Yesterday, we announced full Google Apps for Education Integration with Wikispaces Private Label. Today we’re showing you some great ways you can use this integration in your classroom. Classroom Websites Say you’ve "flipped" your classroom and want to easily post your lectures and slides as Google Presentations for students to access. No problem — hop onto your Wikispaces classroom website and you can add a Google Presentation as a page within the wiki. Any changes you make within Google Docs are reflected immediately within your wiki. Post your daily homework online or update vocabulary lists weekly in a Google Doc. Do them all, and manage them in your wiki. ePortfolios If you create wikis for each student as an ePortfolio and showcase of their work, your students can now include and share all of their Google Docs work. They can easily create new Google Documents from within Wikispaces or move existing Google Documents into and out of their wiki. It’s so easy for students to organize and present their artifacts, add reflections, and put context around their work in your class for parent conferences. Administrative Fun If you’re using Wikispaces as a home base for your administrative needs, such as holding meeting notes, agendas, and important handbooks and procedures, you can now easily use pages, files, or Google Docs within Wikispaces as needed. Get started today If you are a Wikispaces Private Label and Google Apps for Education customer, then you’re ready to get going! Have a look at our integration documentation for your simple setup instructions. To learn more, sign up to get more information. Or start your free 30 day Wikispaces Private Label trial today.

We are happy to announce that we will be at the Google Apps for Education Summits starting this Thursday in Santa Clara and continuing at locations around the world through 2012 and 2013. Let us know if you’ll be attending. The summits are being run by our good friends at the EdTechTeam. We’ve worked closely with Mark and the team over the last few years and are always hugely impressed by their commitment and execution. We know these events are going to be outstanding. The summits are "high intensity two day events focusing on deploying, integrating and using Google Apps for Education to promote student learning in K-12 and higher education." We’ll be presenting "Wikispaces and Google Apps. Easy, powerful classroom collaboration" this Friday at 11.30am and then again at each of the events. The Santa Clara event is already sold out but make sure you sign up for an event in your area or organize one. We’re really looking forward to meeting up with everyone and showing off our amazing Google Apps Integration. Let us know if you’ll be attending or sign up for more information about our Google Apps integration.

We are happy to announce that we will be at the Google Apps for Education Summits starting this Thursday in Santa Clara and continuing at locations around the world through 2012 and 2013. Let us know if you’ll be attending. The summits are being run by our good friends at the EdTechTeam. We’ve worked closely with Mark and the team over the last few years and are always hugely impressed by their commitment and execution. We know these events are going to be outstanding. The summits are "high intensity two day events focusing on deploying, integrating and using Google Apps for Education to promote student learning in K-12 and higher education." We’ll be presenting "Wikispaces and Google Apps. Easy, powerful classroom collaboration" this Friday at 11.30am and then again at each of the events. The Santa Clara event is already sold out but make sure you sign up for an event in your area or organize one. We’re really looking forward to meeting up with everyone and showing off our amazing Google Apps Integration. Let us know if you’ll be attending or sign up for more information about our Google Apps integration.

We know you spend a lot of time creating and editing your wikis, which is why we’ve worked hard to make your experience even better in our upcoming release. Check out a few of our new changes below. Comments We found that while many users loved our comment feature, they sometimes missed when new comments were added to a page. In an effort to make them easier to use, we will be showing comments more prominently on the right side of all pages. Also, since it has become obvious to us that commenting is more about editing pages than discussing them, we are changing the way we manage commenting permissions. Comments will always appear so you don’t miss them. Commenting permissions will follow the page edit permissions — if a user has permission to edit, they will be able to comment. If they don’t have permission to edit, they will not. This also applies to custom page permissions and locking pages. Please note that this means that if you have a page set to allow discussions but not edits, users will lose the permission to add comments when we make this change. And if you have a page set to allow edits but not discussions, users will gain the permission to comment on that page. We do not recommend making any changes ahead of time but you may need to answer user questions as they arise after this change. Manage Wiki The Manage Wiki area is getting a visual overhaul. It will be called Settings, and we will no longer show the link to non-organizers, making your site cleaner for your users. A new "Settings" will replace "Manage Wiki." Discussions We are changing the way discussions look at the thread level. The new look is more modern and cool and part of some new stuff we’re developing. Discussions are easier to reply to, lock, and monitor. Navigation Bar We are changing the way the navigation bar works on the side of your wikis. In the past you could edit the custom navigation bar inline. Now, you’ll need to click "edit navigation" to add new navigation sections, reorder links, or delete sections. Only organizers can edit the custom navigation now, along with all other "Content Manager" pages. We found people making a lot of accidental navigation bar edits so hopefully this will clear that up. These changes will be going live within the next two weeks. We’d love to hear what you think of the new changes. Share with us below or on Twitter.

