Tag Archives: Google Workspace

How to make and share digital holiday cards

December 24 is the one of the few days my very large family all gets together. We have dinner and drinks, open gifts, play with the dogs, entertain the babies...it’s chaos, but the best kind. It’s also when we all get to hear what everyone’s been up to, and relive some of our favorite memories. 

This year, of course, we’ll each be celebrating with our immediate households instead of gathering as a large group. But in advance of Christmas Eve, I’m collecting photos and videos to create a special slideshow—sort of like a digital holiday card—we can all watch together via Google Meet. 

If you’re interested in doing something similar, here’s how I plan on using Google Workspace  (in particular, Google Meet and Google Slides) to put everything together. 

Step 1. Decide what you want to include. You could go the traditional holiday card route and share what you’ve been up to this year, but there are tons of other options. You could include photos of your holiday decorations you want friends and family to see, or maybe a list of favorite recipes you’ve been making. Personally, I’m going to include some favorite holiday memories as well as short videos and old photos. 

Step 2. Next, open Google Slides and select New Presentation. You can use templates, or start with a blank slate. I started from scratch and chose a dark blue background. I also experimented with creating some visual elements by choosing the Shape icon on the horizontal toolbar.

Images showing Google Slides open with a dark blue background and shape created trees and stars on the slide.

Step 3. For a little help with the design, I searched for holiday-themed graphics with transparent backgrounds and found some great icons and illustrations. Using Google Search, you can make this even easier by clicking Images and then Tools to select what type of image you want; under Type, you’ll see an option for “Clip Art.”

Animated GIF showing a dark blue slide with trees and stars and clip art of an pink ornaments and the words "let's celebrate!" being placed on the slide.

Step 4. After creating some slides, you can start pulling in photos and videos. I’m going to include some slides with photos of holiday memories, including these two photos of my sisters and myself visiting Santa. And for a more traditional holiday card approach, you can choose to add a text box and write a letter about your year. You can even add audio to a slideshow, and feel free to play around with animations.

Image showing a dark blue slide and two photographs of small children with Santa being inserted onto the slide.

Step 5. Once you’ve finished your “card,” you have a few options on how to share it. You can download it as a PDF or PowerPoint, or send a Drive link so anyone can view it or add to it if you want to make it a group project. You can even publish it to the web. I plan on hosting a virtual Christmas video get-together, and I’ll present my “card” in Google Meetand “open” it with friends and family. 

However you choose to make your digital “card,” you can be sure it won’t get thrown away anytime soon. And who knows? Maybe you’ll even start a new holiday tradition. 

Live captions come to Meet in four new languages

This year has marked a dramatic shift in how many of us work, learn and stay in touch with one another. And as many of us learn to embrace remote tools and virtual communication for the first time, it’s incredibly important to have inclusive, accessible and fair virtual meetings, whether you’re planning a return to the office, going fully remote or using a hybrid model, with some people together in person and some remote. 

For years, Google has focused on building products that help level the playing field. Google Meet, for example, uses speech-to-text technology to provide live captions in meetings; this helps participants who may be deaf or hard of hearing follow along and stay engaged. We introduced live captions in English last year, and starting today, we’re expanding live caption support to four additional languages: French, German, Portuguese (Brazil) and Spanish (Spain and Latin America).

More inclusive video calls

We know from our work with teachers and parents over the years how essential caption tools can be for students with learning disabilities, as well as English-language learners in both K-12 and higher education. Professional development experts often encourage the integration of this technology to make lessons more accessible, especially in the time of COVID-19. We’ve heard from Meet users about how helpful it can be to not only see who is speaking and view their expressions, but also read the text of what they are saying. By expanding live captions to more languages, we can help more students feel empowered to participate, and help more teachers share a space that is both accessible and inclusive. In addition, we’ve made captions settings “sticky,” so they’re even easier to use. This means that if you turn them on or off during a meeting, your preference will be saved, along with the chosen language, for future meetings.

