Google Slides Saved my Classroom Management

The months of April and May are always challenging for teachers - there are no more vacations in sight, the kids are hyped up with spring fever, and state testing makes meaningful teaching feel impossible.

Google Slides has seriously saved my sanity this year - and it's SO simple! I wish I would have thought about it sooner as it is a total game changer in my classroom.

With the dreaded "Spring Fever" comes the inability for students to control their chatter. In 9th grade, the struggle is OH so real. I have always given time limits for tasks, but I was the one watching the clock and announcing the time. I then started using timers, but I always had kids look at the timer with 2 minutes left and ask... "What are we supposed to be doing?" It was a total mood killer when I felt like I was being a rock-star.

Enter Google Slides and the Power of YouTube Timers.

Google Slides makes it incredibly easy to insert any YouTube video into a presentation. Click "Insert" at the top and choose "Video" it will give you the option to search for a YouTube video or you can copy/paste a YouTube link. You can even insert videos that are saved on your Google Drive (awesome for any personal videos or student presentations).

Did you know that YouTube has TONS of different timers available? Type in "Five Minute Timer" to the search and you will see so many different options - silent timers, timers with music, various different colors and backgrounds, and different alarm sounds. I also have yet to find a timer amount that isn't there - including weird numbers like 7 minutes.

Instead of having a separate browser tab displaying one huge timer, you can now have it embedded into your Google Slides presentation! But, we still need to solve the problem of the dreaded "What are we supposed to be doing?" question.

I like to choose the slide layout "Section Title and Description" that displays a perfectly halved, yet still colorful and cute, layout. I use one half to place my inserted timer, and the other half to list the directions for what students should be doing.

 If there are multiple tasks, I number them by priority.

This simple change in routine has been a life saver for me. While planning, I can set up multiple tasks with various timers in the order of the lesson. It helps keep class on track so we don't loose track of time, gives students a reminder on what to do, and gives students a visual cue for how much time is remaining. 

You can also use the video feature to enter other YouTube videos you may want to show to the class. For example, there's a great YouTube video about Keystone Species, but I know that through the course of a discussion I will likely completely forget to open it in another tab or window to show to students. Problem Solved! I simply inserted it into Google Slides so when we arrived at an appropriate part of the lesson, I could play it without opening anything new!

Such a simple change for much more effective classroom management and time management in my classroom! Hopefully you find it helpful too!

Blog Challenge: Day 13

Name the top edtech tools that you use on a consistent basis in the classroom, and rank them in terms of their perceived (by you) effectiveness.

As much as I love integrating technology into my classroom, it is one thing I find extremely difficult to stay consistent with week in and week out. I feel myself getting bored with certain tools. If I'm getting bored I know my kids are certainly bored! There have been a lot of tools I have used briefly (EdPuzzle, Class Dojo, Edmodo...) but I have not used those on a consistent basis. I'm only going to list tools that I use regularly and that my students are currently familiar with.

SmartNotebook

I am fortunate enough to have a SMART board in my room and I use it on a daily basis. The Smart Notebook software in particular, is fabulous for our interactive notebooking. My students and I are now in a routine: If I write, you write. Your page should look like my page. I set up my Smart Notebook page to look identical to their notebook page -- I place pictures and diagrams where they should go and approximate their size. When I write notes, students can easily see and place their notes accordingly. My favorite part is that I can easily save it as a PDF (Print to PDF to be exact) and post it to my webpage. I date all the documents so students can easily find anything they missed from a day they are absent. It is an absolutely wonderful tool for interactive notebooks!

Effectiveness rank: 10/10!

Document Camera

If the Smart Notebook has one downside, it's how difficult it is to color diagrams. Color coding text is simple, but coloring diagrams becomes difficult. I have tried using the pens, highlighters, and there are just so many problems with getting colors to look correct. It became frustrating to both me and my kids. This year I was able to get a document camera through a grant from our PTSA. The document is very simple -- it plugs into a USB on my computer and I can project the picture from my computer onto the board. It is so helpful to use the document camera when coloring as students can much more easily see where and what I am coloring. It's also great for showing directions for foldables or more complicated gluing in our notebook.

