DISD Ed Tech News
May 21, 2018
New Gmail Interface Available for Dumas ISD
The new Gmail looks different, with a cleaner design but don't worry, everything is still there! There's much more white space, which will look familiar if you've used the Google Inbox app. Below is a list of notable changes:
1. When you click on an email to open it, you will see a "Notes" area pop in on the right side that you can use to type notes about the email, copy and paste from your email, etc.
2. You can now see the attachments to an email and open them directly from your inbox without having to first click into the email itself to open the attachment. If you don't want to see the attachments like this you can simply click on the Gear/Settings Icon and select Cozy or Compact for the Display Density.
3. All of your Labels listed on the left will look a little different now. Instead of the name of the label/folder you will now see an icon for each label. Hovering over this left hand menu will cause it to pop out to full size so that you can see the name of each label as your are used to. You can also click on the Three Hot Dogs menu icon in the upper left to pop the full view of the label names out all of the time so that it looks more like the view in the older Gmail.
4. Where there was a Compose button in the upper left you will now see a colored Plus Sign (+) that you will click to compose a new email.
5. On the far right of your inbox screen you will now see icons for Calendar, Google Keep and the Tasks List. Clicking any of these will cause that item to pop into your inbox view as a separate pane on the right side of your screen. This allows you to easily check your calendar or add new events while still in Gmail, add emails or items to Google Keep, or add items to your Tasks list. You will also see a Plus Sign (+) which is how you can look for and add Add-Ons for Gmail to your account. For instance, there is an add-on called Trello for Gmail that allows you to quickly create new cards on your Trello boards without leaving your inbox. Clicking each of the icons again causes the right side pop out view of that item to disappear again.
6. Users will also now notice that the options to Delete, Archive, Move to, etc. that normally appear at the top of your inbox are now missing. When you click into an email you will see them just as you always have but when in the view of your entire inbox you can now simply hover over an email in the list and you will see all of those options show up on the right side of your screen. There is also a new icon called Snooze that allows you to simply "snooze" an email until later that day, tomorrow, next week, or even "someday" before it reappears at the top of your inbox.
Users will also notice that there are now suggested "automated replies" at the bottom of each email you read that allow you to click a button to send a canned response such as "looks good", "I'll see you then", "Thank you", etc. based on the context of the email. It's fun and a little scary to see how the program looks at the email for you to suggest a reply you might want. It's a time saver if you choose to use it.
Other new features include better spam scanning and Gmail now reminding you to reply to emails that have sat around for a while. You can also disable whether people can forward, copy, download or print messages. Google has a complete guide to the new Gmail here.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Insert Learning Allows Teachers to Insert Instructional Content on Any Web Page
When a teacher wants to add instructional content to a webpage they simply click the Insert Learning icon/extension and a small blue menu pops out on the left side of the screen. From that menu teachers can highlight text that they want to call student attention to and insert questions (yes/no, multiple choice, or discussion) and then see student responses on the teacher dashboard page. Teachers can also insert a class discussion and students can see the responses of other students as they discuss the content of the webpage or teacher questions. Clicking another button in the side menu allows teachers to assign the webpage with the teacher-added content to students via a link or via Google Classroom.
One of the things I was most impressed with, however, is the ability to insert a "sticky note" to point out content to students or even insert a related video clip right into the content of the webpage. I was reading an article on Tween Tribune about Volcanoes and inserted a sticky note after a description of the type of volcanic eruption that happened at Mount Saint Helens. I found the YouTube video that I wanted and copied the URL. Once back in my Insert Learning menu on the original webpage I just pasted the URL for the YouTube video onto a sticky note and it inserted a video viewer window right into the content of the Tween Tribune webpage so that students could just pause at that point in their reading and view the video I had assigned to them. The sticky notes also have an option to click the small Video Camera icon in the corner to quickly record a teacher screencast that students can click on to view while still in the original webpage. You really just have to try out these options to see how amazingly easy it is.
Not only is Insert Learning intuitive and easy to use, but teachers can also look at lessons done by other teachers in their grade level and/or content level found in the Insert Learning Dashboard site. There teachers will find help on multiple topics:
1. How to make a lesson
2. Getting students to your lesson (sharing a link or assigning to Google Classroom)
3. Viewing Student Work
In the dashboard teachers can view their saved lessons and use them again and again by clicking the Assign button. The free teacher account allows teachers to store up to five lessons at a time in their dashboard with unlimited classes and students. A yearly subscription with unlimited lesson storage is just $40 with teachers able to earn free months by referring others.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
New Chrome Extension to Make URL Custom Link Sharing Easier
In the past you had to know how to change the URL you shared with your students to achieve these purposes but this little extension now makes it super easy. No more having to remember how to make those customized links. When you have a file you want to share with students or others you can simply click the Sir Links-a-Lot extension and a menu appears that allows you to just click a button to get the custom URL to force them to make their own copy, share the document as a template while preserving your original, etc. If you choose to share a PDF of the file, students will automatically get a PDF download of the file when they click the preview button.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
YouTube Full FILL Chrome Extension
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
WWF Introduces Wild Classroom with Resources for All Content Areas
World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has developed a new free learning website called Wild Classroom"connecting educators and parents with the tools and resources they need to help kids explore and understand the world around them." Teachers will find a growing library of free animal and nature related teachers guides, fact sheets, and activity plans that are aligned with national education standards. The activities in the toolkits are geared to help students develop their understanding of the natural world and to reflect on how their own actions can help shape the future.
