Getting Going with Google

This is a great introduction to Google Drive and the basic features of it.  I had no experience with Google Drive before this course, and I am ready to jump start this school year using Google as my classroom cloud storage! I am so excited because I have been able to access my drive from all of my devices. I can access it from home & school (for convenience). Google Drive has a wide variety of products you can use. I can't wait to dig deeper and use these more & more!

Digital Citizenship

Teaching digital citizenship is not just for the tech teacher or Librarian but should be taught in the classroom as well. But when does the classroom teacher have time to teach this? So it falls back on the teach teacher. The information is very clear on how much is 'fair use' for educators. I love all the lessons you have on the Internet.

Google Basics

I just finished the online course of Google Basics.  I love the interaction with this course in creating a shared folder with Google documents, Google sheets, Google forms, and Google slides. The presentation and resources were all excellent. Although Cheat Sheets seemed to be an ad, I enjoyed all the cool resources. I can't wait to get started.

Google Basics

This course was a nice introduction to some of the Google basics such as Docs, Drive, and Sheets. I had previously been comfortable using Google Docs, but this course introduced me to something new and wonderful, Google Forms. I thought this was great! I've already come up with some ideas on how to use Forms in the classroom. I used the course to become even more familiar with the other Google basics which has been helpful in the day to day use of Google at school.

Transforming Instruction

It found the SAMR model very interesting. It was interesting to think about how I use technology and how I can take what I am doing now in the classroom and, by making a few adjustments, get the students to be working on a much more higher order thinking activity.
The growth mindset portion of the course was also beneficial and something that I have applied more since taking the course.

Digital Citizenship for Teachers

I thought that this course was a great reminder that all teachers, no matter what grade or subject, are technology teachers. All teachers have the responsibility to teach and model appropriate technology practices. Technology is such a powerful tool within the classroom. It provides students with real world skills which will be necessary in their future. Hopefully teachers are able to prepare all students to be great digital citizens. With all of the online bullying that takes place, specifically on social media, knowing first what to include and not include online, then second, how to treat people online are two skills that every student should leave school with.

Calendar/GMail

I recently completed the Calendar and GMail course. Despite being fairly comfortable using both, within each component I learned some very useful strategies for making my life easier. In the calendar section I was amazed at how customizable the calendar can be. As for the GMail section, instead of using folders in Outlook (which I never used), labels are used in GMail (which I've already started using). Overall, it was well worth taking the time to get to know Google a little better.