Grmr.me

When I grade, I always link to a relevent website where a motivated student can find help.  This will be a great resource to me in the future!

http://grmr.me/ is a great writing and literature website that explains issues in clear language. It also includes videos and quizzes!

They even have a quick guide with the links for the most common grammar felonies.

How do you use technology to help your students?

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The Gooru Strikes Again: How to use Animations in Google Presentations

Animations have been lacking in Google Presentations...until now!  Google finally got the animation portion of their presentation set up, and you can use it TODAY!  I exclusively use Google Presentations in Canvas.  It integrates easily, and I love how it updates anywhere that the presentation is without me having to relink it.

The Google Guru has a great video on how to use this exciting feature.  View it below:

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Keyboard Shortcuts for your iOS Devices

I've been depending on my iPhone more and more for everyday tasks, and I've utilized lots of copy/pasting.  However, I always got frustrated when I'd try to copy one word or one phrase only to have it copy the wrong thing, or cut off part of it, or do the next paragraph...just frustrating!

I was thrilled to find this article on shortcuts.  I think I'll be using the "tap twice on the word" one all the time!

What tricks do you know?

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How to add a dropdown menu in a Google spreadsheet

I love finding shortcuts, and here's one of my favorite ones in Google Sheets.  If you find yourself typing the same stuff in a specific column, or want to be sure that the multiple people editing your sheet use the same consistent language, make a dropdown menu! We use this in some of our training spreadsheets with things that are the same, like department names.  For example:

The benefits are not just ascetic. It also makes it *much* easier to use your sort functions and get the needed results.  It also makes you look like a rock star when you are able to pull up a neat, organized worksheet on the fly in a meeting.

How do you make this amazing drop down?  I'm so glad you asked.  Here's a step by step video just for you!

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Google Chrome Shortcut Keys

Save time by learning how to use shortcut keys.  Since I use the Google Chrome browser a lot, I know a lot of the chrome shortcut keys.  Here's a few of my favorites:

CTRL + T will open a new tab.

CTRL +R will close the current tab that you are in.  If you accidentally close a tab without meaning to, try CTRL + SHIFT + T- it will reopen the last tab you closed.

CTRL + SHIFT + V will paste the content from your clipboard as plain text.  This can be extremely helpful if there's a lot of crazy formatting on whatever you copied.

That is an extremely small sampling of the many, many shortcuts for Google Chrome.  What's your favorite shortcut?  Leave a comment below!

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Work Skills Your Students NEED for the Jobs of the Future

What will your students need to know in 2020?  I found this fascinating infographic about the types of skills that the jobs of the future will require.  What do you think of their findings?




Source: Top10OnlineColleges.org

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Google Gooru Secrets: The Remove Formatting Button

If you do any copy and pasting in Google products like Gmail and Drive, you know the pain of going through and fixing all the formatting weirdness that happens.   I recently found out that there's a single button to fix all of those issues with a click!

Here's the Gooru:




I can't believe I did not know about this before.  It's going to save me time!  Was I the only one who had never noticed it?  Leave your answer in the comments!

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The Illustrated Story of Facebook

I love that Facebook was created by a college student.  Do you have a Mark Zuckerberg in your classroom?  He took an idea and made himself a billionaire in a relatively short amount of time, and he continues to innovate his product.  Love it or hate it, Facebook is a technology that has undeniably made an impact worldwide.

Here's a fun, short video that gives the highlights of Facebook over its first ten years.

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Easier Shortened Sharing Links on Google Forms!

Google made some changes to their forms a few months ago, and I'm going to take a moment to show you one of my favorite new features.

I use Google forms all. the. time.  I also like to send links to my forms various social media outlets, which means that I often have to shorten the link. I used to take my longggggg Google Form link and plug it in to one of those link shorting services. Now I can just do it right in google!

Here's how:

Go to the blue "Send Form"button in the upper right hand corner.  Click on it.

It will open the same options you know and love, but it will also have a few extra options.  One of those is Short Url.  Click it, and it will provide a shortened link.  WOO HOO!

Wasn't that easy?

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Saving Time in Gmail Part II: Taking Canned Responses up a NOTCH!

Here's yet another way to save time in Gmail, particularly if you're getting the same types of e-mails over and over.

I showed you how to do canned responses.  Did you know that, using filters, you can make sure those canned responses go out automatically to people who fit a certain criteria?   You will not even have to click a button.

This solution is a bit more complex than making a canned response, so I'm going to let the Google Gooru handle it.  Here's a great video giving step by step directions on how to make this happen:



I made one that you can check out.  Simply e-mail me at CWildmanZoer (at) gmail (dot) com. Put Canned Response in the subject line.

As long as you follow those directions, you'll get an e-mail back from me with some information.  It was quick to put together, and will be responding to e-mail for me 24 hours a day as long as it meets the criteria!  Try it- and if you have questions I have not answered, feel free to ask them in your e-mail.  I'll get back to you. :)

I hope you found this helpful, and I look forward to hearing about how you use it.

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Saving Time in Gmail: Canned Responses

If you use Gmail and find yourself frequently answering the same question, consider using canned responses. Canned responses are a great way to save time answering the questions you get asked over and over and over and over.  Here's how:

Be sure that you have canned responses turned on in Gmail.

Go to the gear and click on settings:









Click on Labs and look for Canned Responses.





Be sure to Enable the Canned Responses.  Be sure to scroll to the bottom and save your changes!

Once you have your changes saved, you can make your canned response.  Start by opening a new message and then writing your response.  Once you are done, click the triangle at the lower right hand corner and select canned responses.







Select New Canned response and name your response.  Be sure to think through the name- you want it to make sense to future you!

You're done!  Your response is now ready to use.

To use the response, open up an e-mail.  It can be a brand new one or a response to an e-mail that you've been sent.  Go to the same triangle to get to your canned responses, look under insert, and select the one you've already named.  Click on it. It will insert in the message.

You now know how to add canned message. I hope that this helps save you time in the future!

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