Our district also utilizes GradeCam (which I will discuss in a moment) but the document camera works hand in hand with GradeCam that makes grading tests and quizzes cinch!

Effectiveness rank: 8/10 -- sometimes the picture is too dark or fuzzy, but it gets the job done!

GradeCam

Our district utilizes online tracking for all our common assessment data. A new tool they introduced is GradeCam. It allows us to print "bubble" sheets for tests and quizzes and grade them instantly with our LadyBug document cameras! It's so fantastic and such a time saver! Although I don't use this option often, since I don't often give multiple choice assessments, it makes grading 150+ tests so much easier. It also has fantastic data aggregation options that are extremely helpful when we meet as an instructional team. I highly recommend using GradeCam if you can!

Effectiveness rank: 10/10!

D2L / Class Website

Our district uses D2L as our class website platform, and I utilize on a daily basis. It is all customized with our calendar, notebook pages, resource links, study guide answer keys... it is simply a must in this day and age. My kids know what I will say if I hear What did we do yesterday? CHECK THE WEBSITE! It really cuts back on the paper shuffling and helps teach my ninth graders responsibility.

Effectiveness rank: 10/10!

CamScanner

The last edtech tool I want to mention is CamScanner. It's a free app for your phone. It typically has a subscription, but if you're a teacher you can get it for free! It allows you to utilize your camera as a scanner (hence CamScanner... haha...) and you can scan everything from single page documents, to packets, to pictures and diagrams. Once you take a picture of it, you can edit it to the correct size and color and then you have so many options for how to share it. My personal favorite is to upload it directly to your Google Drive. It uploads very fast so you can get your document quickly.

My favorite thing to use this for is answer keys. I like to post answer keys for my students when they have a study guide, so they can check their answers and work at home. For chemistry when we have a lot of math problems, it is very time consuming to type the answers and much easier to do them on paper. I fill out the answer key, CamScan it, upload it to Google Drive and then I can post it on the class website, print it out, or email it to another teacher. So handy and useful for so many things.

Effectiveness rank: 10/10!


What are your favorite edtech tools? What is the next thing I need to try?

Blog Challenge: Day 2

Write about one piece of technology that you would like to try this year, and why. 

I am always one to hop on a new tech tool. I love finding and integrating new technology. One thing I would like to better integrate into my class next year is Google Docs. 

I have personally used it for years to help organize my files and create graphics, but I haven't integrated a lot of the collaboration components into my work. Since I will be the main organizational force for our instructional team, I want to really work on how to best utilize the collaboration tools. 

One thing I have already worked on, is creating our instructional calendar in Google Calendar. From there, I can easily share it with my other colleagues, edit it as needed, and even embed it onto my class website. 

My next goal is to have all our common assessments, study guides, and labs on Google Drive to be able to share them with each other. We have limited storage in our email and our school share drive is not accessible at home. With Google Drive we can all access it from wherever we are. 

I also want to use Google Forms in my classroom to have students take polls and give feedback -- especially when we try a new project. I often have students vote for their favorite project and this would be a great, easy way to do that. 

What new tech tools are you excited to try? 

Teaching with QR Codes

My husband insists that one of the reasons he loves me is because when I find a good idea, I become a bit obsessed with it. I see it as a fault, but that's not the point...

My newest "obsession" is utilizing QR codes in class. QR Codes Look like this and can be scanned with an app on any smartphone. Each QR code is specific to a link and will automatically bring up the linked webpage. There are many websites that will generate a free QR code for a link you provide.

I love them because it makes it so much easier for a student to find the exact article/website/video I want them to find. They don't have to type in a long website (and inevitably misspell some of the nonsense words) and they don't have to go to Google, search for XYZ, click link 47 on page 112... You get the idea. I find them to be faster than having them go to my classroom website for a link. They are easy and instant -- perfect for using in class!

Tonight, I was working on a CER writing assignment for my Biology class on Interactions in Communities. Part of the process is gathering evidence, so I started searching for articles, websites, or videos they could use to gather the evidence. Then I started thinking about how slim my chances of booking a computer lab for class on short notice would be... Then I thought about how lame the articles are without the stunning photos... Then I thought about the whining and groaning when I give them the articles that don't have pictures...

