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Asylum Software Inc. - February 2010 Newsletter

1. MarkBook 2009 Update to V10.4

We've posted a complimentary upgrade for MarkBook 2009 on our website. Download this file to update MarkBook 2009, Version 10 or higher, to version 10.4. This upgrade will NOT work with MarkBook 2008 or earlier, the MarkBook 2009 DEMO (the demo will become inoperable), MarkBook CY 2010 (see item 2) or MarkBook AM. To get the update, visit the downloads page in our website, MarkBook.com. Or, open any class in MarkBook, click Help in the upper menu bar and click on Update. Download the file to a known location and then run it. The following features are included:

MSS files.
These files may be used to set up each new Mark Set, probably near the beginning of each term. Such files standardize the names of the categories/strands/other terms, their target weights and even the name of the course. While a number of districts have already created a complete set of .MSS files, version 10.4 includes a set of more than three hundred files for Ontario K-12 and a set of eight for the Canadian ESL benchmarks.
Standards Based Assessment.
"Standards Based" is an assessment process in which student achievement of the curriculum is measured directly against the objectives (aka expectations, outcomes, benchmarks, standards, etc.). Rather than measuring achievement in categories or by type of assessment (tests, labs, essays, homework, etc.), assessment data is collected and measured against the curriculum statements, particularly the most significant ones. Version 10.4 of MarkBook enables a user to define as many as 100 assessment groups and name this collection "Objectives", "Benchmarks", "Outcomes", "Expectations", "Standards", "Skills", "Categories" or "Strands". Formerly, only the words Category and Strand were permitted and they were limited to 30 groups per Mark Set. With this MarkBook update, any user can create a standards based system and import their curriculum standards from an .MSS file. For more information, see sections 1-4, 11-1, 11-2 and A-1 in the updated V10.4 Reference Manual (included with the update above).
K-12 Curriculum for Ontario, Canada.
More than 20,000 Ontario expectation statements, each uniquely numbered and cross-classified by grade is included in the update. More than 300 benchmark standards for the Canadian ESL programme are included as well.
Course Description tool.
Version 10.4 also includes a Course Description generator. This tool enables a user to publish a document for any course that includes a thumbnail description of the course, a description of each unit with optional target dates, and a series a policies and resources. Use the optional dates for time management of each course. Publish an Assessment/Evaluation policy, and Attendance policy, a Plagiarism policy, etc. Print on paper or post these Course Descriptions on the Internet. Once created, share these Course Description files (.MCDs) with colleagues for their modification and use. Schools and districts may generate standard Course Description documents and make these available to all teachers for publication. See sections 6-8 and 6-11 in the 10.4 Reference Manual for course description details and samples.
Updated Support Documents.
There's a new Reference Manual with documentation on all of the new tools. It's included when you update MarkBook to V10.4. Also in the Help menu, there's a new Print Samples file which includes lesson, unit and course description samples. These same documents are also available from our website. Note: districts with a custom version of MarkBook should not install this upgrade at school as the customized features will no longer function.

2. MarkBook CY 2010

This is the southern hemisphere version of MarkBook for schools with an academic year starting after Jan 1 and ending by Dec 31. Contact your distributor or purchase it online. See the Order tab in our website, MarkBook.com, for a list of distributors.

3. MarkBook on Mac and Linux Machines

Mac users with OSX and Linux users now have numerous options for running MarkBook. We publish a Mac version of MarkBook for OSX. However, Mac/Linux users in schools and districts that are predominantly Windows would prefer to run the identical version as their colleagues. They CAN! There are "Virtual Machine" products on the market for Mac and Linux systems. Each of these is documented in Chapter 1 of the latest 10.4 Reference Manual included in the update above. There's also a document posted on MarkBook.com.

4. Elementary Teachers and MarkBook

Although Asylum Software has numerous districts with K-12 licenses, MarkBook has a reputation in some districts as a secondary product. Despite this, MarkBook was designed for elementary teachers with multiple subjects and multiple terms in mind. The Mark Set tool (see the support document called "Using Mark Sets" in the Help file and in our website) is an ideal solution for parsing the assessment package into both subjects and terms. For example, I spoke recently with a teacher who has a grade 2/3 split class. Within MarkBook, he has created 36 Mark Sets to handle all of the data for six subjects, three terms and two grades. Within each Mark Set, he has created subject-specific report card comments. One of the prized features of MarkBook for elementary teachers is its ability to quickly assemble robust comments and then, if necessary, rapidly transfer these to other software applications.

Some elementary administrators resist adopting MarkBook believing that it:

  1. only calculates percentages. False - MarkBook employs ABCs, Levels, or any user-defined scaling system.
  2. only calculates averages (arithmetic means). False - MarkBook has multiple measures of "central tendency" including a determination of each learner's "most consistent level" of performance. Note that "most consistent level" is not an average converted to an equivalent level.
  3. cannot generate comments for each subject. False - up to ten multi-paragraph comments may be built and stored within each Mark Set. MarkBook even lets a teacher see what they said last time when building a new report card comment. Print these on MarkBook reports or send them to other report card generators.
  4. ties their hands when it comes time to assigning marks. In fact, MarkBook strongly encourages Professional Judgment on each teacher's part. Each teacher is presented with detailed analyses about each learner ultimately enabling an appropriate judgement.

So, whether it's elementary or both panels, when your district is ready to make a change, please contact us for a presentation about how MarkBook can fit your needs.

5. Open Text FirstClass®

FirstClass is a comprehensive communication system. Implemented at the district level, FirstClass enhances the sharing of information among all appropriate stakeholders (students, parents, teachers, administrators) within the district's education community. Like an Intranet, each member of that community has access to a limited subset of the data within FirstClass depending on their status within the community. Some information is public - the whole world can see it. Students can see information about their courses (public) and personal achievement (very private). Parents have access to similar information about all of their children. Teachers have access to resources posted by colleagues and administrators across the district. Often, these resources are keyed to specific subjects and grades. Blogs or chat rooms are hosted by FirstClass. Users can post questions and expect answers. And so on. Generally, resources that you're allowed to see are easy to find.

Districts employing both FirstClass and MarkBook have a growing list of opportunities. Inside FirstClass, teachers can:

  1. post MarkBook lesson plans (.MLPs), units plans (.MUPs) and course descriptions (.MCDs) for colleagues.
  2. post MarkBook set up files (.MSS) and template files (.MTP) for colleagues.
  3. publish Code Name Class Reports for parents and students as HTML.
  4. publish lessons, units plans and course descriptions for students and parents as HTML.
  5. send MarkBook Email messages and report cards even if the local ISP has a port 25 block.

Please see section 13-6 in the new Reference Manual for examples of using MarkBook within FirstClass and a link to its website.

6. RubricBuilder and MarkBook for Faculties of Education.

Our complimentary RubricBuilder & MarkBook program continues. All candidates and Faculty have open access to both tools. We also provide complimentary training. If you need more details, please contact me, robh@markbook.com.