We know you spend a lot of time creating and editing your wikis, which is why we’ve worked hard to make your experience even better in our upcoming release. Check out a few of our new changes below. Comments We found that while many users loved our comment feature, they sometimes missed when new comments were added to a page. In an effort to make them easier to use, we will be showing comments more prominently on the right side of all pages. Also, since it has become obvious to us that commenting is more about editing pages than discussing them, we are changing the way we manage commenting permissions. Comments will always appear so you don’t miss them. Commenting permissions will follow the page edit permissions — if a user has permission to edit, they will be able to comment. If they don’t have permission to edit, they will not. This also applies to custom page permissions and locking pages. Please note that this means that if you have a page set to allow discussions but not edits, users will lose the permission to add comments when we make this change. And if you have a page set to allow edits but not discussions, users will gain the permission to comment on that page. We do not recommend making any changes ahead of time but you may need to answer user questions as they arise after this change. Manage Wiki The Manage Wiki area is getting a visual overhaul. It will be called Settings, and we will no longer show the link to non-organizers, making your site cleaner for your users. A new "Settings" will replace "Manage Wiki." Discussions We are changing the way discussions look at the thread level. The new look is more modern and cool and part of some new stuff we’re developing. Discussions are easier to reply to, lock, and monitor. Navigation Bar We are changing the way the navigation bar works on the side of your wikis. In the past you could edit the custom navigation bar inline. Now, you’ll need to click "edit navigation" to add new navigation sections, reorder links, or delete sections. Only organizers can edit the custom navigation now, along with all other "Content Manager" pages. We found people making a lot of accidental navigation bar edits so hopefully this will clear that up. These changes will be going live within the next two weeks. We’d love to hear what you think of the new changes. Share with us below or on Twitter.

A few minutes ago we launched a substantial update to Wikispaces Classroom, the just-for-education product we debuted back in the spring. The update is live now for everyone who has a Classroom wiki on Wikispaces.com as well as our customers in schools, school districts, and universities who use Wikispaces Campus. If you’re a teacher or student who’s not yet using Classroom, try it out! It’s free forever on Wikispaces.com just like always, and we’ve removed many of the obstacles that made it difficult to transition. Go to Settings > General and change your wiki type. It’ll take just a second and you can always change back. We currently only support one theme for Classroom, but we encourage you to give it a day or two — we think you’ll like it. Like everything we do, the new features you’ll find today in Wikispaces Classroom were a direct result of the feedback we heard from you here on our blog, on Twitter, by email, by phone, and talking to you in person. We think you’ll like what you see, and if you don’t, now you know five different ways to send us your thoughts! Here’s what’s new: 1. Content Creation Comes First You’ll notice a new area on both your home page and at the top of the navigation bar on all pages. It contains quick links for starting new wiki pages, uploading files, adding discussions, and creating projects and events if you’re an organizer. The feedback we heard loud and clear in our first revision of Wikispaces Classroom was that it took too many clicks to get right to the heart of what a wiki is all about: writing, sharing, discussing. 2. Home Page on your… Home Page! The contents of your wiki’s home page now appear above the news feed. This is a great place to give a brief introduction to your class or to link to important resources elsewhere in your wiki. If you’re moving from an existing wiki this might be a good excuse to pare down the content on your home page so that your members can get to the news feed without too much scrolling! 3. The Return of Custom Navigation Want more than our tag-based list of pages? You can now include any wiki page contents on your sidebar navigation by clicking "edit navigation." If you are moving from an existing wiki, your current navigation will come over exactly as it is. 4. Project Placards We’ve made navigating between projects and understanding what context you’re in much easier to understand. "Pages and Files" and "Recent Changes" are now pulled up into a placard that tells you where you are. You’ll see a placard for every project you belong to as well as the current project if you’re not a member. 5. Flattening the Calendar While some of our power-users might have enough events to warrant the full-size calendar on the home page, most did not. If you have upcoming events they will now appear in a strip across the top of the home page contents. Click for detail or click the calendar icon for the full-size calendar view. We hope you like these changes. There’s much more to come this fall — stay tuned!