There has to be a better way!

Dramatics aside, this is the situation I've been in often so far this year. With a school of 3,000 students, computer use for an entire class is at a premium. I sometimes come up with ideas last minute and don't have the ability to get a computer lab last minute. Why not use the technology students already have in their pockets?

For the CER writing assignment, I decided to provide students with both the written form of the articles and the links to the online versions. I even included a few codes to videos on the topic. Since they are sharing a set of articles as a group, every person will have something to do, regardless of whether they have a smartphone. Those that do have a phone can easily share with their partner.

Utilizing smart phone technology has opened up so many possibilities in my classroom without the hassle of having to book technology.

My favorite ways to use QR codes in class: 

1. Self-Paced Videos: 

Lots of teachers (myself included) like to use a variety of videos to supplement instruction, many times providing a list of questions to answer while watching the video. We all know that students work at different paces. Why not give them a QR code to the video, have them use their headphones, and work through the video at their own pace!

2. Tutorials: 

For math-heavy chemistry units, I make tutorials on my SmartBoard for explanations on how to solve some of the trickier problems. Put a QR code next to tricky concepts on a study guide to provide easy access to remediation and help -- whether its linked to your own tutorial or another you find online.

3. Stations Labs: 

It can be tricky to incorporate variety in labs during the macrobiology units like Ecology. Try creating stations where students gather information from a variety of sources -- articles, websites, videos, text books -- and have them answer questions, create an illustration or graphic organizer at the end. You can use the QR code to provide links to any (or all) of the resources. I usually have some of them printed out, and others only online.

4. Provide Visuals: 

There are so many articles online that include stunning photography. I typically cut these out of my copies for class to save paper and because the pictures don't look that great being photo copied! At the bottom of the articles, I provide a QR code to the online version with a blurb saying "For the full article and awesome pictures, follow the link!"

These are my very basic ways of incorporating QR codes into my classroom. There are lots of teachers out there who go way above and beyond what I have just started to discover. I do not use them on everything -- although I probably could! -- but I think they provide a great way to bring technology into the classroom, give students some control over their learning and pacing, and to differentiate and "spice up" what would typically be less engaging.

Do you use QR codes? I would love to get some more ideas!

Tips and Tricks for Your Class Website!

If your school is anything like mine, then each teacher has a webpage for each of their courses. Perhaps you have your own, or share one between subjects, but regardless of how its set up, its important that your website is functional for both you and your students.

Determining the best method for providing information to students can be cumbersome, especially if you are still learning the basics of how the technology works. Because each school has their own website design and system, I can't give much specific help there. I can, however, give you a list of things to consider for your website and examples of what I use on my websites.

Our school uses D2L (Desire 2 Learn) as our website platform. In the past, I have used Moodle. It took me a while to transition from one to the other, but some of the basic design elements exist in all of them. I have two sites that I share with students -- one for Biology and one for Chemistry. These pages are only visible to me and my students. I also have a page that is shared among all the Chemistry teachers and another with the Biology teachers. It allows us to easily share resources with each other. I also have several other sites I share with other faculty groups. I spend the bulk of my time creating resources on my course pages for my students.

The landing page for my courses looks like this:

Each year I pick a new banner and color scheme (for my own personal excitement, in all truthfulness). I have the same color scheme on both pages, but the top banners are different. It helps me remember which page I'm working on, while still allowing me to share resources between them without them "clashing." 

So, here we go. 

Top 5 Tips for Class Websites

#1: Stick to a Theme

Much like your classroom, it's much more pleasant to look at a page that has a clear theme and color scheme. Use the same theme throughout -- including colors, fonts, and styling. Of course, some things cannot be changed (such as the colors on the Google calendar in the above picture), but if you can change it to match, do it. This will make your website clean and inviting. Students have a higher chance of looking through your website if its neatly laid out and organized than if it looks like a page of random things you found online and thought were cute. 

