If you love Google and you have an iPad there are several must have apps that you’ll love! What is important to know is that you don’t want to just go to Google in your browser. Go to the App Store and download the actual apps.
Start by searching “Google” and download the apps you see which will likely include
Google
Google Gmail
Google Translate
Google Books
Google Earth
Google Currents
Once you have the apps downloaded, go to Google and notice some cool features including a very accurate voice search, a icon that takes you to all your Google apps, and Google Googles. Googles is cool. It is a visual search that let's you search by taking a picture of something i.e. a book, a painting, a monument, etc. Watch this video to learn more. Note: To see the cool screen I have in the shot below, you may need to tap the word "Google" on your device.
When you tap "Applications" you'll see a screen like the one below which has a listing of all your Google Apps.
A few more Google Apps
Below are some of the other Google Apps you'll see. There are more, but I'd suggest starting with these. You might also want to name a folder "Google" and put all the Google apps in that folder.
Google Earth - Hold the world in the palm of your hand. With Google Earth you can fly to far corners of the planet with just the swipe of a finger. Explore the same global satellite and aerial imagery available in the desktop version of Google Earth, including high-resolution imagery for over half of the world's population and a third of the world's land mass.
Google Books - The Google Books app offers access to over 3 million Google eBooks on your iPhone, iPod touch, iPad or whatever device you choose! Take your favorite books with you on the go. Shop in your browser at the Google eBookstore, and read in your app.
Google Translate - Translate words and phrases between more than 60 languages using Google Translate for iOS. You can speak your phrases and hear the corresponding translations. This is AMAZING for travel abroad, or communicating with students or parents who don't speak English.
Gmail - With the Gmail app, you can: Receive notification badges for new messages. Read your mail with threaded conversations. Organize your mail by archiving, labeling, starring, deleting, and reporting spam. Keep track of important messages with priority inbox. Auto-complete contact names as you type. Send and receive attachments. Search through all your mail
Google Currents- Google Currents delivers beautiful magazine-like editions to your tablet and smartphone for high speed offline reading.
These are the Google Apps I use everyday and my top recommendations for Google on your iPad or iPhone or iTouch. If you're ready for more, you can choose from dozens available at this link.
For more ideas about effective ways to use mobile devices for learning, including research-based strategies, lessons, and more orderTeaching Generation Text.
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I became a Google+ user this week and I like it. From what I can tell it lets you do pretty much everything Facebook lets you do with some bonuses including being able to edit your status updates and comments and that you can select who the feed goes to via the circle(s) in which you share your updates. The circles I'm using are colleagues, co-workers, GTA, friends, family, volleyball. The status updates still don't have a feature which I really want: nesting of comments. Is that really so hard??? It does let you tag people in your status which I find useful.
Another cool feature is hanging out. This lets you connect with up to ten people via audio, video, and chat and from my experience it works rather seamlessly. It also has a YouTube video share which I think will be powerful as a teaching and learning tool. While as an educator, my initial thought was only ten people? My next thought was, the reality is that it is difficult to have meaningful discussions with more than ten people. The rule of ten might in fact result in much more interesting and effective learning. For instance:
What if students were empowered to lead hang out discussions and if necessary the teacher could move from discussion to discussion.
What if the teacher set discussions with groups of students as it made sense.
This could be great for meetings of educators who are not from the same school. Think librarian hangouts, science teacher hangouts, etc.
This is a nice tool that could be more efficient for staff who are located in different districts. Rather than spend time commuting, just set up a hang out.
Here is what I like, love, a great tip, and what surprised me about Google+
Top 3 things I like. 1-You can edit your posts 2-You can hit return without the comment posting itself 3-You can still tag people
Top 3 things I love 1-You can select who sees your message. I REALLY like this as I know my friends are annoyed by my work chatter. 2-Hangouts are really cool. They're so easy. I didn't need to install or do anything, though I believe this is because I use the Google Suite. If you don't, you may need to install some plug ins. 3-Creating circles. I don't know why but this seems so much better than creating groups in Facebook.
