GSuite + Chromebook Activity for Middle School

A few days ago I tweeted a picture of an activity we were doing in class, and I had some really great feedback, including some requests to share! This sounded like a great idea for a blog post, so here we go: 

6th grade is completing their GSuite Bingo cards filled with essential skills for using their Chromebooks more efficiently! @GoogleForEdu @ElmhurstD205 @SandburgD205 #creativetechnology #igniteD205 pic.twitter.com/VwmZzY8F6F

— Jennifer Leban (@mrsleban) April 11, 2019

My original lesson for this activity included some tasks that are very specific to my classes (like "find the early finisher activity list" or "On the Creative Technology website, look for..."), so it wasn't as easy as just sharing the sheet as-is. I did a little work and cleaned it up to be less specific/more useful across a variety of schools and classes. When you click the image below, you'll be taken to a copy of this chart that you can actually edit and customize any way you want using Google Docs!

You can get your own (editable in Google Docs) copy of this BINGO board here! 

The way we use this in class is for students to eventually try and fill the entire board, but they can choose to do the tasks in any order that they want.

The first goal though, is to earn an actual BINGO: vertical, horizontal, or diagonal. Once a student has earned a BINGO, they get to pick a sticker from my collection (I keep a bunch in a basket from the dollar store). It's a good way to start the activity off with some excitement! Middle schoolers love stickers (and so do I!).

Do you do any choice board activities in class? I'd love to hear your tips! 

- Mrs L.

Using Pixlr to Combine Images in Creative Ways

I love using Pixlr to combine pictures to make silly photographs! My students do several projects using Pixlr editor that require removing the background on a photo and combining it with another. Removing backgrounds and combining images are pretty simple starter tasks for learning how to manipulate digital images. Here is a breakdown of how we have used Pixlr in class.

Me on a Wheaties Box (left), and Mr Gail-nimals (right)

Visual Puns (left), and Animal Mash-Ups Alliteration Poem (right)

Past projects have included putting ourselves on a Wheaties box, creating animal mash-ups and writing alliteration peoms to accompany them, and visual puns. Just for fun (we had a couple of extra days one term!), we put our assistant principal's head on a variety of animals and called them "Mr. Gail-nimals."

What's great about these projects is that it gets students comfortable with the idea of layers and how to manipulate them, as well as file type limitations (like how a .jpg cannot have a transparent background!) and sizing/re-sizing of images.

We use Pixlr as our image manipulation tool because it is a pretty good FREE resource that works on our Chromebook devices - it's not as user-friendly as fancy Photoshop software would be, but since we can't install software anyway, this suits us quite well. Students need to get used to using the "Free Transform" tool to re-size images and create a selection box with anchor points - they're used to just clicking on an object in Photoshop - but most of the functions are so very similar that the transition from one digital manipulation software/application to another is pretty easy.

This last quarter in 8th grade classes, we made a "Mount FaceMore" project where (as you can guess) we swapped out the faces on Mount Rushmore. After walking around the room and providing assistance to students, I realized that I kept answering the same questions over and over again. So, I decided to make a video all about the process. The first half is about about removing backgrounds using Pixlr, and the second half shows how to manipulate the layers and file types to save as:

This turned out to be pretty helpful in class, as students could refer back to the video (just skipping to the point that they needed help with), but also could get help if they worked from home, or were absent on the day that the project was first introduced or demonstrated. Win!

I really like teaching digital imaging, as it combines my love of art and computers in one happy place. The skills and concepts that students experience in this project are extremely helpful for future applications and across classes, when custom graphics or images can help demonstrate knowledge in other areas.

Do you have a favorite digital imaging project?

- Mrs. L.

Chromebook How-To: Reverse Image Search

Have you ever watched an episode of the TV show Catfish? Each episode details the story of a person who thinks that they have found love online. Over time, they begin to have doubts as to whether or not the person they're talking to is who they really say they are. The results of each show vary, but the investigation pretty much always starts out the same: with a reverse image search!

Knowing how to do a reverse image search is the first step towards identifying fake profiles on social media. I made a video directed specifically demonstrating the different ways to do this on a Chromebook:

Out of all the options, I think that my favorite way to do the reverse search is the simple "right click" method in Chrome! All you have to do is right-click the image, and select "Search Google for Image!" Ridiculously simple!

My 8th graders watch an episode of Catfish as part of our digital citizenship and internet safety unit. We have several essential questions to ponder:

• How does the anonymity of the Internet allow you to be someone other than yourself? 
• Do you ever find yourself doing this to any extent? 
• How would you feel in the shoes of this show's victim? Of the guilty party?

Our lesson ends with going over some tips for spotting a catfish, and about how to take some steps to try and keep our information private. We then try out reverse image search, so we have some strategies for doing our own Catfish-style investigating when communicating online!

What are your favorite tips and tricks for catching a catfish? Do you have any catfish stories of your own?

-Mrs. L.

Hapara + Powtoon: Cool things I've learned this week (so far)

I learned two cool new things in the last week that I wanted to share:

1. Hapara has a really cool feature within its "Interact" function (where I would normally go to see what tabs students have open, to make sure everyone is on task - but I hate being the internet police! - a necessary evil...) that allows me to send a pop-up message in the lower right-hand corner of everyone's Chromebook in the class.

I've been using it as a time-management device to remind students of how much working time is left, and it gives yet another mode (visual, via text) of communication besides the usual "teacher announcements" that can sometimes get automatically tuned out by students. Yay!

2. I taught myself how to use Powtoon! It's a really cool presentation/animation web tool that we're going to use (hopefully, if time allows!) in 8th grade to tell some modernized children's stories/fairy tales/nursery rhymes!

So, I made a Powtoon about the Powtoon project! If you're interested, check out the guidelines I created here:

I get really excited when I learn new stuff like this, and I want to make sure that I keep posting them here so that I can look back and remember how much I've done in my first year teaching computers in middle school.

- Mrs. L.

Chromebooks and GAFE: Learning New Stuff Every Day...

Every day I learn something new about using Google Apps and Chromebooks. Sometimes it's big, and sometimes it's really small or obvious to others - but to me it's a "lightbulb" moment.

Last week it was keyboard shortcuts. Like, how to take a screenshot, or a partial screenshot. And the keyboard shortcut to move layers forward or back in a Google Drawing. So simple, but so efficient! 

Here are a couple of screencasts I created to illustrate some simple tasks that were new (to me) on a Chromebook this week:

- Mrs. L.