You learn something every day.

We've got this policy of only using students' last initial to protect privacy, but that has gone by the wayside when I've had students uploading files with Google accounts with their school e-mails. But today I noticed that a student's upload came through with just her first name, last initial. It was as simple as putting her name in the Google profile, which apparently most of the other students had not done. Yay!

Uploading

Four Google sites. Open to the class, not the public. Prayer students uploaded mp3's. Got a .wav or two, and a couple of .aup's. We'll try to figure that out during an off day tomorrow.

Frosh: some difficulties getting into the site. Some already had Google accounts but with e-mails other than the school e-mail, so the website did not recognize and authorize them to enter. Maybe some other problems, too.

I am very, very much in favor of having frosh set up Google accounts with their Mercy e-mails at orientation. If we're going to use this technology and these laptops, let's just get one step out of the way. I'm not the only teacher using Google apps.

One student couldn't upload her photostory because the file was too big. "It's really long," she said. And truthfully, I don't even know how much my Google site will hold and whether the various projects will fit. A little bit of trial and error here.

So, not everything is uploaded yet. But what I've got so far, I like! I gave a choice of formats because I hoped the girls would pick something they are comfortable with, and could be creative with and have some fun. And in many cases, I think that has happened.