Everyone,

I'll be on a short vacation for the week and the blog will left unattended.  Unless I can talk one of the other WorkEdge people to maybe write an entry.

WE 's CIG

Journaling Programs

I've been using a journaling program for work and personal use for over three years now. The program I've been using is called - iDailyDiary from Splinterware. I've enjoyed using iDailyDiary and have found it be one the most important programs that I use regularly to store notes, information and memories that I need to recall at a later date.

Splinterware's website points out that iDailyDiary has been "...designed around a simple page-for-a-day diary. Providing a simple interface that immediately gets you started taking daily notes, creating a journal, putting your thoughts into writing and much more. iDailyDiary provides a "richtext" editor and the ability to insert graphics, URL's and Hypertext links."

• Data files encrypted and password protected
• Richtext Editor
• Fully Searchable
• Insert Pictures, URL's and Hypertext
• Multiple "pages" for each day
• Export to HTML format to create web pages
• Supports Unicode (non-western character sets)
• Mutli-Language GUI, including Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Turkish and Japanese

But, for the last few day I've been looking at a new journal program called "The Journal" (TJ) from DavidRM Software.

TJ is very similar to iDailyDiary. DavidRM Software's website points out that "The Journal is a powerful journaling and writing tool that can help you take control of your life."

• Create a digital scrapbook of your life!
• Organize your notes about your family, about your work, about a hobby, about anything.
• Write a short story, a magazine article, or even a novel.
• Remember your appointments, events, tasks & special days!
• Find whatever your looking for with The Journal's powerful searching.

WE 's CIG

• Likert - Agreement
• Likert - Frequency
• Likert - Importance
• Likert - Likelihood
• Likert - Quality
• Numerical 1-10
• Numerical 1-5
• Custom

WE 's CIG

The testing part of EDesk 2 has two parts.

1. Testing Engine
2. Testing Tool

The Testing Engine is to support the item/question pool and aligning the items to standards via the Standards Engine. By placing items into EDesk 2 and then using the Standards Engine and schools, districts or organizations can allow teachers to quickly make tests or quizzes.

The Testing Tool is used to make the tests or quizzes with a simple process. Once made the test or quiz can be put online via the Teacher Portal Page and students can take the test. The results are scored and teachers can quickly view reports on how students did on the test.

The Testing Tool has five reports for looking at the students scores.

• Report by Student list
• Report by Pie Chart
• Report by Item or Question comparison
• Report by Item or Question comparison with item history
• Report by Student and standard(s)

EDesk 2's testing is a strong part of the full product.

WE 's CIG

Today's tool from EDesk 2 is the Calendar.

The calendar tool can be used by teachers to share schedules, events, projects and due dates for their students and parents to see.

The calendar is viewed via the teachers portal page and is toggled on and off like all other tools in EDesk 2. The calendar can be password protected and can be color coded to easily see themed events. The calendar has a daily, weekly, monthly and yearly view option. EDesk 2's calendar has all of the normal calendering admin function for the teachers to use to manage their events.

A teacher can have multiple calendars and each calendar has is own unique html address so that it can be shared as a direct link via a simple email message.

The calendar tool is one more of the powerful EDesk 2 tools.

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Teacher Portal Page or Teacher-Parent-Student Communication Interface.

With an account each teacher gets a simple, easy to use teacher portal page. This page can be used with students, parents and community.

On the page a teacher can share:

• Contact information
• Folders w/documents, images, power point files, links to content, etc.
• My Tests and quizzes
• My Links
• My Blogs
• Calendars

Each of the above shared items can be simply toggled on or off at the teachers discretion. Also each item can have a password assigned to it so that students or the public must know the password before using it.

The Teacher Portal Page is a powerful part of the EDesk 2 and is used by teachers in many ways.

Two Examples - Mr. Work and Mrs. Work

WE 's CIG

EDesk 2 was designed to be a web-based formative testing system for classroom teachers. Today I'd like to talk about each of the components and explain there purpose, function and use.

1. A testing engine for developing and delivering formative quizzes, tests and surveys.
2. A standards engine to align test questions or items to curriculum standards
3. A question or item pool engine to use with quizzes and tests.

Testing Engine:

To use the testing engine a teacher gets an account with a user name and password. After getting an account the teacher can make tests in two ways.

1. Create a test using the item pool of questions that is available for use if the system administrator loads test items into a pool and aligns them to curriculum standards.
2. Create a test using questions that are written by the teacher and he/she places them into a test one question at a time.

To deliver a test the teacher simply publishes their test via a toggling method that makes the test visible to students through a portal page.

Standards Engine:

The standards engine is stand alone product that works directly with the testing engine and requires a login give by the system administrator. The standards engine allows an administrator to put standards into the data base in a hierarchical structure

Item Pool Engine:

The item pool engine is a normal system account like Science, Math or etc. that has test items placed into the account with a special value to let the system know that these accounts are part of the item pool option for developing test. A special value is turned on via an admin tool option to denote that these accounts are part of the item pool system. Itemd can and must be aligned to standards at this time for future use in test development. The number of items in an item pool is unlimited.

This is the simple explanation of the EDesk 2's three main testing components.

WE 's CIG

• Testing Engine
• Standards Engine
• Testing Tool
• Survey tool
• Blog Tool
• Calendar Tool
• Public Portal Page Tool
• and More.

• Cody Spendlove, Utah with 15+ years in the education field
• Ryan Hartley, Utah with 8 years in the education field
• Dan Matthews, Washington with 15+ years in the education field
• Don Fournier, Arizona with 15+ years in the education field
• Coy Ison, Utah with 20+ years in the education field
• Levi Ison, Utah coming on as a full partner. Levi comes to the group with a business and computer background

• Quality is never an accident
• Direct result
• Sincere effort
• Intelligent decisions
• Skillful execution

If you've every gone to a meeting, worked on a project or had an idea, then the following is something to think about.

When your thinking about beginning, working or just finished and you say to yourself, "What was the meaning of the meeting, project or idea?"

A simple way to answer, "Was that meeting, project or idea a 1,2 or 3"

1. Transaction meeting, project or idea - this means an intended sale was to happened or something was to be exchanged.
2. Gateway meeting, project or idea - this means no intended transaction was to happen but there is a hope for future doors to opening.
3. Null meeting, project or idea - this mean nothing happen and often seems like a waste of time.

I've been talking to people about the above process and have found many people who like it's simplicity.

WE's CIG

So you might be asking what does a Chief Idea Guy (CIG) do? In fact that is a very good question.

For the next 6 months my full time job is to drive the WorkEdge model across the country. Letting people know about WorkEdge and the EDesk 2 software package.

Also my other task is to think of ideas for the group to consider that will be of value to everyone.

Share your thoughts.

WE's CIG

Welcome and let me introduction myself. I'm Coy and I'm a full Partner in WorkEdge .

Also I'm the WorkEdge CIG or Chief Idea Guy.

One of my new jobs with WorkEdge is to keep the company blog current and fresh.

We intend to be sharing more with you in the next 6 months via the blog about WorkEdge, etc.

Thanks!

WE's CIG

WorkEdge is please to announce a new Code Release!

Version 2.3.0.6 is now available for download.

Sourceforge link for the code.

(WE Staff)

Today WorkEdge went live.

(WE Staff)

Welcome to the WorkEdge Blog.

WorkEdge (WE) Staff