Interactive Google Slides Presentations!

This week in the Ed Tech world I decided to create a Google Slides presentation to present a How-To seminar on using Google Classroom for the first time. I thought I knew quite a bit about Google Slides already, but for this presentation I really combined a lot of other apps and features provided that I had never used before. I am even more of a Google Slides fan now than I was before and I can't wait to use this more with my students! 

To start, the Google Classroom 101 slideshow I created is below. If you aren't a user of Google Classroom yet and hope to be, this presentation would really benefit you! There are short tutorial videos for a variety of tasks and features within Google Classroom!

The biggest takeaway I had from diving into Google Slides further this week was that you can truly make an interactive presentation. I've always known that you can hyperlink videos, websites, and images, but I had no clue that you can actually hyperlink to other slides within the presentation itself! This means that you can create an index page with live links to other slides in the presentation for your users to quickly advance to any section of your presentation! This would be GREAT for students to quickly access specific information or "chapters" within a lesson! 

The screenshot below shows how to do this! 

I also really liked the idea of adding a "home button" on each slide that takes users back to the index page! In the Slideshow that I created, I hyperlinked an image that directed back to the index page of the presentation! This is just another interactive feature that makes the presentation easy to navigate and extremely user friendly! 

Give it a try in my Google Classroom 101 presentation above!

________________________________________________________________

Another great discovery this week about Google Slides is how many theme templates are available to download from the internet. I'm a BIG advocate for the aesthetic appeal of presentations, assignments, and instructions for both students and adults alike! Below are several great links to websites that offer many different Google Slides theme options!

• Slides Carnival
• Free Google Slides Templates
• GraphicRiver
• EnvatoTuts

________________________________________________________________

The last big ah-ha moment came in how easy it is to make tutorial videos and embed them into your own presentations. It should come as no surprise that any time our students want to learn to do something they turn to YouTube! Why do we not use this knowledge and the free tools available to capitalize on this more?! If you've not used Screencast-O-Matic before you need to install it immediately! It is a a FREE tool for recording screencasts, or the actions you are carrying out on your computer screen, as well as audio. This allows you to create simple How-To videos the SHOW how to carry out a task while you speak instructions or tips over the top. 

To make it EVEN easier, once you are done recording, Screencast-O-Matic allows you to directly upload your videos straight to your YouTube account!

 

Once your videos are on your YouTube account, adding your tutorials to your interactive Google Slideshow has never been easier! Simply "insert" a video on the slide and copy and paste the URL of your YouTube video! 

See the screenshot below!

By combining all of these features and tools together, I was able to create an interactive Google Slideshow that will be easy to navigate and extremely beneficial to new Google Classroom users. Imagine to possibilities of using this as an instructional tool in your classroom!

Every teacher's FIRST question: Is it user friendly?!

If this isn't your first question when looking at a new online tool or resource to use with your students, then I'm not sure what is. (It definitely should be!) We've all asked ourselves this at one point or another. Thinking of ways to explain how to access or login to a resource to my students is where my head IMMEDIATELY goes when I'm exploring new tools. This week, I explored some ways to help ease that anxiety and and angst about user friendliness!

Allow me to introduce you to SYMBALOO! Watch the short video below for a full explanation on what Symbaloo is and has to offer you in your classroom!

Do you have several resources or tools that you already use regularly in your classroom? Does your team of teachers use different platforms or learning management systems? Are you working on a unit where students need quick access to specific resources and websites? Symbaloo is PERFECT for you. It creates quicklinks to all of your tools and because it is live it can be customized and changed at any point. And the biggest appeal of them all is the visual appeal that Symbaloo offers to your students. Not only are the "tiles" live links, but you can also customize the image on the tile so students can easily navigate where they need to go. Still not convinced? Take a look below at the webmix that I use with my students. I've updated it over the past two years to reflect the tools, resources, and websites that my 6th grade students will need throughout the year. 

So it answer the first question: Is it user friendly? ABSOLUTELY. Students are not required to login to anything when you send the link to your class Symbaloo. Even better, Symbaloo allows you to embed your webmix (as I have done above) into just about any website or platform. This means that your students have EASY and clickable access to all of your links and tools at any point. 

Is creating your own webmix user friendly, too? 100% yes! Because Symbaloo has so many users, you can search for tiles, such as Google Drive or Outlooks, that are popular and pre-created by other users. This not only makes creation easy but it also saves you a ton of time! Can't find the tile you're looking for or want to create a tile that sends your students to a very specific website? No problem! Create you own with just a few more steps and you can even customize the image that will appear on the tile for your students to see! 

STILL not convinced that you need Symbaloo in your life and in your classroom?! Click HERE to read 11 ways that you could create a webmix to improve your teaching, parent communication, and even your lesson planning!