Chapter 4: Create and view calendars

While your Google Apps school account automatically creates a primary calendar for you, it can be useful to have several additional calendars to help organize the different parts of your life. The primary calendar that comes with your Google Apps account will be associated with the name and email address of your account, however you can create as many secondary calendars as you like. For example, you might want to have a "school/work" calendar that has all the events and appointments related to school (staff meetings, school events, 1:1 conferences, etc.). In addition, you may want to have a separate "personal" calendar for keeping track of events and appointments outside of work (a dentist appointment, dinner with a friend, exercise class, etc.).

These different calendars will not only allow you to see different information on your calendar (you can choose a color for "school" and a different color for "personal"), you can also set different privacy settings for the calendars allowing everyone at your school to see your 'school/work' calendar, while not allowing anyone to have access to your personal calendar.

Here we will review how to create a personal calendar with events and information that only you can see, ensuring that your information stays private from others at your school.

Create a new calendar

To create a new calendar, just follow these steps:

In the ‘'My calendars' section on the left, click the dropdown arrow and select Create new calendar
Enter the required information.

Calendar name - this will appear in the list of your calendars.
(optional) Description - this will appear in your calendar details.
(optional) Location - Specify a location (can be as general as country, or as specific as city,state).
Calendar time-zone

We will review sharing options with individuals and groups in Chapter 5.
Click Create Calendar.

All of the calendars you create will be listed under 'My Calendars' on the left side of your page. For each of the calendars, you can add, delete, and edit events any time you like.

Please note: there's a limit to the number of calendars you can create at one time. If you're receiving an error message when creating additional calendars, please wait 24 hours before trying again.

Private calendars

For a personal calendar especially, you may not want anyone else to be able to see any of the event details. This means that nobody at your school can see the calendar entry name or details (if they can see your calendar at all.)

To ensure that the events on your calendar remain private, just follow these steps:

In the calendar list on the left, click the down-arrow button next to the appropriate calendar, then select Share this calendar. (Alternatively, click the Settings link at the bottom of the calendar list, select a calendar and click the Share this calendar link.)
Check that the Share this calendar with others general setting isn't selected. This way the public and those at your school will not have access to your calendar
Also, be sure not to add anyone in the 'Share with specific people' section. If you do add individuals here, they will be able to see your personal calendar.

Finally, when creating events, make sure that the radio button next to either Default or Private is selected under 'Privacy' on the event details page. This will make sure that even if someone does have access to your calendar, they will only see that you are 'busy' and not see any of the event information.

Please note: if you invite someone to an event on your personal calendar, they will be able to view the event details for that event, but will not be able to see the rest of the calendar if you are keeping your calendar private.

Switch calendar views

Types of calendar views

Depending on your schedule, you may want to see what you have planned for the entire week or just tackle your schedule day by day. With Google Calendar, you can choose to view calendar information by day, by week, and by month. You can also get a list of calendar events using the Agenda view. Finally, you can also customize your calendar view to display as many days as you want in one view.

To change between different views, just click on the tabs in the top-right corner of your calendar. Or to quickly customize your view, just click and drag on your mini-calendar from your desired start date and drag to your desired end date.

You can also use keyboard shortcuts to jump to different calendar views, just enter one of the following keys while in your calendar window:

t = go to today
d = day
w = week
m = month
a = agenda
j/k forward back

Please note: keyboard shortcuts must be enabled in your Settings to use the commands above.

Day view

The 'Day' view displays events for a single day. To use this view, click on the 'Day' tab in the top-right corner of your calendar.

Use the single arrows on the top-left corner of the calendar to move forward or backward by a day.

Click on Today to return to the current day, or select a date you'd like to view from the mini-calendar displayed on the left side of the calendar.

If you have an 'All Day' event, it will be displayed at the top of the 'Day' view enclosed in the 'blue box' area. If you have multiple All Day events, you have the option to hide or unhide them using the arrow to the left of the All Day event section.

While in any other view (Week, Month, Agenda, or the custom day), you can always switch to the 'Day' view by double-clicking on a day in the mini-calendar on the left.