Great tip Shorten your Google+ page url at http://gplus.to This allows you to change the url for your Google+ page to be something like this: http://gplus.to/InnovativeEdu instead of this: https://plus.google.com/116727180683288878674
Surprise One thing I wasn't looking forward to is re-establishing my personal learning network on Google+. I was surprised that this wasn't a problem. Within a few days it seems I already have all my Facebook work friends in Google+. Rebuilding those I connect with was very easy and the circles are so nice because as people are added I quickly and easily dropped them in the right circle. Facebook let you just accept friendship without grouping people so there was no good way to connect with certain groups because I hardly grouped anyone. The instant circles feature has allowed me to instantly group all and those I spoke with most on Facebook and Twitter are right there with me and in the right group :-)
That's as far as I've gotten so far with Google+, but if you want to learn more here are some suggestions :-)
1) Check out the Google+ Guide that is being created by hundreds of Google users, using Google docs. How Google Coolgle is that??? Imagine what kids could do if we allowed them to use social networks to connect with others and make guides about things they cared about???
2) Eric Curts, who I was fortunate enough to have join my first hang out, shared with me a whole blog post he wrote about his ideas for Google+ for schools which you can read here. If you're a Google Apps school, you'll love his App User Group which connects and assists schools in the use of Google Apps for education. His post was also mentioned on the Read Write Web blog in their article, "Is This the Social Tool Schools Have Been Waiting For? by @audreywatters . Check it out.
3) Click this link for information about why it's great for folks who create graphic novels / comics.
4) Visit Larry Ferlazzo's round up of Google+ resources here.
6) View "What G+ is really about (pst!!! it's not social") -- +Vincent Wong Believe it? Go here http://bit.ly/qfHKZQ and see his G+ photo album that argues the case. (Just click the first photo then use the arrows to see the rest.)
Unlike Google Wave which I waved goodbye to well before it disappeared and Google Buzz which I felt wasn't worth the buzz, I think Google+ has a place in social media arena. Facebook, watch out. There's a new kid in town and I think he might become more popular than you.
You have read this article Google /
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Click the graphic below to see her clickable image map that enables you to click on any tool to visit it.
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marc prensky
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Innovative Educators often ask me how to begin using Google Apps for Education. The first step is to set up a domain. Evan O'Donnell from Teaching Matters, Inc. shared this handy step-by-step guide on how to get started using Network Solutions.
4 Simple Steps to Setting Up a Domain with Google Apps for Ed
Completing this form will immediately launch a standard edition of google apps while google review your education application. You can continue setting up the domain in the meantime.
Enable services for your domain and closely follow the instructions on-screen.
To setup email, you have to switch back to network solutions, manage your DNS records and add MX records:
Login and click on "Manage Domain Names" under the "nsWebaddress" link on the left. Select the domain you want to edit and click the "edit DNS" button:
Select "Manage Advanced DNS Records" from the next screen. DO NOT SELECT "Move DNS"
Scroll down to the Mail Servers (MX Records) section and add the MX records that Google requires.
For all the other services you should change the URL of the services so your users can easily access their tools. Click on the service, and choose the "change URL" radio button. Follow Google's instructions for modifying cname records. You change the cname records on the same page as you add the MX records (see above image) - only in the cname section.
Once your services are set, the next step is to setup users and groups. Click on the Explore the different tabs in the control panel:
You can setup users one at a time here, or bulk upload users from an excel sheet using Google's template. If your school is migrating their email from another system, click on the advanced tools tab.
From the Users and Groups tab, you can also setup groups. These are like listserves (allstall) for the domain.
Created by Evan O'Donnell, Teaching Matters
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I’ve had the great fortune to spend a week at Alan November’s Building Learning Communities conference in Boston with a group of New York City school administrators who have made significant progress in becoming transformative leaders. I felt it was important during my week with these leaders for us not only to talk the talk, but to walk the walk and (even if things got messy) use a variety of the tools they were beginning to explore so that in addition to learning about theoretical implications of innovative practices, they would have hands on experience in discovering what it was like using these tools.During our time at the conference our group used a variety of technologies to enhance the way we were communicating and collaborating.To set the stage it was important to establish that our work together wasn’t around learning about things like wikis, blogs, twitter, and learning networks (which we did learn about) but rather about working in innovative ways that enhanced the work we were doing.
