A reminder, access to Flash-based browser content ends next month

Adobe Flash

Adobe Flash has been supporting online games, content, and interactive features since 1996. But with changes in technology, other mediums such as HTML5 which are more power-efficient, more secure, and faster, Flash has become less and less popular. At one point 80% of the interactive content on the internet was Flash-based. By 2017, that number was down to 17%. Noting the continual decline and lack of support across the industry, Adobe determined an End of Life (EOL) date of December 31st, 2020 for the plugin.

What does this mean?

Many different learning websites including sites such as Starfall and CoolMathGames were entirely Flash-based. When the announcement by Adobe was made to end Flash (plugin player support/updates and distribution), many websites started to convert their interactive content to HTML5 and other delivery mechanisms. However, it is up to websites to make this transition. So, as you are planning different learning activities for students, please ensure that you have vetted the website to see if it relies on Flash. A way to check to see if a site uses Flash, Right-clicking on any part of a website will make a box appear with options you can click on. If you see Zoom in at the top of the box and About Adobe Flash Player at the bottom of the box, then you know that you have Flash on the website.

If the site migrates to open web standards (such as HTML5), you shouldn’t notice much difference except that you’ll no longer see prompts to run Flash on that site. If the site continues to use Flash, and you give the site permission to run Flash, it will only work through the end of 2020 or possibly a bit earlier (Chrome v.87 might not have the player built in).

  • You can check if you have a version of Flash player in Chrome by typing chrome://components into the address bar. If you have Adobe Flash Player installed, you may still be able to play Flash content, but it’ll need to be enabled first.

For more information please check out these articles:

https://www.blog.google/products/chrome/saying-goodbye-flash-chrome/

https://theblog.adobe.com/adobe-flash-update/

https://www.online-tech-tips.com/computer-tips/flash-player-in-chrome-is-dead-in-2020-how-to-play-flash-files/

 

For those that teach IXL, access is available to content in four subject areas

IXL

If you are a teacher with IXL licensing, as a reminder, you can adjust the content that you can assign students, to include not just ELA and Math but also the subjects of Science and/or Social Studies* by clicking the boxes for those subjects within your teacher profile when logged into your IXL account.

FIRST LOG INTO YOUR ACCOUNT and SELECT YOUR PROFILE

IXL part 1

THEN CLICK SUBJECTS TO MAKE AVAILABLE….

IXL part 2

* Please note, while access to IXL ELA and Math extends through 2023, access to IXL Science and Social Studies is only available during the 2020-2021 School Year.

How visible do you want your Canvas course(s) to be?

A quick review of our Canvas courses after some teachers reported receiving access requests for particular files referenced in their courses from individuals not associated with the district shows that there are about 950 courses that are fully publicly visible, meaning that anyone with the URL can see all of the course content without needing to log in.  Since all courses default to Private (“Course”) visibility – the Course Settings would have had to manually been changed to “Public” visibility for that to be the case. Perhaps every one of those courses’ teachers want their course content to be available to anyone with the URL, but to play it safe,  consider taking a moment to review those courses you’d prefer were only visible to your students to confirm their visibility setting is as you’d expect and should it not be, change it from “Public” to “Course”.  Alternatively, if you’d now like to make “Public” a previously private “Course”, with a few clicks, you can make that happen.

This guide https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-customize-visibility-options-for-a-course/ta-p/844 explains the visibility options and this PDF https://s3.amazonaws.com/tr-learncanvas/docs/CanvasCourseVisibilityOptions.pdf has a helpful table with a breakdown of those visibility options.

Course visibility

How to extend access for students to a Canvas course past the term end date

Staff can decide whether or not to extend student access to view and/or participate in a Canvas course either before a course’s MISTAR start or after a course’s MISTAR end date. The decision to do so may be based on an interest in allowing students an additional time period to access course content or to interact with and submit coursework.

Please see this guide for the steps and considerations involved in making the adjustment –  https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-change-the-start-and-end-dates-for-a-course/ta-p/1039

and importantly, note: You can only change the course end date when your enrollment is active. Course dates cannot be changed once your enrollment has concluded for the course.

With that in mind, for those that have a Quarter 1 Canvas course, the first quarter ends Friday, November 6th, and if you want to extend access to your students to submit coursework towards that Quarter 1 Canvas course after that date, you will need to change the end date to override the 11/6/2020 date in the system BY THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5th so it is captured in the 11/6 sync. Please also note: Course override dates are only created if the Student Participation checkbox is selected. Since the term end date is the 6th, you will want to select that checkbox if inputting a date later than 11/6/2020.

The pic below is just an example of the setting to be changed….

