Video Tutorial - Submitting Google Docs in Moodle

Tracking  and evaluating student work in Google Docs using the share features can be a bit daunting if you are not meticulous about your organization of folders.  


Another option is to have students submit their Google Docs in Moodle as an "Online Text" assignment by pasting the URL link from the Google Doc (note: this only works if the link is copied from the Share link feature under the share tab)  


This tutorial walks through the steps of adding an "Online Text" assignment submission link and demonstrates how students would share their Google Doc link to your Moodle course.  

Link of the Week #6 - Google Dictionary

Google Dictionary No, this one won't save any lives or cause a camp out in front of the Apple store, but Google Dictionary is fast, accurate, and ad free (for now).

Star your favorite words. Translate some French (handy for the father of a French immersion student such as myself). Move on to more interesting and engaging tasks.

Hey, it just works.

Link of the Week #4 - Khan Academy

This week's link is Khan Academy, a one man video tutorial powerhouse.

According the website, "We have 1000+ videos on YouTube covering everything from basic arithmetic and algebra to differential equations, physics, chemistry, biology and finance which have been recorded by Salman Khan."

Khan has created so many video tutorials I can't even show the entire catalog in one screenshot.

 

The only problem may be that these videos are all hosted on YouTube which is blocked in many schools.  That being said there are some fairly simple tools like zamzar.com which will convert and download the file.  FYI, I've recently read that this may violate YouTube's EULA , and therefore recommend that districts consider offering at least teacher access to YouTube to help teachers access the wealth of educational content available on this and other video websites.

A tale of homework help - Searching for images in Google Earth using Panoramio

My daughter is learning about continents and cultures in her Grade 2 French Immersion program.  Her homework this week is to gather images that represent these regions and the people who live there.  She could have started by cutting out images from old National Geographics, but we decided to explore the Panoramio layer in Google Earth first.

After showing her how to navigate the controls for zooming in and out and panning across the continents we toured the globe and identified each of the continents.  She chose to look at images from Asia first and started zooming in until Panaramio's blue square icons came into view.  Clicking on the icon opened a photograph of people or landmarks.  She then had to decide if the image met the criteria for the assignment.  Clicking on the image a second time opened the image in a web browser.  We created a notebook for her photos in Zoho Notebook and then dragged the image into the notebook using the Zoho Notebook browser extension.  (Side note: I prefer Google Notebook, but they have discontinued support for the browser extension). Update: a Google Notebook extension for FireFox v. 3.5 can be found here.

Soon she was exploring on her own, finding interesting photos and adding them to her notebook.  She noticed that many areas didn't have photos available which led to a discussion about the natural features like deserts and mountains and why people live closer to water and coastlines.  Afterwards, we looked at her notebook and picked out the photos that best fit the criteria before printing.

I was impressed by how quickly she adapted to the use of the mouse for navigating in Google Earth, her ability to work in multiple applications at once, and her critical thinking skills for selecting appropriate photographs.