Create custom backgrounds for Google Slides

Each content slide in the example below (from a classroom project) demonstrates a different background, a Wordart Title, the name of the program used to create it, a link to the program used to create it and a YouTube demo clip of how it was created.

Motivate students through Blog Stats

If you use a Blog, chances are there are some stats available which you might find surprising (and which you can use to motivate your students and to encourage them to consider the quality of their work). For example, here's how Blogger displays them, and I can tell my students that their example works posted on our classroom Blog are visible by a shocking number (to me anyway!) of guests from other countries (top image month view, bottom image all-time). 

Previous month:

All-time:

Add a map link to your Calendar Event

If you enter the coordinates of an event on your calendar in the ‘Where’ window, Google will automatically generate a map link for viewers to click on to get directions to the event

Use ColorZilla for custom color projects

 

• Link to ColorZilla extension: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/colorzilla/bhlhnicpbhignbdhedgjhgdocnmhomnp?hl=en-US
  
• Colorschemedesigner: http://colorschemedesigner.com/
  
• Watch the following video demo used in a recent classroom assignment: How2 select custom colors for any project (no audio) - YouTube

Expand short URLs before you click

Here’s the explanation from the extension install page:

LongURL replace shortened links using LongURL API.
LongURL improves speed, usability and security!
340 services supported (goo.gl, bit.ly, tinyurl.com, ...)

Tired of shortened URL ? Want to see twitter with real hypertext links ? Serious about your online security ? This script is for you !


How to use it ?
Simply browse web pages. When you visit a new web page, this script contact the LongURL API servers for shortened URL found in the page, and modify the links so that shortened url disappear. There is several options you can play with, n'joy.
Please notice the URL that appears in the task bar when you move your mouse over the link, or in the tooltip that appears.
This way you know where you'll get if you click the link ;)

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/longurl/oldnehmjgfcannmkgkojafngdkhfkdpd

Demo Open House Presentation and Video

Here's an example of how you might create a course overview presentation and then use screencasting software to record and post the presentation with a voiceover to YouTube. If you link your teacher site or blog to these products, your parents/guardians who cannot attend or who miss part of your presentation for any reason will be able to review what they've missed. These techniques have many additional useful applications, and if you're interested in how to use the tools or implement the results, please let me know (or for BMS Staff, stop by Friday for some training!)

Here's a link to the Prezi with active links to additional resources: http://prezi.com/bdrivanqwakk/open-house-2013/

…and to the YouTube recording: http://youtu.be/xPuwQ6AcjTU

Create custom ‘how-to’ videos

Camtasia Studio has some nice effects like blur, fade-in, fade-out, etc., which you can see in the embedded demo below, but even with the 40% teacher discount, it’s pricey, but definitely worth it if you want to make a lot of these! You can can create very effective free clips using other tools like screencast-o-matic, which is the web-based screen recording tool which I teach my students to use. In this demo, you can see how to setup a custom Google Sheet for a project like the Den rotations which our campus is currently using.

Help parents stay informed!

…with this ‘all hands’ effort! We’ve recently instituted campus-wide edited weekly parent newsletters and added links to our site.  It’s easy to update, highly informative, collaborative, and posts automatically :)

Here are the steps to do the same if you’re interested:

1. Create GDoc templates for each grade level, dept., etc.
2. Share them with a wide circle of editors (or your entire staff, as we have done)
3. Post links for quick access for editors (we use a links map)
4. Add links in an embedded GDoc on your campus site

Here’s what this might look like (using our example): http://youtu.be/n3bx7yeG3sQ

Qvilt Chrome Extension

If you monitor lots of Google Docs, this extension is an extremely useful way to receive notifications and keep tabs on recent edits on any of them… it shows what’s been edited, who has done the edits and highlights the most recent changes for all documents and it sends you a daily email digest of those changes automatically. Here’s a link: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/qvilt/lbmmkncdkfmlbalgpcjjjffihmfephlb

Revision history in Google Docs

Twice this week and countless times in the past, I’ve relied on one of the most powerful features of Google Docs… file revision history.  This feature lets you:

1. view every edit that has occurred in all Google Documents, Spreadsheets and Presentations, including the date/time of every edit in every file and the editors’ names,
2. highlights those edits and deletions for easy identification, and
3. enables you to restore any document to an earlier state at any point in the process.

