Dear Carmody Middle School 7th Grade Elective Computer Class Parents:

This newsletter can only be read at: <http://www.kuzmich.com/parent_newsletters.html>.

    1. Current Grade for only the third grading period will be posted on are now posted as of May 27th on Dr. Data's Web Site at: <http://www.kuzmich.com/carmody/Grades.html>. Final projects the past two week have made a world of difference with the grades for the third grading period. Spring "fever" is now officially over! Congratulations on the rapid turnaround on the grades for the third grading period. Alays good to finish up the school year on a positive upsurge.

      Here are the mean grades for only the third grading period which represents now for five weeks of classes. They are starting to be improved!!!

      • 1st Period: 78.8% or a B- = 1st week, second week = 73.6% and third week is 72.9%. Fourth week is 65.1% Fifth week is 87.9% Sixth Week 100%
      • 3rd Period: 78.7% or a B- = 1st week, second week = 81.9% and third week is 78.0%. Fourth week is 77.3% Fifth week is 92.0% Sixth week is 95.3%
      • 5th Period: 83.9% or a B = 1st week, second week = 63.4% and third week is 65.4%. Fourth week is 67.9% Fifth week is 80.9% Sixth week is 90.7%
      • 6th Period: 79.6% or a B- = lst week, second week = 80.4% and third week is 83.7%. Fourth week is 85.1% Fifth week is 92.2% Sixth week is 96.0%

    2. Five Floating A's can still be earned any and all students who can learn Multimedia Fusion, a multimedia authoring application, by being able to demonstrate how this creative software application works and then teach others in class during the remainder of this semester! Note: Carmody Middle School has been awarded a free site license for the PC lab to upgrade our Klik & Play multimedia authoring application with Multimedia Fusion. The only catch is that we have to learn it. The application has a retail value of $99 per workstation so it is $3,000+ grant plus we get a free update to version 2.0 when it becomes avaiable.. The problem is that all of the students love Klik & Play so much, that Dr. Data has had difficulty getting students to learn Multimedia Fusion which is now loaded on most of the computers in the PC Lab.. This application can be downloaded for free for 30 days. Just go to: http://www.clickteam.com/English/ourdownloads.php and learn more about Multimedia Fusion at: http://www.clickteam.com/English/multimedia_fusion.htm

    3. Multimedia Fusion is the most flexible, powerful, and full-featured authoring tool available today. Best of all, you can get superior and impressive results with no programming skills or knowledge required. Discover the secret tool used by so many multimedia pros, game creators, and people from all walks of life. Multimedia Fusion provides you with everything you need to start creating software of your own imagination and design. From multimedia applications and presentations, to exciting games and stunning screensavers, you can be creating, sharing, and even publishing your work in no time.

    4. What's coming next in Dr. Data's classes: For more insight, go to: http://www.kuzmich.com/carmody/Final_Two_Weeks_Syllabus.html which offers a lot of flexibility incentives to finish out the semester in grand style with various projects with Microsoft Publisher, Band In-A-Box, Clarisworks, and Klik & Play.
    5. The last two full weeks of instruction will involve any combination of doing creative, graphical projects: newsletters, web pages, computer music creation, painting & drawing, and/or computer game design. The purpose of this instruction is to develop artistic skills on the computer for designing music, painting and drawing and computer games with animation and special sound effects. Each day an assignment from the ones below when completed earn 100 points per day for a minimum of 800 points for the entire eight days! Final Projects are worth 300 points. Match your interests with these assignments and earn as many points as possible as needed to earn the next grade higher!.

      You must, must, must view the student PowerPoint, Klik & Play and web site projects from last semester's classes at: <http://www.kuzmich.com/carmody/power_point_projects.html>. Student projects will again be posted this semester though not in as much quantity because of increased web space expenses for Dr. Data's school web site.

    6. Double grades in Dr. Data's classes! Different 7th grade teams are having PowerPoint Projects in their classes. Dr. Data will let your child work on them during his class periods in lieu of his own PowerPoint assignments between now and the end of the semester. Thus, your child can earn a separate grade for the PowerPoint project with their team as well as with Dr. Data's class! Not a bad deal.

    7. Hope you are going to have a great summer. Dr. Data will be teaching in Australia and New Zealand teaching jazz bands at prestigious schools and presenting three computer technology workshops at the 2005 ASME (Australian Society for Music Educators) National Conference in Melbourne on July 3-7, 2005. More to come next week plus vacations in Tahiti and Tasmania where he plans to meet a Tasmanian Devil "face to face!"

    Hope of this information is helpful.

    Till next time,

    Dr. Data
    7th Grade Computer Class Teacher