Canva is a really wonderful website for creating well designed posters, presentations, social media posts and much more.

Using a calendar on any phone, tablet, or computer is a great way to remember homework assignments and important test dates.
Recently, productivity apps are gaining more and more popularity due to their ease of use as well as the abundance of different kinds of apps. From logging your diets to keeping lists, productivity apps give users the ability to keep track of whatever they need to do and keep track of their personal lives.
How to correctly site your sources and abide by the US fair use policies
I've been with SWAT since it first began in early 2015, and I've enjoyed every moment of it.

The first thing I quickly realized when I first joined SWAT was how it was so much more than just a group working to fix technology. There is a huge focus on the advancement of technology, which includes things such as spreading awareness of innovative uses of technology or helping educate people outside the Algonquin community. There was such a vast variety of tasks, each with their own unique merits, that I never, ever, got bored. Furthermore, this class offered a safe haven from the stresses of other APs and was a nice change of pace in the middle of the day.

Cram.com vs Quizlet
By Brian Keefe
For years, Quizlet has been far and away the most popular online flashcard set that students and teachers alike know and love.  The polished site and stable flash card system has had people coming back for most of their schooling career.  However, there is a new player in the game that I always introduce to my peers when I have the chance, and that is cram.com.
Ever create a really big flashcard set and feel like you know half of the set cold, and the other half is some foreign language?  That’s where paper flash cards come in handy, simply set aside the ones that you get wrong and study them separately.  Quizlet does have a feature like this, it’s called starring, it’s tedious and inefficient and my freshman year I was not doing well on vocab tests, so I decided to look elsewhere.  I dug deep and ventured into the second page of my google search gasp! and found cram.com.  How fitting! A site designed to allow me to start studying the night before and somehow ace the test.  The system works something like this, you have the option to do two things, 1) Create a set, or 2) import your favorite set from quizlet.
The most efficient method of studying these flashcards is called cram mode, a flashcard system that forces you to get every single card right before you move through each of the 5 levels.  If you get a card wrong, it is sent back to square 1 and you are forced to drill it enough times until it is as familiar with the rest of your set.  This mode also lets you pick up where you left off, so you can cram whenever you have a spare minute and not search for the words you need the most, cram will do that for you.

Don’t get me wrong, Quizlet is polished and stable, however, cram.com is a widely unknown competitor.  Both have flash cards, both have mock tests, both have games, the list goes on.  However, cram has devised a genius algorithm that drills you on your hardest words rather than guessing and checking in bulk. In a direct comparison, Quizlet wins for flash card creation marginally, their auto-define system makes flash card creation quick and painless, while cram.com’s cram mode is more efficient for memory retention.  My solution? Create your quizlet list first, then import it into cram and learn your words in half the time.
Laptop Buying Guide 
In this guide, I will attempt to provide a laptop to fit into 4 major budgets for the active student for high school as well as college.  The elements that I considered were processor, memory, storage, screen size, battery life, and build quality. 
As the only Instructional Technology Teacher at Algonquin I get many requests for help.  At this point the requests mostly come to me by email.  I sort through those requests and decide which ones make sense to have the SWAT students involved in.  There are also times that teachers or administrators just stop by with a question or an issue.  If it happens during a period that I have a SWAT student I try to involve them whenever possible.  I always appreciate their input, ideas, and suggestions.  There have also been times when members of the SWAT team have been approached in the hall or contacted individually with requests.  So as you can see people at Algonquin ask for help in a variety of ways.  At some point I would like to move to a more organized ticket system but for now what we are doing seems to work
Hello, world!
I'm super excited to get this blog up and running. SWAT is constantly expanding, and the time seems ripe for us to establish a public online presence where we can share our work and show others what we're about. In this blog, we plan to detail how our club functions, post about our current projects, and provide information on a variety of other technological topics. I hope you find our blog informative and please feel free to get in touch with us if you have any questions or comments.
Students at Algonquin have many requirements but also have space for some electives.  S.W.A.T. or Students Working to Advance Technology is considered an elective and students receive 2.5 credits for each semester they are enrolled.  Guidance works out the scheduling for those who have decided to take S.W.A.T. as a class.  They schedule all of their required classes first and then see where there is space for S.W.A.T.  Guidance also looks at my schedule and where I have availability.  This semester I have 3 students enrolled and each of them comes to me one period a day.  At this point I like it that way because my main role at Algonquin is to be available to teachers to help them with classroom technology.  If I had too many student assistants during certain periods a lot my time would be taken up managing them.  We also have an after school club so students who cannot fit SWAT into their regular schedule come to those meetings and help out at other events.
In order for our student tech support team to run effectively it is important to recruit the best students.  I knew that I wanted kids with great interpersonal skills as well as those kids with a strong knowledge base of instructional technology tools.  The members of the student tech support team at Algonquin focus less on repairing hardware issues and more on the integration of classroom technology.  My main role at Algonquin is to coach teachers on the use of Instructional technology so I needed students to help me with that.  So before recruiting students it is important  to think about what the roles of the student tech support team will be.  The next step for me was to talk to the Guidance Department at our school.   At Algonquin Guidance is responsible for the approval and creation of new courses so that was the logical place to start.  We discussed different ways to run the course and in the end decided to run it  the same we do for other student assistants in various departments.  Students take the course as Pass/Fail and are chosen by the teacher.   We may at some point offer the course to all interested students in our Program of Studies, but  for now this system seems to be working.  The guidance counselors have been very helpful in suggesting students that would be good for the class.  As a former math and web design teacher at Algonquin I recruited a couple of my former students.  Now that the program is up and running students are learning about it from other students
If you're bored of using the same Google Slides templates or just the blank pages on Google Docs, the new Google templates are perfect for you! One of my favorite templates to use throughout my classes is the class notes 'Luxe' template in Google Docs. It allows for clean, simple, and organized class notes that are a click away when studying for upcoming tests or quizzes. Check out my video tutorial below on how you can utilize the new Google templates as a student or teacher!


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SWAT

About

SWAT which stands for Students Working to Advance Technology is Algonquin’s version of a student tech support team. We focus on helping to promote and integrate instructional technology into the classroom. Students can sign up for the SWAT class and/or join the afterschool club
For more information check us out on Mass DESE website
And follower our Twitter @algonquinswat

Contact Us

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The SWAT Team is always looking for ways to connect, build relationships with other teams, and provide support to anyone in need! Feel free to contact us and let us know if you have any questions about us or our work.