INSIDE THIS ISSUE Learning Services ................. 2 Technology/Extras ............... 5 Around BTPS ........................ 6 COMMENTS ABOUT THIS NEWSLETTER? Please send your comments or suggestions to [email protected]We’d love to hear from you! BUFFALO TRAIL PUBLIC SCHOOLS 1041 10A Street Wainwright, AB T9W 2R4 P: 780.842.6144 F: 780.842.3255 E: central_of[email protected]www.btps.ca Twitter: BTPS#28 Superintendent’s Memo For the Week of May 13 th - 17 th , 2019 FROM THE SUPERINTENDENT... MISSION: Buffalo Trail Public Schools is committed to maximizing student learning, in a safe and caring environment, supported by a highly effective team. Question of the week, Page 5. Win a great prize! Email: [email protected]BTPS has always been very proud of the opportunies we provide our students. For a small rural school division, we have been able to provide many experiences that might be thought to be out of reach for schools of our size. Each year, the BTPS Board of Trustees provides support for the BTPS GET MAD. This is an annual event that brings together students from a wide variety of schools to showcase the arts. In the past, we have had combined bands from schools across the district, student artwork from a number of schools, drama performances and choral singing from some of our elementary schools. This year, the organizing group addressed some me challenges brought about by a number of missed days through a video format that showcased the arts in our schools. With the help of the band and art teachers from across BTPS, Jamie Stromberg created a GET MAD video. This video is meant to show the evoluon of a piece of music and how we can collaborate over distance. At the same me, the arsc talents of our students is shared. Thank you to Jamie and those who helped her... please enjoy! Take care,
Sometimes entering any kind of new digital space can be intimidating. Many of us appreciate having a kind of bridge or example of what it can look like before we start.
If you’ve been thinking about utilizing Workspaces in the Hapara suite, they have examples and content created by real teachers from around the world. You can easily search Public Workspaces right from https://workspace.teacherdashboard.com Just go to the magnifying glass in the right corner, choose “Public Workspaces” then type in a subject to explore.
Then you can click on any results that pop up and make a copy of it to repurpose for your own class and add any of your own content as well.
Some school districts have even started using their own tags, so others can easily identify their materials. For example, Ontario Catholic School Board, has stopped using other platforms and encourage their teachers to title all of their Workspaces with OCSB and make their work visible and public, so if anyone searches for “OCSB” they can see work specifically from their school district.
It has greatly impacted the collaboration and learning that has gone on in their district. We’d also
love to start adding to and building more of BTPS28 presence, so we can continue to learn together.
We would like to encourage you to click on the “Visible Publicly” toggle at the bottom of your
workspaces. It doesn’t matter what condition it’s in or whether or not you think it’s complete. When
it goes public, it stays anonymous as to who initially created it, and no one sees any of your
student’s evidence, but only copies of your templates.
Please add “BTPS28” to the title of your workspace, and we can see how our work can grow beyond just East Central Alberta. Who knows, maybe one day your work could impact a classroom in France or New Zealand.
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LEARNING SERVICES CONTINUED...
Used by millions of students in every grade and subject area, WeVideo empowers every learner to discover their voice and make an impact in their world. WeVideo’s platform promotes deeper learning while making it fun and easy for students to express their ideas with creativity and authenticity. BTPS users have premium access to all of WeVideo’s features. Simply log in using your BTPS Google Account.
Need to brush up on WeVideo? Check out our Innovation Coach website for tips and tricks: https://sites.google.com/btps.ca/ics/wevideo?authuser=0
Click on the boxes below for some new tips from WeVideo:
For all problems technology related please use the email addresses below. Big or small, a help desk ticket
needs to be started. Please do not “save” your issues for when a tech member is in your school. We use
the tickets to prioritize and plan for the best and most efficient solution. At least one member of our tech-
nology department is on call to assist you, phone or email. Most issues can be dealt with remotely.
PLEASE start tickets as needed, the sooner a ticket is started the sooner we can look for solutions.
Remember your asset tag number on all tickets.
For Tech problems email [email protected] Phone 780-806-2053 For PowerSchool or Power Teacher problems email [email protected] Phone 780-806-2057
FINAL EXAM PREPARATION
Please contact your school’s Technician to make sure you are set up for the PAT’s and DIP’s scheduled for the next few weeks. Jeremy, Jim and Derek can help with any Quest A+, Google and Desktop exam accounts that may be need-ed. If we can predict it, we should be able to prevent it. Please test your accounts well in advance.
