May 2018

May 2nd- To Print or Not to Print...That is the Question...

Printing is a great way to ensure student work gets turned in, graded and sent home or displayed. However, now with our resources of Google Classroom and/ or Seesaw For Schools very little needs to be printed to accomplish those things. Below are some resources for you to decide for yourself which direction you want to go.

When the goal is still to print or when you have only one or two things to print, the best option would be to have students share the document with you via email or shared folder (see directions here) and then print it.

As always, please let me know how I can help.

May 9th- Hangout Options

The end of the year is always a bit hectic with testing and end of year wrap up. If you are looking for a quick and easy way to infuse tech and spice up learning, I have some easy tools for you.

1. Want to try Mystery Hangouts but don't know where to start? Try Where In the World Breakout Game. This site pairs you up with another school and you figure out their location with clues and answers online instead of a Face to Face Hangout. This eliminates the scheduling factor, yet still gives your kids practice with key geography skills!

2. If you would like to schedule your own Mystery Hangout between now and the end of the year, check out the Mystery Hangout Google+ or the Connected Classrooms Group+. There you will be able to post and request a Hangout or respond to someone else's request.

3. Another form of Hangout you might try is the Hangout With an Expert site. This site is a compilation of professors and experts in the natural sciences (all local people) that would love to Hangout, email your class or record and send you a Mystery Doug style video to talk to your class about a specific science topic. Under the teacher tab, search the directory for keywords to locate the perfect expert for your needs! There are also resources on here on how to set up and do a Hangout.

May 17th- Too Many Tips, Too Little Time

When you feel overwhelmed and remember reading a tech tip about a specific topic, you don't have the dig through the Fast Friday Focus past issues, you can come to the Weekly Tech Tip site (which you can bookmark to remember, or find it anytime in my email signature) and do a search for the tip with a keyword. Google sites have a keyword search in the top, right hand corner. Simple!

Want to share Google Docs, Sheets, Slides with students and not have them tweak your master file? You have a few options, but my favorite is to change the link that you share with students. For example:

My Pirate Breakout link is: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1n1cLJMPYGSjOugmAguewrTlzwqVQ6xfVqxOZkBuuITc/edit?usp=sharing
If I want to share it and force users to make a copy, I change the last part of the shared link to copy instead of edit https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1n1cLJMPYGSjOugmAguewrTlzwqVQ6xfVqxOZkBuuITc/copy

May 23rd- Help! What do I do with my Google Classroom and/or Seesaw classes to keep them for next year?

1. Seesaw Rollover- With Seesaw For Schools, your class will be archived and you will get a fresh class next year. However, with the Activity Library, you will be able to still access activities that you have used and loved this year. Click on the Seesaw link to see a presentation about dos and don'ts of Seesaw rollover.

2. Google Classroom Rollover- You easily archive classes that you know you would like to utilize content from or you could delete your class list and use the same class shell. Click on the Google Classroom link to see a video on how to do that. It is also possible to start from scratch and just reuse posts from an archived class.

Thank you for taking the time to read this. I know that the end of the year is a chaotic whirlwind.

As an added bonus, here is a video to make you smile and laugh. This principal in Kentucky shares his idea for an app you could use to help formulate end-of-the-year report card comments. Enjoy!

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