I tend to like things a bit more muted and calm, but if you like them bright and colorful then go for it, just make sure its still easy on the eyes and organized. 

#2: Stick to a Layout

Once you find a layout you like, stick to it. Changing things up to much will make it confusing for students to find what they need. After all, the website is for the student to use. If its confusing or changes weekly, its going to be frustrating for them -- especially students who are not so good with website navigation (those students still exist these days!). 

My website is built using widgets that can be moved around and reorganized. I play with the placement at the beginning of the year, before students are using it regularly, and look for a layout that neatly fits all necessary things -- calendar, content browser, and news box. Most other things I would want to add can be adjusted once those are in place. 

#3: Organize Your Files

Like #2, if a student cannot find what they need, it will be confusing for them. I organize my files by unit. 

Why is there only one unit folder so far? It's only the second week of school so we are still in unit 1. Although I have files on my page that are for later units, I don't make them visible or accessible to students until we are in that unit. Again, my goal is to minimize frustration. If a student sees ten folders of units they haven't heard of, they will get frustrated and not know where to look. If I limit it to only folders they have heard of, it makes it easier for them to recognize where to go and what to do. 

Typically, I keep past unit folders still visible for students after we are finished with the unit. When it comes to midterms or finals, students have access to go back and look at the previous units and I don't have to worry about hiding them and un-hiding them. 

Within each unit folder, I organize the information based on topic. I used to create a list of every single resource for that unit, but the list was huge and even though I could find that one video we watched last Tuesday in class, I knew students would not have as easy of a time. This year, I am making topic pages. When you open up the unit folder, you now see a list of topics instead of a list of resources. 

The top page says "From Class..." and is where I post a weekly synopsis with links to PowerPoints and Videos from class. I wanted this to be the go-to spot for students when they miss class or needed to review something specific from class. 

The topic pages typically have a short video on the top that highlights the topic. Some of them are videos we have watched in class, some of them are funny songs. The page needed something engaging for students, but still educational. 

Below the video is a short summary of the content. Sometimes it will have key vocabulary or an important equation. It's not a wall of text, but more like a short blurb. You don't want to overwhelm a student who is struggling with huge paragraphs of text. 

I then listed several helpful websites. Usually, these are websites that have interactive help that we don't use in class. Sometimes they are tutorial videos, other times they are educational online games. I like to link things they haven't seen before and could be both fun and helpful. 

Keep in mind that students could access the webpage from home or school, so be sure that the websites are accessible from school. YouTube videos are blocked at our school, so I provide a safeshare link for them to be able to watch them at school. 

For each topic, my goal was to create a one-stop-shop for everything that will help them learn, practice, and master it. 

#4: Multiple Links to Helpful Pages

If you notice, I have a unit 1 folder and also a "References" folder in my content browser. The references folder is full of reference pages for reoccuring topics in class such as metric conversions, graphing, CER Writing, and lab equipment. I even made a Homework Tips page. 

Of course, I hope that students will look at these pages whenever they are struggling, but I know that isn't the case. In order for them to get to the resource, I need to link to it from where I think it would be helpful for them. In my topic pages, I add links that go back to references pages and back to my "From Class..." page. 

If a student is struggling with graphing, they can click the graphing page and watch a helpful video. If they need more help, they can click the reference page. If they want to see the practice from class, they can click the classroom page. As long as a struggling student can remember which unit we are in and identify which topic they are struggling with, I try to make all the applicable resources available from that point. 

#5: Discuss it In Class

Although most students are wizards at navigating iPhone apps, text messages, and video games, not all students are wizards at navigating websites. The best way around this is to discuss the website in class. Show them what it looks like. Give them a tour at the end of class. Before a test, show them where resources are to study from. Show them the website often so they are familiar with it and learn the layout. 

The first week of school, I give my students a tour of the website. I let them know what's available online and I ask them to login and look at it for their homework (world's easiest homework?). Before a test, I remind them of what the website looks like and where to find the resources. 

Periodically I will put an online quiz or project on my website that students are required to submit for a grade. I typically give them a window of opportunity to turn it in, and at the end of class each day during the window, we review where to go to turn it in and how to do it. 

