Your Virtual Classroom

Scott La Counte

• Publisher: SL Editions
• Year: 2020
• eBook ISBN: 9781610422550
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Technology

There’s a Pre-Installed App for That

This chapter will cover: Google Docs, Sheets, Slides Scratchpad Google+ Hangouts Gmail YouTube Calculator Camera Chrome Remote Desktop Photos Keep Google Maps and Google My Maps Google Forms Drawings Play Music, Play Books, and Play Movies Google Calendar Google Play

Just like any computer, your Chromebook will have apps installed right out of the box. Here is an overview and what they’re good for.

GOOGLE DOCS

Google Docs, briefly, is Google’s version of Microsoft Word or Apple Pages. You can edit a document just like you would in any other processor, but it’s all online and synced automatically, which means it’s very difficult to lose anything. You can also share documents and collaborate in real time.

Docs really shines through its connection to Google Drive. Anything you start in Google Docs is automatically saved in your Google Drive account—no need to worry about losing work through power failures, device catastrophes, or really just about any other scenario. Changes are saved as you go, and so are versions, so it’s easy to revert to an earlier stage of a draft if you need to.

The main Docs menu consists of File, Edit, Insert, Format, Tools, Table, Add-ons, and Help. Each of these menu items contains a dropdown menu full of features. The full power of Docs is beyond the scope of this guide, but we’ll show you some of the basics.

Starting a New Google Doc

To start a new document, simply open Docs for the first time, or click File > New to open a new document. Notice that Google Docs > File > New will also let you start new Sheets, Slides, Drawings, or Forms projects as well.

Saving a Google Doc

Google Docs saves everything as you go so you’ll rarely need to save manually. You can find the status of your file to the right of the menu if you’re concerned. Google Docs does save your work offline as well, so if you’re not connected to Drive, you won’t lose your work and you can verify that Chromebook has saved it for you.





Formatting a Google Doc

You’ll find all the standard text editing options you’d expect in the top menu area, including font size, typeface, bold, italic, underline, text color, hyperlinks, and text alignment. If that doesn’t cover you, though, you’ll also find spacing, lists, indent control, and format clearing under More.



Collaborating Using Google Docs

Google Docs is hands-down one of the easiest ways to work on a group document. To invite people to share your Doc, click the blue Share button in the top right corner (note that hovering over this button will also give you the current shared status of your Doc).

You can add existing Google contacts by entering their names, or you can invite anyone through their email address. Note that your collaborators will need to set up a free Google Account to use Google Drive. You can choose the level of access you want collaborators to have—they can edit, comment, or merely view your shared document. You can remove them at any time by using the Share button again.

When two or more people are editing a document at the same time, you’ll be able to see that person’s cursor position and watch edits in real time. If you’re concerned about losing work, remember that Google Docs saves version history for you, so it’s easy to revert if you need to. Click File > See revision history (or press CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+G). By default, revisions are shown grouped into daily periods, but if you wa...

Table of contents

• Introduction
• Zoom
• Welcome to Zoom
• Getting Started
• Your First Videocall
• Advance Conference Settings
• Managing Zoom
• Google Meet
• Google Meet Overview
• Google Meet Environment
• Slack
• Introduction
• Welcome to Slack
• Channeling Slack
• Messages
• Slack Calls
• Account Settings and Apps
• Introduction
• Trello
• Welcome to Trello
• Crash Course
• Creating A List
• Creating A Card
• Creating Your Team
• The Butler
• Account Settings
• Introduction
• Tell Me the Basics and Keep It Ridiculously Simple
• All About Chrome OS
• Getting Around the OS
• All About Chrome OS
• There’s a Pre-Installed App for That
• Making It Your Own With Customizations
• Appendix A: Specs
• Appendix B: Shortcut Keys
• Google Apps
• Introduction
• Google Drive
• The Google Drive Crash Course
• Google Docs
• Google Docs Crash Course
• Your First Document
• Sharing Is Caring
• Beyond the Basics
• This and That
• Google Docs Keyboard Shortcuts
• Google Sheets
• Google Sheets Crash Course
• Getting Started With Google Sheets
• Beyond the Basics
• Sharing is Caring
• This and That
• Google Sheets Keyboard Shortcuts
• Google Slides
• Google Slides Crash Course
• Getting Started With Google Slides
• Sharing Is Caring
• Presenting Your Big Idea!
• Beyond the Basics
• This and That
• Google Slides Keyboard Shortcuts
• Lesser Used Google Apps
• Part 3: Google for the Classroom
• Introduction
• Getting Started
• Classwork
• Beyond Basics
• Google Forms
• About the Author