Canvas extend course date

More uses for Google TASKS

Up until recently, Tasks has been a personal app where you can add your own tasks, give them due dates/times and tick them off as you go. If you don’t already use this app, you’ll see it on the right-hand side panel in most of the Google Workspace apps. [Incidentally, G Suite is now being called “Google Workspace.” This rebranding includes a deeper integration between various Google products. This change will not impact education domains until 2021.]

tasks

Anyway, you can now have a team task list in a Room. Here’s how it works…

  • Go to a ‘Room’ you are a member of [for how to create a room, see here]
  • Select the ‘Tasks’ tab

In there you can

  • Add a task
  • Give it a due date and time
  • Assign it to someone else
  • Tick off tasks that have been completed

tasks in rooms

Any tasks that have been assigned to you will also appear in your own Task list. Any due dates and times will appear in your Tasks calendar (in the Google Calendar app)

Tip: If you get the Tasks mobile app (available in both the Android and Apple stores), you will get a notification when a due date and time arrives.

Loom continues to add features

Loom

Loom’s education product remains free to teachers who have verifiable education email accounts (your @pccsk12.com is one such). Loom for Education gives teachers free access to nearly all of the features of Loom’s business (paid) account.

The recent updates to Loom that teachers should note include viewer insights, shared libraries, and new screenshot options. The viewer insights will let you see how much a video was watched and let viewers respond with emojis to your videos. The shared libraries function lets you share videos with some, but not all viewers (this is in addition to password-protecting videos). And the Loom desktop app for Windows and Mac now lets you capture and share screenshots with just a couple of clicks.

You can read more about their October plan changes here. Some of the feature set is shown below:

Loom features

Google’s Arts and Culture Website

Arts & Culture

Google continues to add to its Arts and Culture site offerings https://artsandculture.google.com/

To celebrate World Tourism Day, Google Arts & Culture partnered with UNWTO so that, despite the current restrictions, educators and students can experience different cultures, from the safety of your desk. AR, StreetView tours, videos, and exhibits bring the world to you. Check it out HERE!

The first ever retrospective of this 15th Century Italian female artist at the National Gallery, London. Watch videos, painting tours and exhibits to find out about the life story, work, and heritage of a pioneering woman. Check it out HERE!

In Art Zoom, a fascinating video series deconstructs famous works of art in ultra high definition, providing a new perspective on classic works of art. Read a blog posting at https://blog.google/outreach-initiatives/arts-culture/art-zoom/ 

REMC Connect’s latest newsletter

REMC’s October newsletter offers details on 12 free virtual courses, Teaching Strategies for Virtual and Blended Learning Environments webinars and more.

Two highlights are pasted below:

FREE WEBINARS: TEACHING STRATEGIES FOR VIRTUAL AND BLENDED LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

Learn general practices for virtual and blended learning environments with REMC’s new webinars:  “Introduction to Teaching Strategies for Virtual and Blended Learning Environments.”  Additional sessions explore grade-specific practices for English Language Arts and Mathematics content areas.

Teaching for Virtual & Blended LearningEach webinar offers a robust toolkit of resources to support teacher planning and student learning.  Participants may choose to attend one or more of the seven sessions. Sessions will be available monthly through March 2021.

To earn two (2) SCECHs per session. Participants must attend the live webinar and complete the assigned task following the webinar.

All webinars are free. Registration is open now for the November and December sessions. Register here: https://bit.ly/3jDOBDO

FREE COURSES: WE’VE ADDED YOUR FAVORITE REMC COURSES TO NOVEMBER’S VIRTUAL COURSES LIST!

Due to pandemic-induced virtual and blended learning environments, two REMC Virtual Courses have been extremely popular this fall:  “Making the Most of Your Google Classroom” and “Using SeeSaw to Inspire Learning.” These courses provide teachers with critical instruction for managing learning and connecting with students and families.  Now we’ve scheduled them again in November to meet the demand for these courses.

REMC Virtual Courses

The REMC Virtual Courses offer an easy, convenient way for teachers to connect and collaborate from the safety and convenience of home. The Virtual Courses are free, offer 10 free SCECHs when completed, and are open to all Michigan school personnel. There are no registration or SCECH fees because REMC SAVE’s vendor partners provide support for all REMC professional learning opportunities.

REGISTER NOW

Twelve (12) courses are offered in November. Each course is open for three weeks and consists of two (2) one-hour “live” webinars that are recorded and available for viewing later, and eight (8) hours of resource review, assessment developments and written reflection.

November 2020 Course Information
November courses begin on Monday, November 2.  The deadline for registration is Friday, October 30.

Ipads running IOS 14 — suggested setting change for Canvas student app

For Apple ipads running IOS 14, up until recently some images wouldn’t show up. A fix is in with Canvas’s release of an update (6.9.4) to their IOS Student App — there is a setting which should be changed (you might need to download the update if your ipad didn’t update itself) to ensure images show up. In the Device settings (iPad settings), when you go to the Canvas Student App from there, there is a checkbox to “Allow Cross-Site Tracking” that needs to be enabled. Click to enable and when students go to Canvas all of the images posted should be visible.
IOS update