google

Google Drawing and Slides Now Have Gradients

samanthamorra 1 Comment

Sometimes it really is the little things that make a big difference.

I love using Google drawings with my students and today we noticed that they added gradients to the fill tools in both Drawing and Slides.

There are two types of gradients: linear and radial.

Drawing

In Drawing the fill menu looks like this:

graddraw

Slides

In Slides, they added a section of colors that matches the slide color theme.

The Slides fill menu looks like this:

gradslides

I would love to see more choices. More colors, blending multiple colors, changing the direction of the linear gradient or changing where the gradient starts and stops would be great tools to add. Hopefully. this is just the beginning. Meanwhile, my students and I will have fun playing with them.

Cool New Things in Google Drive

samanthamorra Leave a comment

Google has been busy. Updating its logo was a big deal, but there are some pretty cool new things in Google Drive.

I have been creating a ton of new docs, sheets, slides, forms, etc for the new school year and I noticed several new things popped up as I was working.

Templates
So, I go to start a new Doc and a pop-up message asks me about templates, so I clicked on it. There are now bunch of professionally made templates that you can use. The templates have a very clean look with placeholders for text and images. Sheets and Slides have Templates too!

DocsTemplates

Sheets and Slides have Templates too!

Spreadsheet Template

Slides Templates

Voice Typing
Under the Tools menu they now have “VoiceTyping.”

Voice Typing

A big microphone icon pops up and turns red when you click on it to talk.

totalktalking

(Parts of this post were written with voice typing. It did get a little glitchy so I had to start and stop it to work a little better.) If you want punctuation you just say that punctuation. For example “period”, it will place a period at the end of the sentence and start a new sentence with a capital letter. If you want to start a new line, you just say “new line.”

***Google Support Blog Post with punctuation, languages, and trouble-shooting.***

Sharing
When you open up a shared  document, you might see this blue icon that says “See new changes”. Click it and it will walk you through the most recent changes.

NewChanges

Sheets
When I opened up a spreadsheet a green explore symbol came up and charts were created on the right side window.

Explore

You can click on the charts and either make them bigger or bring them into the document to edit them.  You have to mouse over to get the symbols on the left of the graph below.

Graph

Now I know those items are brand new, but also played with the new changes below and they are pretty awesome too.

Forms
 I absolutely love the fact you can really customize forms. You can add image to the background, change colors for the form background, and have all sorts of fun with fonts. This was such a needed an update.

CustomizeFOrm

FOrmsCustom

File Types
I noticed that every document now has an icon in the upper left corner that shows its filetype.

Icons

If you click on the icon it takes you to a page that just shows all the items you have that file type. for example I click on the Docs icon  and it took me to a page with all of my docs. (This is very similar to the apps I have on my mobile devices.)   

If you click on the upper left hand corner again, you will get a drop-down menu that takes you to the other file types as well as a link back to Drive.

DriveMenu

I can’t wait to see what else I discover over the next few days.

Google Earth Pro is Now Free – Used to be $400

samanthamorra Leave a comment

I love Google Earth and have used it for years with my students. Because of the price, I did not use the Pro version although there were some features I really wanted to use. Now I can! I can’t wait to see what teachers and students come up with using the Pro version.

Download:   http://www.google.com/earth/download/gep/agree.html

Get License Key:   https://geoauth.google.com/gev0/free_trial.html

You can check out the some of the features of Pro here:

https://www.google.com/work/mapsearth/products/earthpro.html

Making Movies in Google Earth Pro 

https://support.google.com/earth/answer/176684?hl=en

Google Earth Pro Advanced Measuring Tools

Google Earth Pro Map-Making Tool

Google Earth Pro data import tools

An Introduction to the New Google Drive iPad Apps

samanthamorra 1 Comment

This first appeared as a guest post on FreeTech4Teachers.

Check out the added information at the bottom.

Google just announced new apps for Google Drive. Earlier this month, I wrote about how Google Drive is one of the Two Free Google Apps that Bring Out the Best In an iPad. As much as I like the Drive app, I have been hoping for some more features when working in Docs and sheets – like the Research tool. When I heard that Google had created some new apps, I just had to check them out.

With these new apps, Google split parts of Google Drive into individual apps: Docs, Sheets, and Slides. Docs and Sheets are out now for both iPad and Android. Slides will be coming soon. All of the apps are free and Google Drive is still available.

Right now there are really only three ways in which the apps differ from the Drive app.

