Screencasting made simple with the Screencastify Chrome Extension

Moving to a Chromebook 1:1 environment, I've been searching for ways to do screencasting that students could use.

Screenshot from EdTech Teacher's website

Thanks to EdTech Teacher's App Recommendations website, I found a free Chrome extension called Screencastify that allows you to record your screen and/or your webcam, pick up sounds from your computer or mic, then quickly publish to either Google Drive or YouTube. That video could be shared in a lot of places - email, linked in a Google Doc, etc. For me, it has been working very well! There are not any editing features, although you could use Screencastify and then download the video into a video editor of your choice. 
As I was talking with an English teacher today about using Google Classroom, we were talking about her having to be gone this afternoon for a sub, but she was trying to leave directions for students. It's not necessarily feasible to leave a substitute teacher your district GAFE credentials, and Google Classroom does not currently allow for "co-teachers," meaning we couldn't create any sort of "dummy" account for the sub to use. So, especially since teachers are still introducing this to their class, how do we properly give directions without giving someone else our district log in information? Screencastify would be a PERFECT tool for this. The teacher could give students a tutorial of what to do or where to go, a reminder about accessing files or resources, etc. Once the video is uploaded to Drive or YouTube, the link could be somehow shared with the sub to play for students. Maybe even put in Google Classroom in case they have questions during the day. Creating a video in Screencastify could be a lot quicker than actually writing out the plans. Just leave five videos for the sub, one for each period or subject!

Update: Heather Callihan saw this post and shared that the tech challenge for her staff this month is on Screencastify. Click here to see her challenge.

Check out the examples below and put in the comments other extensions or ways that you have students using screencasting in the classroom!

Here is a Screencastify example only using the microphone and screen recording:



Here is a video I did for my staff that also used the picture-in-picture webcam recording:

Learning and Sharing with Flipboard Magazines

Updated (June 2014) - Flipboard mentioned this blog post in their own article about educators and magazines! Thanks Flipboard! 

This spring, I was tasked with learning more about blended learning for my district. I set up a Flipboard magazine for myself to read based off the #blendedlearning hashtag on Twitter, but I wanted a way to save and share the great articles I was reading. I had heard about creating your own magazines in Flipboard, but hadn't ever tried one. They are very simple to create and easy to add to from any device, not just the app! Check out the video below on how to do it (or click here for Flipboard's "how to" page).

Recently I accepted a new position in a district that uses Google Apps for Education (GAFE), something my previous district hadn't used. So I set up another magazine! But this time I knew I needed some help with curating good articles. When you create your magazines, you are also allowed to add "contributors" to help you curate. I had added my friend Kristina to my blended learning magazine because of some work she's doing at our state department of education. This time, I decided to add a larger number of people who were already familiar with GAFE (Stacy, Mickie, and Jim), knowing they would have different perspectives and information streams that I might not be familiar with.
During a recent Dads in Ed podcast, a show I host with Devin Schoening and Brent Catlett, I mentioned Flipboard as my "app/site of the week." One of our listeners, Patrick, shared an article he had found on embedding Flipboard into Google Sites. Even better! I had just created a new Google Site for my upcoming job, so I added the GAFE magazine to the site. It's great because it automatically updates, meaning content will always be new! 
Magazines would be a great way for secondary teachers to create textbook supplements for their students, especially around current events. One idea mentioned in the video above was to save recipes into a magazine to create a cookbook. What a great idea for a family and consumer science classroom! They'd also be great for building leaders who are researching a new curricular or behavior philosophy. You literally can put ANYTHING into magazine form. I may need to share this with my soon-to-be-four-year-old as she works on plans for her birthday cake!

Below I've linked the three magazines I have created. While demonstrating Flipboard magazines for teachers in my iPad graduate course last week, I created one for iPad Ed as well. I'm open to having more people contribute, so drop me a line in the comments or on Twitter if you're interested! 
Blended Learning Magazine
Google Apps for Education #GAFE Magazine
iPad in Education Magazine

First Night Impressions of Google+

Even though I was invited to Google+ a week ago (thanks Russ & Steve), I didn't actually get in until last night with everyone else. Slacker, I know. But I wanted to share my initial thoughts. I will stress - I've had access for less than 24 hours, so I don't have all the ins and outs down. 

