Google Tips and Tricks - Part 1

Last week I was lucky enough to attend the GAFE (Google Apps for Education) New England Summit in Burlington.  Besides being able to visit the Cambridge Google office (see images below) and try on a pair of Google Glasses,  I was also able to learn a lot of in-depth information about the various google products.






Here were some interesting tidbits from my 4-day google-a-thon:

• Google Docs - When adding a comment to a paper, if you start your comment with +, this will send an email to the person with your comment. For example "+studentname@mail.medfield.k12.ma.us you need more clarity" will send that student a message with your comment.  Clicking on the + in your comment will bring up your contacts, so you can easily select a student name without typing it in.

• Google Drive - If you have a Word document in google drive and you want to convert it to a Google doc, you do NOT need to download and then re-upload and convert the doc.  Instead just 'open with Google Docs' (see below)

• Inserting Images -  Now when you go to insert an image and you click on search you have access to insert Stock Images and from Life Magazine.  All these images are labeled for commercial reuse.

• For fun- Go to google.com and type in 'Do a Barrell Roll'

Look out for part 2 coming next week ..

What's your favorite Google Tip?   Please share in the comments section below ..

New Year's Resolution

2014 New Years Resolution

Check out this excellent infographic from Holly Clark (of EdTechTeacher) about her resolutions for this year.  Lots to think about and lots to do.  Here's to a great 2014!

 I'd love to hear your thoughts on this inforgraphic?  Is this all feasible?  Are you already doing this in your classroom?  What other resolutions do you have?  Add comments by clicking on the 'comments' link below.

Neal

Google Tips

Just when you thought you knew it all about Google ..  there comes along a great site with Google Tips.  This site tells you "a bunch of stuff you can do with Google".

You can get tips for the home, office or by Google product.  For example, did you know that:

• You can get your own personalized Google Doodle on your Birthday
• Get your laptop to give directions to your phone
• Add some interior design to your GMail inbox

All these great tips and more can be found at the Google Tips site.

Free Google PD

Our friends at Google in Education have created 5 new online courses to explain how Google Apps and other web tools can help you to meet your teaching and learning goals.  These are self-paced courses that you can work on when its convenient for you.  These courses include videos, toolkits and reflection questions.

The available courses are:

1. Internet 101 - Learn the basics of getting online and finding information, connecting, and sharing on the web. 
2. Google Apps for Education (GAFE) Overview - Understand how to implement and use Google Apps for Education in your schools and classrooms. 
3. Gmail for Educators -  Learn tips and tricks for managing Gmail to save you time and resources. 
4. Google Drive for Educators -  Improve your use of Google Drive to help facilitate creation and collaboration in your classroom. 
5. Chrome and Chromebooks for Education - Hone your browsing skills as you explore how to bring the power of the web to your school.

I know I can't wait to get started on these courses.  Who is with me?

Target Offering At Least $200 for Any iPad Trade-In Through Nov. 9

Need some extra cash around the holidays?  Have an old iPad just gathering dust around the house?

Well, Target is offering $200 for any iPad Traded-in by November 9th.  Here is the article about this deal and the link to the actual Target site with more information.

Google Scholar and Alerts

Google Scholar is an excellent tool that can be used for research and writing papers.  Here is a brief description from the Google Scholar page:

"Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites. Google Scholar helps you find relevant work across the world of scholarly research."

Anyway, there is a way that students can create 'alerts' in Google scholar to let them know when something new is added to a topic that they have been researching.  This is a good way to stay relevant with the latest information about a subject. These alerts can be created in 3 easy steps.  Instructions to create these alerts can be found in the Free Technology for Teachers blog post written by Richard Byrne.

Google Guide to Staying Safe and Secure Online

Google has released an easy-to-read and interactive guide to staying safe and secure online.

 

 This guide is broken down into 4 categories:

1. Stay Safe and Secure Online - In this section you will explore quick tips and how-to’s that explain what you can do to stay safe and secure on the web.
2. Keep your Family Safe Online - In this section you will get advice from parents at Google and family safety experts on how to help your family safely surf the web.
3. Learn How Google Helps Protect You - In this section, you will learn how Google works hard to protect you whenever you use the web.
4. Know Your Web - In this section you will become more familiar with the basics of the web and learns things such as .. What is a browser? How to chat online, search effectively and more.

This is a great reference for any parent, student or teacher.  I especially recommend it for those students/teachers who are participating in a 1:1 or BYOD learning environment.

Get Certified in Digital Citizenship

The week of October 21st - 25th is Digital Citizenship Week.

 What better way to celebrate than to become a Digital Citizenship Certified Common Sense Educator.  A certified educator is dedicated to teaching digital literacy and citizenship to young people using materials from Common Sense Media.  There is no cost to becoming certified or to using any of the materials on the Common Sense Media website.

