Tech Tip Tuesday
Google Drawings Interactive Posters
Google Apps has given us an outlet to have all the same perks of creating posters without as much of hassle. Google Drawings is a perfect medium for creating digital posters.
Google Drawings is an app that gives you a blank slate (or blank poster board!) that you can add elements to. It’s not for linear text (like Google Documents). Plus, it’s not for multiple slides (like Google Slides) … just for one page.
Find Google Drawings by clicking “New” in your Google Drive and then clicking on “More” at the bottom of that menu.
Instead, within Google Drawings, go to “Insert > Image” or click the image button in the toolbar. Then select the “Search” tab at the top. This will search for Creative Commons-licenses images, which students can use and publish. (For more on that, see my post “How to get and use free images the RIGHT way in class“.)
When you are making some type of graphic organizer or flow chart!
Check out all the shapes - lots to make your graphic organizers or flowcharts.
Digital posters on Google Drawings are clickable.This allows students to extend the learning to webpages, videos and other content out on the Internet.
Highlight some text or click on an image. Then use the link button in the toolbar or click “Insert > Link …”.
(Keyboard Shortcut : Use Ctrl+K / Command+K to avoid clicking.
( The bonus of adding links like this through Google Apps is that you can search for a site without leaving the page … the search bar is built right in! )
Note: For those viewing these digital posters to be able to click on links, they need to go to the actual Google Drawing itself.
5. Embed: This lets you add a constantly-updating version of your image to a class website or e-portfolio.
Go to “File > Publish to the web.
Click the “Publish” button and “OK” to accept.
Then click the “Embed” tab.
You will then see HTML code there. Copy it.
Then paste that HTML code in your class website in a spot where it says “Embed” or “HTML”.
This will make a “live” version of the poster that updates on the site whenever changes are made.
(You’ll have to go directly to the Google Drawing file itself for the clickable links.)