Google Meet

Google Meet is yet another option for meeting during distance learning.  It is new so somewhat glitchy, but I did not find it much glitchier than WebEx Teams.  Please note that WebEx is still the district-suggested medium to use.

Meet is now available for all Google Classrooms, though you choose whether or not you want to enable it and if and when you want students to have access to the meeting link.  To get to the Meet info in Classroom, first choose settings:

Scroll down until you see the Meet information.  Click "generate link" and then decide if you want to this link visible to students at all times or not.  If you toggle it on, the link will appear in the banner of your Google Classroom.  If you have it turned off, you can still post the link at a later time, or even change the link each time you want to Meet.  Be sure to save your changes.

If visible to students, they will see the Meet link in the banner:

To start your meeting, simply click the Meet link and wait for others to join.  Another option is to start the meeting from the Google Meet homepage. 

Once you have started your meeting, you will see options very similar to WebEx Teams.  You can chat on the right side, and see the different participants.  In Settings, you can choose the layout of your screen.  Unfortunately, Meet doesn't give a gallery view like Zoom does, but you can see more folks at a time than in Teams.  You can also record the meeting and enable closed captions.  Screen sharing is also an option.

Students that are in the Google Classroom in which you generated the link are automatically allowed into the Meeting room if they click the link.  You can invite more students/teachers, but you will have to admit them into the room.

Hover over the bottom of your Meet window to see the options to enable/mute the microphone, access video, leave call, screen share, and turn on closed captions.