Soft Technology

As you may have heard, Google Apps for Education recently released Google Classroom. While it is NOT a Learning Management System (LMS), it does simplify procedures for teachers sharing files with students. Most notably, it automatically creates a copy of a specified file from Google Drive for each student within an organizational structure then allows students to "turn in" those files virtually, which changes the permissions of the file from student-owned back to teacher-owned. Students retain view rights. If you're looking for a tool to simplify and save time when using Google Apps for Education with your students, it's arrived! Hope you enjoy this hastily made video. Please leave comments if you have questions, and I'll do my best to get back to you.

Last week I visited a school district and saw the most intriguing device. It looked something like the thing on the right. Until I got back home and Googled it, I didn't know what it was called, and so in discussion, it quickly became dubbed the "Teacher Evaluatron 5000." (Nice one, Matthew.) The district had purchased one of these panoramic camera devices per campus so that teachers' classrooms could be recorded and they could then be evaluated from offices far away. My immediate, gut reaction to this was, "How horrible and depersonalizing." I asked a couple of district employees what teachers thought of the device. One of them replied something like, "Well, they should like it, but nobody likes to be evaluated, so they don't like it because it's an evaluation tool." The other employee said something like, "Teachers hate it. They're leaving the district because the way this system is used is dehumanizing." I wonder what you ...

What's the difference between gmail groups and Google Groups? What features do each offer? When should you use a group or create a Group? It's a confusing issue. Why oh why do they have the same name?!? Hopefully this little video will help. . . Smarter Gmail Lesson 10

Have you seen Huntsville ISD's latest Innovation Day video? It's pretty awesome! We think you'll get a lot of good advice about what Innovation Day is, how to do it, and why you should give it a try as well. Please check it out!

Here's a little video about a few of the thousands of things kids can do on a Chromebook in the classroom . . .