40 Ways to Use Google Apps for Education

Here is an amazing resource for google apps for education.

40 Ways to Use Google Apps for Education

Check it out - try one thing new this week.

Google Apps for Education

So SMUSD has switched over to GMail and all things Google. I'm loving it. I just completed the Google Educator course and passed Yippee! For those just wanting the basics, there is a great intro course and you can pick and choose what parts you want to know more about.
Google for Ed Training

Over the summer I will be posting some tutorials on how GAfE will help teachers be more efficient and how it will help help us manage our paper load. One of the best things I started this past year was use Google Docs for student writing and use the Add-On Doctopus to copy, share, and organize the files. Here's a great explanation by Jay Atwood on how it works.
Doctopus

Google Drive - Sharing Files and Folders

One of the most amazing things about Google Drive is the ability to share files and folders. Not only can you share them, but if you are using Google file types (Document, Presentation, Spreadsheet, Drawing, etc) you and up to 50 others can work on the file simultaneously on separate computers no matter where each person is located.

When you are ready to share a file (or a folder, it works the same way), right click on the row of the file or folder, go down to share and choose share from the sharing options.

Check the permissions for sharing. For school files and folders I keep them as "Private - only the people listed below can access". 

At the bottom where it says "Add People" add the email addresses of people you want to have access. If they are district staff or students, once you begin typing their name, the email address will show up for you to choose.

There is a checkbox if you want to email the person/people that you are sharing with. I have students uncheck this box so I don't get 100's of emails. Then just click "Share & Save". 

The shared documents will show up in the other person's Shared Folder. You have the choice in how others interact with the file or folder. They can be set to View Only, Edit, or Comment Only. 

One note - when you share a folder, any document placed or created in that folder will also be shared the same way.

Check it out and try it. It's awesome!

Google Drive

One of the great things about Google Drive is the ability to automatically save everything you do. For students, this gives them the ability to save their work in progress wherever they are and continue later even if it's at a different computer or at home.

For teachers you can organize your files, access them wherever you are, share and collaborate with colleagues, and also share or assign files with students.

The first thing you do is log in to your Google Drive. For SEES teachers, you will go to the district cloud at https://cloud.smusd.org/, then type in your district log in. You'll find your Google Docs on the Desktop (if you don't see it, click desktop at the top of the page in the black bar.) If you are also signed into a personal Google account, you may need to click "sign in as another user" to get to your district account.

Within Google Drive (Docs) you can upload files from any device so you can access them anywhere.

You can also create Google files right within Drive. 

Below is a list of the various types of files you can create within Drive:
Document - similar to Word Documents
Presentation (also called Google Slides) - similar to PowerPoint
Spreadsheet - (similar to Excel but also does amazing things with Forms)
Form - I don't know what it's similar to, I just love it!
Drawing - a drawing app, of course

Next up - sharing Google files and folders.

Sharing Technology

Summers off! People think teachers have it made to have summers off. The reality is that we never really leave it. As I look over the plans for summer I'm excited to have some time to finish some projects at home, but one of the biggest projects is to set up some tips for others to add technology into their class activities.

I'll start with how to access Google Drive and try to share some tips for using and introducing the different parts of drive for the classroom.

To give you some background, we were able to access Google Apps for Education around February this year. Each of our students has access to a personal google account though a district site. This allows them to collaborate safely within the network of the district. They also can easily access their files at home or from whichever computer in school they are working on. I love the ability to add files to a class shared folder for us all to work on.