Hipster Google 2 - Even More Google Tools You Probably Never Heard Of

A couple years ago I shared my original "Hipster Google" post, where I listed a collection of lesser known Google tools. The idea was to have some fun with the "hipster" theme, where something is cool because very few people know about it. Like a band that hasn't become popular yet, or a restaurant that is hidden away, or a style that is not mainstream.

At that time I put together a collection of Hipster Google tools that weren't as popular as the "big ones" such as Gmail, Drive, Docs, and such. Even though these Google tools may have flown under the radar, they were still valuable for use in the classroom.

Well since then, so many new unique Google tools have come out! I have done my best to grab these new tools as they came out and add them to my ever-growing list in Google Docs. However, I did not update my original blog post to share these new tools in detail. So I figured it was time for a new entry to share all of the awesome new Hipster Google resources!

You can see the original list of Hipster Google tools in my blog post from a couple years back: "Hipster Google - Google Tools You Probably Never Heard Of".

And below you can see a new collection of lesser know, but awesome, tools. As always, chances are you will have heard of some of these, but hopefully there will be a few new ones on the list for you to explore. If we all try hard enough we can get schools using these all around the world, and they won't be Hipster anymore. But for now they are, so put on your slouchy beanie and thick-framed glasses and have fun!

Google Tools and Activities for Art Education

Although there is no replacement for getting your hands dirty with finger paints, technology can offer many ways for students to be creative when making art. In addition to creativity, technology can also allow students to explore and learn about art in new and engaging ways.

There are so many awesome technology tools for art, including desktop programs, mobile apps, and interactive websites. Along with all of those, there are many tools from Google that can help with teaching, learning, exploring, and creating art.

In this blog post we will look at a wide range of Googley tools and activities for art. Many of these have shown up in one form or other on my blog in the past, but I thought it would be helpful to pull them all together in one place. As I come across more resources in the future, I will be sure to add them to this growing list.

See below for the activities, and as always, feel free to use and share however you like!

Make Mondrian Art with Google Sheets

Although you might not recognize the name, you most likely will recognize the look. Mondrian Art is an abstract form of art that uses a creative layout of squares and rectangles, often filled in with primary colors.

This style of painting was popularized by Dutch artist Piet Mondrian during the early 1900's. In addition to influencing art, the Mondrian look has shown up in fashion, architecture, advertising, design, and more.

Because Mondrian Art is composed of lots of different sized rectangles and squares, it is the perfect style to be created with digital tools... specifically with Google Sheets!

As we have explored in many previous posts, Google Sheets can do much more than just crunch numbers. Sheets is a fantastic tool for writing prompts, online games, interactive learning databases, and more. Mondrian Art is just one more project to add to the list.

In this post we will take a look at how to create Mondrian Art with Google Sheets. While doing so, we will learn several cool Sheets features such as merging cells, fillings cells with color, and more.