4 days or custom view

The 'Custom View (Next 4 Days)' tab defaults to the next four days but is also customizable.

In this view, the current day (today) will be marked with a yellow background. If you have an 'All Day' event, it will be displayed at the top of the 'Day' view. If you have multiple All Day events, you have the option to hide or unhide them using the arrow to the left of the All Day event section.

Use the single arrows on the top-left corner of the calendar to move forward or backward by a four-day increment.

You can always switch to the 'Day' view for any particular day by clicking on a date displayed at the top of the 'Custom View (Next 4 Days),' view.

If you want, you can also alter the 'Custom view (Next 4 Days)' tab in the top-right corner of your calendar to create your own customized calendar view.

To create a customized calendar view for this tab, follow these steps:

Click Settings in the top right corner of your calendar window.
Make sure you're on the General tab.
In the Custom view section, select the desired time range from the drop-down menu (from 2 days up to 4 weeks).
Click Save at the top or bottom of the page.

Now the fourth tab will say whatever time increment you selected (i.e. if you selected 6 Days, the fourth tab will now say 6 days). To change this setting, repeat the steps above.

Week view

The 'Week' view displays events for the current week. To use this view, just click on the 'Week' tab in the top-right corner of your calendar.

The current day (today) will be marked with a yellow background. If you have an 'All Day' event, it will be displayed at the top of the 'Day' view enclosed in the 'blue box' area. If you have multiple All Day events, you have the option to hide or unhide them using the arrow to the left of the All Day event section.

Use the single arrows on the top-left corner of the calendar to move forward or backward by a week.

You can always switch to the 'Day' view (for any particular day) by clicking on a date displayed at the top of the 'Week' view or double-clicking on a date in the mini-calendar.

Month view

The 'Month' view displays events for the current month. To use this view, just click on the 'Month' tab in the top-right corner of your calendar.

The current day (today) will be marked with a yellow background. If you have an 'All Day' event, it will be displayed at the top of the 'Day' view enclosed in the 'blue box' area. If there are more events than what can be displayed, up or down arrows will appear.

Use the single arrows on the top-left corner of the calendar to move forward or backward by a month.

As with the 4 Day (Custom) or week view, you can always switch to the 'Day' view (for any particular day) by clicking on a date displayed at the top of the 'Month' view or double-clicking on a date in the mini-calendar.

Quick custom view

You can quickly customize the view of your calendar to be as many or as few days as you like using the mini-calendar on the left.

This way you can quickly view 2 days at a time, or 2 weeks – you decide.

To quickly view a set of days on your calendar, follow these steps:

Click on a start date in your mini-calendar on the left side of your calendar window and drag to your desired end date.
For example, to display March 1, 2010 to March 3, 2010, just click on March 1, 2010 in the mini-calendar and drag to March 3, 2010.

Please note: this will not be a default calendar view or the take the place of the '4 Days' tab in the top right. This is just a quick way to view multiple days in your calendar.

Agenda view

Use the 'Agenda' view to view all your events grouped by day. Unlike the 'Day' or 'Week' views, it does not show blocks of time, but rather lists the timing of each event beside the event name (i.e. 9am-9:30am)

To display the 'Agenda' view, click the 'Agenda' tab on the top-right corner of the calendar.

Today is indicated with a grey background. 'All Day Events' are displayed on the top of each day (notice there is no time duration listed, just a color that denotes which calendar the all-day event corresponds). If there are more events than what is displayed, you can scroll using the arrows on the right and then click the Look for more link if you'd like to view more events.

Each of the events listed shows the timing, the name, and some of the basic event details. You can click on the name of the event to expand it and show more structured information such as your status (if you are going), who else is part of the event, and a link to edit the event details or view more details.

If you would like to see all events with this additional information, you can click the Expand All link at the top left of the calendar view. To minimize all the event details, you can click Collapse All.

You can use the single arrows on the top-left corner of the calendar to move forward or backward to view more days. Click 'Today' to display the current day at the top of the screen, or select a day you would like to view from the mini-calendar displayed on the left side of the calendar.

