Thursday, May 21, 2015

Updates

Two things: 

  1. I am in the process of switching this blog over to my personal email address, all posts before this will stay preserved on this blog but all new posts will begin to be posted from that Google Account. I will keep you up to date on here of when it has been fully switched & give you the new URL address!
  2. I have started uploading my instructional screencasts to my Youtube channel, please check it out for instructional tutorials on how to do different things relating to using Technology in the educational setting! youtube.com/user/wabacon There are just two currently uploaded but there are many more to come! (Remember, it's a busy time in the school year, 6 days left of students!)


Any questions, as usual, please email me & follow, +1, and share!

Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Flippity Tools

Flippity is a website that has customizable templates that can be downloaded into Google Sheets to make your instruction a little more interesting. You can take these templates, download a copy into your Google Drive & start entering your own content in these templates! Once you finish filling out the template, there are very simple directions on the Flippity website on how to finalize your template & use it in the classroom!

Flippity currently only has three different templates available but they are all pretty useful! What's really nice about all three is that you can embed pictures, videos, etc. in them! (This is a wee-bit tricky, so comment on this post or email me if you want to learn how to do this!)

Quiz Show - Jeopardy - this template allows you to make a jeopardy style game w/ your class content. Makes for an exciting review day!
Flash Cards - this template lets you enter in concept words & their definition right into a Google Sheet & send this off to your students! The cool thing about this is you can update the Sheet at any time & your flashcards will update! Another cool thing is that you can print the flashcards into a short little quiz/worksheet!
Certificate of Completion - this template lets you make a multiple choice quiz, allows students to take the quiz & continue to retake it until they ace it, receiving a certificate of completion! The certificate is customizeable too if you wanted



Friday, May 1, 2015

Tools you Didn't Know about in the Google Suite

There are a lot of gizmos in the various Google Apps' toolbelt that a lot of people are unaware of! Here are some of my all time favorites!

Research 

If there is one tool that is the most overlooked in Google Docs & Slides, it is the research tool! This allows you to do Google searches without leaving your Google Doc/Slide. You can pan between Google Web, Images, Scholar, etc.; as well as insert links directly to the doc, preview, and/or cite the website. One thing I love about this is that I can highlight something I have already typed out, activate the Research Tool, & it immediately starts the search based on the highlighted words! Check it out, you will love it! Here is a video tutorial my favorite Google blogger did on the tool, The Gooru, check out his original post here.

CTRL+F

(Command+F on Mac)

This is the one shortcut that if you are not using already, you are making your life harder than it needs to be! Okay, a little melodramatic, but come on! Pressing the CTRL+F keys (Command+F keys on Mac), will pull up a search box in Google Apps, which then allows you to type in a word that you want to find on the doc! This shortcut will take you to each time the word(s) appear. This tip is NOT confined to Google Apps, it works on any website that has text available. I cannot even begin to imagine the amount of times I use this shortcut daily. Just think of the amount of times you scan a page attempting to find something, DON'T DO IT ANYMORE! USE CTRL+F!


Linking & Bookmarking

Linking and Bookmarking can be a very powerful tool in Google Apps. Bookmarks allow you to link to various parts in your doc/slides to save you time & efficiency. This can be helpful for long documents, such as meeting agendas, lesson plans, student projects, etc.  This can also be helpful in long presentations when you want to be able to jump to different slides out of order. See my previous blog post on Using Bookmarks in Google Docs for a more in-depth look at this. 



Another cool thing about embedding links? You do not need to go out of your Google Doc or Slides to find the links, relevant links to highlighted text will pop up when you click the "insert link" option.

Using Google's suggested links!

Smaller things that are kinda cool: 

  • using Tables to make your docs more interesting. 
  • Preferences (using symbols such as © or ✓ )
  • Sharing Options (edit, comment, view)
    • If you are sending your Google Files to anyone, you should probably know these options! -Sometimes you don't want others to change your info on the doc, sheet, etc. 
  • Publishing to the web (for a more professional sharing)
  • AddOns (AutoCrat, EasyBibgMath)
  • Commenting vs. Suggesting -sometimes it helps to offer suggestions instead of typing right in the document. The owner of the document will receive notification of either comments or suggestions & can choose to accept or remove.

I hope some of these tools were new to you & let me know if I missed anything. Email me your comments & suggestions!