The term ‘Quiet’ in our traditional school classrooms, often equates to ‘compliance’. This was very important when our traditional school system was built over 100 years ago. It was essential that we had compliance from our students to adequately train them for the industrial era. When I think of quiet classrooms, I think about the […]

Google Groups as the backbone for your organization's sharingIn the world of Education, sharing a digital copy of a document, survey, presentation, video, calendar or site, can be exhaustingly frustrating when you need to add or remove an individual's permissions. Having to go through and touch every single resource you have shared with a class, just to include or remove an individual makes it even more frustrating. Plus, if you have more than one class or prep the issue is multiplied exponentially.With Google Groups, that heavy lift is lightened and it is a snap to add or remove permissions quickly and accurately. The reason why this automagic-ness happens is because Google groups have a public email address attached to them. So, when you create a document, file or a folder with that email address ALL group members immediately gain access. This means that when you add an individual to a group, they automagically gain access to ALL the documents, surveys, presentations, videos, calendars and sites without you having to do a thing. Removing these permission is as simple as removing an individual from a group.To learn more about Google Groups and all the Google Apps for Education, join us at a Google Apps for Education Summit!Register now for the CA Google Apps for Education Summit July 12-13th in Santa Clara CA and the Rocky Mountain Google Apps for Education Summit August 2-3 in Boulder CO.Rocky Mountain Google Apps for Education Summit August 2-3 in Boulder CO.

Google Drive was a long time coming, but I really think it was worth the wait. Today I’d like to share some of the top features beyond the Docs suite that make me happy and have me looking forward to the future features of Google Drive.Offline accessWhen Gears went by the wayside, I really missed offline access to Google Docs on my Macbook-especially since I use Docs for nearly everything. The Chrome web app arrived and it solved some of those problems, but I could only read my documents and spreadsheets when I was without Internet access. Enter Google Drive’s offline access capabilities. I am now able to sync all of my docs, all of the docs SHARED with me, and even can sync my hard drive to the cloud. I can now access videos stored in Drive, pictures, PDF files, presentations, and anything else I have chosen to sync and/or store in Drive even if I don’t have an Internet connection. Everything in one place? That certainly makes me happy :)Drive AppsGoogle has gone all in and has made a Drive API available to developers of web apps that allow users to create, open, save, and share files using the application directly in Google Drive. Any type of file can be stored in Drive up to a maximum size of 10GB per file. As of now, there are a limited number of applications available including a graphing calculator by Desmos (math anyone?), Lulu One-Click Publishing which allows you to publish a Google Document directly to Lulu, SlideRocket for presentations, WeVideo for collaborative video editing, and more. I think we’re just at the tip of the iceberg with this.Create a new file with a Drive AppVideo PlaybackWith Drive, viewers can playback stored video files even without having the correct codec or application installed on their computer. Supported file formats include:WebM files (Vp8 video codec; Vorbis Audio codec).MPEG4, 3GPP and MOV files - (h264 and mpeg4 video codecs; AAC audio codec).AVI (MJPEG video codec; PCM audio).MPEGPS (MPEG2 video codec; MP2 audio).WMV.FLV (Adobe - FLV1 video codec, MP3 audio)You can even add caption tracks to your video files and make it accessible to your viewers. This is very important and useful for developing online content that Section 508 compliant. Awesome!Photo Sharing with Google+ I’m all for integrated solutions which is why I’m pleased as punch that I can now share a photo stored in Drive directly to my Google+ circles. My only question is what will this ultimately mean for Picasa? I’m seeing Drive as my centralized repository for everything so maybe, just maybe, that means I should move all of my photos into one location. Just a thought...To learn more about Google Drive, start here or join us for a Google Apps in Education Summit in your region. I'll be leading a Google Drive workshop at each event.

