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Easily Add Musical Notation in a Google Doc – So Cool. So Simple!

Leave a comment Posted by @k_ferrell on March 12, 2014

Hi music folks!

Add-ons was just released today for Google Docs. I found a music note add-on that you may find useful. To use it:

Create a new Google Doc (or open an old one)
Select Add-ons
Select Get add-ons
Scroll down (or do a search for) and select VexTab Music Notation
Click Free
Click Accept

You then click back to add-ons within your Google Docs and you’ll see the VexTab add-on.

When you add it, you can then edit notes, timing etc. The VexTab add-on lets you render standard music notation, drum notation, and guitar tablature in your documents. You can find out more about VexTab by going to their site.
It looks a little funky at first, but if you just change up some things in the green editing area, and have a play, you’ll see how it works. Pretty cool!

Happy Composing!

The Ultimate Guide for Creating Dynamic Flipping Books from Google Docs

2 Comments Posted by @k_ferrell on March 4, 2014

In my previous post, I listed the steps to create awesome, virtual flipping books using Google Docs and the website Flipsnack. Here is the most thorough step-by-step guide you’ll ever need for you and your students to embark on this excellent endeavor.

Student Examples

The links below are examples from grade 3 students at Singapore American School.
Feel free to leave them a comment!

Happy flipping!

publishing flipsnack, Google Docs, publishing

Easily Create a Free, Virtual Flipping Book!

2 Comments Posted by @k_ferrell on March 3, 2014

There’s a great website called Flipsnack that allows you to create really slick looking flip books from any pdf or jpg file that you have. I use this with third graders so they can publish their writing from Google Docs to their Blogs in a new and fun way.

Below are the steps – you can also click here to view full-page directions.

From Google Docs to Flipping Books

Download Your Google Doc as a PDF

File
Download as
PDF Document

Document will be saved in your Dowloads folder

Download Your Google Doc as a PDF

Go to http://www.flipsnack.com

Click Sign in

Go to www.flipsnack.com

Sign in with Google

Enter your email and password

After entering your login credentials, click “Accept”

Enter your email and password

Choose make your first flipping book

Import your PDF (or Jpg)

You may select a file from your computer, or drag the file from its source
(if dragging, make sure you see the green plus before releasing)
Once document is loaded, click next

Import your PDF (or Jpg)

Publish Your Book

Title and Description

Change the title to your liking
Add a description
Click on Advanced Settings (optional)

Title and Description

Templates

You can select different templates and preview what it will look like.

Templates

Settings

Lots of customizations here, so have a play.
Things to note:

Change custom size to W: 550 so that the book will fit in a standard blog post
If you want to change the cover, select Show title on the first page

Click Finish when done

Settings

Sharing: Link / Embed

To Share, click My Collections at the top of the page
To email the link, select copy, and send email
To embed, select the embed button

Sharing: Link / Embed

Embedding

After choosing embed from previous step, select Use free (with watermark)

Embedding

Copy Embed Code (with watermark)

Select copy and then close

Copy Embed Code (with watermark)

Embed Flipping Book into Blogger Post

Log into your Blogger account and create new post

Switch to html
Paste flipsnack embed code into post
Add title and labels and publish

Embed Flipping Book into Blogger Post

View Blog to Enjoy Your Flipping Book!

Writing flipsnack, Google Docs, publishing

Easily Create Video Presentations Integrated with Google Apps

1 Comment Posted by @k_ferrell on November 19, 2013

Here’s a very slick new tool that allows students and teachers to share a Google Doc or Presentation, record themselves along side the presentation or doc and email or embed the video on a blog. It’s called Movenote, and it’s free.

