Digital Microscopes – A Comparison

Digital Microscopes – A Comparison

by | Jan 25, 2021 | GSuite

Jiusion Digital Microscope

$30.99 at amazon.ca

Pros

Small, Easy to store, takes very good pictures. Adjust lights on the cord of the microscope. Takes very good photos.

Cons

The stand is not very high, nor very steady. Needs to be positioned higher (on a book for instance) in order to view and capture the images of the matter being inspected. Must hang on to microscope while taking photo.

Jiusion Digital Microscope & Stand

$39.99 at amazon.ca

Pros

Small, takes very good pictures. Stand holds the microscope steady for observation and capturing. Stand adjusts up and down with a knob, and maintains the straight angle on the matter being inspected.

Cons

The stand makes these microscopes take up additional storage space. The ring that holds the microscope in the stand makes focusing a tiny bit awkward.

Inskam Digital Microscope & Stand

$47.99 at amazon.ca

Pros

Small, takes very good pictures. Stand holds the microscope still for observation and capturing. Measurement built onto microscope stand where it cannot be lost.

Cons

The white stand reflects the lights from the microscope back into the photo. Grid is measured in 5mm by 5mm squares, with no option to change it to micrometers.

Sample Image

The same sweater fibre has been photographed under each microscope, for the sake of comparison. The two Jiusion microscopes (left and centre) definitely take a better quality photo. 

Conclusion

The IMC will have a kit containing the middle microscope with the steadiest stand. These microscopes are easy to use with chromebooks, so science teachers interested in booking a class set of digital microscopes will have that option. The two jiusion microscopes are very similar in their images, however, the one with the flimsy stand is likely to frustrate some students.

If schools are interested in purchasing digital microscopes and wish to test the three demonstration models out, contact Michelle and she will send you the three to test out and inspect.

Putting Work Online

Putting Work Online

by | Dec 14, 2020 | GSuite

There’s an old saying: “There is more than one way to skin a cat”.  This is true of putting work online for students.  We are going to look at pen-and-paper type work in this post.

First, there is the .pdf way. A worksheet can be scanned on your school’s copier to .pdf and loaded to Google Drive. Staff and students have access to Kami for annotating on .pdf files. If you choose “Create Kami Assignment” on your classwork tab in Google Classroom, that should force the assignment to open in Kami for all students. If you’re not familiar with Kami, I did a 15 minute crash course blog entry recently.

A screenshot set as the background in a Google Slide is another way to make a paper-and-pen assignment accessible for students to respond to. (Taking a screenshot on a chromebook is easy) and once you’ve got that screenshot, you can set it as a background image and students can apply textboxes over it as needed.

Screencastify Tutorial

Screencastify Tutorial

by | Dec 11, 2020 | GSuite

If you are new to Screencastify and are looking for some help getting started, this tutorial covers the content that we went through in the live Google Meet on Dec. 10, 2020. If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to Michelle.  The link for Canadian Copyright law with respect to reading books aloud and recording the reading cis important to check if you are considering reading to your students in a recording.

Bandwidth – Maximizing and Troubleshooting

Bandwidth – Maximizing and Troubleshooting

by | Dec 9, 2020 | GSuite

As we move toward a week of at-home learning for all students in Alberta at the start of January 2021, we are offering this tutorial to try to help families maximize the capacity of their home internet connection without incurring additional costs to the internet service providers. There are many things that can be done for free to try to improve the Google Meet experience.

This video will give an analogy for the internet and bandwidth and then take you through some ideas to improve your home connection.

Summary

  • Move closer to your router. Try to attain 3 bars.
  • Do a speed test of your download & upload speeds.
  • When possible, download content the night before it is needed (especially video content).
  • Enable offline mode for GSuite (Google Docs, Slides, Sheets).
  • Powercycle your router.
  • Set Google Meet’s layout to “spotlight” (and don’t use blur/change background).
  • Remove household cell phones from the wifi, or turn them off.

 

Google Meet – Walkthrough of the New Features

Google Meet – Walkthrough of the New Features

by | Dec 7, 2020 | GSuite

When Google rushed Meet to market in March, there were many features in the works that weren’t ready yet. The quarantine likely caught them as off-guard as it caught us.  But, now, nine months later, there are many new features in Google Meet. This 18-minute video will take you through each of the new features and demonstrate how to use each.

At 16:20 I show how I created a link on March 16 and am still using the same link almost 9 months later.

Attendance Reports in Google Meet

Attendance Reports in Google Meet

by | Nov 26, 2020 | GSuite

It’s a new feature, and one that we, as teachers, really love. An attendance report provided to us after a Google Meet. Awesome!!

As with most new features, the roll-out is gradual. So, sometimes you may receive an attendance report, and other times you may not. In the coming weeks, these reports will become a regular feature of Google Meet, but they aren’t quite there yet.

To receive the attendance report, you MUST be the owner of the Google Meet. So, that means you want to be the first one in the meet, and you do not want to be using the Meet link generated in Google Classroom, becuase those ones are straight-up glitchy!