Tag: tool

Animated Timers for Google Slides

Dale Leave a comment

I’ve always been fussy about how my Google Slides look. And it’s always bugged me that the only real countdown timer option is to just shove a YouTube video in there. It works, sure, but it never really fits. The timer shouldn’t be the focus of the slide; it should just blend in. Too often I find that the embedded videos are clunky and stick out like a sore thumb.

So, I decided to make my own timers. I created some progress bar countdown timers using just the animations in Google Slides. I made a variety of durations – 30 seconds, 1 minute, 3 minutes, and 5 minutes.

For the progress bars, it’s all simple shapes and I’m fading them out one by one. Since Google Slides animations max out at 5 seconds, I just stacked a bunch of those fades together until I hit the time I needed.

How to get them into your slides:

First, grab a copy of my timer slides and put them in your Google Drive. Then, in the slideshow you’re working on, go to File > Import. Find the timer slides, click “Insert,” and pick the timer you want.

Important: Uncheck “Keep original theme” before importing. Then, after it’s in your slide, go to Layout and pick a layout from your theme. You’ll also need to go to Background and reset it to match your theme’s background.

Now, your timer slide is empty, so copy and paste your content onto it. When you start the slideshow, the timer will kick off on the first click, fading those 5-second blocks until it’s done.

Changing the colors:

The easiest way? Click on the progress bar, go to the color selector, and you’ll see the last three theme colors. Those are tied to the timer.

  • The first color (accent 4) is the progress bar’s border color.
  • The second (accent 5) is the color of the fading blocks.
  • The third (accent 6) is the background between the blocks.

You can tweak those theme colors, or you can get a little more hands-on.

If you want to change the colors of the individual blocks, it’s a bit more work. You’ll need to zoom in, select the pieces, and send some layers to the back. Then you can select the individual blocks and change their colors. It’s a bit fiddly, but you can get it looking just how you want.

Here’s a video showing you exactly how I do it:

Grab the template:

Download the Google Slides timer template here.

I hope you enjoy these timers as much as I enjoyed making them.

Bonus Timers!

There’s also two 10 second counters in the template. To change the color of the counter, drag a selection box around all the red objects on the right and then select a new color.

Three apps to help your iPad dress up like a PC

Dale

Don’t get me wrong, the iPad is great. However, some of us have lots of our work living in the Windows environment. To help us out, many apps have been created for the Apple tablet to help us out.

I'm a PC
I'm a PC

Below are three free apps that try to bring a few more windows to the iPad.

  • PocketCloud – Pocket Cloud lets you access your work or home Windows PC via Remote Desktop. There are several other apps in the Apps Store that offer this functionality but for a fee. When you need to get to your computer using only an iPad, PocketCloud does the job nicely in a touch environment
  • CloudOn – CloudOn is an interesting new app that allows you access to the files in your DropBox account so you can edit them in a virtual version of Word, Excel, or PowerPoint. The service was simple to set up but I did find editing documents to have a bit of lag.
  • OnLive Desktop – The OnLive Desktop app takes virtual computing a step farther for iPad users by giving you an entire Windows desktop (Start menu and all) to play with. OnLive Desktop gave me the smoothest transition back to the Windows world. Creating an account (and waiting for it to activate) took longer than I expected but it came with 2GB of free storage for all my Windows files. Editing documents in MS Office was much smoother than CloudOn and I found this app to be a great way to show off PowerPoint presentations.

I should be clear about one thing. None of the apps above will replace your Windows PC. You won’t have an iPad that runs Windows too. The apps above are close but some things are are just not the same in a touch environment. If you’re an iPad user who also runs Windows, all three apps above are worth taking a look at but don’t throw out your PC just yet.

When using QR codes, make sure your punch line is worth it

Dale 1 Comment

What is this?QR codes have been turning up everywhere from the billboard at the bus stop to the back of the ketchup bottle at your favorite restaurant. These blocky little squares are beefed up barcodes that anyone with a smartphone can scan.

We’re starting to see them pop up in classrooms too. We now have QR code scavenger hunts, periodic tables, and worksheets.

QR codes are great for passing long URLs to your students’ devices. I think they work best when you want to conceal information for a period of time while the students try to solve a problem you have given them. For example, let students scan the QR code for a hint on a difficult problem or create a guess and check bulletin board to review a recent lesson.

Scan and find your science teacher
Scan and find your science teacher

However, are they always worth the time? QR codes are not as quick as they’re name (quick response) makes them sound. They are not worth the time for short messages that your students could probably type in faster than scanning. They are especially slow if your students do not already have the app required to read the codes installed on their device. You risk losing your lesson tinkering with technology for technology sake.

McKee Floyd, director of brand development for Sweetgreen, said it best when he spoke with NPR:

The issue I have with QR codes is that marketing is a little bit like telling a joke, and the longer the joke, the better the punch line has to be — and [using] QR code is a really long joke

I think the same is true in the classroom. If you’re going to use QR codes with students, make sure your punch line is worth it.

Are you texting enough in school?

Dale 2 Comments

According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted in the spring:

Young adults are the most avid texters by a wide margin. Cell owners between the ages of 18 and 24 exchange an average of 109.5 messages on a normal day—that works out to more than 3,200 texts per month—and the typical or median cell owner in this age group sends or receives 50 messages per day (or 1500 messages per month).

Here’s how the rest of the nation breaks down.

Who Texts
Wow! According to this table, I’m over 65!

Read the whole report.

This reminds me of a Dilbert I saw recently.

I’m with Dilbert, but our students are not.

Here are two ways to use text messaging with students:

  1. post announcements to Twitter and have students follow via text message
  2. use Google Voice to have students text their questions to your email

Convert that old hard copy with OCR

Dale

Despite my love for computers, I’m not strong when it comes to typing. The idea of retyping something makes me cringe.

That’s why I was so happy to stumble upon Online OCR.

Out with the old and in with the new
Out with the old and in with the new

Using optical character recognition (OCR), this site will take any old document that you’ve scanned in as a PDF and convert it to editable text.

Google can’t do this

Dale 1 Comment

Like many people, I often go to Google for answers. However, when you need to do calculations or access raw data, Wolfram Alpha easily beats Google.

For example, the other day I needed to know what date is 60 days after February 11th. Sure I could get a calendar and start counting but it only takes seconds to do this:

Below are a few of my other recent inquiries:

Start your own investigation or check out their examples to get an idea of Wolfram Alpha’s power.