Sharing Knowledge with Google Docs
Prior to the conference we established a Google doc where we would each capture our Schedulesto enable us to share our plans for the conference. This would serve a couple purposes. 1) It allowed us to be aware of the sessions one another was attending as it’s always great to be able to connect with colleagues who experienced the same learning as you, process, and extend the thinking. 2) It enabled us to capture the knowledge each of us set out to gain so we had an instant record of our group’s professional development experience.
Using a Wiki for Collecting, Capturing, and Accessing Important Materials
We also set up a wiki page for our conference experience.This provided a place for us to collect and access all important conference information such as the conference program, our daily reflection.It also provided a place where we could capture notes and materials shared at various presentations.
Tweeting to Follow Conference Activities and Share Reflections and Plans
School leaders set up Twitter accounts which they used to follow the goings on of the conference using the tag “BLC09” for the first two days.By day three most school leaders were also contributing tweets that included instant reflections of what they learned that they planned to bring back to their schools. This is now permanently captured and available for future reflecting and all leaders have access to see what their colleagues are thinking of doing allowing them to connect and collaborate.Here are some examples of their tweets using the tag 21cl.
·I plan to introduce digital writing portfolios through student blogs, expand use of wikis/blogs, expand our newspaper to be multi-media
·Use twitter and google docs to promote a sense of community that can be extended outside of school
·Have staff tweet to share what is going on in school using a school tag
·Teachers can tweet homework assignments
·Have students create tutorials using Screencasting. (mathtrain.tv)
·As a leader I will model using tech tools in my practice
·Use Google Docs to construct grade level planning conference agendas and collaboratively write lesson plans
Using Google Graphs, Spreadsheets, and Twitter to Poll Participants
Our group was determining what our online brand would be.To do this, all members of our group were asked to contribute by tweeting nominations for the potential group name using the tag 21cl.I collected the nominated names and placed the 25 nominees in a Google Spreadsheet which we planned to use as a free polling tool.Our group members names were placed across the top of the sheet and each school leader used their five votes to nominate their top choices.As they did this we watched the graph rise and fall.The winner was Transforming Leaders for the 21st Century.
During Conference Reflection Using Google Forms
School leaders completed a Conference Reflection Form a few times during the conference to capture what they learned and planned to bring back to their schools.These were captured as
conference reflections that were published enabling each participant to have the ability to access their own reflection any time as well as those of their colleagues.
Posting Conference Reflections Using a Blog
Each principal is going to write one reflection in response to the question, “What specific thing(s) will I do as a transformative leader in my school?”This will be posted on our newly created blog at http://ted21c.blogspot.com.
Connecting Across Schools and Across the Year with A Free Learning Network
Our group spent a session designing and creating the TED21C Learning Networkwhich will be used across the year for schools to connect, communicate, and collaborate both within their schools and across schools.School leaders created groups and customized their home pages.
Capturing Memories Using Flickr
Photos of our experience were captured at Flickr using a new account we set up at ted21C (friend us).These photos are also posted on our learning network.
I’ve spent a memorable week working with school leaders who are thinking about ways they will bring transformation back to their schools.During that time we were Flickring, Blogging, Google Docing, Polling, Networking, Tweeting, Eating, Speaking and more.I can’t wait to see their plans for taking some of what they learned back to their schools as they continue down the road of transformation.
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As a Google Certified Educator I am often asked how to get started using Google Apps. As many teachers know, Google Apps Education Edition is a free suite of hosted communication & collaboration applications designed for schools and universities. (See the top 10 reasons to switch your school to Google Apps.)
Though I know Google is a valuable tool, when faced with this question, I first ask, “Why Google Apps?” This is important to consider as the goals and objectives must come before the tool. Here is a recent response I received to that question:
We're looking for a school web site that is enhanced by the tools that Google seems to offer.As a school, we'd like to be able to communicate with students and parents about assignment deadlines and events, on a general school-wide level as well as for individual classes. We'd like email accounts for students and teachers, calendars, class web pages. We are also interested in using Google docs as a means of encouraging collaboration among students during group projects, lab activities, etc. I think there are a lot of applications to our school.
