Cool and useful website: printfriendly.com

I have seen many printers in schools with stacks of paper students have printed from various websites. Most of these printouts have ads, pictures, and navigation text that wastes paper and toner. Now there is a website that you can use to strip out that extra stuff from webpages and print just the important text. That website is http://www.printfriendly.com.

To use it you just have to copy the URL of the page you want and paste into the Print Friendly box at http://www.printfriendly.com. It will bring up a preview of the page where you can remove other elements you don't want, such as text, navigation, and images. You can then save the page as a PDF or print it. There is even a browser button you can install so that it's always available!

Don't forget that this website is completely FREE!

Here is a video from their site that explains how it works.

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Mission: Email Inbox Zero

image from Flickr

With my new job as a Digital Learning Coach working at 8 different schools this year, I'm pretty sure I'll be doing a lot of emailing. The most emails I've ever seen in my inbox was in the 500s. As I've worked with teachers I've occasionally seen email inboxes with thousands of emails - many of them unread! I've often wondered how those individuals know what important communications they might be missing!

Because I'll have so much potential email this year, I thought it would be better to start with a clean mailbox. I didn't quite reach my goal of zero, but I got down to only 36! All of these remaining emails are current conversations with teachers at my new schools.

In the Clark County School District we use FirstClass for our email system. Directions here will be for that software, but similar steps can be used in any email client. These tips can also be used to get control of your personal email inbox. Here's my list of tips that can help you take control of your email inbox.

GET LESS MAIL

No seriously, the best way to reduce the amount of email sitting in your inbox is to limit the amount of emails that you get. Do you subscribe to automatic emails from all your favorite stores announcing their weekly sales? We all have a tendency to check that box that asks if we'd like to receive regular updates or subscribe to the company newsletter. Take a good hard look at those emails and be honest with yourself. When was the last time you took action on one of them? Most of them come with an unsubscribe link at the bottom. Use it!

Do you use any kind of service like Edmodo that sends you email notifications every time a student posts? It's nice to know what's happening, but get in the habit of checking those services instead. You have to deal with those notifications within that application anyway.

Some of the unwanted mail is SPAM. Our district has built SPAM blockers, but some of those sneaky devils still slip through. Forward any SPAM you get to SPAM and then delete it. That helps the system recognize new SPAM. I noticed I was getting a large amount if SPAM from a particular site. So I created an email rule that automatically forwards it to SPAM and then deletes it. Now I never even see it in my mailbox!

Use mail rules to auto-delete SPAM.

DEAL WITH IT

Another great way to get your inbox down to zero is to either deal with the email or get rid of it. If you're planning to do anything in-between, you should have an explicit understanding of why you're doing so.

Your email is not a to-do list. If an email requires an action on your part, then move it to your actual to-do list. This will prevent you from looking in your email to see what isn't done yet. There are many to-do list managers out there. My personal favorite is Omnifocus, primarily because I subscribe to the GTD method of managing my tasks. It doesn't matter what you use, just as long as you deal with it. Then delete the email!

Sometimes you need to keep emails around for reference. Perhaps they have something like a serial number or login information. Perhaps it's an ongoing conversation you need to refer back to. Instead of leaving it in your inbox, move them to folders, or better yet, download them to your computer. To create folders in FirstClass, go to the File menu and select New then New Folder. You can then name it and move the relevant emails into it. 

You can choose whether emails appear at the top or side of your inbox and whether they are a list or icons. To do that, go to the View menu, down to Split and select either Split Horizontal or Split Vertical.

Emails with information you want to keep can also be saved to your computer as text documents. Highlight the text message and from the File menu select Save As. You can then rename it and save it to any location on your computer. Then delete the email!

These steps cannot be a one time thing either. You will have to be consistent with each of these. But if you are, you have a strong chance of getting that email down to zero!

What other tips or ideas do you have for taking control of your email inbox? Share them in the comments!

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My 7 Must Have Productivity Apps

I received a new MacBook Air as part of my job today. When I set it up I noticed that there were a few productivity apps that I had to install right away, just to help me stay organized with all that I have to do at several schools, plus participating in many district wide training opportunities. These job responsibilities will require me to be more organized than I ever was before.

