How to Set Notifications for Individual Google Documents

Google Drive has long let you receive email and desktop notifications for edits and comments to your shared Google Docs. Unfortunately, it was an "all or nothing" setting. In other words, you could either receive notifications or not receive notifications for all documents. Recently, Google Docs was updated so that you can now set notification preferences for individual documents. Watch this short video that I recorded to see how to set individual notifications for your shared Google Documents. 

Applications for Education
Long ago I turned off all notifications for files in my Google Drive because I could get quickly overwhelmed by all of the notifications created from files that I shared with students and that they shared with me. That meant I'd occasionally miss an update to documents that I had shared with colleagues. Being able to turn on notifications for individual documents could be a great way to make sure that I get notifications for only the most important or time-sensitive documents in my account.

Five More Things Students Can Explain With Simple Animations

Last week I shared five suggestions for things that students can explain with simple animations. This week I have five more ideas to share with you. But first I'd like to remind you that creating simple animations to illustrate understanding of concepts can be done by just about anyone in just about any context. That’s kind of the idea behind Dan Roam’s book The Back of the Napkin and it’s the idea behind my upcoming Making and Teaching With Animated Explanations course.

• What happens when water freezes? (A question from my five-year-old).
• How the Internet works.
• The stock market.
• Fractions
• Long and short vowel sounds (a suggestion from a Kindergarten teacher that I know).

Click here to learn more about and register for Animated Explanations.