If you want students to use the website, you need to teach them how to do it. 

Class websites can be a great resource for students to supplement their classroom learning. Remember your goal is to make it easy for students to use. 

What do your class websites look like? What tips and tricks do you have?

... Using Technology to Spice up Boring Topics

Most chemistry classes begin with talking about lab safety and lab equipment. These are necessary, but mundane and boring. In our high school, students are required to pass a safety and equipment quiz as well as return a safety contract before they can do the lab. For teachers, this means at least a week before we can do any labs involving heat, chemicals, or glassware. So how exactly can you keep students engaged and excited to come to class every day when you are going over boring safety rules and equipment?

I find that anything that allows students to talk to each other, create something, and use technology does a pretty good job of keeping their attention. For lab safety and equipment, I decided to assign them a video project. The groups of 2 were assigned three pieces of lab equipment and two safety rules. Their task was to explain what the equipment is used for and describe the safety rules and why its important. I gave them [almost] two full class periods to work on it -- day one for planning and day two for filming. Since this was during our first week of school, many students don't know each other yet so I didn't want them to have to worry about finding time outside of school to work together.

The videos were short -- some less than 30 seconds! -- but I told them that as long as they included all the information and were thorough, the length wouldn't matter. Some students decided to put their shining faces on camera, while others chose to use paper to create signs with pictures and descriptions. They had options about how they would like to create the video, so each student could cater to their strengths and feel comfortable. This was during the first week of school, so some anxieties were already high! Some groups were more artistic and theatrical, and others were more informative.

Students recorded the videos with their phones and uploaded them to our class page. I looked through them and compiled some of them to watch on Friday after they take their safety and equipment quiz. Here's an example of one of the videos:

And yes, I do tell them the rule is "no shenanigans." It seems to help them remember, and it gave me a cool catchphrase to use during labs. 

I think overall the students did really well with this assignment! They were working hard both days (at least most of them) and became familiar with some of the common equipment we will be using. It was a great break from the typical back to school stuff. 

What do you guys think? Do you have any tricks to spicing up boring topics?

... It's Back To School Time!

It's that time of year again... I officially start school on MONDAY! I can't believe it's August. I know a lot of other states start school much later -- even after Labor Day -- but we start early in the south and are out of school by Memorial Day! I love not having school in June!

I have been itching to get back to work all week. I know, I should be relaxing by a pool, enjoying my final hours of relaxation... but I just have so many ideas on my mind that I just want to get started! I actually did a lot of "fun" stuff this week to get ready for school! During the school year, I don't normally have a lot of time to play with new webtools and try out new things. I've had all summer to let a few ideas percolate, so I was more than ready to put them on paper and get them ready for school.

I know a lot of teachers that start every class with a bell-ringer or warm-up problem. I have started class with practice problems when we are working on math concepts, but I'm not very good at making it a part of the daily routine in class. I feel like this is a missed opportunity, but could never find a system that I felt was meaningful for both me and the students.

I saw this pin on Pinterest, and started thinking. I loved the way that system has students evaluate their learning on their way out the door. But did I really want to look through them every day? Would I have time to do that? I know that if it was every day I wouldn't stick with it... but maybe I could do once a week... That seems much more reasonable. My plan was to give students a half-sheet of paper and hold them responsible for having it all week (and have a way for them to make it up if they miss class or lose it...) and on Friday, when they finish their warm-up, they can turn it in to whichever folder represents how they feel about that weeks content. This idea is still a work in progress! I will post an update when I have it all figured out!

The Creative Classroom had a similar idea, but with bins. I love the wording of these!

Some teachers have a clear way to write their lesson plans. Some teachers buy the same lesson plan book each year or print off their own. Personally, I have never found a system that really worked for me. I've tried printing them off and keeping them in a binder, but the binder I had was too bulky and I didn't like carrying it home or to meetings. I'm trying a new system this year, and I'm pretty excited about it! It's called Planboard. It's a free online lesson planner.