Live captions in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese will begin rolling out to Meet web users across all editions starting today. Learn more about the rollout in our Google Workspace Updates blog.

Live captions in Meet in new languages

Making large meetings easier for more people

Earlier this year, we introduced breakout rooms in Meet to help educators create dedicated spaces for more focused discussions and track student engagement with attendance reports. We’ve continued to improve these experiences and have also made them available to more Google Workspace editions so that organizations can use group discussion formats. Below are the latest updates to these large meeting features that help organizations increase participation and engagement during a call. 

  • Breakout Rooms:A new countdown timer helps moderators keep everyone on task. Moderator requests call on the moderator to join a breakout room if participants need help or have a question, and dial-in participants and anonymous users can now participate in breakout rooms. 

  • Attendance Reports:Viewership data is now available for live streamed events like virtual all-hands meetings, and new advanced settings provide admins and hosts with additional controls over attendance reports.  

  • Hand raising:Participants can now let you know if they have a question or indicate that they would like to speak by raising their hand. In large meetings, this helps to increase participation while not disrupting the flow of the conversation and helps to prevent people from interrupting one another.

Staying connected over the holidays

As you turn to video to connect virtually with your loved ones this holiday season, Google Meet will continue to offer unlimited calls (up to 24 hours) in the free version through March 31, 2021 for Gmail accounts. This way, you can have enough time to keep up your holiday traditions virtually—and not get cut off before dessert.

Enhancing Add-ons in Gmail with Compose-time functions

Posted by Jon Harmer, Product Manager, Google Workspace

Google Workspace Add-ons can already do lots of cool things in Gmail. In addition to providing a way to interact with the other apps that you use every day, from the right hand sidebar as you read a Gmail message, Google Workspace add-ons can also provide another integration point: when you are composing new messages or replying to existing ones. This allows Google Workspace add-ons to make it easier for you to work with multiple applications when you are working on your daily routine of reading and responding to email.

More ways of creating

Previously, the only way a developer could modify the draft of a message in Gmail was by inserting content at the user’s cursor. But we have enhanced this functionality, and now you can enable your add-on to modify the To, CC, and BCC fields, the Subject Line, and you can insert content into the top or bottom of the message the user is composing.

This opens up a number of interesting possibilities. You could use the add-on to BCC your CRM, which allows you to log that message to the appropriate CRM record. Or you could insert a footer to the message or a tag in the subject line depending on who the message is being sent to. You can even insert message templates into the top of the email and help users to compose messages in order to give them a nicer look and feel.

Enhancing Add-ons in Gmail with Compose-time functions gif

Convenient and secure

These enhancements to Compose Actions are a new feature of Google Workspace Add-ons, which means the moment you authorize action with the feature, they will work in Gmail across mobile and web. Google Workspace admins can also easily allowlist the add-ons they want to enable for their organization.

Try Compose Actions today

Google Workspace and Gmail users can check out the Google Workspace Marketplace to find and install add-ons, with more compose actions coming soon. Developers can also consult our documentation to build their own.

Sign up for early access programs

If you want to subscribe to news & updates about the Google Workspace developer platform or sign up to be considered for any of our Early Access Programs, click here.

9 Chromebook and G Suite for Education features to make learning more accessible

Around the world, students with disabilities and diverse learning needs have been learning remotely, and teachers are finding new ways to practice inclusive teaching. In South Korea, Ryu Changdong, a blind teacher at Seoyun Middle School, when switching to online learning, struggled to gauge his students’ level of interaction with the lessons. While teaching remotely, he turned to Google Forms for quick surveys, knowledge checks and feedback before every lesson to help fill the void after not being able to rely on verbal clues like he would in class- and then used that feedback to inform his planning for the next lesson. In every school that’s using Chromebooks and G Suite for Education for learning, students with disabilities are also benefiting from tools that help them read, listen, and connect with classmates and teachers.


In honor of National Disability Employment Awareness Month, we’re shining a light on improvements to Chromebook and G Suite for Education accessibility features.

