CompTIA A+ OS/Hardware - 1/31/2006

Tonight we forged ahead in the hardware section of class, covering two chapters: Chapter Ten, which dealt with Hard Drives and Chapter 17, which dealt with CDs.  Next week we’ll do Chapters 18-19 (Video/SCSI).

Homework:

• Chapter 10: Questions 1-10


• Chapter 17: Questions 1-10

MS Office - 1/31/2006

We today covered Chapter Four, which dealt with Formatting entire documents.  We covered beautiful things such as margins (not margarines), section breaks, etc.  Remember, we have a test next week over Chapters 1-4.  Make sure you know about settings tabs with dotted leaders (Chapter 3, Exercise 21).

Homework:

• Chapter Four: All Completion and Skill Assessment 1.

CompTIA Network+ Training - 1/31/2006

Physical installation and wireless networking were the topics at hand today in Net+.  We did chapters 8 and 9, which covered both topics respectively.

Homework:

• Chapter 8 – Questions 1-10; Lab 8.01


• Chapter 9 – Questions 1-10.

MS Word - 1/30/2006

More work work work on the Specialist section of the Word book.  Remember!  Next week all exercises are due at the beginning of class and we will be having a test over the concepts we’ve learned in the Specialist section.  After the test, we’ll dive right into Chapter One of the Expert section!  Some of you will actually for the first time experience me teach!

Small Business Management - 1/26/2006

Today we talked in depth about the vision and the mission statement and how important it is to both new and existing businesses.  We practiced making a couple of mission statements and then I allowed you the rest of class time to work on your business plans.  See ya next week!

MS Access - 1/25/2006

Thanks again for everyone being great sports as we continue through our ACICS accreditation.  Without this accreditation, it would be impossible for us to continue to open our doors, and your cooperation is making this process go silky-smooth.

Anyway, today we conquered Chapter Three, which dealt with Table Wizards and the Help system, among other things.  Most of you finished the homework in class, but just in case you didn’t, here it is:

Homework:

• Skill Assessments 1, 2, 4.

CompTIA A+ OS/Hardware - 1/24/2006

Tonight’s class was devoted to the wonderful world of Power Supplies.  Make sure that you know the difference between AT and ATX power supplies and that you know which types of connectors are on each.  Know what a (moley-moley-moley) molex connector is and how it’s different from a mini connector and a P1 or the P8/P9 connectors.  

After the power supply discussion, we reviewed for the test (yes, test!) that will be administered next week.  Expect a handful of T/F, some multiple choice, fill in the blank and short answers.  Also: MAKE SURE YOU KNOW YOUR IRQ TABLES!!!  What the hey, I’m going to be a nice guy and reproduce them for you here:

IRQ 0: System Clock
IRQ 1: KeyboardIRQ 2/9: Open
IRQ 3: COM 2/4
IRQ 4: COM 1/3
IRQ 5: Secondary Parallel Port (LPT 2)
IRQ 6: Floppy Disk Drive
IRQ 7: Primary Parallel Port (LPT 1)
IRQ 8: Real-Time Clock
IRQ 10: Open
IRQ 11: Open
IRQ 12: Open
IRQ 13: Math Coprocessor
IRQ 14: Primary Hard Drive ControllerIRQ 15: Secondary Hard Drive Controller

Make sure that I have your e-mail address if you want me to send you the class notes each week.  

No homework since there is a test on Monday.  Study Study Study!

CompTIA Network + Training - 1/24/2006

The first thing we did in class today was take the first test – which covered chapters 1-6.  The grades on the test were a little higher than what students historically make the first time around, but still weren’t as high as I’d like to have seen them.  If your grade wasn’t as high as you would have liked, don’t panic – remember that you have lots of homework possibilities and there will be other tests.

After the test, we covered seven, which dealt with other, non-Ethernet types of networks (like FDDI, Token Ring, ATM, etc.)

Homework:

• Chapter 7 – Questions 1-10


• Lab 7.01

MS Office - 1/24/2006

We completed Chapter Three today (which, by the way, has been historically the hardest chapter – I didn’t want to taint your perceptions beforehand, so I didn’t say anything in class).  The main topic – formatting paragraphs.  We talked about everything from line spacing to indentation to tabs to shading to borders… you name it!  Remember, we have a test in two weeks over Word chapters 1-4.  After that, we’ll start on Microsoft Excel!

Homework:

• Completion: 1-17 (skip 10 & 11)


• Skill Assessments 3, 4, 8.

CompTIA A+ Hardware/OS - 1/23/2006

Tonight’s class dealt with Chapters 6 & 7 – which cover the expansion bus and motherboards, respectively.  We watched as Mike stripped out a screw that held the motherboard in!  (just kidding)

Next week, we’ll do Chapter Eight (power supplies) and start reviewing for the test next Monday.  See ya then!

Homework:

• Chapter Six: Questions 1-10


• Chapter Seven: Questions 1-10

PS: Remember!  If you want me to e-mail you the class outlines, be sure to send me an e-mail at bbedo@draughons.edu.

MS Word - 1/23/2006

We continued our self-study of the Specialist section of Word textbook today.  Remember, all eight chapters are due on February 6.  We’ll also have a test that day (we’ll review beforehand), so make sure that you’re in class on the 6th!!!

Small Business Management - 1/19/2006

Creativity was the topic of today’s class, as we covered spots in Chapter Two and talked about various topics surrounding that and your business plans.

MS Access - 1/18/2006

We covered Chapter Two today, which explained what Primary Keys are and how to use them with relationships in order to soup your filing cabinet up on ‘roids.

