Thing 24: Google Drawings

I am an English teacher, or, in other words, I am a thief.  Any good idea that I see, I want to steal. 

Just last week, I was lamenting about trying to recreate a Frayer Model worksheet in Google Docs, which I had previously created in Microsoft Word. To me, Word was much more user friendly, but we have to re-do everything in Google Docs now, so I will just stop complaining before I become too annoying.

I finally gave up and just did the best I could with a simple table.  And then I discovered Google Drawings as a Cool Tool I could play around with.  I like putting pictures in my work, and I thought that Google Drawings might give me some useful tools.  But when I opened it up and began reading the articles, what is one of the first things I discover?  Matt Miller's "25 Free Google Drawings Graphic Organizers and How To Make Your Own."   

I don't want to tell you how fast I was in downloading these to my own Google Drive, and among them, what do I find?  None other than my own beloved Frayer Model:

I like his idea, too, of making this accessible to my students on-line through our Google Classroom, and giving them the chance to make their own copies and then complete them.  It could make the illustrations a lot more interesting if students can insert images that they find on-line.  And it will mean less time at the copier for me.

Another article that I really liked was Matt Miller's  "Google Drawings Interactive Posters (no glue sticks necessary!)"  I like the idea of setting up assignments for my students, which I can post on our Google classroom, and they can simple follow the links to all the sites I want them to visit, and all the parts of the assignment that I expect them to complete.

I used Google Drawings to make an interactive poster, including links to three of the resources in this lesson (two to the magnetic poetry creators, and one to the magazine cover templates).  If you click on the image, the link will take you to the website where you can create your own magnet poem or magazine cover.  (These resources were covered in "Get Creative with Google Drawings" by Tony Vincent.)

 
Unfortunately, the problem that I am encountering as I post this here, is that I created it as a Google Drawing, and to include it here, I had to use my snipping tool and import it as a picture.  (If someone knows a way I can post it in my blog and still retain the interactive functionality of the links, I would welcome his or her advice!)

Click here to view the actual Google Drawing, and then you will be able to click on the links and have them work. 

Google Drawings is not exactly what I had expected to find, but I find it much more useful, and I can see a lot of ways I can use this myself.  I think it would be great to have the students use it to make Interactive Posters, I am just concerned about how much time it might take to teach them the program.  I could be underestimating my students, though.  They may be lightyears ahead of me.