13 great Google posts this week #17

Google just launched a free, unlimited photo storage service. They're calling it — wait for it — Google Photos.

Alice Keeler uses Google Keep to keep track of her brainstorms, todo lists, and to take quick notes. The app works offline which makes it great for jotting down ideas when she is on a plane. 

Maybe you’re using Google for your email or to look someone up, but have you considered the many ways you can use this web search engine in the classroom? Since Google.com was first registered as a domain name in 1997, it has become a ubiquitous source of information. And that’s not all. Google also provides an ever-growing list of tools that can make your and your students’ day easier and more interesting.

Using Google Drawings to create graphic organizers can help students gather their thoughts and customize to their needs. In Google Apps, there’s a highly powerful yet highly overlooked app called Drawings. It gives users a blank canvas where they can add text, shapes, lines, etc. When done, they can save their work as image files or PDF files and can add those images to documents, slides and spreadsheets.

There has been much said about mail etiquette and how not to craft an email. In this post, the writer will explore four types of emails you can send to start your day on a good note. You don’t have to turn them into a routine or force yourself to send them when you don’t want to. The idea is to develop the habit of keeping your communication amiable, or at the very least, civil, at all times.

This is a webcast showing how to drive safe Google Apps adoption in your school

A few simple shape tools in Google Drawings and Slides make it possible to easily create comics that blend photos and comic elements.
See the Tutorials page for an overview of the comic creation process. The Projects page has examples of one way the writer has used this technique in class. Other possible applications are also listed there.

The comics are a natural fit for some fun classroom creativity games. See that page for ways examples and tips.

There have been a lot of updates to the Google Drive app over the last year, and you may have missed some handy features. Below are a few tricks to help you make the most of using Google Drive on the iPad. This article will show you how to manage multiple Google Drive, and how to upload from other Google Drive accounts, camera roll, iCloud, Dropbox and more! -

Too much time can easily be wasted trying to format documents that have already been put together by someone else. If you use Google Docs, here are 24 time-saving templates that'll let you get on with using the documents, rather than struggling with putting them together in the first place. The templates below have been split into four sections; work, health, home, and travel, so feel free to scroll to the section that’s most relevant to you.…

In response to some requests asking about online  science video sources, Educational Technology and Mobile Learning has compiled here some of the best YouTube channels we uncovered from our archive. The channels feature a treasure trove of educational videos covering various scientific phenomena. The content is student friendly and you will definitely find things to incorporate in your classroom teaching.

Notable PDF is a useful tool to use for viewing and annotating your PDFs.  Notable PDF works with Google Drive and is also accessible offline. You can use it to view PDF files on your browser. You can easily highlight text, add comments, underline or strikethrough text and instantly share your PDF files with your colleagues and collaborators.

Now you can finally carry around all your treasured memories, everywhere you go. Google  lets us store unlimited photos in Google Photos, which was introduced at Google's developer conference in late May. So now, anyone using Google Photos can take as many photos as they want and never worry about accessing those treasured memories at any point in the future. That means you can carry photos of your friends and loved ones, your happy memories, and any random image you've happened to pick up along the way, wherever you go.

If you love Pinterest, you're going to love Google+ Collections! Essentially, they've brought the best thing about Pinterest into Google+! Read the full post to find out more!