Tony Vincent

Graphic showing thumbnails of the contents of Issue 40 of the Learning in Hand Newsletter

The first issue for August has landed! 🛬 #EduSky

🪜 Student Support Settings in Wayground
🚀 Fueling Fascination with FigJam
🎤 Microphone Magic
😜 Grab and Go Goodies
😢 Farewell to a Favorite
🪑 Smart Seating
🙌 Fantastic First Five
👋 Goodbye for Good Goo․gl

learninginhand.com/issue40

Student wearing a T-shirt and a 3D-printed necklace with the Pixel Paws logo

From "Making Discoveries" to "Pixel Paws" to "Birds of a Feather," I’ve seen how branding a class builds identity and community. #EduSky

Read about the value of co-creating the brand with students: tonyv.me/brandnl

Today's First Five Collection - Edtomorrow [...]Read More... from Today’s First Five Collection

First Five from EdTomorrow gives teachers free daily activities that foster fun and connection in the first 5 minutes of class. #EduSky

Along with versions for Grades 2–5 and 6–12, there are now options for PK–1 and Spanish!

www.edtomorrow.com/today/

Tip Tuesday! Know your dashes... #EduSky

👉 Hyphen (-) joins words (student-made project)

👉 En dash (–) shows ranges (Aug 5–9)

👉 Em dash (—) adds emphasis (Humans used em dashes—long before AI learned them)

#BookSky 💙 📚

Google URL Shortener links will no longer be available Understand how you will be impacted by our decision to turn off the serving portion of Google URL Shortener.

Google shut down their link shortener in 2019. Links made with goo.gl have continued to work ever since. But that’s about to change. On August 25, goo.gl links will stop working and show a 404 error. #EduSky #EdTech

developers.googleblog.com/en/google-ur...

August Activity Journal August’s Activity Journal is here! Explore fun activities for Blogger Day, Hip Hop Day, National Toilet Paper Day, and more. Create, share, and keep the learning going all month long!

It's a new month, and Book Creator has an activity book with a page for every day in August.

ChatGPT Knows Me—Here’s What It Thinks I Do Best — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent ChatGPT remembers details about your work, writing style, and projects—so I asked it, “What am I best at?” Its response made me smile and got me thinking about other prompts that tap into AI’s…

ChatGPT remembers details about my work, writing style, and projects—so I asked it, “What am I best at?” Its response made me smile and got me thinking about other prompts that tap into AI’s memory for personal insights.

iLovePDF | Online PDF tools for PDF lovers iLovePDF is an online service to work with PDF files completely free and easy to use. Merge PDF, split PDF, compress PDF, office to PDF, PDF to JPG and more!

I Love PDF is a collection of 26 tools to modify, enhance, and convert PDFs.

☯️ Merge PDFs
↔️ Split a PDF
✏️ Edit a PDF
🔄 Rotate a PDF
✒️ Sign a PDF
🌊 Watermark a PDF
📉 Compress a PDF
🟧 PDF to PowerPoint
🔐 Password a PDF

www.ilovepdf.com

Tip Tuesday! Press the zero key on your keyboard to instantly restart a video on YouTube. #EduSky

Burst Mode on iPhone & iPad — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent Burst mode on iPhone and iPad is incredibly handy for capturing action shots or quick poses.

Burst mode on iPhone and iPad is incredibly handy for capturing action shots or quick poses. #EduSky #EdTech

YES Symmetry Puzzle in Google Slides and PowerPoint — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent Get a copy of this puzzle in Google Slides or PowerPoint! Can you arrange the Y, E, and S pieces in a way that has a line of symmetry running through it horizontally or vertically?

Can your students solve this symmetry puzzle? YES, yes they can (but it might take a while).

🆓 Get this challenging digital activity for Google Slides or PowerPoint.

Recolor SVG images in PowerPoint, Keynote, Canva, and Google Slides — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) images can be resized and edited without losing quality because they are made up of mathematical paths instead of pixels. I love using SVGs in my documents because I…

Bring harmony to your slides—recolor SVGs to match your theme! Check out my quick how-tos for PowerPoint, Keynote, Canva, and Google Slides.

Thumbnails for three FigJam templates

I made three FigJam templates for classrooms:

#️⃣ Tic Tac 15
🤣 Learny Libs: Jupiter
🃏 Select and Reflect

Read more about these collaborative activities: tonyv.me/3figjams

Tip Tuesday! Insert a checklist into Google Docs by clicking the Checklist button in the toolbar.

Clicking a box adds a check and a strikethrough.

Don't want the item to be crossed out? Go to Format → Bullets & Numbering → Checklist menu and toggle the strikethrough off.

Headers That Move: The Missing Piece in Your Google Forms — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent The one trick that will transform your Google Forms: custom header images! Design and animate stunning headers using Google Slides or Canva to make your forms unforgettable.

Make your Google Forms pop with a custom header! Add personality and pizazz to the top of your next form. #EduSky

Check out my tips and ideas.

learninginhand.com/blog/google-...

