The Savvy Technologist

About

Welcome to The Savvy Technologist. My name is Tim Wilson, Director of Technology in the Buffalo-Hanover-Montrose School District in Buffalo, MN, an Apple Distinguished Educator, and a Ph.D. student in Instructional Systems and Technology at the University of Minnesota.

This site contains information that may be of interest to technology coordinators, technology integrationists, instructional media specialists, classroom teachers, and school administrators. Most of the articles are related to Internet technologies such as blogs, wikis, online forums, Web standards and accessibility. Some of my posts may also be found at the eSchoolNews Ed-Tech Insider blog where I am a founding contributor.

I love doing presentations and talking about integrating technology with teachers and administrators. Some of the topics I can present or consult on include:

• Weblogs, wikis, and other Web-based technology
• Building Web sites using Web standards such as XHTML and CSS
• Developing accessible Web sites
• Planning and implementing one-to-one computing projects
• Utilizing open source software
• Online learning

Contact information

Presentations

“Learning To Go: The iPod in Education,” NECC, July 6, 2006.

“Introducing the Read/Write Web: Opportunities, Challenges, and Implications,” NECC, July 5, 2006.

“Podcast Palooza,” FETC, March 22, 2005.

“Life In a One-to-one Computing Classroom,” TIES 2005 Conference, December 6, 2005.

“Podcasting 101,” TIES 2005 Conference, December 5, 2005.

“Introducing the Read-Write Web: Weblogs, Wikis, and RSS,” full-day workshop, TIES 2005 Conference, December 3, 2005.

“Laptops For All: Planning, Implementing, and Evaluating a One-to-one Computing Project,” workshop, NSBA T+L² Conference, Oct, 2005.

“Building Accessible Web Sites,” roundtable discussion, NSBA T+L² Conference, Oct, 2005.

“Blogging/Wikis,” roundtable discussion, NSBA T+L² Conference, Oct, 2005.

“Introducing Weblogs and Wikis: Disruptive Media and the Good Things That Come From Them,” half-day workshop, Minnesota Education Media Organization (MEMO) Fall Conference, Mankato, MN, October 15, 2005.

“Introducing the Read/Write Web,” Minnesota Business Educators, Inc. Fall Conference, September 30, 2005.

“Introducing the Read-Write Web: Blogging, Wikis, and RSS,” full-day workshop, TIES Leadership Camp, St. Paul, MN, June, 2005.

“Laptops For Learning: A One-to-one Computing Project From Inspiration To Implementation,” half-day workshop, TIES Leadership Camp, St. Paul, MN, June, 2005.

“Security Analysis Meets the Cost-Benefit Analysis,” TIES 2004 Conference, Minneapolis, MN, Dec 7, 2004.

“Creating Accessible Web Sites,” TIES 2004 Conference, Minneapolis, MN, Dec 7, 2004.

“Weblogs, Wikis and Online Forums: Communication Tools for the Digital Educator,” full-day workshop, TIES 2004 Conference, Minneapolis, MN, Dec 4, 2004.

“Weblogs and Online Forums: Communication Tools for the Digital Educator,” full-day workshop, TIES Leadership Camp, St. Paul, MN, June 17, 2004.

“Creativity Meets Accessibility: Building Web Pages Using Standards,” half-day workshop, TIES Leadership Camp, St. Paul, MN, June 16, 2004.

Articles/Interviews

“Google acquires wiki tool,” eSchool News Online, November 2, 2006.

“For Some Educators, Tagging Is ‘It’,” eSchool News Online, February 20, 2006.

“Enter the Tech Director,” by Larry S. Anderson, T.H.E. Journal, February, 2006.

“‘Blogs’ Catching On as Tool for Instruction,” by Rhea R. Borja, Education Week, December 14, 2005.

“Coming Soon to an ‘Earbud’ Near You,” The Thomson Gale Report, September, 2005.

“Google Maps inspire creativity” by Corey Murray, eSchool News Online, June 15, 2005.

“Apple upgrades OS, video-editing tools” by Robert Brumfield, eSchool News Online, Apr 25, 2005.

“How do you communicate with students who have grown up with
technology? Schools are looking to technology for the answer.” by Kevin
Delaney, Wall Street Journal, Jan 17, 2005, pp R4.

“Firefox: the new browser contender” by Corey Murray, eSchool News Online, Dec 3, 2004.

Colophon

The blog is powered by WordPress and uses a variation of the standard Kubrick theme. The digital photo the comprises the site’s header graphic is a small section of Prophesy of the Ancients by Brower Hatcher (1988) which is installed at the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden in Minneapolis, MN.

I’m using a variety of Wordpress plugins including:

• Spam Karma 2 — Eliminate 99.9% of comment spam
• Image Browser — Easy way to add thumbnail images to blog posts
• Recent Comments List — Put a list of recent comments on the homepage
• SimpleTags — Simple way to add Technorati tags to your posts
• StatTraq — Track your blog’s popularity on a per post basis and in total hits
• WP-Amazon — Add links to Amazon items easily (and make some money if visitors click and buy)
• Referrer Karma — Not actually a plugin, but eliminates most referrer spam