Classroom Management | News
LanSchool 7.5 Expands Audio and Video Sharing
LanSchool Technologies has released LanSchool 7.5, an upgrade to the company's K-12 classroom management system. The new release is designed to bring near feature parity to the Mac OS X version of the tool and introduces several functional enhancements, including real-time keystroke alerts.
LanSchool is a tool that provides various classroom computer control capabilities, such as screen monitoring, site blocking, application limiting, print limiting, and screen blanking, computer muting, as well as classroom interaction features, such as voting and chat.
The latest release, version 7.5, brings feature parity between Mac, Windows, and thin client versions, though some specific functions only apply to Windows. These include the new browser-independent Web limiting feature; Active Directory secure mode; the new remote login capability; and the SwitchToTeacher utility. It also adds new multimedia features, including audio chat and new audio tools that allow the teacher to listen to audio and broadcast it to other computers, as well as new video multicasting capabilities, allowing teachers to send videos to multiple computers and control playback of those videos.
Other new features include:
- Enhanced wireless performance;
- Keystroke alerting for specific words;
- Support for dual monitors for both teachers and students;
- Limiting USB and optical drives;
- Enhancements to testing features, including prompting for the student name, as well as the ability to display results to the student;
- A new "Clear Desktop" button that allows a teacher to close down all applications on a specific student's computer; and
- Various enhancements to the user interface.
LanSchool 7.5 is available now for Mac OS X (10.5 or higher for teacher console, otherwise 10.4 or higher); various iterations of 32- and 64-bit Windows, from XP through 7; iOS 3 and 4 for iPod, iPhone, and iPad; and various Citrix and Ncomputing environments. It's available as a free upgrade for those who purchased version 7.4 within the last year. The full version starts at $299 for classrooms with fewer than 10 computers. Other options, including school and district site licenses and volume licenses, are also available. Further information can be found here.
About the Author
Executive Producer David Nagel heads up the editorial department for 1105 Media's education publications — which include two daily sites, a variety of newsletters and two monthly digital magazines covering technology in both K-12 and higher education.
A 21-year publishing veteran, Nagel has led or contributed to dozens of technology, art and business publications.
He can be reached at dnagel@1105media.com. You can also connect with him on LinkedIn at linkedin.com/profile/view?id=10390192 or follow him on Twitter at @THEJournalDave (K-12) or @CampusTechDave (higher education). A selection of David Nagel's articles can be found on this site.