Homework:

• Chapter Two: Completion (pg 60)


• Chapter Two: Skill Assessment #1 (pg 60-62)

CompTIA A+ OS/Hardware - 1/17/2006

A+ tonight covered Chapter Five exclusively.  We talked about the BIOS – how it worked and the various parts of it.  Remember that there are three types of BIOS: system, CMOS and Flash.  

Then the snows came and the big boss sent us home!  

Homework:

• Chapter Five – Questions 1-10

MS Office - 1/17/2006

The Office class today covered the second chapter of the Word unit.  We covered a variety of topics that dealt with character formatting – stuff like bolding, italicizing, and underlining.  We also did cool stuff that allows you to convert from UPPER CASE to Title Case to lower case.

Homework:

• Completion 1-15 (pg 60)


• Skill Assessments 1, 4, 5 (pg 60-62)

CompTIA Network+ Training 1/17/2005

Today’s class went over Chapters 4-6 which dealt with Hardware concepts and old-school as well as modern Ethernet technologies, respectively.  Remember, we have a test next week over Chapters 2-6!

Homework:

• Chapter Four: Questions 1-10; Lab 4.03


• Chapter Five: Questions 1-10; Lab 5.03


• Chapter Six: Questions 1-10; Lab 6.02

Computer Dork Alert!

Everyone: check out this article: http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/01/09/strip_out_the_fans/.  These guys have built a computer that’s cooled not with fans, but cooking oil!  How dorky is that?!  Woo!!

Here’s a shot for some extra points: read all 11 pages and write up a one page summary.  You have until 8:00 a.m. Thursday 1/19 to turn it in.  10 points possible.

MLK Day

Everyone in my Monday classes: In case you haven’t already heard, we are NOT having class on Monday the 16th in order to observe Martin Luther King day.  See you guys on the 23rd!

Ben's Blog Gets a New Look!

I was getting a little tired of the old way that the blog looked, so I decided to do a little update.  I hope you like it!

Small Business Management - 1/12/2006

Today we made introductions and leapt feet first into the class project: starting your own business.  We went over the initial business plan outline and then divided ourselves into groups.

Here are the groups and their initial business ideas:

• Heather and Carol: Dayspa


• Tierra & Maja: Lingerie for Specialty Sizes


• Melanie and Casey: Restaurant catering to factory workers in the new industrial park.

These all sound like awesome ideas.  Seriously.  This will be a fun class!

Homework:

• Read Chapters 1 & 2 and be ready to discuss next week.

MS Access - 1/11/2006

We decided to celebrate the first day of our Access class by first passing out the syllabus, and then by looking at my blog.  Next we had LOADS of fun by putting a comment on one of my posts!  By that point, we were ready to start in work on the actual classwork, so we did.  When it was all said and done, we finished Chapter One.

Homework:

• Chapter One – Skill Assessments 1-5 (pg 36-39)

CompTIA A+ Hardware/OS - 1/10/2006

Tonight’s class focused on two chapters: 3 & 4, which deal with Processors and RAM, respectively.  Remember, don’t get too mired down in the details of how a processor works, but make sure you know all the ins and outs of the processor details – be able to tell me what socket an AMD Athlon processor uses, for example.

Homework:

• Chapter Three: Questions 1-10


• Chapter Four: Questions 1-10

Microsoft Office - 1/10/2006

Microsoft Office - 1/10/2006

Today's class covered introductions, a look at this glorious blog and the first chapter of the MS Word unit of our book.

Homework:

• Chapter 1 - Completion, Matching, Skill Assessment 3.

CompTIA Network + Training - 1/10/2006

CompTIA Network + Training - 1/10/2006

Today in Net+ we went over the first three chapters. Make sure that you know the seven layers of the OSI Model. Quiz next week!

Homework:

• Chapter Two: Questions 1-5, Lab 2.03
• Chapter Three: Questions 1-10, Lab 3.03, Lab Analysis, Key Term Quiz

CompTIA A+ Hardware/OS - 1/9/2006

CompTIA A+ Hardware/OS - 1/9/2006

Tonight's class offered up a brief introduction of the computer -- what each part is and what it does. Tomorrow, we'll discuss Chapters 3 and 4 -- Processors and RAM.

Homework:

• Chapter Two: Questions 1-10

Microsoft Word - 1/9/2006

Microsoft Word - 1/9/2006

Today we celebrated the first day of class by handing out syllabi and the MS Word review sheets. Our book is divided into two sections -- Specialist and Expert. Since many of you have either had the Specialist section verbatim through MS Office (or at least the concepts of the Specialist section through Desktop OS), we are going through the Specialist section doing only a small number of exercises. You have until February 6 to finish these at your own pace.

• Chapter One: Exercises 2, 6, 7
• Chapter Two: Exercises 2, 3, 7
• Chapter Three: Exercises 1, 6, 10, 12, 13, 17-19
• Chapter Four: Exercises 1, 3, 4, 8, 14, 15
• Chapter Five: Exercises 1, 6-10
• Chapter Six: Exercises 2, 4, 7, 10, 13
• Chapter Seven: Exercises 1, 2, 7, 8, 11, 13, 18, 21
• Chapter Eight: Exercises 3, 8, 13

Once you have finished all the exercises, turn them into me, and I don't have to see you again until February 6! Make sure that you turn your exercises in -- if I don't have your completed exercises and I don't see you in class, you will be counted absent!!

Welcome!

Welcome!

Hi, and welcome to my weblog (or blog)! This blog will allow you to keep up with what's going on in class this semester. I plan on making brief posts after each class which will summarize what we've done that day and have any assignments.

Look to the right. There are a number of links that you will find useful. If you’re in my A+ or Network+ classes, be sure to check out the links that detail your upcoming certifications. Make sure you check this blog often -- even if you haven't missed class -- as I will put class announcements here (this may include extra credit possibilities!!!)