Category: Google

Digital Whiteboards for Google Meet

Digital whiteboards are a valuable tool in our current virtual classrooms. The two most popular virtual meeting tools being used are Google Meet and Zoom. Zoom features include a whiteboard but Google Meet does not include a whiteboard in the features of their program. Chrome Canvas and Google Jamboard are both digital whiteboards that can be used with Google Meet. 

Chrome Canvas is an easy to use program that does not require the creation of an account. The digital whiteboard can be opened in a new tab and shared to students by sharing your screen. 

Google Jamboard is a program within the G Suite for Education products. You can use your personal or school Google account to sign in. Jamboards can be shared with your students through a link so that students can access and add to the digital board. 

You can click here to access a video tutorial of using both of these digital whiteboard tools. 

References:

Image source, Google products

@hollandkaylah

Hundreds of Things to Ask Your Google Home


“Google Home now has more than 200 third-party skills, also known as conversation actions. If you’re just getting started, or you want to really see what your virtual assistant can do, check out” this list from PC Mag. — Sascha Segan, PC Mag

Pokémon Go Automatically Granting Permission to Read Your Gmail

Pokemon Go

The Verge is reporting that “Pokémon Go has become wildly popular in the days since its release last week, but the app may be hiding a serious security issue. In many cases, users who sign into the app through a Google Account are often inadvertently granting broad permissions over all information linked to the account, including the power to read and send emails. At no point in the sign-in process does the app notify users that full access is being granted” (Source). Read more at The Verge.

Perhaps the app developer will correct this issue in the near future.

Fostering Writing and Collaboration with Google Docs

Teaching ChannelHigh school English teacher, Sarah Brown Wessling, shares strategies for promoting collaborative writing inside and outside of the classroom. Wessling highlights that such lessons also promote digital etiquette, provide opportunities for teachers to provide rich feedback, and provide teachers with insights into the individual student’s or the collaborative group’s writing process.

Google Announces New Learning Management System (LMS)

Google Classroom“Classroom is a new, free tool coming to Google Apps for Education that helps teachers easily and quickly create and organize assignments, provide feedback, and communicate with their classes” (Source). “Classroom weaves together Google Docs, Drive and Gmail to help teachers create and organize assignments quickly, provide feedback efficiently, and communicate with their classes with ease…it lets students organize their work, complete and turn it in, and communicate directly with their teachers and peers” (Source).

The following video highlights the experiences of some of the teachers and students who provided feedback as Google developed Classroom.

Benefits for Classes

Easy to Set up
Teachers can add students directly or share a code with their class to join. It takes just minutes to set up.

Saves Time
The simple, paperless assignment workflow allows teachers to create, review, and grade assignments quickly, all in one place.

Improves Organization
Students can see all of their assignments on an assignments page, and all class materials are automatically filed into folders in Google Drive.

Enhances Communication
Classroom allows teachers to send announcements and questions instantly. Since students can post to the stream, they can help out their classmates.

Affordable and Secure
Like the rest of our Google Apps for Education services, Classroom contains no ads, never uses your content or student data for advertising purposes, and is free for schools.

Learn more: http://google.com/edu/classroom

Google Glass in the Classroom

Glass in the Class

The following is a collection of resources for those seeking to learn more about using Google Glass in educational settings. There are some exciting potential uses and some issues that require serious consideration as the evolution of wearable technology evolves.

Seeing the Classroom through Google Glass

Margaret Powers writes, “As a reflective educator, your goal is to be constantly documenting and learning in the classroom. With Google Glass, that process can be much easier.”

Full Article

A First Look at How Educators Are Really Using Google Glass

“While educators may be impressed by augmented reality features from at-a-glance navigation to spoken Google search-and-response, they frequently save their best praise for Glass’ eye-level video-capture function.”

Full Article

Google Glass: Making Learning Visible with Wearable Technology

“Google Glass provides the educator a means for “making learning visible” (MLV), and can assist with the “observation and documentation in deepening and extending children’s and adults’ learning” that the Project Zero researches from Harvard and Reggio Emilia, who developed MLV, identified as key to effective teaching. The paradox of MLV is that documenting one’s process within the workflow must itself be invisible if it is to be seamless and not “get in the way” of the actual work.” Stacey Goodman provides a nice overview of the technology and presents some potential classroom uses.

Full Article

Reflections on Using Google Glass

Ben is “a special education teacher, and as of late there have been a ton of examples of Glass helping people with disabilities.  If you just look at theGoogle Glass Google+ community you can read about them there. Truly amazing things will come of Glass for people with disabilities.” Ben Hommerding reflects on his experiences with Glass in a series of three blog posts.

Reflection 1, Reflection 2, and Reflection 3

Additional Reading

Innovative Learning Solution’s early ideas about Google Glass.

Cecil College uses latest Google technology in classroom

Is Google Glass Suitable for Schools?

Related News

Image Source: garysking.wordpress.com

Google Search Tricks

Google SearchThis Prezi by Tony Vincent (@tonyvincent) contains many tips for using the Google search box to access the information you need — including answers to math problems, information about the current weather, and much more.

You can also learn more by visiting Inside Search for more tips and tricks by Google.

Image Source: http://easilymused.com

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Google Apps for Education Southern Summit

I’m excited about being a part of this. I hope you can join us!

We invite you to join us for the first annual Google Apps for Education Southern Summit in Atlanta, Georgia on September 22 and 23, 2012. This high intensity two day event focuses on deploying, integrating and using Google Apps for Education to promote student learning in K-12 and higher education. The program features Google Certified Teachers, Google Apps for Education Certified Trainers, practicing administrators, solution providers, Google engineers, and representatives from the Google Apps for Education team.

Sessions include two keynote presentations, plus two full days of informative breakouts, cutting-edge demonstrations, and hands-on workshops led by experienced and knowledgeable professional developers.

  • Deployment & Management of Google Apps
  • Google Apps Scripts
  • Google Apps for Education Certification
  • Chromebooks in Education
  • YouTube for Schools
  • Google Docs, Google Sites, Google Calendar, Gmail power tips, and… even more!

The Google Apps for Education Southern Summit will be in Atlanta, near the area’s most popular attractions.

Register now to take advantage of the early bird rates.

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Class Activity: Take a Virtual Trip through Google’s Servers

Here’s a quick activity that you can do in your classroom to explore the topic of sustainable energy. It comes to us from Google.

Introduction

Ever wondered what happens when you send an email? How does an email travel from your computer to your friend’s smartphone across the country or around the world?

Take a journey with Gmail and find out. In this short video you will follow an email on its journey to see what happens once you send a message. Along the way, you will learn about some of Google’s efforts to minimize its impact on the environment.

 

Exploration

Take a journey through Google’s data centers by following an email along its path. Along the way, explore Google’s data centers with videos, photos and more. It all begins when you click send. Click on the image below to begin the online module.


Google Green

Google claims it is creating a better web that’s better for the environment. Google states, “We’re greening our company by using resources efficiently and supporting renewable power. That means when you use Google products, you’re being better to the environment…At Google, we’ve worked hard to minimize the environmental impact of our services. In fact, to provide you with Google products for a month, our servers use less energy per user than leaving a light on for 3 hours. If you add in our renewable energy and offsets, our footprint is zero. And we continue to find new ways to reduce our impact even further.”

Learn more about about Google Green here.

Educational Connections

Science – environment, sustainable energy, renewable energy, green

Geography – locate the nearest Google data center using Google Maps

Math – calculations regarding distance, time, rate

Language arts – write a sample email, follow the writing process to edit and re-write your email

 

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