In October 2013 former BPS EdTech Team member Tim Calvin published an important post on how to back up notes from Notability to Google Drive. Two years have past and while the simple and effective back up process has not changed all that much (the Drive and Notability interfaces have changed since iOS8) we are still seeing students lose important notes for their classes. This is due to the fact that their Notability notes were not properly backed up to Google Drive. In an effort to help students (and teachers) district wide avoid losing important information for their classes, we have created a short, four minute screencast demonstrating the process of backing up Notability notes to Google Drive.
The BPS EdTech Team recommends backing up to Google Drive for three reasons:
- We are a Google Apps for Education district and all students have a Google account.
- Students have unlimited storage in Google Drive.
- Once notes are backed up to Drive, they can be accessed from any device.
Chances are that students have many notes stored in the Notability application. If these notes are not backed up, students could potentially lose all their notes! For example, if the Notability app were to crash and/or something were to happen to their iPad causing a need for replacement, students could lose everything stored in Notability. We do not want this to happen to any of our students! Therefore, we strongly encourage both students and their parents to watch the tutorial embedded below. Follow the steps and you will have peace of mind knowing that all of your notes are safely stored in Google Drive and can be accessed from any device.
If you are unable to successfully back up your notes after watching this tutorial please do not hesitate to visit your building’s Instructional Technology Specialist for additional assistance. Burlington High School students can also visit the BHS Help Desk, located in the back of the library, and work individually with a member of our student Genius Bar. The BHS Help Desk is staffed with students every period of the day except for period 6. Below the embedded tutorial, we have also included several screenshots that will help guide you as you turn auto backups on.
Please don’t let one more day go by without ensuring your Notability notes are backed up to Google Drive!
Steps to backing up:
Open the Notability app. Tap the bottom left gear icon and select “Auto-backup.” Tap on Google Drive. Tap on the gear icon located to the left of Google Drive. If you have never backed up before, you will be prompted to sign into your Google account. Be sure you sign in with your school account. You will then need to tap “allow” to give Notability access to Drive.
Remember to sign in with your school Gmail account!
Verify the destination folder is “Notability. ” This folder is automatically created in Google Drive when you turn the back up on. This is the folder in Drive your Notability notes will be synced with.
Once you have selected the Notability folder, you can close the settings box. You will notice at the bottom left the words “backing up” will appear. This indicates the back up is taking place. Remember it will take a few minutes to back up all your notes. Be sure to test your notes are successfully backing up to the Notability Google Drive folder. If you discover the notes are not backing up, please see the Technology Integration Specialist in your building for additional help.