When I set it up my new laptop, I noticed that there were a few productivity apps that I had to install right away, just to help feel like all the information I need was right at my fingertips. So here they are,  my seven go to apps that I can't live without, plus two browser extensions that I absolutely love.

iCloud

All right, so I cheated on this first one. It's not really an app and I simply logged into my iCloud account as I set up the laptop, but I really, really can't live without it. I've bought into the Apple ecosystem and absolutely love it. I have two laptops, an iPhone, and iPad, and a Mac Mini. iCloud lets me have my calendar, contacts, and Safari bookmarks everywhere I go. I add an event on one device and it shows up on all the others. It just works and it just keeps me organized.

OmniFocus

I am a HUGE fan of the Get Things Done (GTD) method of productivity by David Allen. I read his book and practice his methods. The app that I use for keeping my tasks organized is OmniFocus. It follows the GTD methodology and helps me keep all of my tasks organized. I can capture my thoughts and tasks, organize them by context and by project, and review them as needed to make sure I'm getting done whatever has been dumped on my plate. I also have the app on my iPhone and my iPad. They all sync together seamlessly, so no matter where I'm at I can quickly capture what needs to be done and make sure I stay focused and on task.

FirstClass

Of course I need to access my email every day. My district uses FirstClass for email, calendaring, and collaboration. Since that is the backbone of communication within the district, of course it has to be near the top of my list of productivity apps!

Dropbox

I haven't yet moved all of my documents to Dropbox. Too many of them still reside on the laptop I primarily use for work. I realized that as my work load expands to include multiple sites and multiple devices, that perhaps my documents shouldn't be confined to a single device. One of my mini-goals for my new position is to make my documents and information accessible where ever I need them, which means I'll be making more use of Dropbox.

Evernote

I know that I'm not using Evernote to it's fullest potential. But so far it's been invaluable for keeping information organized and at my fingertips. I use it mostly to categorize websites for different topics and tech integration ideas. I love that it has a Safari extension called Web Clipper that I can use to quickly and easily add content to my notebooks.  I've also started using it for online journals for professional development classes. At some point I hope to start using it to capture other information such as meeting notes.

1Password

In today's digital world it seems like we all have a bajillion accounts scattered all across the internet. And each one has it's own rules for passwords - must have a number, only 6-8 characters long, a capital letter, a lower case letter, etc. To make my login life easy I use 1Password to keep track of all those usernames and passwords. Then with a click of a button I'm automatically logged in to the website without ever knowing what my username and password are. It also stores my banking information and school alarm code!

Microsoft Office

Microsoft Word isn't my favorite app. In fact, I'm usually muttering under my breath every time I have to use it. I prefer Apple's Pages and find it much easier to use and get things done with. However, my district is heavily invested in the Microsoft ecosystem, so to make it easy to share documents with many individuals around the district, I have the Microsoft Office for Mac 2011installed.

Except for Microsoft Office, all of these apps have equivalents that I can use on my iPhone and iPad. All of them sync across all my devices, enabling me to have all my information with me no matter what device I'm on or where I'm at.

Bonus Apps

These two bonus apps don't really help with my productivity as much as they help me from getting irritated with the internet. And they aren't apps either, but are actually browser extensions I use with Safari.

ClicktoFlash

I hate Flash videos, Flash ads, Flash games, and pretty much any Flash element on web pages. The Flash elements never seem to work right, the fans on my computers are always spinning up when I'm on a web page that uses Flash, I can't download Flash videos, and the browsers are always crashing when Flash is involved. So I installed ClicktoFlash Safari extension to block all Flash content. I have to manually click the Flash element if it's something that I want to access. I save battery life on my portables and my browser rarely crashes anymore! A bonus benefit is that for Flash video it substitutes an HTML video player that allows me to download video content.

AdBlock

Besides Flash, the next thing I hate on the Internet are all the ads. Usually they are obnoxious and have nothing to do with what I'm looking for. I never click on them and they can sometimes be confused with the actual content on the page. I installed AdBlock which blocks the ads from even being downloaded to my computer. Not only does it block the ads, but I know that my surfing and spending habits aren't being tracked and targeted, plus it also blocks those annoying ads at the beginning of YouTube videos.

I know everyone's productivity habits are different and how you use your computer is different as well. This just gives you an idea of those apps I have found indispensable for keeping myself organized. I'd love to hear about other apps that might help as well. Share what you use in the comments!

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