who want to begin using e-mail with their students, should ask their local school e-mail administrator(s) to provide assistance with the creation of e-mail passwords (tied to the unique student I.D. number) for each of the students involved in the initial e-mail pilot program in your school. Steps that should be considered are outline below:

1.   Ask if your school secretary can provide a list or print-out of the class of students together with their corresponding student I.D. numbers.

2.   The next step involves the e-mail administrator of your school gaining access to the e-mail server to request a special time-sensitive password which allows an entire class to assign a password to their respective I.D.s. This individual should request this special password just prior to instructing a class of older children how they can assign their own passwords or just prior to having preparatory time to go through the process of assigning common passwords on behalf of some early years students. The process may differ slightly depending on the age of the students and I will identify this later in Step #14.

3.   The e-mail administrator for your school must start up their Netscape or Internet Explorer browser. They must then enter the following uniform resource locator (URL) address in the "Location" field and press the <Enter> key.

         http://mailadmin.wsd1.org/request/

4.   The school e-mail administrator is prompted to enter her/his username and password and then s/he clicks on the "Login" button.

5.   A web page entitled "Obtain Temporary Master Password" is displayed. A case-sensitive "Master Password" such as "8ASpks1P" (without quotes) will be issued which can only be used from your school for a limited time of approximately 30 minutes. This "Master Password" should be carefully recorded (perhaps on the chalkboard or overhead projector for the class to see in Step #8) paying particular attention to the upper and lower case characters in the password. This password will allow any student to login using it for the remaining time period to activate or to assign a password to his/her student I.D. number which will act as the student's e-mail username for accessing the Divisional mail server anytime in the future.

6.   Teachers should stress the need for students (particularly where passwords are individually assigned) to understand the confidentiality of e-mail and that passwords should not be shared. Similarly teachers should instruct students to pick a cryptic password, comprised of characters and numbers, THAT THEY WILL REMEMBER. If the students in your pilot e-mail class are in the middle years or older ages, they can assign their own individual passwords following the procedure below.

7.   When the class enters, each student should be assigned their own student I.D. number. Once each student has given careful thought as to what their unique password will be, s/he should start up their Netscape or Internet Explorer browser. Next s/he should carefully type in the following URL into the browser's "Location" field:

     http://mailadmin.wsd1.org/activate

8.   On the "Activate Email account" page, each student should enter the case-sensitive "Activation Password" which the teacher has previously written on the chalkboard or overhead projector in Step #5 and click on the "Go" button. Students must ensure that they adhere EXACTLY to the case sensitivity of this password if they are going to be allowed access to the password assigning process.

9.   Each student is asked to enter his/her 8 digit student I.D. number. Make certain that this number is entered CORRECTLY before proceeding.

10.   The student is then asked to enter his/her new password in the first field. This should be done slowly and precisely because the characters entered will be over-written with asterisks (*) to avoid anyone "shoulder-surfing" and seeing the password on the screen.

11.   Since the student is not able to view the first password entry to check for accuracy (because the characters are over-written with asterisks), the student is asked to once again enter the password in the second field as a verification procedure. Click on the "Go" button to complete the task.

12.   If the first and second password entries do not match EXACTLY, the password initiating software will inform the user that the two entries are different and that the two entries should be tried again.

13.   Once the e-mail passwords have been assigned, students should exit the Netscape or Internet Explorer browser and start their respective e-mail software program. It is recommended that each student send an e-mail message to him/herself, using their student I.D. number as their e-mail username and their newly-assigned password to verify that all is working efficiently. Teachers are encouraged to have students regularly delete old mail off the server so as to avoid overflowing their mailbox memory.

14.   For early-years children, Keith Benson, North district support teacher, recommends that the teacher assign an e-mail password for all younger children so that they can learn the rudiments of e-mail without having to go through the more exacting task of assigning their own password.

15.   In order for the teacher to assign passwords for a class of younger children, the teacher should proceed through the first five steps identified above. Once the "Temporary Master Password" has been assigned, the teacher will use it to login on each student's behalf and assign each an individual password. For example, to make it easy for younger students, the teacher may assign the common password "go" to all student I.D. numbers in her/his care.

16.   Once the teacher has assigned a password to activate each of the students' I.D. usernames, Keith Benson believes the younger children can then focus on learning their own student I.D. and entering it correctly into the e-mail software using the common password for the class.

17.  Once these students become proficient at entering their student I.D. to send and retrieve e-mail, the e-mail process will become more automatic.

18.   Undoubtedly, when these younger children reach the middle years or older grade levels, then the teacher can provide an opportunity for such children to change their passwords from the common classroom password (of "go", for example) to their own unique and confidential password.


TRAP - How can I avoid getting viruses through e-mail?

