WE WILL CONTINUE UPDATING THESE INSTRUCTIONS AS NEW INFORMATION & PRACTICES BECOME KNOWN. Watch for "NEW! (Date)" flags to appear in the text below.

Updates 2020-03-24:  • New on-demand training videos added.

NEW! March 24th, 2020

These ten videos cover what our face-to-face training sessions were covering last week (as does much of text on this page).

• Part 1:  Introduction  ← Applies to more tools than just Google Meet!

• Part 2:  Setting up your tech gear ← Applies to more tools than just Google Meet!

• Part 3:  Create your Google Meet classroom and invite your students

• Part 4:  Getting ready to enter your Google Meet classroom ← Applies to more tools than just Google Meet!

• Part 5:  Starting up your class and getting going

• Part 6:  During class-- sharing your screen

• Part 7:  Additional tip-- live closed captions

• Part 8:  Additional tip-- joining by phone

• Part 9:  Ending a Google Meet session

• Part 10:  Conclusion

We haven’t done much “online teaching and learning” at Whitman, let alone on a large scale.  Perhaps you’ve never done anything like this at all. Please try not to worry too much. There will be some bumps on the road you are traveling, but remember that we are all on the road together, and as such, we are expecting bumps.  We should collectively grant ourselves grace.  Technology Services will do its level best to support you (Helpdesk x4976 or canvas_help@whitman.edu) in your efforts, but remember that your students and your colleagues can also act as resources.  Google searches for tips, tricks, and troubleshooting can also be very helpful. If you learn something cool, please do share it with Technology Services and others in the Whitman community-- you’ll be helping all of us when you do.

Breathe.

Here we go...

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• Remote student-- a student who is in a different physical location than the faculty member

• -- where you see this icon, you'll find step-by-step instructions on how to perform specific tasks in Google Meet.  This is not necessarily a substitute for reading this entire document.

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Faculty members will need:

• A computer with a built-in camera OR a computer and a webcam

• Headphones, preferably with a built-in mic (headphones only needed if you are teaching remotely instead of in a physical classroom)

• Firefox or Chrome.  Safari is possible, but not recommended.  Edge or Explorer are out-- don’t use them.

• Patience.  It will take you a couple times to feel comfortable doing this.

Remote students will need:

• A computer with a built-in camera OR a computer and a webcam.  (Tablet or smartphone will also work, and installing the Google Hangouts Meet app is helpful.)

• A must:  headphones, preferably with a built-in mic.

• Firefox or Chrome.  Safari is possible, but not recommended.  Edge or Explorer are out-- don’t use them.

• Patience.  It will take you a couple times to feel comfortable doing this.

In-person students will need:

• Patience.  It will take a few times to feel comfortable with remote students in their class.

• Recommended:  someone to watch the Google Meet chat window (see details below)

• Recommended:  if there are multiple remote students, someone in-class who can “pin” the image of any remote student who is talking, which will make it easier for all in-person students to feel connected with the remote students.  This will help improve classroom dynamics.

There are two ways to start the meeting up.  We recommend using Google Calendar to do this, even if you don’t normally use Google Calendar.  If you need to start a meeting immediately, you can do so directly from the Google Meet webpage.

1. Visit https://calendar.google.com and sign in with yourusername@whitman.edu (type the whole thing) then follow the prompts to sign in. 

2. To set up the Google Meet session, click the “+ Create” button.

3. Begin scheduling your class (or appointment), providing the appropriate meeting details including the class name, the time, and the remote students (note you may need to get their email address to do this if autofill doesn’t work).

   1. Note that you can make the calendar event repeat, so you can set it to appear every day, week, etc.  We recommend you do this with your courses.

4. Click on “Add rooms, location, or conferencing”

5. Click “Add conferencing” - a meeting will be automatically generated.

6. Click Save, then click Send at the following prompt to email the invite to guests.

Once scheduled, you can click on the appointment in Google Calendar to find the link to join your Google Meet meeting. You can also copy the link from the appointment to share it with additional participants whom you did not originally invite (e.g. if you simply want to share the link with the entire class) via email, Canvas, etc.

1. Visit https://meet.google.com

   1. If you are prompted to sign in, be sure to use your @whitman.edu account, sign in by typing your whole email address then following the prompts.

   2. If you are already signed in, you can confirm the Google profile you are using in the upper-right of your web browser screen.

2. Click “Join or start a meeting”

3. When prompted, you can either name the meeting or leave it blank. Click Continue

4. At the next screen, click Join Meeting

5. The next screen will pop up an “Add others” window. You can either:

   1. Click “Copy joining info” and paste this info into an email or Canvas announcement OR

   2. Click “Add people” to search for participants and send them a meeting invite to their email address.   Note that in some cases you may need to know their full email address.