Wilson Riles Middle - Chromebook Info

Chromebook Info

Start of the School Year:

Plug them in to charge!
Use a very light spray of cleaner on soft paper towels or a cloth to clean the covers, keyboard and screen.
Do not use a super strong harsh cleaner.
Do not use the cheap brown paper towels (they can scratch the screen and they pop off buttons on the keyboard)
Open them up and delete the old logins on the front page.
Update them. I would do 5 to 10 at a time. Once you are logged in, go to the 3 dots in the top right, go to Help, and then to About Google Chrome.
You want to be within 1-2 versions of the current one (the further out of date you are, the weirder things get). Current chromebook version is listed here.

If you have lots of accounts on your main page and want to nuke them all at once, do a Power Wash.

PowerWash:

Press ESC + (Refresh key) + POWER and then let go. The screen displays a yellow exclamation point (!).
Press CTRL + D , then ENTER. The screen displays a red exclamation point or a scary missing OS page.
Press CTRL + D, then ENTER. The Chromebook erases and restores itself.
If you see the red exclamation point, then press the spacebar and then press ENTER to return to normal mode.
After the Powerwash, you may need to sign in twice - once for Enterprise Enrollment and again to create your acount on the front page.

Charging:

Do NOT plug the cart into a power strip. Plug it in the wall.
Make sure you are charging fully.
Some carts have one plug, some have 2 and some have 3. Make sure all are plugged in!
All the carts have orange charge lights either on the outside or the inside. If its an inside one, cup your hand on the right side of the cart to see if the light is on.
If you have a cart with one power cord, then you have the cycling chargers - that means you are charging part of the cart at a time and it clicks and rotates to the next section about every 30 mins or so.

Cleaning:

Yes, they get pretty gross.
Have a TA clean the screens and covers with a very light spray of cleaner on soft paper towels or a cloth to clean the covers, keyboard and screen.
Do not use a super strong harsh cleaner.
Do not use the cheap brown paper towels (they can scratch the screen and they pop off buttons on the keyboard)

Aging Chromebooks:

Chromebooks have a built in lifespan of about 5 years. After that, Google says they will block updates on them.

Accounts and Passwords:

Every year, I have the student.centerusd.org accounts reset back to their default intro password. Far more kids forget their passwords over the summer than remember them.
This gives the teachers at the start of the year a known, good starting point when rolling out their chromebooks.
The account info stickers are generally passed out in English classes at the start of the year. During that time, they get the kids signed into the chromebook, school programs and they get into Homelink/Aeries.
Note - Aeries accounts are NOT reset every year. If they remember their info from the prior year, it will still work. If not, they can do Forgot Password and set up a new one.

Keyboard Shortcuts I like:

Control + Shift + Q Do this twice for a rapid logout.
Control + Shift + T This will reopen the last tab that was closed. If a kid closes tabs when you walk by, you can use this to reopen them. Chrome will remember the last 10 closed tabs.
Control and the + button or the - button This will Zoom the pages in or out. Very handy for pages with small fonts.
Control + Z This is the Undo function
Control + This takes Screenshots
For more shortcuts: click here

Parts:

Handing Out & Collecting Chromebooks:

You may be tempted to let the kids go up to the cart in mass and grab the chromebooks. Do not do this! It creates a feeding frenzy and then you will probably have either a damaged device, yanked wires or discipline problems from all the kids shoving eachother.
Have the kids go up in small groups - by table, by row, by group, etc.
Have them unplug the chromebook, then pull it out. If they do the reverse, then your cords get all yanked out and then get cut off in the doors and the cart starts to look like crap.
Putting them away - have the kids put the chromebook back in the ASSIGNED slot, and the CORRECT way. Then, at the end of the day, have a student or TA that follows directions and pays attention to detail plug in the power cords. I am continually surprised by how difficult this seemingly simple task is.
If you put them away via the feeding frenzy method, they will be in the wrong slots, they put it in the wrong way, they plug the power cord into the headphone jack, the cord was shoved it in the back or the cable got cut off because they slammed a door on it. The usual kid stuff.