Solving an Attendance issue

[visionteacher]

Ok so I've got a filemaker database that has been setup with all our forms and what not. I teach children with visual impairments, to give you all some background. I've recently moved into the realm of PDA's and so have filemaker mobile 2.1 with filemaker 6 since that's what the school district is using. Anyway my problem is that everyone has used filemaker really just to print out forms, not for actual data entry so much. I only have ten fields I can use on the mobile version.

I need to keep attendance, and people previously have just used paper, but I'd like to stay digital if at all possible. My thought was that when I saw a student I could go into the pda and just do a drop down box that said whether the student was absent, I was absent, I was in a meeting, etc. It seems like there should be a way that each day it could update the database when I put the information into the pda, but there wouldn't be 180 fields or however many school days there are, but just one, that each day would reset, and then update it in the home database. It would need to keep a running list in the home database, the pda version is just an input method. Does this make sense, I feel like I'm being confusing? Anyhow has anyone dealt with this before, is there a way to do this or am I sort of out of luck? The other teachers are just telling me to stick to paper, but I find that so inefficient, and I know filemaker is a very powerful program, its just teaching them how to use it in a more efficient way, which would start with me learning myself :-). Thanks for any tips you may have, I'm guessing at the least it would have to be a script or something, and I'm completely clueless in this regard. Thank you so much.

~Mickey

[visionteacher]

Since I've not gotten any replies yet, would this question be more appropriate in another forum? Thanks!

~Mickey

[lunk head]

I'm in the same situation. I've been killing myself to find someone to help me with that situation. If you find an answer please let me know. I will post if I find the answer. My email is [email protected]