Favorite things:
1. Set your schedule/classes and there are many, many schedule variations for the schools with A/B days or different Thursdays...
2. Keeps plans from previous years
3. Day/Week/Monthly Views

This is what the Day View looks like:

I love how clean it is. It has a "notepad" area for notes for that day. For each lesson, you can attach files to easily find them (I probably won't use this feature) and you can attach standards! You can attach a set of standards to each course and it will track your standard progress throughout the year. I love this feature! This is something that is so time consuming for me to do on paper, but when it's online it should be much easier!

This system is all about sticking to it, so I'm going to try use it diligently and I will let you know my thoughts once the school year gets rolling.

To celebrate the start of school, I'm throwing a sale in my TpT Store AND there is a site-wide TpT sale going on too! Such a great time to find those new resources for school!

How are other teachers feeling about going back to school?

... I Discovered Piktochart!

I love going to PD sessions, especially in the summer. This summer, I was part of a resource development team. Luckily, all of the team members got along extremely well. When the time came for our last meeting of the summer, we really did have so much fun. The best part of the team is that we all had extremely different talents and perspectives which allowed us to come up with some very creative lessons and activities.

The best part about that last PD session was the technology focus. For me, I was the technology guru in the group. I love finding new websites to play with, new online project ideas for students, and new ways to make existing lessons more engaging. During the PD, we were shown a resource to A MILLION (okay, not a million... but a lot!) of online resources targeted at different teaching strategies, such as assessment, classroom management, or vocabulary. We had time in the meeting to play around with a few. I was able to go through the lists pretty quickly, since many of them I had used before or at least heard of and had an idea of what they did. I took my time to explore new ones that I had never seen. There were a couple of really good ones that I have added to our class Symbaloo for future projects and assignments. And then there was one that I became obsessed with and spent the night playing with...

Piktochart. 

It is advertised as being a website to create your own infographics. That was cool enough for me to at least check it out. I find infographics eye catching and interesting, even if they are about something as mundane as the composition of dust, or the statisitics of doing laundry. They are just pretty, and have cool layouts, and all these fun facts... 

If I could somehow combine that engagement I feel when looking at them with something in class, it must be a win... but I'm not a graphic designer. I was not born with that artistic gene, so perhaps I was getting into something that I really didn't know anything about... oh well, worth a shot.. 

I sign up for free, and see that there are templates I can try out either as an infographic (which is a long continuous page, not ideal for printing out), a report (which prints well on A4, which I found out is printer paper... DING DING!), a banner, or a presentation. Honestly I ignored the last two when I looked at report. I picked a pretty template... then realized I'd likely want to print them out in black and white, so a colored background was not condusive... and chose a different template with a light background instead. 

The editing layout online is pretty straight forward. You can delete or edit everything from the template. I chose a few details, but deleted almost everything else. You can delete the extra pages too if you don't need them. There is a toolbar on the side with options for graphics, text, background, tools... Seems like everything you need is there. 

It was surprisingly easy to work with. They provide lots of guide-lines to help you line everything up in a pretty way. There is a shockingly nice array of fonts to pick from. There are photoframes and textframes you can customize to really personalize things. I had so much fun playing around with the layout, font combinations, and paging through the icons (there is actually a huge variety here -- many of which you can change the colors of, which is a plus). 

So why even bother playing with all this? What in the world could that be useful for? 

My original thought was to use them as handouts or reference pages. There are a lot of topics that come up at the beginning of the year that students need to remember all year long. I started with those topics -- CER Writing, Metric Conversions, Graphing, Significant Figures... 

I started working on my class period websites today, and realized that they would be perfect for making a reference section on the website. After creating them, you can download them as .png or .jpeg files, which make them super easy to embed online. This also meant that future pages could be done with more color if I'm going to post them only online. I'm thinking of making a class rules/procedures one to post online. I could even email it to parents then too, which would be great I think. 

All of the ones I have made so far can be found on my TpT store as FREE items! What teacher doesn't love freebies?

I need fuel for my current obsession. What other topics would this be great for? 

... Today I made a Tutorial Using my SMART Board!

Today I made my first tutorial using my SMART Board! It was surprisingly simple and I'm a little sad I didn't give it a try sooner! It was such a simple way for me to provide support to struggling students and to help students with make-up work from when they are absent.

