Dear Providence Hall community,
Providence Hall is an educational community that continuously seeks innovative ways to enhance our students’ learning and to increase their joy and satisfaction in the educational process.
Each year Providence Hall strives to add value to our academic program, and this summer was without exception. Over the past twelve months we have been developing a campus wide learning initiative titled “Connected Learning.” Connected Learning at Providence Hall combines modern technology with a college preparatory curriculum, taught with the best instructional modes and creating an environment where a student’s social, personal, and academic worlds converge. Stay tuned as you will hear much more about this exciting initiative in the months to come.
Although we are in the early stages of implementing Connected Learning, our students will enjoy many enhancements this fall with more to come throughout the year. This summer every teacher has been equipped with a new iPad to explore the vast possibilities of a 1:1 iPad program at Providence Hall in the near future. We have increased our partnership with RenWeb to include the fully integrated Moodle Learning Management System to assist our teachers in providing students with valuable course content online. RenWeb launched their “RenWeb Home Application” (available today in the Apple apps store) giving students and parents real time access to grades, homework assignments, attendance, school directory and more directly on their iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. A select group of students will be piloting an online dual enrollment program offered by a nationally recognized Christian university. Finally we will be moving all Providence Hall students and faculty to “the cloud,” utilizing Google Apps solutions for the entire school.
Everyone at Providence Hall is eagerly awaiting these improvements and anticipating the impact they will have on everyday learning as we prepare our young people for their future in the 21st century. Below you will find brief descriptions of some of the technological improvements we will be implementing for the 2012-2013 academic year.
Sincerely,
David O’Neil
Head of School
Moodle with RenWeb Integration
Moodle is a Course Management System (CMS), also known as a Learning Management System (LMS) or a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). It is a free web application that educators use to create effective online learning sites. As of December 2011 it had a user base of 72,177 registered and verified sites, serving 57,112,669 users in 5.8 million courses.
Announcing Mobile Access to ParentsWeb!
ParentsWeb Mobile provides free browser-based access to ParentsWeb information from any mobile device, including an iPod, iPhone, Android Phone, iPad or Android Tablet.
With ParentsWeb Mobile you can access Homework Assignments, Daily Grades, Lesson Plans, School Directory Listings, Report Cards, Attendance, Behavior Events and Class Schedules. Future enhancements include Pay Now, Newsletters, Resource Documents and Medical information.
Download RenWeb Home App today at: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/renweb-home/id518334522?mt=8#
Google Apps for Education
Learn more at: http://www.plu.edu/google-apps/about-google-apps/home.php
Google Apps is a package of web-based applications that make creating original work, communicating with classmates, and collaborating on group projects at Providence Hall easier and more efficient. The cornerstone of Google Apps is Gmail, Google’s web-based email program, which integrates with Google Docs and Google Drive, for creating and sharing documents, and Google Calendar, for coordinating schedules. All of these services are hosted online, so email, documents, and calendars are always accessible from any computer, anywhere in the world. Providence Hall’s Google Apps system is a closed system (students are unable to communicate with users outside of providencehallsb.org) creating a safe place for students and teachers to collaborate, create, and communicate. As our upperclassman prepare for their future and begin their college applications their accounts will be allowed to communicate outside of our domain.
Below you will find a description of each Google service which will be available to Providence Hall students.
Gmail – Every member of the Providence Hall community will be given a Providence Hall email account with 7GB of storage. With a standard Providence Hall issued email address we can ensure that students are always well informed on all things Providence Hall. Our students’ email service will only allow communication within our Providence Hall domain. This security protocol allows for a safe online community that is only visible and accessible to the Providence Hall community.
Google Calendar – Share calendars and schedule people, groups, rooms and resources easily, even from your mobile device. Google calendar will streamline student-to-teacher communication allowing students to request meeting times with their teachers through their online calendar.
Google Docs – Create and share a variety of online documents, from word processing and spreadsheets to forms and presentations — all with mobile access. This means that students will ALWAYS have access to their documents whether they are at school, at home, or on vacation. Students can simultaneously collaborate and create a group presentation from the comfort of their own home and then deliver their presentation online in our classrooms. Finally, students can choose to share their presentation online with their classmates for further collaboration.
Google Drive – Google Drive gives our students a single place for up-to-date versions of their files from anywhere. In addition to any file-type they choose to upload, Google Docs are also stored in Google Drive. Even if the students device is lost, stolen, or damaged, their files are backed up to Google’s cloud. And with business-grade security and reliability, their data is safe in Google Drive.
Google Sites – Providence Hall teachers and students can effortlessly build shared websites that include videos, images, gadgets and documents. Students can utilize this technology to build a website for a class project, organize a student club, online student tutoring, creating an e-portfolio for college, and more. Teachers can create online spaces for interactive class discussions, share class documents and presentations, post relevant articles, and much more. With Google Sites, the possibilities are numerous.
Google Groups – Students and faculty can create their own moderated forums and mailing lists featuring strong sharing and management controls. Let’s say the homecoming committee, a group of 18 students and 25 parents, needs to plan the school dance. They would not need to schedule an on-campus meeting to keep everyone informed. They can plan and communicate any time, day or night, using Google Groups.
Google Talk –Instant messaging, calling (VOIP), voicemail and file transfer make staying in touch a breeze. Students and faculty can hold online study sessions at any time during the week or hold a conference call to discuss their upcoming project, test, or paper. As of now Google Talk has been disabled for our middle schools students and will be tested throughout the high school before we make this feature fully available to students.