Here is a Storify of what Curriculum Is to many outstanding educators in the Twitterverse. I hope that the conversations will continue:) //storify.com/ForestofReading/curriculum-is/embed[View the story "What does Curriculum mean to you? " on Storify]  

Math Communication.   Podcast describing key differences between 3 amazing communication strategies for math: BANSHO, Gallery Walk & Math Congress.

by Jim SillI remember writing a letter to the editor of our local paper back in 8th grade.  It was part of a class project about trying to change our neighborhood.   Every morning, I searched frantically through world news, local arrests from the night before, & page after page of advertising  just to find my letter IN PRINT!  I recall running around the house showing my entire family my 2 paragraphs.  I eventually cut it out for the world to see anytime they visited our refrigerator.  I was published.Times have certainly changed when it comes to publishing, hasn't it?  With dwindling newspaper subscriptions and more tech savvy class projects, teachers are looking for today's equivalent of publishing student work.  Enter Youtube.  Sure there are plenty of other video hosting sites, but ask any kid to rank their coolness factor and YouTube will rate the highest.  Youtube receives 48 hours of video every minute.  From all over the world, videos pour into what seems like a bottomless abyss of storage.  Students, especially my own, love seeing their work on YouTube.  I even find them often rethinking their work because they know it will be shown on the site.   For many teachers, uploading videos there comes with some trepidation.  Part of worry among educators comes from lack of knowledge on how to manage the files we upload.  YouTube allows you the ability to control how people see your work.  Once you sign in to Youtube, you will be able to drag and drop videos right into the upload screen. There you can choose how people will be able to see your video.  This comes in three flavors: Public, Unlisted or Private.  PublicThis adds it to the zillions of other videos on the site.  Using keywords, tags, user names and more, anyone can search for and view your video.  This is wide open and a great way to get everyone to see your video.  This means EVERYONE.UnlistedAnyone with the link can view your video.  Choose this option and you will be given a private link to your video.  This means that only people who know the link can view it (such as friends or family to whom you send the link). An unlisted video will not appear in any of YouTube's public spaces (such as search results, your channel, or the Browse page).  This is a great way to share videos with relatives that don't have a Google account.  Be careful of posting this link on social networks.  Once the link is out there, anyone can use it.PrivateIf your video is set to Private, only you and up to 50 other users (that you choose to invite) will be able to see it your video.  The video will not appear on your channel, in search results, or in playlists.  You are essentially using YouTube to store your video, but not make it available for the general public to see.  The catch with this one is that anyone that you choose to invite must have a YouTube/Google account.  This might rule out poor Aunt Marilyn in Rosendale.By just taking the time to understand these three options,  you can start to take advantage of this amazing resource for publishing student work for everyone or just a couple people to see.  Kids will frantically skip world news videos, FAIL videos, and countless advertisements, just to find their video from your class.  Once they show their family, they will copy the embed code and paste it on their Facebook wall for all the world to see.  Ahh…to be young again. In the workshops that I will be doing at some of the Google Apps EDU Summits, we will explore many other ways to use YouTube to intelligently start showing the world all the awesome things you are doing in your classroom.  Hope to see you there.If you are wondering about how to introduce the topic of staying safe on Youtube, visit the Teen Safety page to get started.To learn more about YouTube in Education, don't miss the Google Apps for Education Summit produced by EdTechTeam in partnership with Google, coming to a region near you in 2012-2013: http://www.gafesummit.com

This a curated Flipboard of resources supporting Technology and Media for Learning. It represents a board range of topics and areas for further study and reflection, to improve student learning.  http://flip.it/Kwg2v http://flip.it/Kwg2v  http://flip.it/Kwg2v http://flip.it/Kwg2v