1. Each app is dedicated to just one individual tool in Google Drive.

2. When you open the app, you see your most recently edited files of that type only, which does mean less time searching and scrolling.

3. The apps have better built-in offline support, so you can easily view, edit and create files without being online.

When the new Slides app comes out, you will be able to create and edit presentations, so that will be a great new feature. Like I said above, I was hoping for more features, but these apps seem like  a step in the right direction.

You can download the apps here:

New Google Docs App                    New Google Sheets App                  

   docs                               sheets

Docs App in for iPad                      Sheets App in for iPad

Docs App in for Android                Sheets App in for Android

 

Google Slides – Coming Soon!

slides

You can still view and present from Google Drive

The Google Drive app is still an important tool on iPads, Android devices and computers. It is the bridge that connects all of the work you create in Docs, Drive, Slides and other apps. For workflow with other apps on your mobile devices, Google Drive is a powerful app to store, transfer and coordinate with other apps. These new apps, are also great because you will now have easy access to the specific Google tools you need.

Google Drive App 

Drive

Google Drive for iPad

Google Drive for Android

If you are new to Google Docs, Sheets and Slides, you can find some great information here to get you started:

Get started with Google Docs

Get started with Google Sheets

Get started with Google Slides

Added Information

So, I explored the apps even more and just a few days after I wrote the article above, there were some more changes.

Google Drive on the iPad no longer opens up Docs or Sheet in the app. If you tap on a doc in Drive it will open up Drive. It will do the same for spreadsheets. I can not wait until they come out with Slides so we can finally add and edit presentations on the ipad.

There are other features I had hoped to see, and I am hoping that separating the parts of drive into different apps is just the first step in that direction. I am really hoping for the research tool and the ability to add and edit images.

Jeanne Reed, @jeannereed1 , started a quick conversation on Twitter about other features that would be great to have on the iPad.Miguel Guhlin, @mguhlin , mentioned adding tables to Docs. Tim, @biology , mentioned adding charts to Sheets. I agree with both of them. We were all lamenting the loss of access in Drive, but I am sure we will get used to it.

Two Free Google Apps that Bring Out the Best In an iPad

samanthamorra Leave a comment

This first appeared as a guest post on FreeTech4Teachers.

Many of us using technology in the classroom find ourselves caught between two worlds: Apple and Google. Apple’s iPad is a fantastic tool in the classroom which provides students with various opportunities to consume, create, and communicate. Similar to a swiss-army knife, it is only limited by how we choose to use it. At the same time, Google apps provide students with cloud-based services, from search to document creation and sharing, that work seamlessly on iPad.

So, what are some of the best ways to experience Google on the iPad? Let’s take a look at two apps from Google: Google Search and Drive.

Google Search

Usually when you think of Google you think of searching first. The Google Search app has a nice clean interface: a search bar, a history button, a voice search button, an apps button, and Google Now cards. Most of the features are pretty intuitive. While, I like the apps button because it provides access to many Google apps and sites from one place, my favorite part about this app is Google Goggles.
With Google Goggles, you can take a picture with the iPad camera, and Google Search will scour the internet for that picture. This is a great feature that taps into two of iPad’s strengths: mobility and image capture.

 

Google Drive

The Google Drive app offers some great features on iPad. You can create docs, sheets and folders, as well as open, edit and collaborate on any doc or sheet that you started from another device. There are also two great features that bring out the best in your iPad: speech-to-text and supporting workflow.

Speech-to-Text

I have tried speech-to-text on other apps and sites with minor success; however, it works really well when creating documents in Drive. The best part is that because it syncs with the cloud! This means that you could be on the same document from a computer as well as iPad, talk into iPad, and the text will also appear instantly on the computer. This is an amazing feature – especially for students who struggle with writing.

Workflow

Another powerful feature of Google Drive is how it supports workflow on iPad. You can upload video and images from the camera roll right into your Google Drive. This is a great way to get an important video or image off of iPad and onto your computer or another device. It is also a great way to collaborate. You can gather class images and video in Drive and then share or merge them together on a single device. Google Drive liberates your creative masterpieces from a single iPad.

A final great workflow feature in Drive is “Open In…” Any file, in any format, can be stored in Google Drive. This feature gives you a variety of options for how you want to open that file and use it on iPad. For example, you could open a PDF from Google Drive in iBooks, Evernote, Subtext, or any other app that might allow for PDF Annotation.

Google and iPad compliment each other beautifully, and together can make a great tool for learning and teaching.