We are on paid site right now, but I have heard a lot of good things about Google Apps for Education. It seems more user-friendly/intuitive since Google is something the kids (and staff) are used to working with. Not to mention that it's free.
This school seems to have some great reasons for using Google Apps. Now that the stage is set, here is how I recommend getting started.
GET READY
Read the Quick Start Guide The Education Edition is engineered to help schools organize the wealth of knowledge that lives inside schools. This guide will assist a full-scale deployment of Google Apps.
View Tutorials & Tips View videos and tutorials on how you can use Google Apps at your school and in the classroom.
Sign Up for Free Email with Message Security in Google Apps Education Edition for K-12s Keep your students safe with Google Message Security, offered free to current and new K12 Google Apps schools that sign up before July of 2010. Customizable inbound and outbound filtering based on content or senders - you make the rules.
Set Up Sites for Teachers Check out the new Sites for Teachers page to see how teachers, students and administrators are using Google Sites to create their class sites, organize school trips, and run school projects.
Help Students Search Effectively Educators often say that they could use some help to teach better web search skills in the classroom and make sure Google is used well and to its full potential. Google Certified Teachers have develop a set of nine modular and practical lessons to help educators do just that.
Take a look at Classroom Activities and Tips Posters Be sure to check out some examples of teacher work in the new classroom activities section and check out the handy tips posters, which you can print out and hang in your classrooms, computer labs and libraries.
GET SET Once you’ve done your homework, it’s time to start connecting with others doing the same work. These will be your best resources to becoming successful using Google Apps for Educators. Here is how you do this.
Get on the map Find other Google Apps educators & students around the world. When you visit the Map you will find schools, along with their url, that are using Google. Figure out the key people at that school. Connect and visit. Here in New York you will find:
Become a Part of the Google Teacher Community Here you will find the Google for Educators Discussion Group designed to keep you updated on Google's K-12 Education initiatives. The group has become the home of a vibrant community of educators. In this space educators start discussions with fellow teachers; share ideas about innovation in education; ask questions about where to find teaching resources; tell colleagues about curricula you've created that have worked really well and more. You will also find examples of classroom activities using Google products.
GO! You are now ready to begin using Google Apps at your school. You will want to introduce this to your colleagues through a meeting or email. When doing this be sure to include your school goals and objects around why you are doing this. Have some simple ways they can get started now. Share some ways you plan to measure success.
You may want to set the stage with a video. Here are two I recommend.
Celebrate Your Success and Get on The Map Once you launch this work in your school, add yourself to the Google Community Map publicly with your colleagues. Share your success by commenting here. Invite others to your school (physically or virtually) to see the great work you are doing. Share and publish your experience like this teacher did Spontaneous Collaboration... How cool is that?
You have read this article Google Apps /
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Google Earth - Hold the world in the palm of your hand. With Google Earth you can fly to far corners of the planet with just the swipe of a finger. Explore the same global satellite and aerial imagery available in the desktop version of Google Earth, including high-resolution imagery for over half of the world's population and a third of the world's land mass. 
Google Books - The Google Books app offers access to over 3 million Google eBooks on your iPhone, iPod touch, iPad or whatever device you choose! Take your favorite books with you on the go. Shop in your browser at the Google eBookstore, and read in your app.
Google Translate - Translate words and phrases between more than 60 languages using Google Translate for iOS. You can speak your phrases and hear the corresponding translations. This is AMAZING for travel abroad, or communicating with students or parents who don't speak English.
Gmail - With the Gmail app, you can: Receive notification badges for new messages. Read your mail with threaded conversations. Organize your mail by archiving, labeling, starring, deleting, and reporting spam. Keep track of important messages with priority inbox. Auto-complete contact names as you type. Send and receive attachments. Search through all your mail
Google Currents - Google Currents delivers beautiful magazine-like editions to your tablet and smartphone for high speed offline reading. 