Go to www.movenote.com
Click login and select Sign in with Google
When the Adobe Flash Player Settings window appears, select Allow and check Remember and then Close
Select Add Content and choose Google Drive
Select a Document or Presentation to upload
After upload is complete, press record to begin recording
Use the left and right arrows above the document or presentation to advance and go back.
When you finish recording, press pause, and then Save & Preview
You can now rename and select More Options to get the embed code

Google Apps, Technology in the Classroom Google Apps, Google Docs, google presentation, video

QR Codes, Voice Recording, and Google Docs

1 Comment Posted by @k_ferrell on February 7, 2013

This is a great project for elementary and beyond. Report/bio/non-fiction writing in a Google Doc with an embedded QR code that links to the student reading excepts from their research. You may print out book style when complete, or create on online flip book using sites such as Issuu, Youblisher or Flipsnack.

Learn how to easily record your voice, generate a corresponding QR code and make your Google Doc come alive!

Google Apps, Technology in the Classroom Google Docs, QR, Voice Recording

Collaborative Writing – Fifth Graders and Google Docs

2 Comments Posted by @k_ferrell on October 6, 2011

I cannot tell you how excited my 5th graders were to write today. Each of our students in grade 5, for the first time, now has their own Google Apps account and today we dove straight in to collaborating on a personal narrative piece they had previously written in Microsoft Word. The process was as follows: Upload, share, advise, revise.

Upload

After logging in, the students first uploaded their document into Google Docs, named it, and read over it to make sure that everything looked good.

The students then added their collaboration partner by giving them the ability to view and comment on their document.

At this point, they also added their teacher.

Advise

Each student then went back to their Google Docs account and found a new document from their friend waiting for them. After opening it, they were then able to read through and make comments.

Revise

The best part of the day was seeing how enthusiastic the kids were to go back in to fix and improve their writing. After the students made changes to their original piece, they asked if they could add more editors to their document who could review and make comments on their piece. Here’s a short, raw video of part of the process. My favorite part is at 1:25 when a student enthusiastically yells out to the class, “Everybody, everybody, get on mine!”

That’s exciting writing!

Google Apps, Technology in the Classroom, Writing collaboration, Google Docs, writing

Paragons of the Week – Collaborative Revision w/Google Docs, Learning Science, Story Home

Leave a comment Posted by @k_ferrell on December 10, 2010

Episode 36 >> Previous Paragons

1. Teach Collaborative Revision with Google Docs

Google Docs has recently partnered with Weekly Reader to come up with ways to help teachers teach collaborative writing to students. Two of the many features of Google Docs is the ability to have multiple people working on the same document simultaneously, and also, the intuitive ability to insert comments into a document. If you are new to Google Docs, they’ve broken this process down into four steps:

Download a step-by-step tutorial [pdf] for Google Docs.
Learn about the comments and revision features of Google Docs [pdf].
Download, print, and share the following articles [pdf] with your students:
Download the Educators Guide: Teaching Revision with Google Docs

EdTechIdeas: Google Docs is great for students to write collaborative poems, stories, book reports, movie scripts, essays, and more. Students can “hand in” their writing and the teacher can make comments and “pass it back” to the student for corrections and improvements. The nice thing about using comments is that editors can see who added what, as a time and date stamp, along with the users name is displayed along with each comment. Going further, a revision history can be accessed for any document to see who did what when.

2. Motion and Forces (Learning Science)

Part of Learningscience.org, this is great place to find games and activities that help students learn about and develop understanding of the fundamental concepts of principles of motions and forces. There are 17 different activities listed here with explanations about what each learning tool teaches. EdTechIdeas: With high interest games like Simple Machines, Energy Skate Park (very cool), Galileo Drops the Ball, and Projectile Motion (Blast a Buick out of a canon – who wouldn’t like that?), Motion and Forces really come alive and are made understandable for students.

3. The Story Home

The Story Home is a site where students can go to hear free audio stories of original and classic tales. You can search for specific stories, or choose from the many different categories (animal stories, fairy tales, holiday stories, and a bunch more). EdTechIdeas: The Story Home would be a great listening center. If you’re lacking in computers, subscribe to the podcast, put some stories on an iPod, add one of these, and you’re good to go. Have students write in their own words what they listened to. Re-write the ending to a story. After listening to a few stories, have your students record their own stories (original or classic) and turn them into podcasts for all to enjoy.