This week I helped someone who had overwritten a document with new info go back into the file history to find the original data and then copy that data into a new file without affecting the current version, and I was able to restore a document to an earlier state before a block of important data had been accidentally deleted. Revision history is built-in to Google Docs and requires no additional actions on the part of the users… all edits are automatically saved and accessible. Here’s a tutorial which I found this morning on the web which will help explain how to use this critical feature: http://goo.gl/wOS7Un

Customize your campus (or teacher) Twitter Page

In an earlier post, I listed some links and information to help you setup auto-posting from your campus or teacher public calendar to a twitter account. Twitter provides a host of customization options which can help personalize your page, as in the example below with our campus colors, background image and custom links formatting.  Here’s a link to the Twitter help page with instructions on how to customize your own page :)

Click the image or here to visit the page!

Google’s online help guide for G+

Now that the district has rolled out G+ for required professional development, you might have questions or need refreshers on some of the features of this powerful and vast platform. The online help guide has lots of information and tutorial videos to help you… here’s a link (or click on the image): https://support.google.com/plus/?hl=en#topic=3049661

Setup multiple profiles in Chrome

Chrome allows you to setup and synchronize a variety of profiles according to your needs, and to access them through icons in the top left corner of the Chrome browser. My setup looks like this (the Green checkmark shows the current profile):

This is useful because each profile (blue and red icons and arrows below) has its own set of bookmarks (blue and red rectangles below) and extensions associated with it which synchronize across all of the computers you use. My wife’s profiles are loaded too, so if she needs to access important bookmarks or extensions, she can load her profiles (work and home) from my browser whenever she needs to. The green arrows show you how to add profiles from the Chrome settings window:

Campus GAFE Resources Directory

The number of Google Apps For Education (GAFE) resources for your campuses is likely to explode very quickly, and organizing drive folders and documents for easy access will become very complex, especially since those folders and documents will most likely be created and shared by a wide variety of staff with no common organizational scheme. While this is liberating for the originators (since there’s no need to adapt to any organizational vision) it can be quite frustrating to those who are trying to make these new resources readily available… in fact, unless you’ve already created an organizational folder structure for your campus, even getting started will seem like a monumental task. One solution which I highly recommend is to create a directory of resource and links in a single Google Spreadsheet and then post a link to that directory to your staff and in your G+ communities links sections. This will allow you to create a structure through labels and links which can be sorted/filtered in a variety of ways and will function independently of the mindset of the originators. I’ve started working on one for BMS this morning, which you can view at the following link: Public View link of BMS GAFE Resources Directory

3 Great Resources

I’ve added these to the ‘More tips…’ section of the Tech Topics Blog (right-side panel). There are many useful tips and techniques located on these sites for all skill levels:

• 100+ Ways Google Can Save Teachers Time
• Digital Inspiration (Advanced Tips)
• Teacher Tech (Intermediate Tips)

Skyward Gradebook tip: Modify Gradesheet Sequence

If you keep a paper gradebook along with your Skyward electronic version and you get a new student in your class, most likely you will add that student to the bottom of your list (and they will, consequently, be out of sort order with the rest). Your electronic gradebook will add that student in whatever sort order you have selected (most likely alpha order by last name). The following screenshots will show you how to make your Skyward electronic gradebook match this ‘out-of-sorts’ custom order (i.e. match your paper copy):

How to recover a bookmarks folder in Chrome

This morning I accidentally deleted a large bookmarks folder while trying to copy it to another Chrome profile… there is no undo option for this :( I did, however, find the following instructions to be extremely useful in restoring a backup bookmarks file which might be useful to you at some point! http://www.howtogeek.com/111784/how-to-recover-accidentally-deleted-bookmarks-in-chrome-firefox/

How to embed a collaborative document on Google (or other) Sites

Here’s a link to the G+ post with instructions: https://plus.google.com/u/0/115174107767353780511/posts/3px2V6AdcjC

…or you can the following link to view them directly (once the image loads, click on it to zoom in and scroll around): https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/197021/Tech%20Posts/EmbedProcesScreenshot.png

Use an Incognito Window to Allow Students to Present from Your Computer

This is a great tip from Alice Keeler (posted here) which would also work well in other situations (like demonstrating something in your Chrome setup on someone else’s computer while they’re logged on)

How to Import Web Data into Google Docs

This is cool: http://www.labnol.org/internet/import-html-in-google-docs/28125/

More great ideas here: http://www.labnol.org/