Save paper and time with Google Drawings

Creating Google Drawings worksheets

I found this great Factors and multipliers puzzle online here

It's one of those activities where students (or teachers) have to cut out all the bits of paper (right hand side) of the sheet. That means cutting 25 numbers and 10 headings. They then manipulate them on the puzzle sheet until they get the right combination. It is a hands on activity and encourages students to use a variety of problem solving techniques and think about different types of numbers.

When we did it in our 80 minute maths block, many of the students took more than 20 minutes just to cut out the bits of paper, (some took 60 minutes) then bits of paper went missing or were blown around by the fans and air conditioning. A couple of students finished, but then it took for ever for them to glue them in their book. Once the lesson was over, we then had to find a way to store the hundreds of bits of paper.

Rather than being the wonderful learning opportunity it promised, it ended up being an exercise in frustration. 

In hindsight it would have been better to make it a group activity and do the puzzle on A3 paper or spend hours cutting them out and laminating them for the students. Who has time for that? 

Then I got thinking, I could save a lot of time, paper and anguish by turning this activity into a digital Google Drawings worksheet (I hate the term worksheet). It will take me a bit of time to set up, but once it is created I will have a permanent version that can be used over and over again and I would rather spend my time playing with Google drawings than cutting out bits of paper.

The whole process took about 12 minutes, I sped the above video up by a factor or 8 so you get to see it happen in just over a minute

I started by creating a 5x5 table, then added rounded shapes for the headings, if you create one shape and format it exactly as you want it (Shape, colour, font etc) then it is easy enough to copy and replace the text. I then did the same for all the number cards.

Once I made my worksheet I could have grouped all the objects together (so that students couldn't accidentally move the tables and heading etc) but in Google Drawings I find it is easier to take a screen shot, delete the other images and add the screenshot as a single image.

Once the Google Drawing worksheet has been created it is then a matter of sharing it with your students I like to use a force copy link (I like to use Sir Links a lot) so each student has their own copy, the students can then move the shapes around to solve the puzzle. They can rotate the shapes and move them. Do pretty much anything they can do with a paper copy (plus a fair bit more).

No wasting time cutting paper or gluing tiny bits of paper to a sheet, no worries about losing or storing tiny pieces of paper. The puzzle is stored on the students drive. 

You can share different versions for students at different levels. e.g. perhaps one version with the labels in the correct spot or the labels facing the correct direction or half the numbers in the correct position or some blank tiles. It offers lots of scope for quick differentiation, make a copy of the drawing then make the change, make another copy, make the change.

This technique works for lots of different worksheets and once you have created the resource, you have it forever and can share it or use it again and again.

The next maths lesson I used the Google drawings version and the kids completed it much quicker with less stress and we were able to have those valuable discussions about problem solving techniques and how different students solved the puzzle. I am now making many more digital worksheets for my Maths class.

Merge Cube - AR in your hand

Late last year, I was reading someones Christmas wish list and it included a Merge Cube. This was from a thread about AR on twitter. My interest piqued, I did a quick search for Merge Cube. It was brand new, Augmented Reality and looked like a lot of fun.

Quickly searching all the online retailers in Malaysia and I couldn't find any, a quick check of Amazon found a seller that was willing to ship to KL (it was about 3 times the price you can get them in the US). I figured it was still worth having a look at. To my extreme pleasure the Merge cube arrived in less than a week.

The Merge Cube is a foam cube about 7cm by 7cm it acts like an AR projector screen. Using any of the Merge Cube apps, you can project a 3D image on to the cube, as you move the cube the image moves.

The kids and I got straight into it, we started downloading some apps and started playing. Some of the apps were not available on the Australian or Malaysian App store, but we still managed to find a few.

One of the first apps we played with was Anatomy AR+

It was pretty cool to be able to hold a beating heart in your hands or to turn a skull around to see it from every angle. The cube is very responsive and tracks the image very quickly.

We then downloaded Things for Merge Cube this is basically a set of 16 demos and game, you select the demo by turn the cube and selecting the game you want to play. My son loves the fireworks demo and my daughter loves being able to see the moving people and cars in the city

We downloaded a few other apps Mr Body and Defused, but the above two are my kids favourite.

My son who is in early years (3 and 4 year olds) wanted to take the Merge Cube to class to show his teacher because they were learning about bones. Once we showed the teacher she got excited and asked me to bring it back so the whole class could experience holding a skull when their grade 6 buddies came to visit.

We used an iPad air in a stand so that the kids didn't need to hold the iPad and the cube, sometimes they found it a bit tricky to see the image and hold the cube, but they got there in the end.

