Tuesday, January 29, 2019

Common Craft Explains Podcasting

The development of easy-to-use podcast production tools like Anchor and Synth have contributed to the proliferation of podcasts in the last few years. The ways that we can find and listen to podcasts has also increased substantially in the last few years. That's why Common Craft has released a new version of their popular video, Podcasts Explained by Common Craft.

Podcasts Explained by Common Craft explains what podcasts are, why they are popular, and how to subscribe to podcasts. 


If you've considered creating your own podcast or podcasting with your students, take a look at the tutorial videos that I have produced on the topic. You can also find a list of ideas for classroom podcasts right here.

Disclosure: I have a long-standing, in-kind relationship with Common Craft. 

Take Your Class On a NFL Virtual Field Trip

The Super Bowl is happening this weekend. If your students have an interest in football, you might be interested in a virtual field trip that the NFL and Discovery Education are hosting tomorrow.

NFL Play 60 Kids Day Live is happening tomorrow at 12pm Eastern Time. The free virtual event will take kids on a tour of the field where the Super Bowl will be played. Throughout the tour there will be appearances from NFL players and cheerleaders who will share tips for staying physically active and healthy. You can register for the virtual field trip right here.

For those who cannot attend tomorrow, the virtual field trip will be available on-demand at a later date. And there are lots of related lesson plans that you can download and other videos that you can view on-demand on the NFL Play 60 Teachers' page. There are lesson plans that can be used in elementary school and middle school physical education, science, math, and language arts.

The Sunset for Classic Google Sites Has Been Extended to 2021!

Last year Google announced a timeline for the shutdown of the classic version of Google Sites. That announcement called for the classic version of Google Sites to come to an end at then end of this year. It appears that Google has listened to user feedback because this week they announced that support for the classic version of Google Sites will continue until the end of 2021!

In the same announcement about support for classic Google Sites there was information about new features being added to the new (current) version of Google Sites. Those new features include tables, image carousels, and greater control over font styling.

If you're wondering about the key differences between the classic version of Google Sites and the new version of Google Sites, I wrote an overview of them here.

And for those who want to convert their old Google Sites to the new version, I created this video tutorial for you.

How to Make Room in Your Google Docs Dashboard

One of the participants in my current Getting Going With G Suite course asked me about how to change the layout of her Google Docs dashboard. In this case we're using dashboard to refer to what you see when you visit docs.google.com. In particular, my students' question was about applying the linear layout to the Google Docs dashboard that she is using in her Google Drive dashboard. Fortunately, this is a simple change to implement. That's what I demonstrate in the following video.

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