There are 3 main components of Google+: 

• Circles - organize your friends into groups to share info
• I'm still struggling with how I'll use this, and I know others are as well. You're able to send certain info (like Sparks, below) to specific groups. So kind of like if you could only tweet to certain people? 
• Sparks - your feed of information from the web that you can share with friends. My first thought was Zite, the iPad app.
• If you become a big Google+ user, I see the point of this. It's where you get your info. But you really get to search and add anything you want, so I'll be interested to see how drowning (or the opposite - useful) the information will be.
• Hangouts - up to 10 video chat feeds at a time
• Absolutely love this feature. Last night I was chatting with 6 people in 3 time zones. Almost like we never left ISTE. By default, the person who is making noise (not necessarily just talking) shows in the main screen. That can be a little distracting, but just by clicking on one of the video thumbnails holds it on that person's video.

The more I thought about Hangouts, the more value I could see in education. As a principal or teacher, I could create a circle of district (or outside of district) experts. In a team meeting, if something came up, I could send them a quick invite to a Hangout to join in the conversation. It's really what I thought group video calling in Skype could become, but here you can send the invite all at once for whoever is available to join. Imagine the tools at the hands of those schools who are Google Apps schools? By the way, I still haven't heard from any school that isn't upset about moving to Google Apps.

Will Google+ cause me to keep my Droid and forget about an iPhone? Lets not go that far. But it's definitely got more promise than Buzz and more momentum than Wave ever did. It will also be interesting to see if people move from Twitter to the Google+ stream, or at least how they use each going forward.

Growing Up

I was inspired by Dean Shareski's blog post (see post for his inspirations) to use Google's Street View to give a short overview of where I grew up (none of my family still lives in the houses I showed). I think this could be a great way for students to tell their story, or narrate a fictional one with a setting of their choosing. If students didn't want to hear themselves speak, or you didn't want to mess with screen recording, a text version of this could be done using kmz files in Google Earth to tour the world.

Shareski used Jing and pieced together less than 5 minute clips to make his video (free Jing maxes at 5 minutes). I used iShowU HD because I already had it on my computer. I did have to do some editing in iMovie to get it under 10 minutes (max allowed by YouTube). I'm not a huge fan of iShowU (see: audio quirk towards the beginning...happens more often than I like to admit), but it gets the job done.

Enjoy!

The New Sidewiki From Google

I can't imagine the surprise that, after two days, you're getting another blog post from me!?! Well, a) I've got another thought to share and b) there has been some motivation to get my Fridge back up and running a little smoother. Nonetheless, I'm glad to also have the time to share some more with you.

Google came out yesterday with Sidewiki, a browser add-on that lets you see other people's comments about a specific website.



The good and the bad is that the content is user driven. That could mean sharing outstanding personal experiences at websites for museums or historically significant places. It could also mean garbage. They do have a plan for how comments show up in Sidewiki, but I don't know if there would be a filter on it for "inappropriate" words (or who deems what's inappropriate...just lookin' out for the kids).

Under the hood, we have even more technology that will take your entry about the current page and show it next to webpages that contain the same snippet of text. For example, an entry on a speech by President Obama will appear on all webpages that include the same quote. We also bring in relevant posts from blogs and other sources that talk about the current page so that you can discover their insights more easily, right next to the page they refer to.

Other drawbacks that either aren't there or I haven't found yet include:

• Having to re-open Sidewiki each time you go to a new page. I can see where it would be annoying to always be on, but I would like that option, especially if I was doing research.
• The requirement of the Google Toolbar. I realize the new toolbar includes the button, but I'm not a toolbar kind of guy. I'm a huge Diigo fan, but I like a small toolbar.

In the end, I really think that Sidewiki could be a huge boost to students and educators when searching the Internet...as long as there is a way to keep the content clean. I would try it out for yourself and make your own opinion.

More great insight from Free Tech 4 Teachers.

Google Chrome Revisited

Early this month I mentioned that I had started using Google Chrome. I have it set as my default browser for my Gateway tablet (w/Vista) and I do have to say I like it. It still is kicking the crud out of Internet Explorer, much to absolutely no one's surprise. I am getting to the point, though, that I'm missing the "features" of other browsers. Most importantly, there is no Diigo toolbar. Which, for me, renders it somewhat useless. Of course I can copy my URL, go to my Diigo bookmarks and add it manually, but who does that? Maybe Chrome isn't being used enough to justify creating it, but it won't be used by the majority of the population until those types of add ons are created. I guess I realize it's been a month, but doesn't Google have the pull to make this happen? Or maybe they don't think you need it? Just some thoughts...

Random Updates

I had a couple things I wanted to touch on, so bare with me jumping around.