1. More colors for cursors on Chromebooks

To help students see cursors better on Chromebooks, they can choose from seven colors—red, yellow, green, cyan, blue, magenta and pink—in addition to default black. They can also make the cursor size bigger for more visibility. To change cursor sizes, go to the “Mouse and touchpad” section of Settings. 

02-cursor-color-change@2x.gif

2. Select-to-speak and ChromeVox improvements

To make it easier to focus on the spoken text, students can shade background text that is not being spoken aloud using Select-to-speak. This can be helpful for people with low vision and learning disabilities like dyslexia. To enable this select-to-speak feature, search for “Select-to-speak settings” within Settings. 

Voice Switching automatically changes the screen reader’s voice based on the language of the text being read, providing more clarity for pages containing multiple languages. We’ve also added Speech Customization, Smart Sticky Mode, and improved navigation in ChromeVox menus. Search for ChromeVox in Settings to try these new features. 

SS GIF.gif

Use Select-to-speak on Chromebooks.

3. Accessible test-taking for students on Chromebooks

Administrators can set Chromebooks into kiosk mode, so an exam app can run in full-screen mode on a device. When using kiosk mode for testing, Chromebook accessibility features are now more readily available and customizable- like screen readers, magnification, and more. And some testing providers like Pearson make it possible to access third-party accessibility tools from partners like Don Johnston and Texthelp. Later this year, we'll add the ability to set device accessibility policies so students with disabilities can use personalized accessibility settings. We also enabled the use of accessibility features built into Chromebooks when using locked mode in Quizzes in Google Forms, along with tools from partners mentioned above.

4. More support for braille in Google Docs

Students can use a braille display to read and edit documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and drawings. Now, with several improvements to braille support in Google Docs, like new keyboard shortcuts, faster typing echo and screen reader navigation, improved handling of punctuation and spaces, and more.

5. Live captioning in Google Meet

Live captions help make meetings more accessible by reducing barriers among students who are Deaf or hard of hearing, regardless of whether they’re participating remotely or in person. And now, captions are rolling out in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese.

6. Smart to do's in Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides

In Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides, when you use comments to assign tasks or action items, suggested action items will appear based on the content in your file. This is helpful for working quickly and making sure follow ups are noted.

7. Work hands-free in G Suite for Education

Students can use voice commands to carry out actions in G Suite such as navigating, selecting, and editing in Google Docs, sending emails in Gmail, and joining or leaving Google Meets. 

8. Closed captions in Google Slides

With this Google Slides feature, everything students and teachers say during a presentation in Slides can be shown as a caption at the bottom of viewers’ screens. It’s a helpful feature for people who are Deaf or hard of hearing, and can likely help all users better absorb a presentation’s content.

Perz GIF.gif

Use closed captions in Google Slides.

9. Live edits in Google Docs

Live edits are accessible through screen readers. This includes announcing changes, reading edited text, and also naming who’s doing the editing.

Where to get support

Read our Guardian's Guide for advice on using Chromebooks and G Suite for Education for learning from home. For additional support, check out Teach from Anywhere and the Chromebook accessibility hub.

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New safety and collaboration features in Google Meet

With the new school year underway, teachers are learning how to best manage their classes and continue to stay connected with their students. Here are new Meet features to help.

Digital whiteboard with Jamboard

Now you can use Jamboard to make your Meet lessons more interactive—start by preparing your digital whiteboard in advance of your lesson. When it’s time to start a class session, whiteboards are view-only to the class by default but can be made collaborative so all students can edit and build on one another’s ideas. Both teachers and students can present a whiteboard, but the teacher can restrict this using the “who is allowed to present” setting. If presentations are restricted, then students will still be able to view and collaborate on the teacher’s whiteboard.

Meet + Jamboard.png

Jamboard integration helps students collaborate and build on one another’s ideas. 

