Upcoming Webinar - Gemini Gems to Skills

For the last year, I have been a major proponent of Gemini Gems, which are reusable, custom AI prompts that you can create, share, and use in Gemini.

I ended up creating my EduGems.ai website where I share over 170 Gems for schools, covering a wide range of uses for educators and students.

Well recently Google announced that they would be transitioning from Gemini Gems to Skills, and I have received loads of questions about what this means for schools.

To help provide guidance for this transition, I am excited and honored to be providing a free webinar as part of Google's Edu on Air series. Here are the details:

• Mastering the Shift: Gemini Gems to Skills
• December 10, 2026 - 1:00pm to 1:45pm Eastern Time
• Register for free at https://bit.ly/gem2skill or Website link
• Description: Get ready to level up your AI understanding as Google Gemini evolves from Gems to Skills! In this high impact 45 minute webinar, K12 educators, instructional coaches, and district leaders across the globe will get the essential need to know strategies to make this transition seamless and stress free. Discover exactly how this shift impacts your custom Gems and daily workflows, complete with school and district ready action steps to keep your staff ahead of the curve. Best of all, join renowned EdTech pioneer and Google Gems guru Eric Curts (creator of EduGems.ai) for an exclusive live demonstration showing practical classroom examples and hands on migration tips in real time. Walk away with everything required to prepare your classroom, school site, or entire district for the future of Gemini Skills.

Feel free to share with others, and I hope to get to learn with you!

AI Prompts for Support & Differentiation

Educational technology is constantly evolving, so my PD catalog has to change as well to keep up with everything new. During the course of the year I typically add several new sessions to my offerings. 

At the moment my PD catalog has over 70 different sessions that I offer for schools, conferences, and organizations. You can see the full catalog here - https://bit.ly/curts-pd

Recently I added a new session that covers AI prompts for student support and differentiation. 

See below for all the details and session resources. Feel free to use these resources any way you need, and if your school or conference is interested in this session or others, please reach out to me to discuss options for me to join you in person or virtually.

Supercharge your Classroom with Google Workspace for Education Plus

Although Google provides a free version of their Workspace suite for schools, they also have paid tiers available for schools that are looking for more features and capabilities. 

I often get asked by schools to explain the differences between the free and paid versions of Google Workspace for Education, to help them weigh their options and decide which plan is best for them.

The current tiers include:

• Education Fundamentals - A free foundational suite of secure and easy-to-use tools such as Google Docs, Classroom, Meet, Gmail, Forms, Chat and more.
• Education Standard - A paid edition that builds on the Fundamentals tier with advanced security and analytics tools.
• Education Plus - A paid edition that includes everything in Fundamentals and Standard, but with even more tools to empower users and enrich and personalize learning.

To help schools understand and evaluate the different tiers, I maintain a resource document that highlights many of the added features of the Plus tier. See below for access to that document, as well as a duplication of the information as this blog post for easy reference.

Although there are many security and analytics benefits of Plus, I tend to focus on the impact on teaching, learning, and the end user, so those are the features that I have pulled out for this resource.

EdTech Links - Week of 10-12-2026

Each week I keep an eye out for the latest edtech resources through blogs, social media, podcasts, videos, user groups, and more. I then try to reshare these resources in many ways.

One way I share these is here on the blog in these "EdTech Links of the Week" posts. See below to explore the latest batch of resources, and be sure to share with others who may benefit.

If you want to make sure you don't miss new resources, you can:

🔗 View all EdTech Links of the Week: bit.ly/caa-links

📰 Sign up for my weekly email newsletter: bit.ly/curts-news
📧 Join the "Control Alt Achieve" email discussion group: bit.ly/caa-emailgroup

🔔 Get new blog posts automatically through email - FollowIt link

And as always, please let me know of any resources that you recommend. I would love to learn from you!

Recorded Webinar - Your Brain on AI: Moving from Crutch to Catalyst

I recently recorded a webinar titled "Your Brain on AI: Moving from Crutch to Catalyst" all about the dangers of overreliance on AI, and what we can do to help our students use AI in a way that actually enhances their thinking.

In this session we explored the 'Wrestle, Rap, Reflect' framework, a powerful, practical solution that keeps the human in the loop by requiring learners to engage their own brains before and after the AI interaction.

• 💪 Students first wrestle with the content independently of AI.
• 💬 Then the students rap with the AI to enhance and extend their learning.
• 🤔 And finally the students reflect on their use of AI to thoughtfully incorporate it.

To learn all about applying this framework, see below to watch my recorded 1.25-hour webinar and to access the resources from the session.

Join Me for the 2026 ITEC Fall Conference

I am excited and honored to be presenting at the 2026 ITEC Fall Conference on October 12-13, 2026 in the Des Moines, Iowa.

I always look forward to an opportunity to see old friends, make new friends, share some ideas, and learn so many new things from others.

You can get full details about the event and register for this conference at:

https://itec-ia.org/fall-conference/

See below for all of the details on my sessions. I hope to see you there!

What's New in Google - September 2026

Catch up on everything new in Google Workspace for Education from September 2026, and see great ideas and resources!

Below is the recorded video from our September 2026 Google User Meeting, along with the meeting agenda with all the awesome resources and Google updates from the last few months. This includes lots of new Google updates and Google resources for your class.

The monthly meetings are hosted by the Google Educator Group of Ohio, but are open to anyone from any location. The purpose of these meetings is to:

• Connect Google-using educators
• Share the latest Google Workspace news and features
• Provide tutorials, demonstrations, and how-to’s
• Share best practices of how Google Workspace is being used within schools
• Ask questions and get answers

The video from the meeting is recorded and available for later viewing for those who cannot attend or connect live. See below to view the recorded video, agenda, and all the resources from the September 2026 meeting: