💥 Tech items - More Google templates, Jamboard tips, SeeSaw tips, a couple GREAT extensions and more in this weeks tech tips!

 

Several staff (Via the Chromebook survey) did not realize you can already do these with your current Chromebooks and setups:

• You can easily cast your Chromebook to your projector. How to Cast here. 
• You can easily use your phone as a remote mouse for your computer.  More info here. 
• Your current Chromebooks do have dual cameras. (So you have a camera when in tablet mode as well as your webcam.) 

Contact Jason or myself to help get you started with any of the items above. 

---

Did you know? ... all of my tech tips emails get archived to my blog?  You can access them here. 

---

Miscellaneous tech tips:

5 Quick Activities to Try with Jamboard Tomorrow - with templates!

Looking for Royalty free music for student or teacher projects?  Check this one out: Bensound

How to Design & Send Certificates With Google Slides and Forms 

An Overview of How Students View and Return Assignments in Google Classroom

How to Create Citations and Bibliography in Google Docs 

20 Ways to Use Google Drawings in the Classroom  - Google Drawings is a hidden treasure for teachers and students, but many have yet to discover its benefits.

Quick Tip of the Week (Extract Text from Images and PDFs) - Did you know you can convert images and PDF documents into a Google Doc and extract ALL the text?  This tip could save you valuable time!  📺 Watch this quick video to learn how!

Market, an Interactive template for counting money. Free Google Slides template! Check it out! 

---

How to become a Google Docs power user (free PDF) a few highlights include:

• Top 5: Tips for getting the most out of Google Docs
• How to tag collaborators in Google Doc comments
• How to add more fonts to Google Docs
• How to insert a text box in Google Docs
• How to add footnotes in Google Docs
• How to check the word count in a Google Doc
• How to create a long dash in Google Docs
• How to make your Google Docs easier to read using indents and spacing
• How to make the most out of the mobile Google Docs editing tools
• How to add page numbers and bookmarks in Google Docs
• How Google Docs grammar check compares to its alternatives
• How to translate documents into different languages with Google Docs
• How to share Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides
• How to add images, tables, and drawings to a Google Doc file

---

Great poster or cheat sheet to share with your students - Send a copy to your students or enlarge and print a copy for your classroom. Get a copy of this Chromebook shortcuts sheet! 

---

Jamboard Activities for Independent Learning - It's located in our Jamboard templates folder.

---

USING BITMOJIS IN YOUR VIRTUAL (AND REAL) CLASSROOM -Some great resources are here as well as a few new tools that were new to me. (Pixton, Wimp yourself and more...) 

---

CREATING AND USING RUBRICS IN GOOGLE CLASSROOM - Rubrics are an excellent way to assess your student's work. Google Classroom makes it easy to share these rubrics with your students before they work on the assignment and after you have graded it.  Check it out. 

---

Don't reinvent the wheel!  There are a lot of templates for Google that are available from a lot of resources. We have just added Templates for Teachers  to our template resources.  Check out our Google Templates doc that is chocked full of template resources! 

---

This is a good  Seesaw tip - especially if you’re having students take pictures of work - it’s hard to hold up the work and use the trackpad!!

---

A couple great Chrome Extensions! (We have added these to our approved list for students too.) 

Record to Slides easily allows you to do a quick recording from your webcam/Chromebook and insert it into slides. 

mote: voice notes & feedback     (Great find by Gault!) 

Easily add audio notes when grading your student's assignments! Mote is integrated with Google Docs, Google Classroom, Slides and Sheets. You can create a voice note by clicking the mote icon in any Comment box. They have a few paid features, but the free version still gives you 30 seconds per feedback note, which is more than enough time. 

---

We are seeing a lot of Phishing emails similar to this! 

The past week we are seeing a bunch of automated phishing emails.  They are getting better... using an actual picture... using a fake gmail account with the name... etc...

Always be cautious!  You guys are doing an amazing job so keep up the great work! 

---

Import Google Classroom Roster to create a group in Flipgrid with the latest update! Checkout this short 1 minute video to learn how. 

---

💥 Tech tools - Some great new Gsuite features, Google Drawing tips, tech tools and more... in this edition.

✔️Finally - they added it!  Enhance presentations in Slides with audio. 

Google is adding the ability for users to embed MP3 and WAV audio files from Drive into Slides. It will be rolling out soon.  More details here. 

Another Slides update - Easily Customize Theme Colors in Slides

Gmail Smart Compose Subject Suggestions

Via G Suite Updates | Smart Compose can now make suggestions for the subject of your email.

Schedule your Gmail - It's here for Norris users already!

In the past few weeks, Google has been rolling out the capability to schedule when your email is sent.  (In the past, this required an extension like Boomerang for Gmail)  

More info here: Write now, send later with Schedule send in Gmail.) and More info in this Google help article. -Works on mobile apps too! 

Note: You must enable Gmail offline for this feature to be present on your Chromebook or desktop computer. (These settings are specific to each device you log into.) 

Take action faster with customizable swipe actions in Gmail on iOS

This feature was already in Android... but If you have an iPhone it's a nice addition!  Check out how to do it here.  (I loved this update for my iPhone! - Swipe one way I delete the message and swipe the other way and it' archived. Customizable!) 

Google Classroom update - NEW (Students/Staff will want to update their apps!)

Note - This will only affect new classes created after 4-17-19.

What do I need to know?

From April 17, 2019, any new classes created in Classroom will experience new ordering rules on the Classwork page. New topics or items posted to the Classwork page in these new classes will start to appear at the top of the page instead of the bottom. We have made this change to improve the user experience of Classroom based on teacher and professor feedback. This feature will not be supported by versions of the mobile app which are older than 2.2019.06301 on iOS and 5.2.102.04xx on Android.

What do I need to do?

To enable your users to view the new ordering on mobile, please update your devices (via the Play and App Stores) so that they are running the latest versions of the Android and iOS apps.

The Google Classroom iOS and Android apps have the ability to markup assignments. A teacher can use a finger or a stylus to add colorful annotations, handwriting, and highlighting.

Note: The K-2 Chromebooks and 9-12 Chromebooks are set to run the Android Google Classroom app- so this works great! Make an assignment and students can mark it up and turn it back in via the Android Classroom app! 

 Remember - It's easy to give a percent of your Amazon purchases to the Norris Foundation! At no cost to you! 

This document will get you started.  Only takes a couple of minutes - and at Norris, you are always taken to smile.amazon.com so once you set your charity, it will go to the foundation.

Great reminders from our Norris Staff - Limit the "reply all" emails.

• If you want to avoid people doing a reply all to an email you send - send it out with the BCC instead fo using the C or CC. Great tip!
• You can also change Gmails default reply behavior - I recommend doing this! Here is a how-to article, or here is a screenshot courtesy of Andrew Carlson:

Pretty cool: 

From Charlie Hutzler - @CAHutzler Mr. Applegate led his #NorrisTitans through a virtual tour of #Auschwitz utilizing #Chromebooks and http://panorama.auschwitz.org .

Misc. Tech:

Several from via Richard Byrne @rmbyrne 

31 of My Favorite Ed Tech Tools - video (54 Min. but great tools!)

My 5 Favorite Google Docs Add-ons 

The following resource is from Matt Millers DitchThatTextbook email.  Check out his great website for a ton of resources and subscribe to his email list for more goodies. 

More Google Drawings goodness

• RESOURCE #1: The Google Drawings Manifesto for Teachers, a post we just updated this week. It's full of Google Drawings tips and tricks -- plus lots of activities you can do in class right away!
   
• RESOURCE #2: A phenomenal full-length webinar from Tony Vincent from LearningInHand.com about Google Drawings. He shares successful activities he uses in his own classroom that your students will love!
   
• RESOURCE #3: The PDF notes from Tony's presentation. TLDR (too long; didn't read)? Or, in this case, TLDW (too long; didn't watch)? No problem! We capture the highlights of Tony's video in this PDF notes file. You can download them or print them if you'd like.

(PS: That Tony Vincent Ditch Summit video presentation is only available for a few more weeks, and then it'll go offline until the summit in December. Don't wait!)

Today, the #DitchBook Twitter community has shared in a big way! In addition to the resources listed above, they shared 35 MORE ideas for using Google Drawings in the classroom!  

NETA 2019 Session resources

Didn't make it to NETA - you can still view the session resources here. (Some great ideas and resources for K-12 classrooms.)

Updates to Stream in Google Classroom

From Google - Thanks to your feedback, we brought back the ability to move posts to the top of the Stream, just like in classic Classroom. We also introduced a setting for controlling how notifications appear in the Stream.  To stay on top of what's new in classroom - Checkout out this site. 

IT IS BACK!! To-Do in Google Classroom 

To Do List in Google Classroom is Back - learn more here.

📧Write now, send later with Schedule send in Gmail!  

Yes, Boomerang has been a great extension that gave us this functionality in the past... But coming in the next few weeks... It will be built into Gmail! More info here. 

Where on Google Earth is Carmen Sandiego?

The world's greatest super thief has struck again! Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Google have created an interactive quiz that takes your students across the globe to find clues and solve the mystery of the Crown Jewels caper.

Build and share your own VR experience

You and your students can now view and guide your own VR tours in Google Expeditions on both iOS and Android! Start by visiting https://vr.google.com/tourcreator/ 

CHROME MUSIC LAB - Check it out!

Pretty cool site for teaching some music concepts - Rhythm, Chords, and more. You will love it... and kids will love it too!

Here is a NETA 2019 presentation and a few resources on the subject.  

Google Trends?

Want to see what's trending in search - https://trends.google.com/trends/ 

Here is a 5x5 grid of what's being searched - Pretty cool! 

 Hipster Google - Google Tools You Probably Never Heard Of

You will find some pretty cool ones in this slide deck by Eric Curtis of Control Alt Achieve. 

Some great resources from... Eric Curtis of Control Alt Achieve

• Fantastic Feedback Tools for Google Docs
• Beyond the Slideshow: Google Slides Activities for all Subjects
• Google Tour Builder for Any Subject
• Google Tools for Struggling Students

Note- Eric presented at NETA 2019 - so the topic above were all presented live.  

Some great resources from... Tony Vincent

Create Learning Activities in Google Drawings

Animate Learning with GIFs

Crafting a Class Brand

Documenting with Style

Note- Tony presented at NETA 2019 - so the topics above were all presented live.  His tips and resources rock.  Special thanks to @tonyvincent for allowing me to use his graphics in my posts! 

How To Share Pictures of Student Work with Spark Page. If you are not using the Spark tools... you are missing out.  Check out our help article on how to log in and more about these great tools. 

Google help is great - and the help adapts to what Gsuite product you are in and what you are doing! 

If you want others to only view your Google Docs, Slides, Sheets, or Drawings document, you can cut the clutter by making a Preview link.

📆 How about adding visual cues to your digital calendar with emojis? Since emojis can be entered anywhere you can enter text, you can add emojis to calendars and lesson plans!

💥 Tech tools - New Google activity dashboard! SAY YES to this!!! , Tech tools, Download YouTube Videos, Chrome extensions for EDU and more in this weeks tech post.

NEW - Activity dashboard in Google Docs, Sheets and Slides!

Great new feature:

See who has viewed a file:

1. On your computer, open a file in Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides that you can edit.
2. At the top, click Tools  Activity Dashboard.

Note: You can only view activity on files owned by a Google Account that can use Activity Dashboard.

You may be presented with the following agreement/warning: 

Some great websites and tech tools:

Google Hacks for the Educator - Great tips!   - A slide deck presented at a recent Google Summit.  

Going Further with Google Photos 2.0 - A slide deck presented at a recent Google Summit. 

Around the World with Google Geo  - A slide deck presented at a recent Google Summit. 

Video Playlist of strategies for students around using images in Google Docs - Nice short tutorials - worth the watch! 

25 Tech Tools, Tricks, and Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Chromebook. 

More info from Google on this new feature:

Improve collaboration in Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides with Activity dashboard

G Suite makes it easier for users to collaborate efficiently and effectively. An important part of collaboration is deciding how and when to follow up with others. To help inform these decisions, we're introducing Activity dashboard in Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. It’s a feature that lets users with edit access see who has viewed the file and when they viewed it.

Google Forms:

10 Google Forms Tricks! 

If you are new to using Google forms - check this out!  Google Forms for Educators - Introduction/tutorial. 

Several free Chrome apps for the classroom:

Create stop-motion animation with Clap Motion: EDU Review on this product: This is a new Chrome App I recently discovered. Free to use, works offline, super simple.

LabCamera - Real-time video analysis in your classroom- Track and graph horizontal and vertical movement of objects with Intellisense LabCamera Kinematics module. The webcam based natural science exploration and data logging laboratory for STEM education. LabCamera allows students and teachers to carry out substantial scientific observations and measurements by using our software and a simple everyday webcam. Conducting physics, biology and chemistry experiments with LabCamera - both in the classroom and at home - brings natural science education to a new level.

The CleanPrint extension is pretty nice!  Here is a short 2 min. video on how to use it.  

Use Yout.com to Download Videos from YouTube

• Find a YouTube video you want to download
• In the URL, take the ‘ube’ out of youtube.com and then hit ENTER
• Pick to download the file as an MP3 (sound) or MP4 (video) file
• Great if you need to get a video to play offline for an educational reason or to store in your Google Drive. 

Google Docs - Image Annotation with Drawings  Great Tip!

• Take an image into a GDoc
• Click on the image and COPY it
• Find an open space in the doc and click so the cursor is there
• Go to INSERT > DRAWING
• Drawing window opens. PASTE your image
• Use the shapes, arrows, lines, text tools to do whatever editing is needed over the image and then 
• Click SAVE AND CLOSE when done and the ‘drawing’ is in the doc. Can double click on the drawing to go back in and edit if needed. 
• Great way to MARK-UP images right in the doc!

Great tech tips... web tools, QR, Google, and more.... Our new app, and more... in this weeks posting.

Check out our new Mobile App for Norris!

I would encourage you (and your students) to download the new Norris mobile app for your phones and tablets. Make sure you do the initial setup as directed to customize the content for your needs.  Be the first to find out when school is closed!  Lunch menus, schedules, news, and more... all at your fingertips.  Just had a staff member tell me it's awesome...glad to hear that feedback!  Visit http://norris160.org/app

Web tools and sites: 

A new safe search site for kids - Kiddle - check it out. 

Bamboozle - Create your own educational games for free, or play some of their pre-made games. Sample geography one here. 

Creating Elementary Portfolios with SeeSaw. (Free version and paid versions avail.) 10-minute audio podcast with links to items mentioned in the podcast. 

Nice listing of web creation tools (And a great example of an Adobe Spark Page.) (Scroll down the page.)

Some of my favorite free QR code scanning and creating tools...   Via Tony Vincent (@tonyvincent)

A few cool Google tips... Via Tony Vincent (@tonyvincent) 

Practical Ed Tech Tip of the Week – Try Know Recorder for Creating Video Lessons Their support page has some nice short intro videos to introduce you to this site and app.

Online audio Editing:

Edit sounds online! Free Technology for Teachers: 3 Online Alternatives to Audacity

4 Audio Editing Tools for Chromebooks - A Comparison Chart

Assessment tools:

Sure... Kahoot, Socrative, and few of my other favorites are in this list... but there are some other new ones too! This is a great list! - Know Students Better: 17 Tools for Formative Assessment

Google Chrome and apps:

150+ Chrome Apps and Extensions for Teachers and Students (Updated!) (I love how they present the list with the cards and short descriptions of the app/extension. 

Google Classroom:

New Feature! (Released Jan 2017) Google Classroom – Late Work Notifications

Google Sheets:

The Easier Way to Freeze Rows and Columns in Google Sheets - Via BetterCloud Monitor | There are simple tips that make a huge difference. If you're a Google Sheets user, this is one of those tips.

Support for rotated text, accounting number formats, and more in Google Sheets

Google Photos:

12 Amazing Google Photos Features You Didn’t Know About!

Google Slides:

How to Add Your Voice to Google Slides - Short 3 min. how-to video. 

YouTube news:

Sad to see Annotations going away.  An awesome YouTube tool, that many never used..... BUT -- NEW --  Keep fans engaged with Cards & End Screens as we say goodbye to Annotations Editor  This short 2 1/2 minute video will show you how. 

Google Drawing:

How to make a colorful Venn diagram in Google Drawings... (works in Google Slides, too)

Avoid clicking on emails, they are constantly phishing you - Hot of Twitter! 

Free IOS app, some great tech tools, and some surprising findings in tech and schools - In this weeks tech posting.

IOS Apps:

Great Free IOS app for audio recording and editing. TwistedWave Audio Editor  (Reg $9.99) - Free today! (1-10-17) 

Math Resources:

G Suite for Education - Recharge Learning - Digital Math Resources for K-12 A really nice document of resources.

Misc. Web tools and resources:

TechNotes - Our 2016 Google Resource Roundup. A really nice list of tools! 

This interactive website lets students listen and learn about animals and habitats around the world. The great animal orchestra.  - Pretty cool!

WriteReader - Collaborative Book Creation for Elementary School Classrooms.

Organize Your Classroom Library with Spark Post 

Mercury Reader for Chrome provides ad-free, distraction-free reading. (Similar to the old Clearly extension, and others.)  Great to have in the toolbox! 

Six great search engines designed specifically for younger kids. 

Google Apps: 

Crop, Rotate, and Add Borders to Images in Google Docs - Via BetterCloud Monitor | Along with the ability to crop images into slightly smaller versions of themselves, you can also crop them into specific shapes, called masks. Pairing this with the ability to add a custom border to your images definitely gives you a lot more flexibility in Google Docs.

6 Ways to Become a Google Slides Pro. 

Got Google Photos? This guide will help you get around the service like a pro: 

Google Drawings cheat sheet for teachers and students.

Should kids have school-issued devices?  Should we be using YouTube?  Surprise.... top parent concern is...... 

Over 100,000 people have shared their views on education via the Speak Up survey, and here is what they are telling us:

10 Things Parents Told Us About Digital Learning

 

10 Things Students Told Us About Digital Learning

10 Things Principals Told Us About Digital Learning