A few minutes ago we launched a substantial update to Wikispaces Classroom, the just-for-education product we debuted back in the spring. The update is live now for everyone who has a Classroom wiki on Wikispaces.com as well as our customers in schools, school districts, and universities who use Wikispaces Campus. If you’re a teacher or student who’s not yet using Classroom, try it out! It’s free forever on Wikispaces.com just like always, and we’ve removed many of the obstacles that made it difficult to transition. Go to Settings > General and change your wiki type. It’ll take just a second and you can always change back. We currently only support one theme for Classroom, but we encourage you to give it a day or two — we think you’ll like it. Like everything we do, the new features you’ll find today in Wikispaces Classroom were a direct result of the feedback we heard from you here on our blog, on Twitter, by email, by phone, and talking to you in person. We think you’ll like what you see, and if you don’t, now you know five different ways to send us your thoughts! Here’s what’s new: 1. Content Creation Comes First You’ll notice a new area on both your home page and at the top of the navigation bar on all pages. It contains quick links for starting new wiki pages, uploading files, adding discussions, and creating projects and events if you’re an organizer. The feedback we heard loud and clear in our first revision of Wikispaces Classroom was that it took too many clicks to get right to the heart of what a wiki is all about: writing, sharing, discussing. 2. Home Page on your… Home Page! The contents of your wiki’s home page now appear above the news feed. This is a great place to give a brief introduction to your class or to link to important resources elsewhere in your wiki. If you’re moving from an existing wiki this might be a good excuse to pare down the content on your home page so that your members can get to the news feed without too much scrolling! 3. The Return of Custom Navigation Want more than our tag-based list of pages? You can now include any wiki page contents on your sidebar navigation by clicking "edit navigation." If you are moving from an existing wiki, your current navigation will come over exactly as it is. 4. Project Placards We’ve made navigating between projects and understanding what context you’re in much easier to understand. "Pages and Files" and "Recent Changes" are now pulled up into a placard that tells you where you are. You’ll see a placard for every project you belong to as well as the current project if you’re not a member. 5. Flattening the Calendar While some of our power-users might have enough events to warrant the full-size calendar on the home page, most did not. If you have upcoming events they will now appear in a strip across the top of the home page contents. Click for detail or click the calendar icon for the full-size calendar view. We hope you like these changes. There’s much more to come this fall — stay tuned!

We know many of our friends in the Northern Hemisphere have headed back to school this week, and we wanted to help prepare your school, teachers, students, and parents for using Wikispaces Classroom right out of the gate! Our team has created a Back to School Toolkit to help you get your online classroom running and ready for students to start collaborating. Tutorial Walk-Throughs Get up to speed in Wikispaces Classroom quickly- click through our brief tutorials on how to add student accounts to wikis, how to get your Newsfeed up and running, how to administer a project, and how to differentiate using the Assessment Tool Handouts and Presentations Which Type of Wiki? Classroom vs. Basic Wiki Figure out which wiki is right for you and your students Letter to Parents Customize our Back to School letter for parents to help involve them in their child’s online learning process Getting Started: Teachers A handout to get teachers acquainted with all things Wikispaces Classroom Getting Started: Students A handout just for students, including a place to put their username and how to log in and get started Getting Started: Parents A handout to acquaint parents with Wikispaces Classroom and how they can access the site Back to School Night Webinar with Wikispaces As you hold your own Back to School Night events throughout this month, we hope you’ll join us for ours! Put on your jammies and join us for a special evening webinar to review our Wikispaces Classroom Back to School materials, get ready for Back to School Night, and have a discussion about best practices for the new school year with wikis. Join us Thursday, September 12th at 6PM PDT, 9PM EDT and register here. Feel free to share your #backtoschool with Wikis tip, trick, or story on our Back to School wiki, Twitter @wikispaces or below in the comments.