At first glance teachers might assume that this is a site best suited for the science classroom but a glance through the Teacher Toolkits quickly shows that the resources here are intended for a much broader range of content areas. After clicking into the Tiger Toolkit I found many resources that I wasn't really expecting. There is a beautiful downloadable Educator's Resource Guide which would be a great resource for using as a whole-class resource or in Google Classroom. There are, of course, science activities but there are also writing activities for language arts, social studies activities using data collection, and arts education activities with crafts related to the topic. There are reading activities, free classroom posters (and beautiful photography all over the site) and I especially liked the language arts activity called "A Look Through a Tiger's Eyes" where students use creative writing skills by putting themselves in a tiger's world and compose a descriptive journal entry from the tiger's point of view.
The site is organized where students and teachers can quickly search from a list of species or search by keyword to find a wealth of information on that particular species. There are games, information on Endangered Species and a large library of teacher resources. Students and teachers can also explore by "Places" such as the Amazon, Arctic, Eastern Himalayas, Northern Great Plains and other locations which makes it useful for geography lessons. Students and teachers can also find links to other sites with interactive games, lessons and activities. Check out the Wild Classroom to find great resources for your classroom!
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Recent Update Allows Team Drive Members to Easily Email All Members of the Team Drive
- From the Team Drive: Navigate to the Team Drive, click the drop-down menu next to the Team Drive name, and click “Email members.”
- From within a file that is in the Team Drive: While editing or viewing the document, open the File menu, and click “Email Collaborators.”
For more information on Team Drives, see how to manage Team Drives. For information on user permissions in Team Drives, see Google's Learning Center article on Team Drives.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Free Summer Audiobooks for Teens (and Adults too!)
SYNC is sponsored by AudioFile Magazine and titles are delivered through the OverDrive app on whatever device the listener wants to use to access the audiobooks. There is a link to download the OverDrive app on the SYNC home page. Downloads are in the MP3 format and are also Mac and Windows compatible. Each SYNC audiobook will be available for download for a period of 7 days only before the next two titles are made available. Titles, once downloaded, are yours to keep.
To get notifications when the new free audiobook downloads are available you can sign up at http://audiobooksync.com/. Toward the bottom of the page are boxes to either sign up for email alerts when new titles are available for download or for texts alerts of new titles available. Signing up does not automatically download the files on your device. You will just be notified that new titles are available and that you can click the link to access the downloads.
There are many reasons to encourage students to listen to audiobooks. Students are exposed to rich vocabulary, correctly pronounced and used in context. For reluctant readers it is a great way to easily access the author's words and structure of the text. They also know beforehand how long the book will take to enjoy.
For avid readers is is a different way to experience diverse authors from a variety of cultures. It allows students to expand their reading time by listening in the car, around the house, etc. One suggestion from a Youth Services Librarian on the SYNC website says "Got teens with summer chores? Load an audiobook on their iPod and the hours will slip away!"
Adults can check out the SYNC blog for information on each of the audio books for the summer, as well as ideas for promoting reading and audiobook listening. There is a toolkit to help librarians, teachers and others spread the word about the summer program that includes posters, bookmarks, and many more resources.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
WikiWhere Chrome Experiments Game for Reading and Geography
There is another fun game utilizing the online version of Google Earth that is quite engaging and quicker to play as well. WikiWhere is a game where players are given snippets of a Wikipedia article describing a location. Players guess the answer by placing a pin on a 3D globe. There are five rounds to a game and players can get additional hints (up to three paragraphs total) if they can't get the location from the first paragraph hint. Scores are based on how close you are to the city described and how many hints are used. This game would be a fun geography activity but also a good reading and analysis activity.
WikiWhere is one of many Chrome Experiments that can be found at experiments.withgoogle.com. Online since 2009, Chrome Experiments is an online community where coders have created thousands of amazing experiments using Chrome, Android, AI, WebVR, AR & more. Google showcases some of the best on the website, along with helpful tools and resources, to inspire others to create new experiments. While some are "just for fun" others have real educational potential. In the "just for fun" category, try out "Mystery Animal". This is a Voice Experiment actually made to play with a Google Home device but you can play it on your desktop computer, Chromebook or Android phone. In Mystery Animal you try to guess the animal in 20 yes-or-no questions or less. Be prepared to laugh.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
DISD Instructional Technology
Jenetta Baxter - Instr. Software Specialist
Email: rhonda.artho@dumasisd.org
Website: bit.ly/disdedtech
Location: Teacher Training Center, DHS
Phone: 806-935-6461 1029
Twitter: @rartho2