In searching this issue I had a harder time than normal finding a solution, at least a free one.  I was not interested in paying for third party software.  The first solution that looked like it was heading in the right direction was found on serverfault.com in a comment.  From this comment I found a Microsoft knowledge base article detailing the install of IISADMPWD. After installing IIS and ASP.net on a secondary domain controller I followed the steps in the article to get things started.  I set the PasswordChangeFlags to 1 since I only wanted users to change passwords from the LAN and did not want to deal with the complexity of ssl.

I went to http://[server address]/iisadmpwd/aexp2b.asp and the page to change my password responded.  After entering the information and clicking submit I got a 404 error, it was sending me to an https page.  I opened the aexp2b.asp page with Notepad and found the reference to https://[server address]/iisadmpwd/achg.asp.  After changing https to http and saving the page I got my next error, stating that Either the password is too short or password uniqueness restrictions have not been met.

After digging some more I found another Microsoft knowledge base article solving a problem with users not being able to change their password in Outlook Web Access. I followed the instructions in the workaround and was able to successfully change my password!

I’m not too excited about the first round of any of the iPad competitors…except for the possibility of HP and I think they will be just as expensive. Here are my reasons:

-Windows – Balmer has said they are not developing an OS specifically for the touch tablet but that Windows 7 is ready today. I don’t agree that Windows 7 is right for touch tablets, nor would I want to manage a network where every student had a Windows 7 device.

-Andriod – a lot more promise when the next version comes out but I think it will take Google and the vendors a year to get things worked out. It is going to be harder to develop for the range of screen sizes and device types that we are hearing about.

-Hardware – this will be the first time that most of these vendors attempt and device like this. First generation device = trouble. I don’t see the iPad as a first gen device. Apple learned from the iPhone and iPod Touch before they attempted the iPad. The other PC vendors don’t have that same mobile device experience. The mobile phone vendors have the experience with the smaller touch devices but they don’t have the PC experience. Apple has done both well and the iPad fits in a neat place in-between the 2.

The key is focusing on tools that are web based on the iPad and not app based so that we are not locked into any platform and that is going to be hard to do until HTML5 is a standard.

I created a CourseSmart account and browsed through some of the over 10,000 books available.  CourseSmart claims that the average student saves $65/textbook but this claim does not hold up in a traditional high school setting where books are used for multiple years.  I found a book that I was interested in using for a Python course next semester and requested a demo copy.  This is one of the great strengths of CourseSmart.  Within a couple of days I was approved for the evaluation copy and with that approval was given access to the fist 25 pages of every book in their vast library.  It is a great tool for instructors to quickly evaluate texts.

I was not as excited once I started to browse the book.  I have become accustom to the smooth interface of the iBook application and CourseSmart is nowhere near as slick.  The books are lower resolution scanned images of the original book.  They do not allow for highlighting and note taking is not intuitive.  In the positive column CourseSmart books are searchable and your content is available on the web as well as the iPad and iPod Touch.  If I where a college student or a high school with a 1:1 program I would seriously consider purchasing my textbooks through CourseSmart.

CourseSmart is off to a good start making textbooks available online.  I hope that they are able to work with the publishers to convert these texts into true ebooks that utilize the benefits of current ebook readers.  As online courses with their animations and video meld with traditional textbooks these tools will be even more appealing and will truly start to change the face of learning.

Take all these issues and the concept of an electronic textbook becomes very appealing.  An etextbook solves most of these issues, except for cost, easily.  As publishers consider etextbooks for high schools I think that pricing will also be an incentive.  At this point it is not because the models are geared towards college students who only use the book for a semester.  A hardbound book may cost $150 and the ebook may only be $50/semester but for the high school who expects to get 5-6 years out of a book the ebook ends up costing more.  This, of course, allows for schools to update texts more frequently and manage course sizes without concern for the numbers of texts.  However, I don’t see that high schools who use texts for more than 3 years will see a cost savings under the current model.

While all of these things are interesting, to me the most exciting opportunity for etextbooks is the potential for the text to come to life for the student.  Having an platform like the iPad will allow textbook publishers to include at minimum hyperlinks to web content for the course.  I can see the line between online courses and the textbook blurring as publishers add video and animation to the textbook.  I am looking forward to seeing a publisher who pushes the textbook to the next level and brings the content to life for the student.

I spent some time with weekend with an etextbook from CourseSmart.  I will let you know in a later post how it went.

Green = Good, Red = Bad, * = important

• Keyboard: I have grown to love it. I am using it now even though I have a bluetooth keyboard in my bag. It does take some getting used to but once you do it is easy to type over 30 words/minute on it.
• Size: The size makes it feel a lot like a book. I don’t like carrying it around without a case. It seems like it could easily slip out of my hand. The screen size makes it very easy to browse the web and read books. I haven’t found myself wishing it was a different size.
• Reading: I have enjoyed reading books on the iPad. This comes from someone who though it was an ok experience reading a complete book on the iPhone. The iPad has quickly become my preferred ebook reader.
• Battery Life: It’s incredible. You really can use the iPad for over 10 hours without charging it. It makes it far better than a laptop for travel.
• Web Browsing: Not having flash is still a bummer. It is getting better but there are still too many sights that use flash. This is not a deal breaker for me but it would be nice. Other than flash I prefer to use the iPad for basic web browsing. It feels very natural to use the touch screen. I’ve also noticed that because of the size apps are not as important. On the smaller screen the app was needed, on the iPad the web app usually works fine.
• Productivity Software: Pages, Numbers and Keynote are all very capable tools. They have a way to go before they match the desktop tools but for most work they are fine. My biggest issue is Google Docs. You can not edit docs or presentations. You can edit spreadsheets but not very well.
  Email: The built in mail app is great. With the coming unified inbox in the next release it will be even better. I still like Google’s Gmail interface the best but this is a close second.

Overall I have enjoyed the iPad more each day. It is an excellent computer for media consumption and a capable tool for creation.

Wow!  The Penn State One-to-One Conference was great.  The material was relevant.  The presenters were excellent.  The format was efficient.

I noticed in the participants list that we were the only Christian school at the event.  This conference was really more about innovation in education than about one-to-one programs.  The PA public schools have been very innovative in the classroom but I sensed that they struggle with why they are doing it.  Christian schools have a reason why, we should be setting the standard for innovation in the school.

Here are the highlights from the sessions I attended:

• Goals of one-to-one must be clearly defined
  • The goal should not be to improve test scores
  • The goals need to centered around classroom engagement and student creativity
    • One of the things that set this conference apart from any other for me was the level of engagement because of the use of technology.  Almost every session included audience participation through tools like polleverywhere.com
  • Is our goal one-to-one? Why?
• Online Learning
  • 28 states have public schools that are completely online, most others are developing them
  • Need to read Disrupting Class by Clayton Christensen
  • Look at Apex Learning, Plato Learning, Aleks
  • We need to put greater effort in to exploring existing online offerings and creating our own
  • How do we train our teachers to be online teachers?
  • What Christian organizations are already working on this?
• Technology Adoption Life Cycle
  • Move from Substitution to Modification to Redefinition
  • We bounce between substitution and modification, how do we move to redefinition?
• Open Source is key in sustainability
  • Chrome, Linux, OpenOffice are all things we already use or watch closely
  • We need to look at open content
    • Freereading.net
    • Ck12  Flexbooks  (take a look a the physics textbooks)
    • Archive.org
    • OpenCourseware (MIT)
    • Wikibooks
    • blendedschools.net
  • Where could we use this content?
• Moodle – Course Management
  • Excellent open source course management tool
  • We need to setup a pilot for this for professional development and a summer course