Turning your Print outs into Interactive Google Doc templates

I was working with Neil today who has a lot of Graphic Organisers, writing and reading templates that he prints out for his students. He wanted to know how he could 'recreate' them in Google Docs. When I looked at them most of them were in Word so could be uploaded straight to Google Docs and with a little tweaking make them more interactive.

He had also made some templates in Comic Life.

I suggested taking a 'screen capture' of these templates and paste into a Drawing box on Google Docs
Mac: Shift - Control - Command- 4 (click and drag around the part you want to copy)
Win: Open Snipping Tool (click and drag around the part you want to copy) click Copy
Go to your Google Doc
Go to Insert - Drawing
Ctrl- V or Command- V to paste
Tip: if it doesn't paste into the Drawing window, save and close and paste onto the Google Doc. Copy it again Ctrl - C or Command - C then go back into the Drawing Window and paste


 Students can then use the Drawing tools to add text boxes, change fonts, styles and colour, draw their own graphics in the Draw window or paste in graphics drawn in another programme.

This template is available in the Public Template Gallery if you search for 'Narrative Story Web'.

Book reviews in Google Docs

This post has been cross posted from iPads, iPods and Devices in Education

 I was asked to work with some Year 2 and 3 children today on writing book reviews. They had read the story on the school Kindles or the Kindle app on the iPad.
e-Books can be purchased from Amazon

Geronimo Stilton 'Lost Treasure of the Emerald Eye'

They had discovered how they could write notes.
I saw this as a great opportunity for writing notes myself and leaving 'Think about' questions and comprehension questions on pages for students to look at while reading the book. Students can then add their answers to the note and all of the group can share their understandings through the note feature.

All of these children have Google app accounts so I made a Google Doc template for them to work from. They used computers for the Google Docs as the Drawing elements cannot be edited on an iPad.

We talked about the book and some of the features of the story  and then I showed them the template I had shared with them. I took a couple minutes explaining how they could access the different embedded draw items and then we discussed what 'Synopsis, Review and Character Descriptions were.

I had intended them to use the Google Draw tools for their book cover but as we had access to iPads we used the Free version of Crayola Paint and Create. They drew their pictures and emailed them to themselves and then we pasted them into the Draw box. They then used the Google Draw tools to add their Book titles and Author names.
Below is Charlotte's work.

A lot of today's session was about getting used to writing and editing in the Google Doc. There was a lot of sharing of ideas and 'how to do things' amongst the group. The next time we work on this template with a new book we will look more closely at the content the students write.

Create Maths games and templates

Use the drawing tool in Google Docs or Presentation to make maths activities.
In the example below, the format of the activity has been made in one Drawing window and then it is copied and pasted and then edited with the new problem.

1. Go to 'Insert Drawing'
2. Use the Drawing tools to create your activity
3. Click 'Save and Close' to insert drawing on to your Doc page
4. Click once on the drawing
5. Press Ctrl-C (Command -C) click on the page where the next activity will go and  Press Ctrl-V (Command -V)
6. Click on the new Drawing, click on Edit and make the necessary changes to alter the activity

And in the example below created in Google Presentation, the slide in the left hand panel has been duplicated (Ctrl-D or Command-D) and then each object gets deleted or duplicated to create a new activity.


These activities can be used for

• follow up activity
• home learning
• e-Portfolio examples of learning 
• students can also create their own, ask them to duplicate a slide, make this number i.e 37, students have to remove/add tens and ones and then type in the answers

 To turn these into templates, go back to your main Google Docs window with all of your files. Select the file by clicking in the box to the left of the file name, click on More

Click on 'Submit to Template Gallery'

Type in a description
Choose a category
Click Submit Template

Add Facebook and Twitter Streams to Google Sites

Facebook Stream
For Facebook go to the Like Box page and paste in your Facebook URL

Click on Get Code
Click on iFrame
Highlight Code
Copy Code
Click OK


Go to Google Sites

Click on the Edit button

Click where the Facebook stream will go and click on the HTML button


Paste in code, click Update and then Save

Twitter Stream

For Twitter click where you would like the widget to appear
Go to Insert - More Gadgets
Scroll down and click on Twitter Widget
Click Select
Click on User Profile
Type in your User name
Click Ok
Click Save

Colour cells in a table in Google Sites

I found this trick out by accident today 'How to colour a cell in a table in Google Sites and Spreadsheet.' It will not work in Google Docs.

• Click in one cell and drag to the right to highlight all the cells you want to colour 

• Click on the Text Background Colour button

• Select a colour

• The cells will now be coloured 

Colouring Cells in Google Docs

If you want to colour cells in Google Docs, right click on the cell and choose Table Properties 










Click on Cell Background colour and choose a colour
Click OK
You can click and drag a number of cells at one time

Live updates

Another useful aspect of Google Drive is the 'Live Updates'.



Click on 'More'






Click on 'Activity'




You will be able to view in 'real time' documents as they are being updated.

Google Drive Hint #1

In the old version of Google Docs, you saw all your files in the main window and the default setting would show all the docs that had been changed at the top of the list.
If you  have changed over to Google Drive you might be wondering where all your docs have gone!

My Drive

This is where all the files are that you have made

Shared with me

This is where all the files are that have been shared with you (but you can move them to 'My Drive' by selecting the file in the check box and clicking on 'Add to my Drive')

Starred

Stores the files that you have starred

Recent

Finds everything you recently opened or edited

Google Docs and Webcam

A fun addition to Google Docs is the 'Webcam' Picture. You can insert 'webcam' stills.

• Go to Insert Image 
• Click on Take a snapshot
• Click on Allow
• Click on Take a Photo
• Click on Take Snapshot
• Click on Select
• Resize and move around

How could students use this feature?

• take photos of themselves
• take photos of artwork or models they have produced
• take photos of a group of students

Reference Tool

This is an extremely useful tool for students, especially for those who get easily distracted when researching on Google.

This is best used when you need to

1. look for websites
2. look for pictures
3. reference a website

While you are in a Google Doc go to Tools - Research. Type in a search term and the results will appear.
Click on the arrows to see the graphics, drag and drop the picture you want to use onto the page.

When you 'hover' your mouse over a web link, 3 buttons will appear.


Click on 'Preview' to see a preview of the website. This is useful because at a glance you can see what the website looks like i.e. lots or very little text, few or too many graphics. This will help influence student's decisions on whether to look at the website or not.
The 'Insert link'  will insert your search term hyperlinked to the website you are looking at.
The 'Cite' will insert a footnote with a full citation for the website.

Change the Default Page size of a Doc

Change the default margins on Google Docs 'permanently'


Open a Doc
Go to File- Page Setup
Change the margins
Change the Page Type
Click on Set as Default