Five on Friday

I hope you all had a wonderful spring break.  I know I did!  I did lot's of cleaning which makes me feel very accomplished.  Took care of some basic car maintenance.  And most importantly, spent lots of time with my family, especially my two amazing grandsons.  I feel well rested.  What I did not do was send out a Five on Friday last week.  I figured you all were doing the same types of things as I was and didn't have time to read it anyway. I do have some cool stuff to share this week though.

1.  First, how would you like to use your Google apps to create customized sticky notes?  I love sticky notes!!!  Well, here is a blog I stumbled upon which explains just how to do that and even gives you the template to use.  I hope you find this as amazing as I do!  After all, we all have tons of those notes stuck inside out desks, right?  Why not create personalized exit cards, etc. There were specific folks in each of my buildings that I immediately thought of when I saw this.  Have fun!

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2.  Chrome has a new extension created just for you math teachers!  EquatIO takes the pain out of creating equations, formulas, and math quizzes. With EquatIO, you don’t need to know any of that complicated math code. It understands what you’re typing or handwriting, instantly turning your expressions into clear, accurate on-screen formulas. And it works on Windows, Mac and Chromebook.  After 30 days you will be asked to upgrade to a premium version.  You can decide at that time if you want to pay more or just continue to use the basic features.  

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3.   Create a Google Slides presentation with images with a click of a button. Gather images in a folder in Google Drive. Open that folder in Drive and run the DriveSlides extension. DriveSlides creates a new presentation and drops each image on its own slide. The slide show can then be opened and edited by adding text or a design to the presentation.  I love it!

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4.  Docs will let you type with your voice. In a Google Doc, go to Tools > Voice typing … and click the microphone. It will dictate what you say. (This also works for typing speaker notes in Google Slides.)   What a great way to help students who struggle with handwriting yet have great ideas for stories.

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 5.  Friday at the Movies - We have worked a 4 day week and you know that always feels like an 8 day week so here is something that is non-educational just to make you smile.  And if Madea doesn't make you smile, just remember . . .we only have 5 more weeks!