[Year 12 IT Apps] RE:Google tools

[ken price]

There doesn't appear to be an age issue from Google's perspective, as they
offer services specifically to schools.eg
http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/edu/customers.html

Of some relevance is that the entire NSW education departmetnt (one of the
largest education systems in the world) has decided to switch its entire 1.3
million student email accounts to a Google-provided service
http://blog.devnet.com.au/index.php/google-apps/nsw-education-grows-with-google-apps

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/news/technology/who-is-googles-biggest-client/2008/07/29/1217097282429.html
I'm not sure if these Gmail accounts work like the usual Google accounts,
given you access to all their tools.

There may of course be age conditions for individual education systems.

The other aspect of Google services is the storage - I don't know of many
schools who can offer every student 6 Gigabytes of online storage,
accessible at home or school. And that all you need to access this range of
applications is a computer with a browser - this can be provided with an
open-source OS with no licensing costs and no software installations on home
computers (with associated questions of legality)

These issues are relevant not only in delivering the IT Apps course, but
perhaps merit student discussion within it?

We live in interesting times..

Cheers
Ken

Ken Price
President, TASITE  www.tasite.tas.edu.au



On Wed, Nov 5, 2008 at 9:39 AM, Alex Hopkins <a.hopkins at bcc.vic.edu.au>wrote:

> Is it in fact a requirement, though? It seems to me that this is
> important, as it would make a substantial difference to our teaching
> practices. I use Google docs, etc with year 9s, who certainly aren't 18! I
> don't have a year 12 group this year, but when I saw Bill's idea I thought
> it an excellent one for the group that I will have next year. So could we
> have any clarification on this matter?
>
> Regards,
>
> Alex Hopkins
> Bayside Christian College
>
> > Thanks, Anne.
> >
> > I was not aware of the minimum 18 year old age requirement.
> >
> > I guess I will confine it to my class where the students are all over 18
> > years old.
> >
> > Thanks for the heads up.
> >
> > Regards, Bill Oldham (sessional teacher at Chisholm TAFE and VU)
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: itapps-bounces at edulists.com.au
> > [mailto:itapps-bounces at edulists.com.au]
> > On Behalf Of murch at tpg.com.au
> > Sent: Tuesday, 4 November 2008 9:03 PM
> > To: Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing List
> > Subject: Re: [Year 12 IT Apps] RE:Google tools
> >
> > I love your idea Bill, and use google substantially. If you set up an
> > igoogle page, most of these tools can be accessed quickly, so add in
> > reader, notebook, todo etc as well.
> > However, do students have to be 18 years of age to use all this. I am not
> > certain but thought I read somewhere that was the case.
> > Anne Mirtschin
> > Hawkesdale P12 College
> >
> > Quoting Bill Oldham <billo at kew.hotkey.net.au>:
> >
> >> Is anyone considering using the Google tools that are now available
> >> to use
> >> in all the SACs for next year except the database one?
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> This year I started with a Google account. I began with Gmail, Gtalk,
> >> and
> >> Ggroups.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> This lead into using Blogger, Google images and Picasa.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Then came the online versions of a word processor, spreadsheet and
> >> web page
> >> creator programs as part of Google docs.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Timelines were developed in a rough sense using Google Calendar and
> >> Google
> >> docs spreadsheet.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Add to this a start of using PBwiki, YouTube and Google toolbar.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> It seems like most of ITA in 2009 could be covered using Google tools
> >> and be
> >> completely online.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> What do you think?
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Regards, Bill Oldham (sessional teacher at Chisholm TAFE and VU)
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> >
>



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