Maplebrook is clear to reopen Wednesday May 6, 2009

Officials have cleared Maplebrook Elementary (Humble ISD) to reopen to teachers and students on Wednesday, May 6, 2009. All staff and students should report to school as usual.

Education vs. Prison

Wow, I’m actually agreeing with Kathleen Parker more and more, ever since she said Palin was out of her league last year. Now she has written an article about how we need to improve our schools or else spend it on prisons later. Which is what I’ve been saying for years now.

I keep yelling from the roof tops of how teachers will teach under the worst conditions, they will teach no matter what. I taught technology applications with no computers, no books, not even a computer for myself until the second semester. I never did really get computers. Oh, yeah, I got about a dozen, but they didn’t accept flash drives, would freeze up and I didn’t even have proper outlets to plug them up. I tried, I asked, but they have placed tech apps in never never land, no one but the principal to go to. Oh…and internet… forget about it.

It would be nice if teachers got the supplies they needed, decent furniture, enough books so kids didn’t have to share, or even get books at all, like moi. It would be nice if they even got the recognition they deserve. Lord knows I’d love to see “real” technology in the classrooms. I know, there are groups and committees that give them the kudos they deserve, but the average Joe still doesn’t get it. Really!!

Browse privately

Internet Explorer 8: More secure, private, and reliable. At first, when I found out about this, my hubby told me about it, I wanted to get the word out there, but didn’t think it was “educational.” But, alas, I was wrong, oh, yes! Anyone who deals with kids on the internet needs to be aware of this. I am downloading the beta version, as I type. This is not good news for those who need to “see” what their charges are doing on the internets. Oh my, oh my, yes indeedy. I only hope there is a way to block this baby.

I’m certainly not a big fan of Internet Explorer, not ever since I was guided to Firefox. I left IE behind from the get go. I’m going to try this, become aware of it, at the minimum. I suggest you do to, if you are in a position where there are people you need to keep track of their internet explorations.

InPrivate Browsing
Sometimes you don’t want to leave any trace of specific web browsing activity, such as when checking e-mail at an Internet café or shopping for a gift on a family PC. InPrivate Browsing in Internet Explorer 8 helps prevent your browsing history, temporary Internet files, form data, cookies, and usernames and passwords from being retained by the browser, leaving no evidence of your browsing or search history.

You can start InPrivate Browsing by opening a new tab and selecting Start InPrivate Browsing or selecting it from the Safety button on the top right corner of the browser window. Once you complete this action, Internet Explorer 8 will launch a new browser session that won’t record any information, including searches or webpage visits. To end your InPrivate Browsing session, simply close the browser window.

This simply amazing. Now anybody can browse porn and not get caught. What’s this world coming to?

Oops, update, not so fast:

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 looks very promising, but it is very obvious why it is and will be for some time in beta phase. Apart from several annoying bugs reported by those who downloaded the early next-generation browser from the Redmond company, there are some problems with Windows XP’s Service Pack 3 as well.

Microsoft Corp. warned users of Windows XP Service Pack 3 that they won’t be able to uninstall either SP3 or Internet Explorer 8 beta 2 under some circumstances. The actual problem appears only in users who downloaded and installed IE8 Beta 1 prior to updating Windows XP to SP3, Microsoft said, which triggers a special installation message which reads:

If you chose to continue, Windows XP SP3 and IE8 Beta 2 will become permanent.

Internet Explorer 8 will feature a full-fledged privacy mode which will prevent the browser from saving any browsing or search history, will delete your IE8 browser cache at the end of every session and will also disable saving of cookies, data, passwords and other offline data. The tools share the “InPrivate” name, which Microsoft registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office several weeks ago.

Internet Explorer 8.0 includes three rendering modes: one that is using the current web standards, a second one that reflects Microsoft’s implementation of Web standards at the time of the release of Internet Explorer 7 in 2006 and a third one based on rendering methods dating back to the early Web. By default, the first mode of rendering will be enabled in Internet Explorer.

Seems appropriate, since I was having trouble downloading it anyway. That’s pretty easy to do for me, have trouble, when you are trying to do a dozen different things at a time, like I do, plus trying to keep up with Hurricane Gustov.