Breakout rooms

Breakout rooms allow educators to split students into simultaneous small group discussions. They are now available to G Suite Enterprise for Education customers, as many schools have started distance or hybrid learning, and will be launching to additional Google Workspace editions later this year. Over the next few months, we'll add new features like a timer and an "ask for help" option for participants to get the teacher's attention. With breakout rooms, teachers will be able to mirror their in-classroom teaching methods in Meet.

Breakoutrooms.gif

Allow increased engagement with breakout rooms and split students up for simultaneous group work. 

Attendance reports

Taking attendance can be time consuming, especially with remote classes. Teachers can save time with attendance reports, now rolling out over the next few weeks to G Suite Enterprise for Education customers.The report includes each participant’s name, email and the length of time the participant was on call, including initial join and exit time. Meeting organizers can securely receive these reports after meetings with more than five participants. Later this year we’re adding admin controls to enable or disable attendance reports for the domain and host controls to give teachers the choice to turn this feature on/off for each meeting.

Attendance Google Sheet [future use].png

Attendance tracking reports will automatically be sent to meeting organizers, sharing participant names, emails and length of time in meeting.

Q&A

The new Q&A feature, which G Suite Enterprise for Education customers will see in the coming days, allows students to ask questions without disrupting the flow of the lesson or discussion. Students can post their questions to a queue and other students can upvote questions so the teacher knows which to answer first. For better control, teachers can hide any questions and can enable or disable question submission at any time.

Q&A.png

Q&A helps students share and prioritize questions without interrupting lessons. 


Polling

And lastly, polling, now rolling out for G Suite Enterprise for Education customers. Polling allows teachers to periodically check in to make sure students understand the classwork and aren't falling behind. Instant feedback also allows teachers to adjust curriculum when students require extra development on certain subjects. Polls can also make classes fun with icebreakers to revive class engagement, start discussions or debate a topic. Checkout some tips on how to use Q&A and Polls here. 

Poll.gif

Polling allows teachers to get instant feedback from students

ICYMI: Recent launches to Meet for educators 

We recently made it easier for moderators to manage who can join their meetings with a simple toggle called Quick access. Educators also have new meeting controls to manage who can share their screen and who can send chat messages within the meeting to make the distance learning environment as safe as possible.

1342-GDU-Meet seetings-01.png

Education moderators can now easily control who can join, chat, or present during a meeting.

You can now blur your background in meetings (coming soon to Chrome OS), which offers class participants more privacy and limits potential distractions like an unmade bed or a friendly pet. And since many classes can’t be all together in person right now, we’ve made it easier to feel like you’re together with a larger tile view of up to 49 participants at once. 

If you have additional requests, please share your feedback within Meet as this helps us prioritize and accelerate the feature roadmap to best support educational needs. We’re here to empower teachers and schools to accomplish what they do best. Stay tuned to the G Suite Updates blog for all the latest updates coming to Meet.

Introducing Google Workspace to help you get more done

Whether at work or at home, people want to do great things. But for many, this means juggling a variety of apps and tools to stay connected—none of them centralized—which can make it hard to keep track of things or make progress on what matters. 


Today we’re announcing Google Workspace:everything you need to get anything done, now in one place. Google Workspace includes all of the productivity apps you know and use at home, at work, or in the classroom—Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Meet, Chat and more—now more thoughtfully connected. 


With Google Workspace, we’re introducing: 

  • A new user experience that brings together tools like chat, email, voice and video calling into a single, unified place. This is available to business customers now, and in the coming months we’ll make it available to consumers. We’re also adding helpful features like the ability to create and collaborate on a document within a room, the ability to see people in a meeting while you're collaborating together with Meet picture-in-picture, and more. 

  • A new brand, Google Workspace, that reflects this more connected, flexible experience for all our users. In the coming weeks, you’ll see new four-color icons for Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Meet, Chat and many more.

  • New ways for customers to get started with tailored offerings that meet their unique needs, from smaller businesses looking to make fast, often self-serviced purchases, to larger enterprises that have more complex implementation needs and often require more support. 

Learn more about Google Workspace on the Cloud blog.