The End Is Near!

We are at the middle of May, and we are really close to the end of the school year! It's actually a bittersweet time for me -- I am looking forward to summer and the plans I have, but I also get lonely and bored kind of quick during the summer now because my kid is all grown up and lives away from home. So I get itching to get back to work kind of quick!

The end of the school year is also a stressful time -- there are so many little things to do and not nearly enough time! So, let me add to the pile :-) Here are two things for you to CONSIDER doing at the end of this school year -- or even during the summer, sitting on your patio sipping a sweet tea:

1. Archive your Google Classroom.
2. Upload all your H drive files to Google Drive.

Archiving Google Classroom
At the end of the school year, you may want to archive your Google Classroom. This removes it from your list of active classes as well as from your students' list of active classes. You (and your students) can still access the archived classes; they just can't be modified. This access is good for you so you can look back to see resources you used and use them in your next Google Classroom. It's also good for your students so they can go back to see resources you shared (might sound something like this: Do you remember way back in 2nd grade, Mrs. Byers had those weather websites in her Google Classroom for us to use? I could sure use those now as I work on my Dream Lab project about developing a helmet people who work outside can wear if they get stuck in a hailstorm!). Archiving is easy and quick -- a few mouse clicks! Here's a big THANK YOU to Rachel at Three Rivers who put together this terrific document explaining archiving and giving step-by-step directions how to do it (if you need help beyond this document, feel free to reach out to your building-level tech (BLT) -- Mary Jo at NBG; Robyn at PP; Rachel at TRS; or me at CJHS.

Upload Your H Drive Files to Google Drive
We had a full year of Google this year, so why not take the next big step and ditch the H drive? By uploading all your files to Google Drive, you can access them from anywhere -- no more having to be in CSD 17 to access your files! No more emailing them to yourself at home and then back to work! No more saving to a flash drive! You might be thinking that MS Office files can't go in Google Drive, but that's not true! They CAN go in Google Drive -- but they are only viewable there, not editable. If you need to edit any of those files, all you have to do is open them as a Google file:

• Word = Google Docs
• PowerPoint = Google Slides
• Excel = Google Sheets

Then you'll have an editable copy to work with! (Full disclosure: if you have a highly formatted file created with Office -- lots of fancy fonts, text boxes, tab settings, etc. -- that formatting might not transfer over to Google perfectly.)

Ready to make the jump from H to Google? Just follow these steps:

1. Open your H drive.
2. Create a new folder called “H Drive Files”.
3. Drag all the files/folders in your H drive into your new folder.
4. Open your Google Drive.
5. Click New.
6. Click Folder Upload.
7. Locate your H Drive folder.
8. Click Upload.

Again, if you need help, just get in touch with your BLT!!!

Enjoy the last couple weeks of school, then have a restful, rejuvenating summer!