Video: The Writing Process using Google Drive

Writing is an incredibly important and marketable skill. The process of teaching and learning writing has traditionally required the use of copious amounts of paper. With Google Drive, writing can be a near paperless activity.

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Kidblog moving to a pay only model - consider Blogger

The once "kind of free" Kidblog is moving to a pay only model in September.

From the kidblog pricing page:
Beginning September 2015, free trials are active for 30 days - upgrade for unlimited access

Another free service bites the dust. The service will now cost $29 per teacher per year. This is not a huge amount but with district, campus and personal budgets stretched thin, every additional expense seems daunting.

There are other options available. Austin ISD is a Google Apps For Education (GAFE) district. GAFE provides an array of tools for staff and students to use including Blogger. If you are considering student blogs for your classroom, consider Blogger. 

Students already have accounts they can access through Google Drive.

From the AISD Cloud, launch Google Drive.

Once Google Drive has loaded, open a new tab and type blogger.com.

There are ways to set your blog to private.
In your blog settings, set both privacy options to No.

Reader access can also be restricted. 

Also is settings, the blog can be set to only allows authors to read or allow all those added.

Using group lists, such as campusname.students@grp.austinisd.org, can make the process quick.

Instructional Technology would enjoy the opportunity to help you get up to speed with Blogger.

Google Drive Revision History - A Powerful Tool for Teachers

This is the first of a series of posts on Google Drive features that classroom teachers may find quite valuable.

As a classroom teacher it is not enough to grade an assignment and move on. Why a product misses the mark is as important (if not more so) than the mark itself.

This was a problem I struggled with as a classroom teacher.

Is the work below expectations because I did not present the concepts well? Did the student misunderstand the assignment? Was the project completed in a rush the day before the deadline? The answers to these questions each suggest a different way to help the student and teacher improve.

In the "dark ages" of classroom technology, we used Clarisworks/Appleworks.  Students would bring their printed writing to the writing conference. We would discuss the work. I might make a few suggestions for improvement. The student would work on the revisions and later turn in a revised final draft. It wasn't chiseling on stone tablets but it was Old School. I am certain, but couldn't prove, I frequently received a freshly printed copy without any changes.

I needed a good way to find out the "who, what, when and where" of the project timeline.

• Who contributed (especially important for group assignments)?
• What was contributed, changed, pasted or otherwise added?
• When was is done?
• Where was it done? (This one is easy.)

Teachers and students in Austin ISD now have access to Google Drive and the extensive suite of productivity applications it provides. There are too many features for one post.
I want to highlight the revision history available in most document types.

Revision History shows time stamped changes in the document. It is accessed from the file menu within a document.
File>See revision history

There are several useful features in revision history:

WHO?
Notice that each collaborator is listed with different colored text. Collaboration is a crucial skill but group projects can be difficult to assess. Did everyone contribute or did Vanessa, Diane and Shelley do all the work while Marc and Howard played "Monty Python quotes" and made rude noises? That almost never happens but you get the idea.

WHAT?
Clicking on an entry in the revision history will show the changes made at that time. Did Howard change one word and call it a "revision"? Did Marc paste an entire paragraph without citation? Once again, examples are for illustrative purposes only.
Howard never does revisions. His work is perfect from the first draft.

WHEN?
Every entry in revision history has a time stamp. Now it is easy to tell if an assignment was finished two weeks ago and polished or if it was done start to finish the night before the deadline.

A teacher can easily tell the who, what and when about the work from revision history.

WHERE?
That is easy- anywhere there is internet. Google Drive is available on the internet 24/7, no software to install and nothing to buy. A device with a browser and an internet connection is all that is needed to use it.