The slideshows below offer some helpful tips and tricks for more effective Chromebook usage.
Some Chromebook Usage Tips
Two Key Highlights from Zoom’s August Releases
New and Enhanced Features
- Focus Mode: In Focus Mode, only the host can see participants’ videos and profile pictures. You can start Focus Mode from the “More” menu on the toolbar of the desktop client. This setting is available at the account, group, or user level setting pages. To use Focus Mode, you must have desktop client version 5.7.3 or higher for Windows or macOS.
- Authentication exception for single instance of recurring meeting: If only authenticated users are allowed to join the meeting, account owners and admins can allow authentication exceptions for a single instance of a recurring meeting to allow guests to join the meeting. This feature can be enabled in the Meetings > Security Web Portal settings.
Focus Mode
Focus Mode does just that – it helps keep people focused in a Zoom meeting. Designed with educators in mind, Focus Mode places meeting participants in a view where they are only able to see themselves, the host/co-hosts, and the content they are sharing. In this view, hosts and co-hosts can also choose to view participants in gallery view, enabling them to see all participants simultaneously.
Don’t forget to download the latest version of Zoom to access these features and more.
REMC Back-to-School Learning 📅 Register for September Virtual Courses, earn 10 Free SCECHs
Passing along news from REMC: 2021 SEPTEMBER REMC Virtual Courses
Kick off the school year with new skills and tools to engage students.
Earn up to 10 Free SCECHs
Take advantage of September’s Virtual Courses for all your back-to-school needs. It’s a great time to learn a new skill in an instructor-led virtual course setting. Each course offers 10 free SCECHs, registration deadline is Friday, September 3rd.
The REMC Virtual Courses offer an easy, convenient way for teachers to connect and collaborate from the convenience of their home. The Virtual Courses are free, offer free 10 SCECHs when completed, and are open to all Michigan school personnel. There are no SCECH fees because REMC SAVE’s vendor partners provide support for all REMC professional learning opportunities.
- Formative Assessment Tools that Support Teaching and Learning
- Gamification for Student Engagement & Learning
- Learning to use Open Educational Resources on #GoOpen Michigan
- Practical Differentiated Instruction
- Storytelling to Enhance Teaching
Register by Friday September 3rd – Classes Begin September 6th.
If you have questions or need further assistance with your course registration, please contact Erin Rommeck, REMC Event Coordinator.
Two-factor authentication now required for MISTAR access
As shared in an earlier newsletter posting, due to enhanced cybersecurity insurance requirements in response to the dramatic rise in cyber-attacks, districts now have to ensure that staff pass two-factor authentication to gain access to personally identifiable data (PII), including student data, in two MISTAR applications (Q and Student Scan).
- Upon logging in, each staff user will be required to retrieve and enter a system generated six-digit number.
- The number will be emailed to their email address and will come from noreply@resa.net with subject MISTAR-Q Login Code.
- If logging into the mobile app and notifications for the app are activated on the device, the number may also be received via push notification.
- Staff will need to authenticate only once per day (as opposed to each login throughout the day) using the same browser and same device. Each browser or device will require authentication each day access is attempted.
- Each initial login attempt will generate an email of a different six (6) digit code and the most recently emailed code will be the only code that will work to successfully log in.
NOTE: since the Student Connection and Parent Connection applications accessed by our students and parents ARE NOT required to have two factor authentication at this time, our district has decided to NOT MAKE that a requirement for successful login for those account holders.
BrainPop subscription renewed for entire district’s access
Just a reminder that BrainPop (and at the elementary level, BrainPop JR) are available digital resources for all of our elementary, middle and high school students. Log in is via Clever (clever.com/in/pccs).
Their latest newsletter offers the following:
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District Overdrive subscription with Sora renewed
The online Sora app was designed around the modern student reading experience. This app, developed and curated by Overdrive, empowers students to discover and enjoy ebooks and audiobooks, for both leisure and class-assigned reading. ALL STUDENTS in all of our district’s schools AND ALL STAFF can log into our Sora page using their Google Accounts at http://links.pccsk12.com/sora and begin checking out ebooks!
Once logged in, students and staff are able to “borrow” ebooks and audiobooks from a selection of thousands of titles available in their school, district and/or Wayne county library collections. Check out this 2 minute video for how to access the app via the Google apps launcher (aka waffle) as well as how to add a library collection (only need to do that once per year).
Remember To Please Submit a Service Request if/when seeking Tech support
With over 2,000 staff members and over 15,000+ devices to support, it’s important to have a system to track issues, document trends, and assign support to the appropriate technicians or tech integration specialists. If you are needing assistance with anything technology related, we ask that you use the Service Request ticketing system. There are a couple of ways to access this system.
Go to links.pccsk12.com/helpdesk
Once there, to log in, you will input your district GMAIL Email address for your “Username”.
For “Password” you will input your network password (not necessarily your Google password) – Your network password is the password you use to log onto a district desktop computer.
Then you fill out the service form with the details that best describes your situation and support needs.
Alternatively, to locate the service portal…
- Browse to the PCCS Website: http://www.pccsk12.com
- Hover over Staff
- Click on Technology Service Request
If you might submit more than one service ticket during the year, consider bookmarking the Service Desk url by clicking the Star on the right side of the address bar (see pic below), so that it is easy to locate the page again.