For more information on how to become certified including the criteria and an application, please check out Common Sense Educators: Digital Citizenship Certified.

Create a Custom Search Engine for your Students

Have you ever done a research project but only wanted your students to use reputable sites in their research?  You could use a Diigo list to provide them with this information, but there is still a better way.

You can actually create your own customized search engine in Google.  Check out my Bruins search engine. I limited the search to only browse through ESPN and Boston.com.  Try typing in 'Chara' or 'Lucic' or anything hockey related.

This took less than 3 minutes to create and I followed the excellent instructions provided by Teachthought.com.  You can make your search as broad (entire domains) or as narrow (limit to just a particular webpage) as you want.

How to use in Education

There are many possible uses for this customized search engine.

• When your students are doing research you may want to limit the number of sites they can get their data from
• You may want to only have them search on high quality sites that you have previously vetted out.  
• For younger students this would be a good way to ensure that they are only visiting sites that are age and content appropriate.  

What other ways can you think of to use a customized search engine?  Please share your thoughts in the comments area below.

Adding images to Google Forms

Well they finally did it.  You go Google!

For those of you that use Google Forms regularly you probably were frustrated by not being able to add an image to your forms.  Well our prayers were answered and Google has now added the option to insert images.  When adding an item, you simply need to select on 'image' and then you can uplaod an image from your computer or the web:

For further assistance, watch this video on how to add images to your forms.

How to use in Education:

Being able to insert images makes using forms for quizzes for math or geography or social studies classes much easier.  It will also allow you to create forms that are more esthetically pleasing.

QR Codes in AP Art

Do you notice a difference in these pictures?

Actual QR Code for Catherine's Project

Well, if you were walking the hallways of Medfield High School in early April, not only would you have been exposed to the amazing portfolios from the AP Studio art students, but you may have also noticed this (see image to left) next to some of their art work.  These symbols, called QR Codes, are just barcodes that can be read by most cameras/scanners*.  Once you scan these QR codes, you might be taken to a website, image, or video (you should be able to scan this QR Code to the left).

For our AP Studio Art Students, these codes provided an opportunity to share their insights about their work through video.  When scanned, you might hear from students about their concept, technique and what inspired them to make these amazing pieces of art.  More importantly, it allowed for other students and faculty in the school to learn more in depth about what they were seeing.  (You can access all student videos at AP Art –QR Codes)

Keep your eyes open next time you are walking the hallways of Medfield High School, as I imagine you will be seeing QR codes being used across multiple disciplines.  And you never know who you will find scanning QR codes.

Superintendent Maguire scanning QR Codes

* If you are using a tablet or smartphone, you can download a free scan app (go to the app store and type in ‘scan’ in your search).   Then simply open the app and hover your device over the QR code.

Digital Citizenship and 'Choose Your Own Adventure'

With YouTube's video annotation options, you can create 'Choose Your Own Adventure' type videos.  In the video below, a girl receives a text message from her boyfriend asking for pictures. The viewer then has to decide whether to  "send it" or not send it. The choice that the viewer makes takes him or her to a video that explains the "results" of the choice.


(from my limited testing, the selection of the options 'Yes' or 'No' does not seem to work on a mobile device)

How to use in Education

• Having your age-appropriate students or children watch this video is an excellent way to remind them about making good choices about what they do with images.  This would be a great video to embed into any digital citizenship curriculum.
• Using YouTube Video Annotations, you or your students can easily create a 'choose your own adventure' type series for use in your classroom.  

The Voice of the Active Learner

Are we doing all we can to support the Active Learners and Digital Natives in Medfield?

Check out this 2 minute video below:

Free E-DaVinci Code

Doubleday announced Monday that a free e-book edition of Dan Brown’s blockbuster novel ‘‘The DaVinci Code" will be available at online retailers through March 24.  You can also access the e-book from the Dan Brown Website.

If you ask me, it seems like Angels and Demons would be the better choice with all the recent news about the selection of the new Pope.  Anyway, if you have not read 'The DaVinci Code", go get it for your e-reader.

Free Travel for Teachers

Hilton Worldwide has launched the Teacher Treks Travel Grant Competition which will fund 15 teachers to travel and experience firsthand what they teach (seems ideal to me for World Languages, Social Studies and English).