As more and more of our students and staff gain access to e-mail and start corresponding with others world-wide, the potential for acquiring viruses increases. However, the chance of acquiring a virus via the text of a e-mail message is, today, virtually impossible. That is not to say that viruses cannot be acquired through the electronic mail process. Rather viruses that are acquired through the e-mail process are transmitted not in the text of the message but in the executable files that may be attached to a textual message.

To protect our staff and students from viruses, our Division has purchased virus scanning software from McAfee and Associates at: http://www.mcafee.com which should be installed in all Windows-based computers in each school. Such software will alert the user if a virus is introduced to a workstation by inserting an infected diskette, by downloading an executable virus-infected file over the Internet, or by receiving a virus-laden file attachment with an e-mail message. If the workstation, which has the McAfee virus scanning software properly installed, detects a virus on the computer, it will inform the user and "lock up" so that there is less risk of spreading the virus within your lab or school.

However, those new to Internet e-mail will eventually receive a message similar to the following warning from a well-intended colleague:

"This is a warning for all internet users - there is a dangerous virus propagating across the internet through an e-mail message entitled "PENPAL GREETINGS!. DO NOT DOWNLOAD ANY MESSAGE ENTITLED "PENPAL GREETINGS!"

This message appears to be a friendly letter asking if you are interested in a penpal, but by the time you read this letter, it is too late. The 'trojan horse" virus will have already infected the boot sector of your hard drive, destroying all of the data present. It is a self-replicating virus, and once the message is read, it will AUTOMATICALLY forward itself to anyone who's e-mail address is present in YOUR mailbox!

This virus will DESTROY your hard drive, and holds the potential to DESTROY the hard drive of anyone whose mail is in your inbox, and who's mail is in their inbox, and so on. If this virus remains unchecked, it has the potential to do a great deal of DAMAGE to computer networks worldwide!!!!

Please, delete the message entitled "PENPAL GREETINGS!" as soon as you see it! And pass this message along to all of your friends and relatives, and the other readers of the newsgroups and mailing lists which you are on, so that they are not hurt by this dangerous virus!!!!"

Many well-intentioned Internet users immediately forward this message onto as many of their friends as possible to inform them of this potential disaster. The recipients often pass this same message on to several others and the information distributes exponentially.

Whenever, I am notified of a potential virus, I point my browser to the virus information page on the McAfee server at: http://www.nai.com/vinfo/ to see if I can ascertain if the message is indeed a hoax. When you inspect the Virus Hoax Information link on this page you will find that the "Penpal Hoax" is listed together with 13 others, which probably propagate around the Internet faster than any real virus.

So when you receive an e-mail message indicating that there is a new virus on the Internet, at least be responsible, and search McAfee's site to determine if it is indeed a hoax. If it is, e-mail the sender with this web page asking that they check the resource before they send it on. If, on the other hand, McAfee does not list it as a hoax, does not identify it as a virus nor does it have any information on the suspect virus, please pass it on to your friends and include me as well.

[Editor: Warren Wiens and the staff of Information Services, who have implemented the Divisional e-mail server and have written the web browser interface to make managing the e-mail accounts for students and staff so much easier, are to be commended for their fine job and responsiveness to suggestions from the field.]

[Table of Contents]

Have you hugged your "Snood" today?

by Brian Metcalfe - Technology Education

"What's a Snood?", you ask. Snoods are little creatures, like those above, which consist of the four main attributes of: hair, eyes, nose and feet. Students can assemble Snoods in a particular fashion or let the computer randomly generate the four components. Regardless of how they are created, students can have a very rich experience as they work at classifying Snoods using an imaginative problem solving software product called "Tabletop Jr.". This software was created by TERC at http://www.terc.edu and distributed by Broderbund Software for Education at http://www.broder.com.

Elementary schools receiving new Windows 95-equipped labs this year, were provided copies of Tabletop (Jr. and Sr.) for each of their 20 workstations. Like a word processor which spans many grade levels while supporting the writing process, the Tabletop series spans many grade levels as it supports the mathematics and problem solving processes.

Recently, I have been very fortunate to learn about the Snoods as I worked with some very creative Grade 1 - 6 students at Strathcona School. It has been my pleasure to work with Fred Rosenblatt, a very caring and talented teacher who, like the students he is working with, is learning about how technology can support teaching in many innovative and wonderful ways.