The kids had a blast, holding different body parts, turning them around and experiencing first hand what a heart, brain and skull look like. The next best thing to actually holding these things (not that any of us want to hold an actual beating heart)

It was just good timing that the Early Years class were learning about the human body when the Merge cube arrived.

My next challenge is to try and find a way to get reasonably priced cubes here in Malaysia and explore other apps that could be used in other classes and subject. It would also be very cool to use a Merge cube in a breakout.edu and maybe even get a merge cube VR headset.

Sidenote - I just started playing with defused and it is excellent, great problem solving - this is one app I want to use in class.

Google Docs Scavenger Hunt

A fabulous start of year activity (actually a great anytime activity) is a Google Scavenger Hunt

Google Drive Scavenger Hunt

In grade 6 a couple of weeks ago, we did this scavenger hunt. 

Whenever I think of an idea for an activity, I always go to Google it to see if anyone has already created one that I could use. I found this Google Doc's Scavenger Hunt by Catlin Tucker. But it wasn't exactly what I wanted, I wanted the kids getting up, moving around and learning together rather than sitting at their laptops.

I found a few others but they were all a bit 'sit at your computer and do this', So I had to create my own. I used Google drawings and just stole a few ideas and developed some of my own for the tasks.

It was a collaborative activity / lesson / activity. The students had to find someone else in the room who could do the task on the square (even if they already knew how to do it). Then that person had to show them how to do it. e.g. if the task was "use voice typing to record your thoughts" someone in the class had to show you on their computer how to do it (not just tell you they could do it). The students then wrote the name of the student who showed them.

If no one in the class knew how to do it, the kids could research (google it) or just play until they worked it out. If the students knew how to do something but no one else did, they had to show someone, then the person they just showed had to demonstrate the skill.

It was lots of fun and it was great to see the kids teaching each other. Kids were walking around the room talking to each other. Some of the interactions I heard included

• "Do you know how to do this?" 
• "Arlo knows how to do, why don't you ask her to show you" 
• "Who did you get to show you how to use the built in Google training?"

It was really powerful to hear lots of oohhhs and ahhhhs as students learnt a new skill or hint (they loved voice typing) and the energy in the room was super high. Much better than walking past a classroom with everyone with their heads down in computers and no human to human interaction.

One of the big takeaways was that there are lots of other people in our class that can help us with technology (and it is OK to ask them for help). The students were given explicit permission to ask each other for help and told that the teachers would also be asking them for help.

We are now thinking of other ways we can use this concept with other tools and apps.

Make your own Icons and buttons for Google Sites

Use Google Drawings to make your own Google Sites buttons / icons.

This is something that many teachers and staff at IGBIS have been doing in many of our sites and pages. It is pretty easy to do and once you get into a rhythm you can make a new icon (or change an existing one in no time at all)

Icon Template
(you can use this to start straight away)

To create the template I started with a Google Drawing and changed the page setup to a custom setup, to make the image smaller. (This is also useful when using drawings to make A4 or A3 posters, just Google the paper dimensions)

I started with an image and used the mask with a shape (click the little down arrow next to the mask icon) to turn it into a circle (you could use any shape that you like)

Then added text and our icon was made

Then I download the icon as a png file (this keeps the transparency in the background) or a jpeg (if you are happy with a white or coloured background)

You can then drag and drop the icon on to your Google Site to upload it. When you start resizing images Google sites will often crop them for you, which can be annoying. You can use the uncrop button to instantly remove the cropping.

Then link the icon to another page in your site or an external website.

It's as easy as that.

Make your next button / icon

Once you have created your first icon, things start to speed up

You have a template, you can easily change your icon by using the replace image button in Google Drawings

The good thing about using replace image is that it keeps all the dimensions and settings of your original icon. You can then change your text, download your new icon and add it to your Google Site. The workflow is pretty seamless and can be very quick.

start with the template

replace the image

change your text

download the icon

add it to the Google Site

resize and link

You could also add the drawing directly via 'insert from Drive', if you use this option you can't link from the inserted drawing, you would need to add your hyperlink into your Google Drawing and also copy the Google drawing to make more than one icon. 

I think the download as a png is a cleaner workflow.

Have fun playing and making your Google site look

Add an animated header to your Google site

The stuff you find when looking at other teachers google sites.

While helping one of our teachers I found she used this cool hack.

I love how Google make this stuff so easy.

Add an animated header to your google site (in three easy steps)

1. Go to Google Photos and select the photos you want in your animated header

Hit the plus button and create an animation

2. Once you have created the animation use the share button

get a link 

copy the link

Now the magic happens

3. In your Google Site, click on the header / select image

Navigate to your albums and select your Animation (gif) as your site header

press select

And there you have it, an animated Google Site Header