Winners will get a trip valued at $6,000 to go where they want and their schools will get a $2,500 grant for their school.  A few more details:

• Deadline to apply is March 15th
• Applicants must send in a photo, 2 essays detailing their global adventure plan and how they'll share it with students and colleagues, a 140 character entry summary, and a letter of recommendation from their principal
• Winners will be picked by a panel and public voting

 Teachers can enter the competition by visiting www.hhonors.com/teachertreks or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/hiltonhhonors

enter by visiting www.hhonors.com/teachertreks or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/hiltonhhonors, - See more at: http://www.boston.com/travel/blog/2013/02/free_travel_for.html#sthash.duOEFVpp.dpuf

enter by visiting www.hhonors.com/teachertreks or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/hiltonhhonors, - See more at: http://www.boston.com/travel/blog/2013/02/free_travel_for.html#sthash.duOEFVpp.dpuf

enter by visiting www.hhonors.com/teachertreks or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/hiltonhhonors, - See more at: http://www.boston.com/travel/blog/2013/02/free_travel_for.html#sthash.duOEFVpp.dpuf

Teacher Treks Travel Grant Competition

Teacher Treks Travel Grant Competition

Teacher Treks Travel Grant Competition

Problem-Attic - More than 80,000 questions available

You may remember that I introduced Problem-Attic at a faculty meeting earlier in October and also wrote a blog post about it.  Well, great news!  This past weekend Problem-Attic added more questions to their database.  Now it includes about 80,000 questions, grouped as follows:

•  22,000 released test questions from state assessments and curriculum documents. These cover Math, Science and Social Studies for grades 3–12.
• 3,200 questions from released NAEP/TIMSS tests.  These are for grades 3–12, mostly math and science and some ELA.
•  9,000 high school math contest questions.  These come from two prominent North Carolina state competitions.
• 45,000 NY Regents questions covering 11 core subjects.   These are mostly for grades 9–12, though middle school teachers will find many uses for them.

By late April, Problem-Attic expects to have questions from at least 25 states.

How to Use in Education:

I found it really easy to create worksheets based on the bank of questions in Problem-Attic.  This is a great tool to create review questions, challenge questions, or to differentiate instruction in your class.

Google Science Fair 2103

The Google Science Fair is an online science competition open to students age 13 - 18 from around the globe.  Google is looking for ideas that will change the world.  For more information, watch the video below and go to Google Science Fair 2013.

Hockey in the Classroom

While watching the Bruins game the other night (what work stoppage?) the ticker on the bottom of the screen mentioned hockey lesson plans created by the Bruins for use in the K-8 classroom.  All the lessons are aligned to the Common Core and the few I looked at seemed to be quite complete and engaging (and more importantly had to do with hockey).  The following subjects have lessons available - ELA, Math, Science, PhysEd, and French.

 

To check out the lesson plans, you just need to sign up at the ICE School page.  Let me know what you think by posting a comment below.

How to use in Education:

Clearly students are more engaged when they are learning about a topic they can relate to; since the Patriots collapsed in the playoffs again, its time to focus on hockey and this seems like the perfect opportunity.

Doodle 4 Google

While most people visit Google to search for information, some people visit just to see the Google Doodle of the day (simply go to www.google.com to see today's doodle).  Here is a list of the 2012 Google Doodles.  (One of my alltime favorites is this one - make sure to hit play and have the sound up).  What is your favorite Doodle?  Please let us know in the comment area.

Anyway, Google has announced their 6th Annual U.S. Doodle 4 Google competition, inviting K-12 students around the country to create their own doodles.  This years theme is 'My Best Day Ever ... ".  The winning student will see their work on the Google Homepage for a day, win a $30,000 college scholarship and win a $50,000 technology grant for Medfield (I mean, for the winning school).  More information can be found at the Google Blog and at the Doodle4Google page.  Also check out the video below:

How to use in Education

Please share this information with your students and their parents in case they are interested in submitting their Doodle4Google.  The deadline is March 22nd.

Quick way to share bunches of links with students

Like me, I bet you find it annoying when teaching and you ask your students to go to one website, and then to another and then another.  Inherently there are issues with typos and backslashes, etc.  How about if you have a teacher website or blog post and you have to list 5 links for people to visit?  This takes up a lot of real estate and usually people get tired of clicking on all your links.  

Well, there is a solution to both these problems as there is a new service out there that allows you to bundle links together.

Bundlenut is a simple service for organizing links and sharing them with others.  Here is the bundled link I created for Medfield Technology Support.  Creating your own bundle is simple and takes seconds.

How to use in Education:

• Anytime you have the laptop cart and are going to send students to multiple websites during a class, it would make sense to bundle your links.  
• If you were having students do a research paper and you want to allow them to only use specific resources, you could provide that list to them in a bundle.  
• Students could use this to create a works cited page (with all their research links) and could provide that to you with one url, rather than a laundry list of urls.  
• If you ever present at a conference, you could post all the links you talk about in one bundle and then participants would only need to know the one bundled link.

Make sure to let me know how you end up using this in your class!