NCFL's digital learning platform Wonderopolis to close - National Center for Families Learning Since 2010, educators, students, and families the world over have sparked learning together using Wonderopolis.org—that’s 5,475 days… 131,400 hours… or a whopping 7,884,000 minutes! Those are some…

Sad news: Wonderopolis will permanently close July 31. 😢 #EduSky

It started in 2010 and became a go-to spot for student-friendly nonfiction.

The content should continue to be available on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. 🤞

familieslearning.org/blog/ncfls-d...

Tip Tuesday! Having a difficult time positioning an element exactly where you want it in Canva? Hold down Ctrl or ⌘ while dragging. This prevents automatic aligning.

Google ISTE Product Guide PDF thumbnails - 22 pages.

Google announced lots of new features at #ISTELive last week. This PDF describes the upcoming features, when they will be available, and who can access them.

I'm most excited for teachers to be able to share and assign Gems (custom chatbots) with students.

services.google.com/fh/files/mis...

AI’s Tell-Tale Writing Style — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent The more you use AI, the more you start to spot its writing habits. I put together a graphic that highlights some of the common signs of AI-generated text.

The more you use AI, the more you start to spot its writing habits. I put together a graphic that highlights some of the common signs of AI-generated text. #EduSky

(Just because a piece of writing has a few of these traits doesn’t mean it was written by AI.)

Graphic showing thumbnails of the contents of Issue 39 of the Learning in Hand Newsletter

Crack open Issue 39 of Learning in Hand... #EdTech #NotAtISTE #EduSky

🐴 Slow-mo piñata reveal (or that was the original plan)
📚 Free summer learning series
🤖 Signs of AI-generated writing
🎮 Interactive Google Doodles
📱 iPhone email shortcut
✅ Easy Quizizz certification

learninginhand.com/issue39

Google Vids: AI-Powered Video Creator and Editor | Google Workspace Create, edit, and share rich video content with Google Vids - a powerful online video editor infused with Google’s AI technology.

Tip Tuesday! You can start a new Google Vids project by importing Google Slides. It inserts your slides into the timeline and adds transitions. Then you can enter a script and record a voiceover or generate a voiceover with AI. #EduSky

vids.google.com

The Curiosity Effect: Irresistible FigJam Activities — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent FigJam is a free collaborative online whiteboard for classrooms. Watch my 23-minute presentation on using FigJam to spark student curiosity and engagement.

FigJam is a free collaborative online whiteboard for classrooms. Watch my 23-minute presentation on using FigJam to spark student curiosity and boost engagement. Recorded at #ISTELive last week. #EduSky #EdTech

learninginhand.com/blog/2025/7/...

A colorful, hand-drawn infographic by Manuel Herrera for Figma K12 education, showcasing "The Curiosity Effect" through a Mad Libs theme. It features sections for nouns and adjectives with examples like "pickles" and "juicy," along with roles like "coach" and "teacher." Other elements include a "Guess the AI Image Prompt" section with a robot, a "Calligram" illustration, and "Blur + Reveal" text.

I presented "The Curiosity Effect: Irresistible Activities in FIgJam" in the FIgma booth and Manuel S. Herrera sketched it! 😍

If you're at #ISTELive, come see me Wednesday 11:00-11:30 in the Figma booth! #ISTELive2025 #ISTE2025

From Prompts to Pictures logo

People say more context in a prompt = better output.

But that’s not always true, especially if you're looking for creative inspiration.

Let’s talk about it in "From Prompts to Pictures" at #ISTELive

🗓 Monday 10–11 | 📍HBGCC 225A

learninginhand.com/iste2025

Tony Vincent, representing "Figma for Edu," invites attendees to his booth (#2418) at ISTE. He will be presenting "The curiosity effect: Irresistible FigJam activities" on Monday at 12:00 PM, Tuesday at 12:30 PM, and Wednesday at 11:00 AM. The image includes a smiling headshot of Tony Vincent.

Figma is letting me present in their booth at #ISTELive!

I'm showing practical, research-backed ways to spark curiosity and boost motivation for any lesson. I've got FigJam templates for silly warmups, mystery reveals, and more! #ISTELive25

Graphic showing thumbnails of the contents of Issue 39 of the Learning in Hand Newsletter

Crack open Issue 39:

🐴 Slow-mo piñata reveal (or that was the original plan)
📚 Free summer learning series
🤖 Signs of AI-generated writing
🎮 Interactive Google Doodles
📱 iPhone email shortcut
✅ Easy Quizizz certification

learninginhand.com/issue39

#ISTELive #EduSky #EdTech

I've been using Quizizz for 10 years, and they sent me a pinata so that I could help them reveal and celebrate their new name. Watch as I whack open the pink... Quizizz's New Name → Piñata Reveal!

Wayground is here! 🎉

Formerly @Quizizz, they’re embracing a bigger vision—and bolder pink.

The name reveal? Let’s just say it involved a piñata and some playground drama.

Making this video was a little too much fun: youtu.be/u7iTpBHVGSs

#Wayground @WaygroundAI #sponsored

Tip Tuesday! From your Canva homepage, select a presentation, click the More ••• icon, select "Enable offline presenting," and click Continue to confirm. Now, even if your internet isn't cooperating, the presentation will appear on your homepage and you can open it. #ISTELive

Thanks, Rachel!💖