PDF Annotation

You can use any PDF file as an opportunity to engage a class in discussion around the content of that document, and it's as easy as sharing a link to any PDF in your Google Drive with your class. Just make sure the link is set to allow commenting. That's it.

When turning a web page into a PDF, it's a good idea to use the reader view in Safari to get rid of all the clutter. Or the Mercury Reader extension in Chrome.

Note: When you create the post in Teamie you can change the view settings by clicking on the eye icon.

If you missed that step you will need to go back in and change the share settings in your Google Drive, as Teamie 'helpfully' override your initial share settings so students can only view, not comment...

This technique works with video as well!

Teamie also has some very powerful tools for annotating PDFs built right in, all you have to do is open any PDF posted in Teamie, whether it's in a post or in an Assignment.

So all you need to do is post any PDF file on Teamie, whoever can see it, can open it up and annotate it; whether that's a class of students (such as a PDF attached to a class post), or just you and one student (a PDF submitted as an assignment).

Note! This only works if you add the file, not if you choose it from Google Drive

In Teamie, this makes any PDF into a social space, not just one, but several students (even an entire class) can work on the PDF at the same time, sharing their annotations, and even replying to one another.

It helps if the PDF has selectable text, ie not just a scanned document.*

Also, this technique works with video as well!

Teamie also has some very powerful tools for annotating PDFs built right in, all you have to do is open any PDF posted in Teamie, whether it's in a post or in an Assignment.

So all you need to do is post any PDF file on Teamie, whoever can see it, can open it up and annotate it; whether that's a class of students (such as a PDF attached to a class post), or just you and one student (a PDF submitted as an assignment).

Note! This only works if you add the file, not if you choose it from Google Drive

In Teamie, this makes any PDF into a social space, not just one, but several students (even an entire class) can work on the PDF at the same time, sharing their annotations, and even replying to one another.

It helps if the PDF has selectable text, ie not just a scanned document.*

The application in English for text analysis is obvious, but this technique can be useful across the curriculum, eg:

A shared text for comment/analysis/critique
An image for labelling
An exemplar exam question response (awful or outstanding) for group evaluation
Peer to peer assessment, any PDF a student adds to the class stream can be annotated by anyone else in that class
Easy pre-assessment/post assessment—the same PDF can be used for group annotation, or/and used to download (with or without annotation) for individual submission and annotation
Minimax: All you need is a good PDF file, the rest is teaching, learning and formative assessment.

All of this is powered by a powerful third party tool called 'Crocodoc' you can even have a go, right here, right now, just click this.

Virtual BookClubs

You can share several PDFs with a class, and ask the students to self select, and work as a group within that PDF, straight from a post, here's an example:

Annotation Assignments

If you would rather see a student's work privately, then set it as an Assignment; the student downloads the PDF you have shared with the class (either as a post, or as an attachment to the Assignment itself) and immediately submits it. Once submitted, the student clicks 'view submission' and mark up the PDF, only you and they can see their annotations. (To view the assignment instructions while annotating the PDF they can click the 'i' in the side panel.

*You can convert PDFs with scanned texts to make the text selectable using OCR (Optical Character Recognition) using software like Adobe Acrobat Pro (not the free Reader) just choose the option to edit the PDF, and it will convert it to text for you. Alternatively you can use Google Drive, in Drive open the PDF with Google Docs, and the text will be converted for you, although the original formatting will be lost.