1. The first thing is, I found a new speech by Chris Lehmann, principal at SLA in Philadelphia, thanks to the Assorted Stuff blog. I saw Chris for the first time at this summer's NECC. I really appreciate a person who sees a problem and puts himself in a position to solve the problem. Just a note about the conference he was at, I don't get the format. His info (and I'm sure that of may others), is way too valuable and pertinent to make them speed through 5 minutes.

2. I really love Google Chrome, except that it regularly crashes when I try to start it up. Yeah, I realize that's not always minor, but even by the time I start it 2 or 3 times, it's still faster than IE. Now if only my work related websites worked better with it. I know, it's Beta. I understand the consequences of using it. I'm just saying...

3. The XDRTB poster that you've seen posted on the side of the Tech Fridge and that we posted about last week is a graphical push to highlight the terrible effects that TB has around the world. The photographer who created the video has some outstanding, albeit tough to look at, pictures.

That's it for now. Enjoy the rest of your week!

Google Font

Thanks to Katie Morrow for tweeting about Google Font. Now you can create a logo to look just like Google's. What will they come up with next.....

The Power of Google Forms

Last year Google introduce surveys and forms to go along with their Google Docs arsenal. Forms have quickly became an EXCELLENT way to collect and organize information...for free! Recently, Google took them out of Spreadsheets and made them their own tab. The biggest projects I've done are a survey of my building tech people and to put together a student roster for my upcoming grad class. You can quickly create your own survey, choosing between a text, multiple choice, yes/no, drop down list or paragraph answers. Then you can publish your survey as a link or embed it into a website.

The surveys are then collected as a Google Spreadsheet (aka, Excel form) which can be re-organized by columns or into different sheets. As with other Google Docs, that form can then be exported in a variety of ways (Excel, pdf, etc.).

Tom Barrett has put together ten outstanding uses for Google Forms. Experiment with them in your own classroom and comment on how it goes!

Using Google Talk in iChat

Here at the Tech Fridge we are constantly looking for new ways to collaborate with others around us. Something that had slipped by us, whenever it happened, is that you can log into iChat with your Google Talk information (i.e., your Google account). We knew that you could always sign up for a free AOL account, but Google I hadn't heard of. According to Jeff Utecht's post at U Tech Tips, there where not any limitations in iChat, and it's a hundred times more useful than the Google Talk software. Read his post to find out the full scoop.

More Twitter Apps

We discussed the merging of Skype and Twitter last week and I've really started going full bore using Twitter. One of the tweets I got was that there is content called betwittered for your iGoogle page. There you can tweet and view with the content being updated every 3 minutes. As if I wasn't distracted enough. I really feel that Twitter is MySpace for those with ADD. 

More on how I may actually be using this in education at a later time...

Google Docs: Thought You Knew

Sometimes we here at the Tech Fridge leave the door open too long and let some cold air out.
I was going to update a previous post this morning with this great article from Tech Learning about using Google Docs. Problem is, I haven't written about it yet. I've done other Google products, including the last post about Blogger, but never Docs and Spreadsheets, Pages, etc. Well, fine then. We'll start with Docs and Spreadsheets. Be that way.
One of the biggest problems in education, as I mentioned in the Blogger post, is time. The second? Money. With more and more technology items costing more and more money, more and more districts are/will be looking at cheaper products to lighten the budget load. That is where free and open source programs come in, and district tech coordinators shudder.
Google is different from open source in a couple ways. First and foremost, its online. Nothing to download, constant monitoring of the website. On the other hand, your files are out in the open. According to the Tech Learning article (and from when I've used Docs), you can make your file closed to searches. (Then again, if you are working on something so important that no one else can see it, are you really going to trust an outside website?) But the collaboration piece of Google Docs is great. Many different people (all with free Gmail accounts, of course) can work on a single document from different parts of the world. Docs has many of the editing features of Word, etc., so a lot of what you could do with Office is available. Google also gives you the ability to export the document as a Word, html, rtf, pdf, etc., document for those of you that need it that way. You can also upload your current document to share it with others.
So what does this have to do with education?
I think Google Docs and Spreadsheets is a great way for teachers to be able to edit documents for assignments/projects/lessons and share with other teachers in their district. For example, our district is big into formative assessments (I'm guessing you've heard of them in one form or another...). If you had a common place to share those documents, teachers could constantly be updating, adding and/or improving those assessments...without a cost to the district. Students could use it for group projects, but they would need a Google account, something that may not be square with your district's beliefs. Giving them or allowing them to create their own account allows them access to all Google features and doesn't give you control over the accounts. You could create a couple accounts for you class and then change passwords, but I'll let you decide. Again, we get back to, is your document non-sensitive enough that if something happened to the Google site, would you get in trouble for releasing that information? That's something you have to decide.
I know that many district IT coordinators hate the idea of open source software and are leery (as they should be) about all-but-requiring students have access to a Gmail account, but with prices and students going up, look for more and more districts to drift towards these free choices.