Google Docs: More than Plain TextIf you've dabbled just a bit or maybe even dove deep into Google docs the past five years you've been through quite a few iterations of the text based version of this wunderkind tool. From basic clunky collaboration (remember writely), to the insanity of document free for alls; folks writing on top of each other, and wonky workarounds like horizontal lines and tables. It is safe to say that Google Docs has changed quite a bit the past five years.One thing that has not received much love or attention is the formatting bar. Formatting features are no longer in the conversation when it comes to choosing your collaborative classroom document creation tool.  Looking back at the dull and drab out of the box features like fonts, colors, commenting, bullets, alignment, and tables; it really goes to show just how badly we needed a tool like this available to all of our teachers and students. Questions like, "Why would I need a wiki if my document creator can do all of this," were running through folks heads as the next iteration of the tool(s) came and took our use to the next level of text document design. Functional design and organizational features like headings, headers, footers, footnotes, bookmarks and the underused Paint Brush formatting, which makes big changes in a snap, made it an easy sell in the classroom.What flipped the script and changed things during the 10’-11’ school year was some of the advanced-ness that came into our collaborative document tool. The Ability to quickly insert nuggets of awesome like math equations, collaborative mind maps, drawings, and advanced use of hyperlinks (linking to emails, bookmarks, TOC) makes collaboration and co-creating handy, convenient, and über easy. But, those really great features are nothing compared to what we have at our disposal today and how easily we can leverage the single space document creation tool with our learners.The latest Image insertion is tremendous. Quick access from different sources, it is amazingly simple, easy to use, and makes sense to users. UploadTake a snapshotBy urlYour Albums,Integration with DriveSearch.The New Research toolbar (left) provides the power of Google Search and reference into the document itself. Quick access to Google web search with relevant and useful vetting of sources. Quick checks for quotes, images, and the web, make it a decent research tool for students to use. Pagination view is great for page counters or printers as well.#GdocsTo learn, practice, play with these and even more Google Docs features, tools, and latest nuances; join us at a Google Apps for Education Summit!Register now for the CA Google Apps for Education Summit July 12-13th in Santa Clara CA and the Rocky Mountain Google Apps for Education Summit August 2-3 in Boulder CO.Rocky Mountain Google Apps for Education Summit August 2-3 in Boulder CO.

Thanks to @DougPete for tagging me in the ongoing meme #makeschooldifferent : Here are some of the things that I think we need to stop ‘pretending’ in our schools:  We have to stop pretending that: 1. Content matters more than the skills. Content can be Googled.  Further, writing a test will only work well for those […]

Google sites is a great way to publish content to the web for a wide audience. Teachers and students are using Google Sites in a variety of ways in education.  As a classroom web pageFor Student ePortfoliosFor a unit or projectAs a digital resource for teachers, parents, board members, community members or clubsSee examples hereTo take Google Sites to the next level, I like to start with the simple theme in Google Sites and then begin playing with the colors, fonts and design of the Google Site.  OrganizationIn order to get more real estate on your Google Site (more links visible on the front page) in an organized manner, I like to use Horizontal Navigation.  With a few simple organizational clicks you can change the navigation from the side bar to horizontal navigation with drop down menus.You can learn how to use Horizontal Navigation here.DesignIn order to help you with creating a new header for your Google Site I like to use ColourLovers and PicMonkey (a replacement for Picnik).   Using ColourLovers you can find colors that look good together and create a pattern based on the colors you like.  Then, you can import the colored pattern into PicMonkey and add some text, boarders and images if you would like.  Then, I add this new header for my Google Site.You can watch my screencasts on how to use ColourLovers and PicMonkey here. How to use ColourLovers and Picnik (now use PicMonkey) to replace your Site LogoHow to use ColourLovers and Picnik (now use PicMonkey) to create an image for your Site*Note...the screencasts are examples of me using Picnik (no longer active) and not PicMonkey.  I think you'll find that both of these sites use the same type of editing and you will be able to create and edit in PicMonkey just as easily as Picnik. To learn more about Google Sites and see examples in education click here-MollyWant to learn more?Join us at one of the Google Apps for Education Summits this year!CA Google Apps Summit- Santa Clara, CA July 12-13CO Google Apps Summit- Boulder, CO August 2-3Maine Google Apps Summit- Yarmouth, ME August 16-17Latin America Google Apps Summit- Mexico City August 31-September 1New Zealand Google Apps Summit- Auckland, NZ October 9Midwest Google Apps Summit- Wisconsin Dells, WI November 12-13