Decision Making - Week 5

This week we took a look at Google Trends. I have heard of people looking at this site before to see the latest hot topics on Google but I had never gone there myself. I liked that users can search keywords and see traffic on that topic over a period of time. Also, to be able to go back to that period of time to see the news and blogs posts related to the topics was nice. Overall, I think it is a good basic tool to gather information. As far as using it in a business setting, I do not think that this is an appropriate tool. There is not enough information given here to make wise business decisions.

As for the statistics part of the class this week, I found the work on z scores to be helpful. I am still a bit confused as to how to calculate it properly but a little more work on it and I will understand it just fine. I will also be glad when we are finished with this class. It has not been difficult but it has been quite a bit of work. Looking forward to moving on to the next class.

Decision Making - Week 4

This last two weeks has been a lot of work. The survey we put together was related to some information that I wanted to gather at work. So I spent a lot of time putting together questions and making sure they were worded the way I wanted. Finally the survey went out and 24 few hours had 80 responses! Great turnout and the results were good for my department.

Now that this process is done it is time to start the in-depth analysis of the results. I am looking forward to what the results really mean.

It also seems that this week and next we some larger assignments. The Hitwise assignment this week is going to take some time. Hitwise is an interesting company but I wonder how accurate they can be with the information they gather. Just because a topic is searched, for example, a political candidate, does not meant that that person is going to win or have a large turnout in their favor. It is interesting to see the trends in searching but I am not sure that it really means all that much in the end.

Decision Making - Week 3

Survey says...

That is the theme this week. I never knew so much thought and planning had to go into a survey. It is a lot more difficult than I thought.

After our group decided on the topic and our participants it was time to put the survey together. Much harder than predicted. I have created a number of surveys in Survey Monkey for our school but I never created the survey from scratch. It was always done by someone else and I just put it in the system. I thought I had a good handle on it until I started putting it in a document. Then everything fell apart.

Hopefully things will come together as we talk about it more in our group. I am looking forward to seeing the results and starting the process of analysis.

Decision Making - Week 2

Pirates and monkeys. That is what will stick with me most this week. Despite my lack of enthusiasm, the statistics part of the class has not been that bad and I am starting to understand things a bit more.

The assignment that took the most of my time was the survey comparison. One of the sites that caught my eye was Survey Pirate. I happened to see that title in the list and had to check it out. After all, last Sunday was International Talk Like A Pirate Day! (Everyone knows about this, right? Was I the only one celebrating?)

After visiting the site, not only was I disappointed that there were no pirates but the software was not that good. You can't judge a book by its cover, right?

The other site I checked out was Survey Monkey. I had used this site in the past but have been off of it for about 2 years. I was surprised at all of the new features that were added. I was also surprised that, after adding these features, the price of the site did not go up. There were lots of great enhancements and the price is great (only $200/year for unlimited responses).

I really enjoyed the Capterra site as well. What a great resource for finding any sort of software that you may need. Who knew that there were so many choices!

Decision Making - Week 1

Statistics. Not my favorite subject. I was a poor math student in high school and college. It just does not interest me unless it has to do with physics, which I find fascinating. The process of coming up with statistics is very boring to me. So, to say the least, I am not looking forward to the math part of this class.

One thing that I do like is to look at numbers and analyze them. Numbers can tell a story. When it comes to statistics at work, it my job is to export data, like grades, attendance, and test scores from our student information system and get them to others to compute and analyze.

I am hoping that this class will provide me a better toolset for dealing with statistics. I would like to know how to better analyze the statistics and put them to good use. Our school has been doing data driven instruction for the last couple of years. This is the type of class that I need to better understand that process.

Facilitating Collaboration - Week 5

Wow, this week I found tons of Web 2.0 resources. I checked out the Go2Web20 and All Things Web 2.0 sites this week and was almost overwhelmed with what I found on those pages. I have had teachers ask me for site and application recommendations for their classrooms in the past few years and have always looked at purchasing some tool to fulfill their needs. With these sites I found almost everything for free! This is going to be a great resource for me and my teachers.

I am still working on my Google site. I have the pages created. Now I need to add content, graphics, and mess around with the page colors a bit. So far Google Sites is really easy to use and, since it is part of the Google Apps package that our school uses, readily available for our teachers to use without signing up for any additional accounts.

Facilitating Collaboration - Week 4

This week was another great week of resources for my job. I spent a lot of time researching the screencast solutions. In the past I have used different applications like Snap Pro X or Quicktime to record desktop movies. I then had to find ways to publish or distribute these videos.

After checking out some of the options, I chose to use Screenr for my assignment. What I liked about this was how easy it was to use and that it was connected to my Twitter account. My goal for a couple of years has been to create short tutorial videos to replace the over 100 page technology manual that we distribute to teachers. I plan on having a Twitter account setup so that each time I post something a message is sent out to a group e-mail address so all teachers and staff get a message. Now, as I create these videos I can automatically Tweet that it is done and all teachers and staff will get notification about it.

I also spent time this week working on my Google Sites pages. I have been working on a site for the Messmer Tech department for a while and this is going to motivate me to get it done. Still lots to do to get this ready before school starts.