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Google Education Summit Teaches Teachers About Google Apps

The summit hosted more than 400 teachers and gave tutorials on how to maximize the potential of Google's free educational apps and workshops.

(TNS) -- More than 400 educators throughout the state filled Bakersfield, Calif's Ridgeview High School classrooms this weekend for a summit to teach teachers how to use Google apps and tools to transform the way they educate students locally.

The Google Apps for Education Summit packed dozens of workshops and tutorials into two daylong schedules keeping educators from 7:30 a.m. to at least 5 p.m.

They learned how to create and share graphics, videos, presentations and documents all using Google and other web-based products.

Three Arvin High teachers sitting near a grassy lawn near the Ridgeview High auditorium for lunch said this was not the kind of summit where presenters spit out a bunch of information, leaving listeners to wonder what they would do with it all.

Two of the teachers, Aleida Rojas and Kimberly Lee, said they planned on implementing some of the apps and tools they learned with students Monday morning.

Rojas said she started creating her next chapter test using a game-based learning platform dubbed Kahoot.

She held off on finishing the test though because she wanted to allow students to make up some of the questions, which the platform allows them to do.

“It’s important because that way I know the kids’ needs,” she said.

Rojas, a history teacher, did say she’s worried about her school’s capability to support increased internet use. She said Wi-Fi isn’t very reliable.

The need to implement new technology while also updating infrastructural needs to support that greater technology use is a problem school districts throughout the state are grappling with and the Kern High School District has laid out a plan to solve.

Lee said she knows the district is working on it. In the mean time, Arvin High teachers planned to roll some of the newly-learned technology out with advanced placement students first.

“It’s a lot of information and bells and whistles we’re not used to,” Lee said.

©2015 The Bakersfield Californian (Bakersfield, Calif.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.