Best Cloud Storage for Elementary Students

December 8, 2015 9:38 PM

I need to teach my 3rd-5th graders how to save files on a network. They need to be able to access their files from different machines and locations around the school. My chief objective is that they learn to save thoughtfully and carefully, so that they'll develop good habits and be able to find their work in the future. (FWIW, I believe this means teaching them to be conscious of 1) what they want to call their file and 2) where they want to put it).

My district seems unable to provide a server that protects each students' files– they want me to have kids save to folders wherein others can see, move, change and delete their work. So I'm looking for a better solution. I suspect that some of the myriad of cloud storage solutions would work for me, but I'm having trouble wading through them. Here's what I want:

1) While the kids will need their own folders, I don't want to create accounts for each; mostly because I'd probably need to ask parents for permission but also because hassle. I'd prefer to have a single simple login to one directory, and the ability for kids to create their own folders within that directory and protect them with a password. (Yes, to protect against forgotten passwords I might assign them or possibly create the folders for them; again, hassle.)

2) Users need to be able to mount the directory on the desktop (we use macs) and then navigate to their own folders. Nesting would be nice. It'd be nice if I, as administrator, had sole access to change location or delete folders as well as access to all content for grading purposes.

3) I want students to be able to save by naming their file and then navigating (within the save menu) to their folder. No saving to the desktop and dragging to the right location, ugh. And definitely no "upload" process subsequent to an initial save.

4) Storage size isn't hugely important. Mostly they'll be storing small WP files and the occasional photo.

5) I'm perfectly fine with paying for this service. I imagine 10 or 20 gigs would suffice for this year.

Thanks so much for your advice and recommendations!

posted by carterk to Technology (6 answers total)

Everything you're asking for doesn't really exist in one cloud product. For the scale of what you're doing, if you're all using Macs, you could set aside one Mac and run a directory service (accounts and computer management) and a file server with OS X Server. You can make yourself administrator, access your students' files, and set up other Macs so that they provide logins and drive mounts through your server.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 2:07 AM on December 9, 2015

Does your school/school system have a technology policy? If your elementary school does not, look at what the middle and high schools use in your district. For example, our district uses google for education (which can be controversial, admittedly). Is saving a file or navigating to a file structure on a hard drive an official learning objective for your state/district? That seems oddly out of sync with the way my elementary kids are learning and using technology in 2015. My oldest kid, for example (5th grade) uses Google docs which auto saves, Google drive for saving files, and she likely will through to high school, and who knows what computer management skills she will need by then? What you need to do is prepare them for the tools they will be using over the next months to years of school, in the framework they will be using in middle school (eg Google for Education, if that's the approved tool, Macs if every 6th grader is given a Mac, and so on).

I'm not sure how COPPA would work for elementary students using a shared cloud account, but it honestly sounds kind of nightmarish logistically and liability-wise to administer. In 3rd grade, my oldest was using a specific educational software app that allowed communication between kids:kids or kids:teacher, and that was problematic for bullying reasons, and the teacher had to forbid kid:kid interactions. Having a shared account seems prone to similar abuse if it's not designed to work the way you want to use it.
posted by instamatic at 3:19 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I should also say that educational technology (especially online) can be a very, very contentious issue with parents. Our district is super tech savvy-- all kids have google for education accounts, the district is phasing in iPads for elementary kids and Mac laptops for middle schoolers. They have a solid tech policy and scrupulously follow COPPA. And yet, this is one of the hottest button issues in the district right now, with parents complaining about the allocation of resources, privacy issues, and equity across the different schools. If I were a teacher in our district, I'd stick to *exactly* what was spelled out in the tech policy, or I'd work to revamp the policy, because I wouldn't want to jump into the middle of that contentious fray with a one-off solution that I'd have to defend to cranky parents.

(Sorry! I hope your school system isn't as cranky as mine. But I find educational technology can bring it out in parents.)
posted by instamatic at 3:31 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm a little suprised myself you don't have any official policy on this. When I was a part of the technology committee at a school, we were constantly in talks with IT about what we could and could not do. A lot of things that seemed like no big deal to us, were big onstacles from a security perspective. In our case, it wasn't really because of parents, but making sure our students were protected, and us, from a liability standpoint. I second the person above to look at the policies of nearby districts - especially if they are uploading anything with identifiable information.
posted by Aranquis at 5:08 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: All very helpful, thanks Askme.

Looks like OS X Server is cheap, and I can spare a machine to run it. Of course I'll need to clear it with tech services. The questions I have are:

1) How long will it take me to set up as an unfamiliar user? Are there tutorials that will help me set up for this configuration?
2) Can't I also save to this server from PCs? We have a bunch of those as well, this solution won't really work if kids can't save from them.
posted by carterk at 11:53 AM on December 9, 2015

You might read through the Ars Technica walkthrough for OS X Server. It's a year old, but is detailed and still almost entirely relevant.

You'll probably be most interested at first in the Open Directory, Profile Manager and File Sharing pieces. These will let you set up accounts, bind other computers to your server, and decide how you want to share files.

An installation of the OS X Server application comes with tutorials within the application. After tutorials, you might browse through the documentation on Apple's site. It is organized pretty well.

The File Sharing component supports SMB which Windows uses as a protocol for file sharing, among other things. As well as Macs, you can have users log in with their accounts via Windows PCs and "mount" or present the server's file shares as drive letters via the usual File Explorer.

You might start with two Macs and a Windows box: One Mac to run the services, one Mac to test as a client, and one Windows box to test as a client, as well. This will let you test your setup and "start from scratch" on the server application-side of things, until you get the hang of how it works.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 9:57 PM on December 9, 2015