Here at KCISD we believe that technology is a great communication and educational tool. To help our faculty and staff get the most out of the technology available, we provide a number of useful tools. These tools include:

• District Email Address
• Server Based "Home" drives
• Teacher Drop Boxes
• Teacher Web Pages

To help you to get up to speed quickly with the system and procedures here at KCISD we have prepared a few quick lessons:

• Email Login
• H: Drive, What is it, and how do I use it?
• Teacher Drop Boxes
• Teacher Web Page

Email Login

We have 2 ways to send and receive email here at KCISD.

• Microsoft Outlook 2007
• Outlook Web Express

Microsoft Outlook 2007 is a program that you will find in the start menu on your computer and may be accessed by clicking the Email icon:

Unfortunately, this program only works on your specific computer and will not "follow" you around the district. Because of this, the program will not work for any new staff member until after the August New Teacher Inservice day. Once we have all of the new faculty and staff assignments on this day, the tech department will visit your room and setup the program for your individual email account.

Once your computer has been setup for Outlook 07, you will be able to login using your email address and password that you have been assigned. In most cases you will receive your login and email passwords at the August New Teacher In-Service Day.

Outlook Web Express is an internet based email program that is made available through ESC 5. We provide an icon similar to this one: We place the icon on your desktop for this program no matter where you login within the district. This allows you to access your email no matter what computer in the district you may be logged on to.

You may also access this program by opening a web browser such as Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox and typing mail.kirbyvillecisd.org in the address window. This will allow you to be able to access your KCISD email from any computer in the world that allows you access to the internet.

When you either click the Outlook Web Access icon, or point your browser to mail.kirbyvillecisd.org, you will be taken to the TexasESC.net sign in page for ESC Region 5 as you see below:

You will then click on "Email" and this will take you to the login page. At the login page you need to choose the option "This is a private computer" and then enter your complete email address followed by your password and click Logon.

Microsoft Outlook 2007 allows more user friendly features such as task manager, contact management, and calendar management, but is limited to only your individual computer. Outlook Web Access allows more flexibility to be able to access your email when you are away from your computer, but still able to access the internet..

H: Drive, what is it and how do I use it?

Your H: Drive, or Home Drive is a virtual hard drive housed on one of our district servers for your convenience and protection. At KCISD we believe that you should have all of your files available to you wherever you are in our district. If you bring a class into a computer lab, you should have immediate access to all of your files stored in your Home Drive. This is accomplished through your login. Since the H: drive is server based, when you login to any computer in the district, our main server authenticates who you are and automatically maps your Home Drive to that computer.

You can access your Home Drive by clicking on the Start Menu on your computer and selecting "My Computer". The "My Computer Window opens and should appear similar to this one:

Because of this, we have ask that you save all files, data, photos, etc... to your Home Drive. You will find your Home Dive under listed under "Network Drives" and it's title should include your login username. In the example above, you can see that my Home Drive is named "jgaspard on 'kcisd-file2\Home\Tech' (H:). Your drive name should be similar, but will have your username in front.

You may be asking yourself, Why should I use the H: Drive? Why can't I just save the files to "My Documents" or the "Desktop" like I do at home? Well, you certainly have that ability to do so, but if you do save files to your local machine in that way, we can't guarantee the safety of those files in the event of a computer or hard drive failure. The advantages for you of using the Home Drive are:

• H: Drive will follow you to any and every computer you login on within the school district, even at other campuses. This allows you to always have your files.
• If your computer hard drive crashes, you will not lose any information you have saved. We replace your hard drive, you log in, and 'presto' your files are still there.
• We backup the contents of our faculty Home Drives each week along with other important district data. In the event of a major catastrophe we can restore all the Home Drives data if it is lost from our server. This has never happened before...but it's good to know we can do this when needed.

Here are some Frequently Asked Questions about the H: Drive:

• I am worried someone else will be able to view my files. Whether on your room computer or on your Home Drive, the only people who would be able to view your files besides yourself are the Technology Team Members. We have permissions setup to keep other users from being able to view your files.
• What if I don't use the H: Drive? You do not have to use the H: drive, but if something happens to your data and files on the computer, the Technology Department will not be able to recover those files.

Just as you as a faculty member have an H: Drive, so each of your students will have one. Theirs is slightly different in that they have to use their H: Drive. Students have absoloutely no permission to save files anywhere else, including flash drives. So it is important that you know all about the Home Drive so that you can educate your students on it's use as well as protect the files you will use.

Teacher Drop Boxes

In keeping with the idea here at KCISD that through technology we want faculty members and students to have access to the data and documents they need no matter where they login, we have developed the Teacher Drop Boxes. The Drop Boxes are delivered to both teachers and students, but in different ways. For teachers the drop boxes are delivered as a mapped drive in "My Computer" under Network Drives along with their H: Drive:

For students it is delivered as a folder on their desktop along with their Home Drive..

Once opened the Drop Box folders are identical for teachers and students, with exception of the permissions to the folders. Let me explain...

Here's what both students & teachers see when they open the Drop Box folder:

Inside the main folder you will find folder's with each teacher in that campuses name. When you open a specific teacher's folder, you will find two more folders:

• Drop Box
• Shared

The Shared folder is just that, a folder for the teacher to share documents with his/her students. Any item placed in this folder can be opened and edited by the students.

The Drop Box folder is designed to only allow the teacher access to what is in it. Students cannot open the folder, view it's contents, or access anything in that folder. What they can do is drag a file from their H: Drive and "drop it" on top of the Drop Box. This will save the file in the Drop Box for the teacher to view/grade/edit at their leisure. If the teacher wants to return the document to the student they can place it in the Shared folder for the student to pick-up.

Below is a chart of abilities of the Drop Boxes for both teacher and student use:

To learn more about Teacher Drop Boxes for both your use and to be able to educate your students in effective use of this tool, please visit our Training Page for a downloadable PowerPoint show.

Teacher Web Pages

KCISD provides web pages for faculty use through netStartClass. In most cases, your teacher web page login information will be provided to you at the New Teacher Orientation Day for all new teachers. The login page for your website can be found at http://classroom.kirbyvillecisd.org. Your teacher webpage is a powerful tool allowing you communication with your students and their parents like never before. With this tool you will be able to display Class information such as:

• Class Syllabus
• Notes from lectures & for review
• Homework Page
• Links to Online Information
• Photos of Class Projects**
• Calendar of Events
• A Contact Page to introduce yourself to the community
• Forms for Online Quizes or Gathering Information

**No photos of students or students work may be placed on a District Webpage without prior authorization by the KCISD Director of Technology. To receive authorization, please fill out the Student Photo Form found on the Technology Webpage.

The webpages are simple and easy to use. If you can type a memo in MS Word, you will be able to create, edit and update your webpage with ease. We will be offering Tech Byte classes for those who feel they need some guidance getting their page up, but for you self learners who like to jump right in, we have the instructions for editing your page on our Training Page.

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