Summer at the Center for Teaching and Technology doesn’t mean that things slow down in 133 Erickson Hall.  We are supporting summer courses taking place in the Erickson Hall technology classrooms and several summer camps and programs that take place through early August.  Events include the Chinese Language & Culture camps taught by the MSU Confucius Institute, Grandparents University, the EPET summer cohorts, and the Summer High School Scholars Program.  In addition, rooms 128 and 130 Erickson Hall are getting updates to room equipment in the month of August.  The Technical Interns that are here during the summer have also been busy creating instructional videos about popular equipment like Smart Boards, digital audio recorders, and handheld (Flip video & other Flip-like) cameras.  They are also creating short how-to videos for the touchscreens, document cameras & other media devices in the technology classrooms on the first floor of Erickson Hall. QR codes will be posted by all work stations in the rooms that will link to videos via smart phone apps that read QR codes and bar codes. The videos will also be linked from this web page and distributed from our social media outlets like Twitter (@Centr4TeachTech) and Facebook.

Fall semester 2011 will once again bring the annual educational technology conference that is co-sponsored by the College of Education Alumni Association and MACUL (Michigan Association of Computer Users in Learning).  The single-day conference will take place on Saturday, November 12, 2011.  There will be some small changes to the format of the conference, but for the most part the schedule will remain the same, beginning with the featured presenter to start the day at 9:00 a.m.  Dr. Troy Hicks, an alumnus of Michigan State University and the College of Education will be the featured presenter this fall.  Dr. Hicks is an assistant professor of English at Central Michigan University and focuses his work on the teaching of writing, literacy and technology, and teacher education and professional development. In his research, he collaborates with K–12 teachers and explores how they implement newer literacies in their classrooms. Hicks is director of CMU’s Chippewa River Writing Project, a site of the National Writing Project, and he frequently conducts professional development workshops related to writing and technology. Also, Hicks is author of the The Digital Writing Workshop (Heinemann, 2009) and a co-author of Because Digital Writing Matters (Jossey-Bass, 2010). In March 2011, Hicks was honored with CMU’s Provost’s Award for junior faculty who have demonstrated outstanding achievement in research and creative activity. Most importantly, he is the father of six digital natives and is always learning something new about technology from them.