One evening as I was creating some Snood-related activities, I realized that the process that I was going through was probably being replicated by other teachers hoping to introduce the Snoods to their classes. It seemed natural to me that as I constructed an activity, it should be shared with other educators. However, one of the drawbacks that I have observed in past is that a number of very creative teachers have distributed files of activities and assumed that the recipient automatically understood how the collection of shapes, for example, might be used by a class. I admit that often my assumptions and the way I might have chosen to use the collection were quite different from the way the creator intended. For this reason, I not only created Snood activity file (with suffix .TTJ), I also created a corresponding Help file (with suffix.TXT) describing how I might use the activity file with children. Any user can open the .TXT file using Windows Notepad or using Microsoft Works. The collection of these files including the Snood activity files and their corresponding Help files are available as a freebie. Educators can either download the compressed .ZIP file over the Internet or educators in our Division can send in a blank diskette to acquire this freebie resource.

Those educators downloading the file must first decompress the .ZIP file. When the individual .TTJ and .TXT files can be identified, they should be copied to a floppy. The lab facilitator can copy these files over to each school's NT server and place them in the "2STUDENT" directory for all workstations to access. I found that both middle and early years students quickly adapted to the procedure of accessing centrally-located files by selecting the "Open" command in "Tabletop Jr." and then selecting the appropriate .TTJ files off the "S" or "2STUDENT" drive.

Students were encouraged not to "duplicate" or "trash" any Snoods that appeared in any of the activity files below:        

[Table of Contents]

"River of Sand" - An Internet-enhanced view of Mali

Friederike Knabe - Director, USC Canada - E-mail: knabe@fox.nstn.ca

"I am writing today to get your school interested and connected to the most exciting project USC Canada is involved with. You may remember that we have a major project in Mali. Well, we are in the process of filming in Mali and will bring the country, the people and USC's work there to life. To make the work in progress interesting to Canadians, in particular students and young people, our producer and we have designed a special web site. It will be interactive between February 7 to March 3; the site itself will be kept for a year with regular up-dates to the site. Bruce Cockburn will be in Mali to participate in the shoot (and I will be there too) and people can send e-mail questions to him and us about our trip, Mali, the project etc. The web site will follow us as we travel in the country. To get a sense of what is being developed, please visit the site at: http://www.kensingtontv.com/go/riverofsand

The title of the film will be 'River of Sand' and will be narrated by Bruce. It will also be a good educational resource later on - and we will work on additional materials for schools.

We need your help to spread the knowledge of the web site fast and also to give some feedback as to the best use of the site within the school curriculum and framework. Please get back to me as soon as you can."

[Editor: Rob Fiola, of David Livingstone School, asked if I could share this timely request with educators.]

[Table of Contents]

Freebie Request Page

by Brian Metcalfe

Please duplicate as necessary and complete form by PRINTING.

        NAME: ________________________________

        SCHOOL: ______________________________

                      PHONE: _______________________________

Internet users are encouraged to download these "freebies" by selecting the appropriate underlined and/or colored link below. Educators in The Winnipeg School Division No. 1, who do not have Internet connectivity, may still acquire these "freebies" by sending in this completed form with the appropriate number of NEW double-sided, HIGH DENSITY 3.5" blank diskette(s) specified in brackets. Others, outside our Division, are entitled to these "freebies" on the condition that they download these resources using the Internet.

[    ]  Tabletop Jr. Activities - Snoods - Disk #1                                                      SNOODS1.ZIP                  [#275]
          (Single NEW 3.5" high density disk) 
          This diskette consists of a number of files which can be loaded into Tabletop Jr. software.
          Various creatures, called Snoods, are grouped by attributes such as hair, eyes, nose or feet.
          Each Tabletop Jr. (.TTJ) file has a corresponding Help text (.TXT) file which can be read
          with Windows Notepad or Works to suggest how the corresponding Snoods activity
          might be introduced to students. Review the article in this issue entitled "Have you hugged
          your 'Snood' today?" for more information.   
  

      MEGA - FREEWARE Web Site at: http://www.priddynet.com/gooser/free.html
          This web site slogan states "The largest freeware shareware & freebie site on the web and
          getting bigger every day!" The categories listed on this page include Games, Art-Graphics-Music,
           Anti-Virus Software, Major Software Sites, Mac / Amiga / OS/2, Freeware & Free Stuff, and
           General Shareware Sites. (Thanks to Nic Devine, from Andrew Mynarski School, for informing me
           That the older link in the "hard copy" version of the newsletter had changed.)

*** E-mail Notification to "Bits and Bytes" Readers ***

If you would like a brief reminder sent to you each month by e-mail when each new issue of "Bits and Bytes" is available on the World Wide Web, please complete the form below and return it as indicated. I will endeavour to develop an e-mail address database and e-mail readers when a new issue is available to peruse electronically. If you prefer, you can e-mail the contents of each of the five fields below directly to our secretary Linda Shelest at: lshelest@minet.gov.mb.ca
Thanks for your understanding.

FIRST NAME: ____________________    SURNAME: ____________________________
SCHOOL: _______________________________________________________________
PHONE: ________________   E -MAIL ADDRESS: ______________________________

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