Special Free PD from OTIS: Alice Keeler, Bryan Miller, & Michelle Blanchet
Looking for some tech-related PD? Consider signing up for a free basic OTIS account to access their free course content . Their calendar to see what’s available when can be found here. OTIS is bringing some special guests for great back to school webinars! They’re covering everything from Google apps, to coding, to engaging educators in professional learning. Two of their many sessions are noted below. More free courses can be reviewed and signed up for here.
Back to School with Google Forms
Tuesday, 8/17, 3 PM – Alice Keeler
Google Forms is the greatest thing since sliced bread. You know the basics of creating a Google Form, but what else can you do to leverage the learning power and student engagement elements of Google Forms? Let’s go over how to reuse your Google Forms from last year. Why and how to use Branching Forms. Join Alice Keeler to start the school year off right by upping our Google Forms game!
Teaching with Google Jamboard
Tuesday,8/24, 3:00 PM ET – Alice Keeler
Join Alice Keeler for this session, which is an intro for teachers on how to use Google Jamboard app in the classroom. It will cover everything from the basics of how to navigate to lessons/activities you can use today! Alice will also cover some important pedagogical considerations to help you know when and how to use Jamboard…
Some upcoming changes to students’ online access and experience
We’d like to alert you to two online services we use (Zoom and Google) who are enforcing changes to the student experience in the coming school year. In June we posted about Google’s upcoming age-based changes taking effect and have re-posted our information below with a bit more elaboration.
ZOOM meeting changes
This summer Zoom announced a policy change that will be going into effect in a few weeks that prohibits any student from having a Zoom account associated with a K-12 educational institution. This is being done in part to align their terms and conditions since people under the age of 16 aren’t otherwise permitted an account (up until now those under 16 had only been permitted under the “School Subscriber” terms within Zoom for Education accounts) and in part done to increase the security of meetings. Their new solution is called external authentication, which allows institutions to have an increased level of security without having students in their account. Students will be able to join Zoom meetings safely and securely without the use of a Zoom account and will simply authenticate for meeting access using their district Google account. Some FAQs they have shared are posted below.
Will Breakout Rooms work if my students do not have Zoom accounts?
Yes, you can still use Breakout Rooms as usual. If you would like to pre-assign students to Breakout Rooms, you will need to upload a CSV file with the details .
Will my guest speakers or teacher be able to join a meeting?
Any external guests will not be able to join the meeting unless that specific party has an authorized account in your SSO Identity Provider.
How is this different from standard Zoom/SSO Authentication?
This is authenticating users upon joining a meeting and does not create a Zoom account.
Can I pull a report of the students and have accurate attendance information?
Yes, all student’s names will be documented accurately with their associated email address.
[We had a virtual meeting with our account representative last month to discuss these upcoming changes and among other questions asked about the ability for users to add their personal pronouns. While they said that it was possible, it would have to be mapped via a field in Google since Zoom accounts were no longer going to be associated with our students. At this point, we’re not in a position to set up that mapping, but are looking into other options.]
Safer learning with Google for Education
- Google is launching a new, age-based setting to control their app experience for users that goes into effect next month. See this support page for more detail. [Since we don’t have a way to group students by their age in our admin console, these settings will apply to ALL of our students, from our youngest to any students at PCEP and Starkweather that might be 18 or older during their time in district.]
- After September 1, 2021, students will see changes in their experience across Google products. For example, after September 1, students in K-12 domains can view YouTube content assigned by teachers, but they won’t be able to post videos, comment or live stream using their school Google account. More specifically, our students’ district YouTube accounts won’t have access to or be able to…
- Create channels, playlists, stories, shorts, or upload videos
- Watch or create live stream events
- See or post comments
- Participate in live chat
- Use apps, including YouTube Go, YouTube Music, YouTube Studio, YouTube TV, and YouTube VR
- After September 1, 2021, students will see changes in their experience when signed into Chrome. For example, after September 1, to ensure a safer web browsing experience for K-12 institutions, SafeSearch and SafeSites will be on by default, and Guest Mode and Incognito Mode will be off by default.
- After September 1, 2021, students will see changes in their experience across Google products. For example, after September 1, students in K-12 domains can view YouTube content assigned by teachers, but they won’t be able to post videos, comment or live stream using their school Google account. More specifically, our students’ district YouTube accounts won’t have access to or be able to…
Two-Factor Authentication (for staff) to access MISTAR, goes into effect August 27, 2021
Due to enhanced cybersecurity insurance requirements in response to the dramatic rise in cyber-attacks, districts must ensure that staff pass two-factor authentication to gain access to personally identifiable data (PII), including student data within MISTAR. Districts, including ours, are required to enable two-factor authentication for staff accessible applications (Q and Student Scan) by August 27, 2021.
NOTE: The Student Connection and Parent Connection applications accessed by students and parents ARE NOT required to be enabled at this time.
- Upon logging in, each staff user will be required to retrieve and enter a system generated six-digit number.
- The number will be emailed to their email address and will come from each user’s own email address.
- If logging into the mobile app and notifications for the app are activated on the device, the number may also be received via push notification.
- Staff will need to authenticate only once per day (as opposed to each login throughout the day) using the same browser and same device. Each browser or device will require authentication each day access is attempted.