To make the tutorial, I used the "Recorder" option on the SMART board toolbar. The toolbar I'm referring to is typically docked at the side of your screen. And looks something like this:

If the "Recorder" option isn't on the toolbar, you can click the Settings button on the bottom to add it (just drag and drop it). The icon looks like a little camcorder. 

Once you have the tool located, you can click it to open it up. It brings up a small box that has a few buttons: Record, Pause, Stop, and a Menu drop down menu. From there it's pretty simple to figure out -- Record to Record, Stop to Stop... you get the idea.

The SMART board I have has a microphone built into it and records audio along with screencasts while recording. The screencasts will show whatever is showing on your SMART board screen, including any ink notations or other tools you use. This allows you to work through a problem on the board and it will record your writing simultaneously with your voice. Awesome! Students not only get the benefit of seeing how you work out a problem, but also get your verbal explanation. 

After you are finished recording, click stop on the recorder screen. It will create the video file for the recording (this takes a few minutes) as a .wmv file (played in windows media player) and you can save it to your computer. I chose to upload my tutorial videos to a YouTube channel so my students can easily locate all of them. This also allowed me to link them to their online course page (eClass). 

For my first tutorials, I used a few stoichiometry problems we did together in class. Stoichiometry is one of those topics that students have to repeatedly review and practice and I chose to show them problems they had already seen so they could follow along with their work and hopefully find how to fix their mistakes. In the future, I'd like to also include key lectures for units so students can use them to study for tests. I was able to make three stoichiometry videos (about 5 min. each) in one prep period, and I am able to use them and refer to them over and over. Seems like a short time commitment for a great payout! 

I wanted to post a link to my YouTube channel so you can see for yourself what they look like and how helpful they will be to students. 

Has anyone else tried this out? What do your students think? 

... Google Drive is the Best!

I have always been a fan of Google drive, but when it first came out, it didn't have all the fancy tools that Microsoft Word did. Eventually, I stopped using it... 

Until this year! My neighbor teacher talks about it and uses it for everything, so I thought I'd try it out. I must say, I'm a major fan. 

Google Drive is awesome for three reasons: 
1. Easy-to-Use
2. Portable
3. Versatile

The Google Docs portion of Google Drive looks and functions much like any other word processing program. Same types of options and same shortcuts make it a breeze to switch from one to the other. You can insert images and tables easily. You can even install customized fonts -- which is awesome since I like to use the same unique font for everything (see my previous post). It does not have every bell and whistle that you may find with a program like Microsoft Word, but it has enough for a basic user like myself. The only complaint I have is that making columns is a little tricky, but possible. 

I love how portable Google Drive makes all of my school documents. You can upload any Word Document, PowerPoint, Excel Sheet, or PDF to Google Drive and open it anywhere. No more lugging out my school laptop to make a small change to something. I organize everything into folders by course and unit, which makes it simple to find everything. If I have documents on my computer for the unit I'm planning, I will quickly upload all the necessary documents to the folder so I can get to everything at home. I create and edit most of my documents at home where I'm free from meetings and interruptions and this is by far the easiest method. 

My favorite thing about Google Drive is how versatile it is. You are not limited to just word processing, but can also create presentations, drawings, and spreadsheets. 

The presentations are great because you can insert videos straight from YouTube! It's as simple as copying and pasting a link. It allows you to play the video within your presentation instead of having to open up a separate browser window. I've embeded videos into PowerPoint before, but would get lag spikes or skips in them. It was never reliable for me. As long as you have a stable internet connection, the inserted videos in Google Presentations work great! 

Drawing is my new favorite document type! It seems like its supposed to be similar to Publisher, but I find it much easier to use. You can create any imaginable graphic using pre-created shapes, text boxes, various types of lines, or inserting images. I love using Drawing to create customized models for class -- I'll share some of these later! It is easy to use and has a ton of possibilities. 

Best part about the Google Suite -- you can insert Drawings into Documents! You can create a customized graphic and embed it into a lab or activity document. So simple. So lesson changing. 

Love it!