Parents use Google to Write a Story for Their Child

Parents use Google Presentation to Write Stories for their Children

A Little Background
Our district is not a Google Apps for Education district.  I did have the privilege to help prepare teachers for the arrival of chomebooks. Teachers created their Google Accounts for homework and when they arrived, we dove right into Google Drive.  Everyone created a shared document and we randomly selected a teacher created doc to begin collaborating on.  Ideas began to fill the page. English teachers could see students writing in Google Docs and sharing it with the teacher and other students to proof read.  Teachers could see themselves using the comment feature to leave comments on student work.  Teachers could see themselves carrying a lot less paperwork home with them. They loved the idea of not worrying about a specific tool to open up a word processing document to edit.  "It saves automatically?" "I can see it on my smart phone!"   Let's just say, I had really good time.  I think the teachers did too!

All About Me Story
Two days later, I arrived early to set up for an after school session with teachers.  As I walked into the library, I saw many parents working on the computers. They were lead by two of Literacy coaches I had in my session a few days prior. They were beginning a project with parents to help them write a story "All About Me Story" for their child.

Parents had been invited to attend every other week to work with them.  They had prepared templates for parents and loaded them onto flash drives.  There was a problem, the computers in the library did not have Microsoft Office.

The Principal, that came to my session, had the solution, why don't you try Google Docs?  (Goose bump moment. YES!!!) The two of them took off.  Parents were creating accounts or logging into their Gmail accounts and had their first experience with Google Drive.  Let's just say creating the "All About Me Story" wasn't glitchy and no one lost their work. :)

It was a proud moment.  I was able to see see the results one session had.  It didn't just reach students, it reached parents!  Too Cool!!!