We know many of our friends in the Northern Hemisphere have headed back to school this week, and we wanted to help prepare your school, teachers, students, and parents for using Wikispaces Classroom right out of the gate! Our team has created a Back to School Toolkit to help you get your online classroom running and ready for students to start collaborating. Tutorial Walk-Throughs Get up to speed in Wikispaces Classroom quickly- click through our brief tutorials on how to add student accounts to wikis, how to get your Newsfeed up and running, how to administer a project, and how to differentiate using the Assessment Tool Handouts and Presentations Which Type of Wiki? Classroom vs. Basic Wiki Figure out which wiki is right for you and your students Letter to Parents Customize our Back to School letter for parents to help involve them in their child’s online learning process Getting Started: Teachers A handout to get teachers acquainted with all things Wikispaces Classroom Getting Started: Students A handout just for students, including a place to put their username and how to log in and get started Getting Started: Parents A handout to acquaint parents with Wikispaces Classroom and how they can access the site Back to School Night Webinar with Wikispaces As you hold your own Back to School Night events throughout this month, we hope you’ll join us for ours! Put on your jammies and join us for a special evening webinar to review our Wikispaces Classroom Back to School materials, get ready for Back to School Night, and have a discussion about best practices for the new school year with wikis. Join us Thursday, September 12th at 6PM PDT, 9PM EDT and register here. Feel free to share your #backtoschool with Wikis tip, trick, or story on our Back to School wiki, Twitter @wikispaces or below in the comments.

Erin Connery joined the Wikispaces team recently as our Operations Manager. Be sure to tell him hello below and stay tuned for more thoughts from our new team members over the coming months. I studied social innovation at Babson College and much of my education focused on entrepreneurship and social responsibility. After graduating I worked at a corporate social responsibility consultancy for three years. Our team comprised of entrepreneurs and academics and served as one of many parts working to improve the business practices of a multinational corporation (generating multibillion-dollar annual revenue). The power in a large corporate checkbook was exciting to me; we’d tell them how to spend all that money and the world would become a better place! But I soon realized that while the corporate business leaders control a lot of money, and this money can purchase many things (our advice, branding, lobbying power) a large checkbook does not by itself create responsible leadership inside a corporation. Too often "corporate social responsibility" turns into branding and philanthropy. This idea that responsibility wasn’t simply for sale, and couldn’t be purchased, resulted in a more serious lesson: creating a strategy to actually improve responsibility inside a large and complex company required focus that was deliberate and relentless. It required concentrating attention on the target with the power to implement change, which in this case was the managers and leaders inside a company. When trying to figure out how to improve something without a clear definition of success, such as improve "responsibility" or "education" the business has to become much like a classroom. We spent much of the first year in conversation with their corporate team, listening and building personal relationships in order to discover how we might add value, trading role of teacher and student as we collaborated on ideas. This lesson about focus transfers to where I am today, at a company developing a digital classroom. A classroom is, by general definition, "any place where one learns or gains experience." So how do you create "any place"—a digital platform that was customizable for a wide range of users (i.e. K-12 classes)? Improving "education," like improving "responsibility," lacks a clear definition of success, and so requires the same rigorous focus. Unlike corporations, schools and teachers generally have very small budgets. The "education technology" field is full of companies designing technology to make these small budgets stretch farther. But great technology by itself cannot create a great education inside the classroom; it requires teachers. That’s what drew me to Wikispaces; this small company iterated its platform design based on the feedback it received from its users over the course of 10 years. This led to the simple and powerful objective it holds today: to help teachers help students. It seems when the goal is to improve areas as complex and personal as "responsibility" and "education" there is no easy solution. The solution must be created, and we must treat business as a classroom in order to find the focus with which we develop that solution.