Hidden Google Gems

There are certain moments in life when you realize that you have been doing something completely wrong. Today was one of those moments for me. Google is taking over the world. Everyone is impacted by Google in some way whether it be using Google Drive, Gmail, Google Calendar, and most commonly the Google Search engine. Even this blog is connected to Google. Google has caused for an extremely streamlined society. Google has very basic and easy to use features like emailing or searching for whatever your heart desires. Google also has some very complex features that can make life very easy. This post is going to look at three of the hidden gems that I discovered recently in Google; Google Task, Authentication Verification of emails, and Custom Search Engines.

1. Google Task- If you are anything like me you wear many hats. For example I am a teacher, husband, basketball coach, club moderator, assistant athletic director, and graduate student. (breathe in, breathe out) I have been running around stressed out for the past year due to the disorganization of my life. This disorganization is not intentional I just forgot an appointment here and there, look at my schedule at the last second and realize I have double booked myself.

We've all been here

Google Task is a hidden gem that will help to organize your life. It is a part of Gmail and helps to create a to do list. Here is a quick video tutorial on Google Tasks uses as well as how to get Google Task here.

After downloading Google Task you can download the app on the Android and Apple Store by searching "gTasks"

You can also create a tab on your toolbar. by doing the following
1.  Searching for Google Task in App Search Bar      

2. Click on Better Google Task

2. Authentication Verification- The next Google hidden gem is a simple authentication verification. This verifies the sender of your email to make sure that the sender is actually the real and not a virus or a phishing scam.

This is a simple way to help protect yourself from identity theft as well as well as keep you safe from any phishing scam. You can see how to enable this simple feature here

3. Custom Search Engine- The last Google hidden gem that I discovered is a custom search engine. As an educator this will be very useful in the coming years, especially for projects. So what a custom search engine does is allow you to put parameters on the content that is being searched. For example, if you are wanting your students to research a particular topic you can add filters and specific websites that will direct the search engine. This will help to create relevant and reliable sources.

Let's say you want your students to research about Richard Nixon and Watergate and use a regular Google Search. The third link down is wikipedia.com which is not a credible website because of the ability for anyone to edit the page.

With my custom search engine that same search topic will give you more reliable sources. I made the search engine to look for websites ending in .org, .edu and .gov. These websites are more credible. I also allowed for history.com and ushistory.org

The same search now garners these results:

Notice the top three results are from history.com and nixonlibrary.gov.
This video will help you create a custom search engine

I hope these little gems excite you as much as they excite me and as always use your voice to make a change.