Tech Notes

Google Drive has a new section for Google Photos and the new feature is being gradually rolled out. (I got mine today) Here's how it looks in Google Drive for desktop. You should see a message which informs you that the new feature is enabled: "New! Access your Google Photos from Drive". There is a Google Photos section in the sidebar. Click the new menu items and Google suggests to add the folder to My Drive to make it easier to organize your photos. Click "Create folder" and Google Drive shows a strange message: "You have given Google Keep access to your files in Google Drive. Creating the Google Photos folder in My Drive will give the app access to your photos and videos from Google Photos, as well (including photos and videos from your mobile device if you've turned on AutoBackup)." Google adds a Google Photos folder to My Drive, which groups your photos by year and month. For some reason, Google Drive doesn't show your albums. You can p...

Google just announced a few new updates to Classroom allowing more convenience in keeping track of your classes no matter what device you are on. Now from the mobile app on your phone or tablet you have the ability to: Grade assignments and add private feedback to give students guidance, encouragement, constructive criticism or personalized feedback. You can create and edit assignments on the go, including the ability to make a copy for every student.  Just take a photo to create a post or assignment, so you can easily share those whiteboard notes with the class or assign the math problem that you jotted down on that napkin.

I found this great  Google spreadsheet template to create a digital notebook that includes a cover, an assignment page, a learning journal page, and a page for notes. Pages can easily be duplicated and modified. Student Class Notebook Template Log into your Google account. Click the link above and make a copy of the template. This will put the spreadsheet into your Google Drive. Once it’s there, you can use it over and over! Change the titles and labels as desired.

I have just discovered an awesome tool for those of us that are iphone/ipad users and had to share with you all. There is an app called Wifi Photo Transfer You install the app on your device. You must be connected to wifi. Open device and enter the web address that appears into your browser and instantly your entire photo stream/camera roll is now in your browser for you to download any pics you need. This is great for so many reasons, but it really simplifies getting pics off those ipads you are using in your classrooms without having to install drive and login to your accounts to upload. As always, please let me know if I can help:) Have a great Wednesday!!

NEWSELA is an awesome tool I shared with you last year. Remember, ​students can access news articles digitally and access them at individually appropriate reading levels. The articles are available with the same content on various lexile levels. There are questions associated with most articles or you can use them however you see fit in your classroom. So now for the new stuff.....NEWSELA has recently announced a new feature called "Write." Now, each article has a prompt associated with it that students can respond to. Check out the link below. This is a really awesome product. If you haven't spent at least 10 minutes investigating you should!!! http://support.newsela.com/hc/en-us/articles/203161979-Quick-Start-Guide-for-Write-Teacher-

This morning as I was creating a new Google Form, I noticed a few new options that I have never seen before. You now have the option to shuffle question order and collect only one response from each user as an overall option on the whole form rather than on individual questions in the past. This will help greatly for those who use forms for student assessment. Check out this update from Google:  https://support.google.com/docs/answer/160166?hl=en

Check out this awesome new game by Google, using Google Maps.   http://smartypins.withgoogle.com/ Players are presented with trivia questions that they have to answer by placing a pin on a map. Players earn and lose miles for correct and incorrect answers. Questions are from five different categories including: arts & culture, science & geography, sports & games, entertainment, and history & current events.  Beware this game is so much fun and very addictive. 

Do you ever have emails that you need to follow up on later? Would you like the ability to schedule emails to send at another time? Boomerang for Gmail is an add on service that operates seamlessly within your existing gmail and works like your personal assistant. Watch this quick video for an overview. If you need help getting set up let me know:) This link will take you directly to the Chrome Web Store where you can add Boomerang. http://goo.gl/UI8XW

I found an awesome resource that I want to share with each of you. I have heard about www.newsela.com in the past but never took the time to truly check it out until today. What is newsela.com? A FREE website that delivers daily news items for your students to study current events. It is an excellent tool for improving reading comprehension and practicing non fiction reading. All articles are available in five different lexile levels (3rd grade and up) to allow all of your students the opportunity to read the same content regardless of their reading ability. Most articles are also accompanied with a quiz to test the reader's understanding of the content. When you register with this site you can create classes so that you can "push" content to your students. If you don't want to (or don't have the means) to use this resource digitally you can also print the articles for your students. This is an awesome resource to develop critical thinking skills as well as ...

I had a teacher ask me about blocking the short ads that appear at the beginning of a youtube video. They are sometimes inappropriate or use some language that we don't want to hear our students repeating. Well, I found a chrome extension that will block the ads on youtube and other ads throughout the internet. I tried it and it seems to be working great. So I wanted to share with all of you. You will need to add the "Ad Block" extension to chrome. Here is how you do that. Go to the chrome webstore .  In the search box near the top, search for Ad Block. Your results will look like this. Make sure you select the Extension for Ad Block and click the add button  (it says +FREE) You will see a pop up window asking you to confirm adding the extension, click ad.  It will take a few seconds, then you will see confirmation that AdBlock has been added. Now in the top right hand side of your chrome browser you will see a small icon for Ad Block. This confir...

Era ISD has GONE GOOGLE!!

Using filters to automatically label emails will help tremendously in organizing your emails. Filters are applied automatically according to the settings you create. You can create numerous filters ahead of time to save time when cleaning up and organizing emails. Here is a video to show you how, as always just let me know if you have questions.

When checking email in gmail I really like the ease of being able to preview the message directly from my inbox. With the Lab Preview Pane you can do this easily. First, you will want to enable Preview Pane from the Labs tab in Gmail Settings.  After you enable Preview Pane from the Labs tab in Gmail Settings you’ll see a toggle button in the top right corner of your message list, which lets you switch between preview and list views. For those of you who have more vertical space you can also move the preview pane below your message list. You can enable this using the dropdown arrow next to the toggle button: If you’d like to remove the new layout, simply return to Gmail Settings and disable the lab. As always let me know if you need any help setting this up:) 

I wanted to make you all aware of the option to enable Keyboard Shortcuts in Gmail. Go to the gear in the top right corner and select Settings. In settings under the General Tab you can turn Keyboard Shortcuts on or off. With keyboard shortcuts you can navigate through your email quickly and easily. Additionally, there is a lab which can allow for custom keyboard shortcuts which you can define yourself. Here is a link to a helpful document about keyboard shortcuts. If you need any help setting this up just let me know. https://support.google.com/mail/answer/6594?hl=en

I have had a few questions about opening a word document in google docs. Here is a quick video to show you how you can make a word document into a google doc so that you can edit and store it as a google doc.

I wanted to let you all know that the black google bar, normally seen in any google app is no longer there. Here is a really short video to help you out with this:)

Bump is an awesome app that allows you to contact info or transfer photos from your phone wirelessly. You can transfer to another phone or even your computer.  I must give credit to Mrs. Lisa Jones for introducing me to the bump app and I wanted to share this awesome trick with you. This will save tremendous time and effort.  1. First, you will need to download the Bump App 2. Go to Bump’s website:  https://bu.mp/ 3. Open the Bump App on your iPhone (or Android phone) 4.  Select the photos you want to share. 5. Tap the spacebar with your iPhone or Android phone. ( You kind of have to shake your phone when you hit the spacebar, it took me a few tries)  6.  Bump will automatically import your photos. 7.  The pictures will show up on the bu.mp website. You can download and save the photos then. Thats it....See I  told you it was easy:) 

Many of you have asked about how to delete your messages in gmail. Here is a quick explanation. 

Open  Add your gmail account to ipad or iphone