Five Essential Google Drive Skills For Teachers This school year I've worked with a few school districts that are using Google Apps for Education for the first time. A lot of what I have done with those school districts is help to get the teachers acclimated to using Google Drive. When I sat down to plan an upcoming Google Drive training session I thought about some of the essential Google Drive skills that teachers need in addition to creating documents, presentations, and spreadsheets. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Step 1: Step 2: Step 3: Step 4:
Five Essential Google Drive Skills For Teachers This school year I've worked with a few school districts that are using Google Apps for Education for the first time. A lot of what I have done with those school districts is help to get the teachers acclimated to using Google Drive. When I sat down to plan an upcoming Google Drive training session I thought about some of the essential Google Drive skills that teachers need in addition to creating documents, presentations, and spreadsheets. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Step 1: Step 2: Step 3: Step 4:
Lots of Answers to Common Google Apps Security & Privacy Questions This morning I received an email that I get on a fairly regular basis. The question always goes something like this... "we're thinking about using Google Apps in our school but we worry about storing company projects on a third party servers, can you give us some guidance?" The first thing that I always share with people asking that question is a link to the Google Apps security and privacy overview. To put it simply, Google does not own your data.
The Digital Curriculum Part 2… Eight Amazing Free Digital Curriculum Resources… Time to Explore Everyone is talking about a digital curriculum free of those hard copy textbooks that have been a part of schooling since the advent of the one room schoolhouse. This is the second post in a series devoted to investigating resources that can open up a world of digital curricula. First, your subscriptions mean a lot to me so sign up by RSS or email! You can also follow me on twitter (mjgormans) and please take a moment to share and retweet this post. As educators begin to distance themselves from the traditional textbook there is more and more need to find digital alternatives. While many educators have been moving the textbook from the center, other find it not quite as easy of a task. 1. As the site states… watch, practice… learn almost anything. 2. BLOSSOMS video lessons are enriching students’ learning experiences in high school classrooms for students across the globe. 3. This is the community of K12 open resources. 5. 6. 7. 8. By now you maybe wondering how to get started.
How To Use Google Voice Commands In Google Drive Editor’s note: This is a revised version of an article we originally ran on March 22nd, 2014, updated to reflect the latest Google innovations. Since its inception, Google Drive has been a source of excitement for innovation-minded educators. However, as with any new teaching technology, you may find yourself thinking “it sounds intriguing, but will it really make a difference?” In regards to Drive features like audio feedback, the answer to that question is an unequivocal yes. Aside from offering convenience and helping spare teachers from endless amounts of typing, the addition of voice commenting brings with it profound benefits to the learning experience as a whole. Below, you’ll find five compelling reasons to give it a try, as well as a simple guide on how to get started. Image via Flickr by Ben Marvin Conversational Grading: Red ink is synonymous with financial debt and academic failure. Unfortunately, there’s only so much that can be said with traditional grading methods.
Google Docs for Administrators – 5 Ideas to Get Started As another school year begins to come to a close, I have recently had some of our administrators (mostly elementary) contact me with ideas for making administrative tasks more paperless and create a more efficient workflow not only for themselves but for their teachers. Some of these have been regular “end of year” tasks and others are being put into motion in preparation for next year. Given my known affinity for Google Apps for Education, and being we are a Google Apps for Education district, my first inclination is always to figure out how these tasks could be completed using GAFE in one way or another. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. What I think is also great about this is that there’s positive modeling going on for use of Google Apps for Education. Please feel free to add your ideas in the comments section! Like this: Like Loading...
Going Google with WordPress Plugins Peanut butter and jelly. Bonnie and Clyde. Yin and yang. Horse and carriage. Some things just seem to naturally go together. If you run a WordPress site, then unless you’re running a very unusual site in a very unusual way, you probably have it connected to Google in one way or another. Whatever it is, if you stop and think about it, you’re probably connected. Below we’ll give you some more potential connections – 25 to be exact. If you know of other good ways, let us know in the comments. Info & Download The “Google Adsense” plugin, as you might imagine, lets you easily place Google adsense ads into your site. Info & Download The Google Analytics+ plugin is one of our own here at WPMU DEV. As our Analytics plugin is not free, we’ll go ahead and mention a free one here too: Google Analytics Dashboard for WP. Info & Download The Google App Engine for WordPress plugin is one of only two plugins official maintained by Google itself. Info & Download Info & Download Info & Download Info & Download 8.
iPurpose before iPad The two above images are good examples of purposeful thinking about iPad usage in schools. One, a screenshot of an oft-used tool known as iPad As.. by edtechteacher.org, focuses on what the iPad can be used for and provides links to various apps that can be utilised for those functions. It goes without saying that it is a very useful website for schools thinking about iPads. It provides nutshell explanations of a number of apps that relate to each iPad as… category as well as pricing. The other, The Padagogy Wheel, is one of many variations on applying Bloom’s Taxonomy of skills to iPad apps. Both tools have supported my reflection on iPad use in school and are worth checking out in detail. The Padagogy Wheel provides many links between skills and tech activities but doesn’t really address what iPad apps address which skills and activities specifically other than lumping them into a particular category. Now this sounds like a big task and it is.
38 Ideas to Use Google Drive in Class August 11, 2014 This is the third post in a series of posts aimed at helping teachers and educators make the best out of Google Drive in classrooms. This series comes in a time when teachers are getting ready to start a new school year and hopefully will provide them with the necessary know-how to help them better integrate Google Drive in their teaching pedagogy. The two previous posts featured in this series were entitled consecutively "New Google Drive Cheat Sheet" and "Teachers Visual Guide to Google Drive Sharing". Today's post covers some interesting ideas and tips on how to go about using Google Drive in your classroom. This work is created by Sean Junkins from SeansDesk. Google Docs
10 Apps in 10 Minutes #chromebookedu | Kyle B Recently my colleague Jill and I worked with some teachers during a PD day on finding great Chrome apps & extensions for learning. We thought we’d kick off the time together by picking 10 of our most favorite (picking only 10 is hard!) and sharing them with teachers in 10 minutes. We wanted to quickly get teachers excited about educational apps and extensions available to their students. Here are the 10 we covered with a quick description as well as the link to the Chrome Web Store. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. The great thing about installing apps in Chrome (whether on a Chromebook or not) is quick and easy. These are just a sample of the great educational apps available in the Chrome Web Store. Like this: Like Loading...