Create a Digital Portfolio on PortfolioGen

Disclosure: PortfolioGen is currently an advertiser on FreeTech4Teachers.com.

PortfolioGen is a nice digital portfolio service for students and teachers. Teachers can use PortfolioGen to create a professional portfolio that includes examples of their lesson plans and media they've created. Of course, PortfolioGen pages can also be used to display all of the information like education and certification that would be found on resume.  PortfolioGen pages can include contact forms for potential employers to use to get in touch with teachers.

Students can use PortfolioGen to display examples of their best work in text, visual, and audio format. Students using PortfolioGen as part of a college entrance application can display things like references from teachers and employers.

If you decide to use PortfolioGen portfolio primarily for text and static visual content, you may be interested in the option to download your portfolio as a PDF.

How to Share Videos Through Google Drive

Google Drive is an incredibly useful tool for storing and sharing files even if they have been created outside of the Google Apps suite. I use it to store screencast videos that I've created. I also use it to store video clips that I've recorded on my mobile phone. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how to use Google Drive to store and share video files.


Applications for Education
On a fairly regular basis I am asked for recommendations on how to privately share videos without using YouTube. Storing your video files on Google Drive makes it easy privately share videos with students and their parents.

How to Enable Page Level Permissions in Google Sites

Page-level permissions in Google Sites allows the creator of a site to share and grant collaborators editing access to specific pages within a site rather than giving collaborators access to edit the entire site. To use page-level permissions open your Google Site editor then click "enable page-level permissions." With page-level permissions activated you can share and allow editing for each page individually. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how to enable page level permissions in Google Sites.


Applications for Education
As I mentioned in the video, using page-level permissions is a good way to use Google Sites as a digital portfolio for your students. Give each student access to edit just the page that is assigned to him or her.

40+ Alternatives to YouTube

One of the most popular posts that I have ever written on FreeTech4Teachers.com was a list of alternatives to YouTube. Over the years I've updated the list as new sites emerged and old ones shut down. I updated the list again last night. You can see it here or here.

If you do have access to YouTube in your school, consider using tools like ViewPure and Watchkin to display videos without showing the "related" videos comments from YouTube.

How to Turn an Outline Into a Mind Map

When it comes to organizing their thoughts some students prefer to use an outline style while others see large concepts better when they're in a mind map format. Text 2 Mind Map bridges the gap between the outline format and the mind map format by providing a tools for creating both on the same page. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how to use Text 2 Mind Map.