Using Google Earth in the Classroom

Oops, wrong button. Sorry for those you using Google Reader. I didn't mean to post this twice today. I thought my cursor was there, but it was there...you know how it goes. Its still pre-lunch on a rainy Monday. What do you expect?

Google Earth is technically nuts. I have never seen a project that I use a lot that I know so little about. Please, if you are an advanced Google Earth user, just move on to one of the other posts. I, unfortunately, can't give you anything on the advanced features. For those of us novice users or experimenters, you will find something that you should be able to sink your teeth into.
Google Earth is a free, downloadable application that is similar to Google Maps, but 500 times cooler. Many people around the world have added their own little bits of information to it through Google's online community. One of the biggest informants for me is Sightseer, Google's newsletter about new features and ideas using Google Earth. The latest version of Google Earth, 4.2, allows for you to see constellations in the night sky, as well as tour the world as if you were flying an airplane (controlling takes some time to master).
At its basic, it is a great tool for kids to see the world. If you are reading a story about England or studying the Middle East in social studies, you can take your students there and see what it really looks like, not what a book wants you to see, via satellite images. There is a database that allows you to control how much information is provided while you are spanning the globe. You can get content from National Geographic about indigenous people in Africa. The sightseeing feature allows you to take trips to some of the more famous areas or landmarks around the world. And that's just what comes standard. Google has provided TONS of "overlays", allowing you to see more and more of the world and more and more of the world in 3-D. You can even create your own 3-D versions of buildings using Google Sketch-Up. One great feature that I used last year in a science class was being able to show students volcanoes. Turning on the volcano layer allowed students to literally see why the Pacific Rim is called the "Ring of Fire." Each and every volcano popped up, with a short paragraph or phrase about what, if any, importance each had. Mount St. Helens is also in 3-D, so you are able to take your students on a trip around it.

You are also able to read about current events. One that I happened to open up was an article from the U.S. Holocaust Museum declaring, in 2004, a genocide emergency in Darfur.

In the news now, Google Earth has been asked to help in the search for Steve Fossett, the adventurer who has been missing after taking off from a Nevada air strip. His friend Richard Branson has asked Google to update its satellite images of the area over the past days to allow people using Google Earth to aid in the search from the comfort of their home.

To recap, Google Earth lets you travel around the world on your computer. There are hundreds of content areas and overlays that let you see everything from skyscrapers to fast food stops. It is a great educational tool that lets you take kid to far away places without having to get field trip permission slips. You'll never want to hop on a bus again.

09-11-2007 - Great minds think alike:

Apparently Google Earth read my mind or post, because today they posted a blog entry on using Google Earth in the classroom. Maybe more people are reading this than I expected.

Google for Educators

Last year, Google decided to dip their hands into the education world, launching Google for Educators. Very cool, as we like to say here in the Fridge. They have designed/are designing/suggesting already created programs to be used in education.
For example:
Google Calendar can be used in a variety of ways by staff and parents. Our school used a general Google Calendar log in so that we could check out our mobile lab, SMART Board and projectors (no, we don't have one per room). It has been suggested all over the Google world that it be used to show assignments, etc., for parents.
iGoogle, the new customizable homepage, offers users to choose from hundreds of different services to keep you in the know about EVERYTHING. Many bloggers and educators have suggested using iGoogle for student start up pages, and while I see how cool that would be, I did miss how that would be practical.
Another feature that I used in my classroom long before it was under the massive Google umbrellas was the feature you are using right now: Blogger. From test preparation to finding out what's going on in class, Blogger has endless possibilities.
My new favorite Google tool is Google Reader. Google Reader allows you to read what is new on your favorite websites (including this one) without actually having to go there. And, with iGoogle all I have to do is open up to my homepage to see if any of my favorite author's have made contributions to our world (including David Pogue, Edutopia and the Infinite Thinking Machine, Google's education blog).
While these suggestions are just scrapping the top of the barrel, these that I mentioned are some of my favorites and most used. Feel free to comment on how you are using any of these or other Google for Educator tools.