For Teachers . . .

SymbalooEDU - Web Mixes - Converging online resources
The Educator's PLN - Teacher's Personal Learning Environment
Moodle - A course management system for online courses
PBWorks (in Education) - Online educational workspaces
Teacher Lingo - An educational community
Atomic Learning - training and resources for student success
Instapaper - A simple tool to save web pages for reading later
Evernote - Capture anything, access anywhere, find things fast
Posterous - Privately (or publicly) share photos, videos, ideas via email, mobile, web (free).
Google Wave - Communicate and collaborate in real-time
HootSuite - A social media dashboard
Blackboard - Building a better education experience - online

284days since
Start of School!

Hillcrest School's Information Technology Site

At Hillcrest School we strive to integrate technology into everything we do.  Student have designed dressers with Sketchup, and created math and social studies lessons with Scratch and HTML.  Students search and evaluate websites to find valuable information for their reports. We are currently learning video production to make tutorials on troubleshooting and building desktop computers systems.  The students are very proud of their newspaper with the next edition quickly approaching.  This collaborative project between elementary and middle schools means everyone has the opportunity to get published. 

Project Showcase 2011-2012

7th Grade Ultimate Energy Formula- Enter the values for x,n,y and find out for yourself.

7th Grade Excel Company - The spreadsheets use formulas to update information on customer purchases.

Have some fun with the 6th grade Madlibs.  Just enter your nouns, verbs, and then read the story.

Learn all about Montana in this Powerpoint by 5th grade. And dont forget to print your tri-fold travel brochure if you are going to West Virginia (p1,p2)

Check out movie posters for our California Bio Region 4th Grade Theaters. Or watch the Powerpoint on the Sierra Nevadas.

How is my typing?  Students in 4th and 5th grades practice touch typing with a keyboard cover or modified keyboard.  See their progress.



Computer Best Practices - All Grades

This section is one I expect all my students to visit. "Best practices" means that although there are many ways to do things, there's a certain way of doing things that is the best way. (Read more)

Planned For This Year:

4th Grade
  • Introduction to computer keyboarding.
  • How to find out information on the web (Google image/fact searches)
  • Type 2 Learn Intro an weekly practice
  • MS Word Formatting
  • Intro to Scratch (What is Programming?)
  • Intro to Excel
  • Doing reports in Word
  • Designing report covers with Publisher templates
5th Grade
  • Continued practice with keyboarding
  • Advancing weekly in Type 2 Learn 4
  • Internet Security and Cyber-Safety
  • Introducing "Tech-Trends" Analysis (Reading & Write Ups)
  • Intro to Scratch (What is Programming?)
  • Intro to HTML
  • Formatting reports in Word
  • Designing  report covers in Publisher
 6th - 7th Grades
  • MS Powerpoint: "Who I am, Who I see Myself Becoming" (plus presentation skills)
  • Scratch Programming: Game Design
  • Podcasting
  • "TechTrends" Research & Write-ups
  • More HTML, Intro to CSS

8th Grade
  • Introduction to Online Journalism
  • Yearbook & Documenting
  • Photoshop focus for sharp yearbook images
  • Learning about Typography
  • Learning about Consistency in Layouts
  • Working Collaboratively in teams for yearbook layout assignments

Select Student Projects 

2009 - 2010

See all student work this year

Featured Projects:




MS Technology Blogs!





Google SketchUp



2008 - 2009


4th: Slideshows



... see more projects ...


2007 - 2008


7th: Web Atlas



... see more projects ...

Meet the Teacher      

Mr. Nielsen
Welcome to another exciting year in the Hillcrest Computer Lab. We will continue to build on an outstanding program.  We will be writing macros in excel, video editing with blue screen, and creating sustainable web based lessons.  Here is more info about me. 
Email:  hillcrest.tech@yahoo.com 

Software Apps for Home Use!

Parents: I've heard from some of your kids that you are afraid of viruses/security breaches on your home computers and so are hesitant to allow downloading of anything suggested by your child. I understand your concern (especially if you are Windows users--you should be conscientious about this). However, the following are trust-worthy sites/locations; I have not had any problem and consider these all to be safe to download.

Type  to Learn 4:
Click here to download:
To get started: click here for instructions.

Audacity: Sound editing software
Students who enjoyed audio/sound editing in Audacity can download the app for free at home (Mac or PC!).
Go to the download page.

Scratch: A Free Programming Application

Middle School Update for Parents

  • March 31, 2011 - HTML Wrap-up HTML is a difficult thing to teach kids, and because it takes them a while to wrap their head around the (mostly) totally new language and its syntax, I didn ...
    Posted Apr 1, 2011 2:38 AM by Andrea Orvik
  • Jan. 24-28th: 6th, 7th & Yearbook End of grading period is here . . . I encourage you to work with your middle schooler to review Grade Book Wizard, find out what's missing (especially 8th grade parents), and ...
    Posted Feb 4, 2011 10:03 AM by Andrea Orvik
Showing posts 1 - 2 of 19. View more »


Technology and Education

  • Anonymous Bullying This post isn't really about technology in the classroom, but how teenagers may be using the internet to bully people they know totally anonymously. The Common Sense article I ...
    Posted May 20, 2011 9:24 AM by Andrea Orvik
  • Obstacles to Technology in Schools This article discusses the major obstacles found in schools and includes survey input from  almost 300,000 students, 43,000 parents, 35,000 teachers, 2000 librarians and 3500 administrators, from ...
    Posted Apr 26, 2011 2:08 PM by Andrea Orvik
Showing posts 1 - 2 of 15. View more »


Lab News

  • Virus Protection Installed I've recently installed AVG's Anti-Virus Free Edition 2011 software in the IT lab. I've experienced some virus issues in the lab which I'm trying to ...
    Posted May 5, 2011 10:20 AM by Andrea Orvik
  • March 2011 - Laptop 'Lockdown' Software I've just installed Advanced Desktop Shield onto the IT Lab computers allowing the instructor to preserve settings for the desktop, screen resolution, screen savers, etc. This resolves issues with ...
    Posted Apr 1, 2011 2:26 AM by Andrea Orvik
Showing posts 1 - 2 of 6. View more »




Subpages (5): About Miss Orvik . . . Mr. Nielsen Parent Survey Progress Reports - Overview Teacher Survey: 2010-11