You can easily switch to the 'Day' view by clicking on one of the date links.

Change default view

Google Calendar by default opens to the 'Week' view. If you would like to change this and have Google Calendar open to a different view, you can change the default view in your settings.

To change your calendar's default view, follow these steps:

Go to Settings in the top right corner of your calendar window.
Select the General tab.
In the Default view section, select the desired view from the drop-down menu.
Click Save.

Use agenda view to create a lesson plan

Detailed planning with agenda view

In the agenda view, it's easy to have a full list of activities for each day. This can be particularly useful for detailed lesson planning. For example, you could add individual activities to each 15 or 30 minute increment of your agenda. The agenda items can also be linked to the course material relating to to that particular activity.

You can have this available readily for yourself, but it can also be useful for sharing with others. For example, you could print off the 'agenda' for a day and pass it along to a substitute teacher. Your lesson plans are not disrupted by your absence and then the substitute teacher has a detailed plan of action for the day.

Create a lesson plan with calendar entries

To create a daily lesson plan in Google Docs, you will need to use new calendar entries (or 'events') to describe the activities you will be conducting. It can also be helpful to create a separate calendar for these lesson plans if you don't want to include these activities in a broad 'class' calendar that your entire class (students and parents) can view.

Example:

Let's say for a 50 minute class on Tuesday at 9:00AM you set aside 20 minutes for reading of a class book, 15 minutes for a written reflection, and a 15 minute class discussion. You would enter each of these activities into your calendar like so:

Click the Create event link on the left side of your calendar window.
Fill in the first event details:

what: Individual reading.
when: Tuesday 9/22/12, start time of 9:00, end time of 9:20.
calendar: "Lesson plan".
description: Students will read Catcher in the Rye for 20 minutes.

Click Save. Now the first activity is planned.

For the second activity:

Click the Create event link on the left side of your calendar window.
Fill in the second activity details:

what: Reading reflection journal entry.
when: Tuesday 9/22/12, start time of 9:20, end time of 9:35.
calendar: "Lesson plan".
description: Students will read write a reflection in their reading journals based on the Catcher in the Rye passage.

Click Save. Now the second activity is planned.

For the third activity:

Click the Create event link on the left side of your calendar window.
Fill in the third activity details:

what: Class discussion of reading passage.
when: Tuesday 9/22/12, start time of 9:35, end time of 9:50.
calendar: "Lesson plan".
description: Class will engage in discussion of the reading passage based on discussion question prompts.

Click Save. Now the third activity is planned.

View lesson plan calendar

Now that you have created lesson plans in your "Lesson plan" calendar - you may want to view just this calendar and see it in the agenda view format (which will show the list of activities and the timing, instead of colored blocks of time).

To view only your 'Lesson plan' calendar:

In the main calendar window look at your My Calendars box. Calendars in the list that are currently being viewed will have a colored background, while calendars that are 'hidden' will have a white background.
Find your 'Lesson plan' calendar and click the right down arrow next to it.
Select Display only this calendar. The rest of the calendar names in your list should now have a white background, denoting that they are no longer visible.
Click the Agenda tab in the top right of the calendar window.

Now you can see only the entries on your "Lesson plan" calendar in the agenda view.

If you would like to see the entries of your other calendars, simply click on their names in the My Calendars list. When they have a colored background, they will be visible in the Agenda view, and in all other views.

Print lesson plan calendar

It can be helpful to print out your daily lesson plan to have on hand when you are not at a computer.

To print your lesson plan calendar, follow these steps:

Make sure only your "Lesson plan" calendar is viewable. (If you're not sure, review the previous step)
Click the 'print' button in the top right corner of your calendar window under the More dropdown menu, adjacent to the calendar view tabs (Day, Week, Month, 4 Days, Agenda).
Select the print range (today or multiple days).
Choose your font size and print orientation preferences.
If you would like to have all the details for your activities printed, select the Print descriptions check box (Please note: this is not checked by default.)
Make sure the Print end times option is checked so you can see the start and end time for each activity.
Uncheck the Print attendees, Print my response, and Show events you have declined options, as for your lesson plan none of these will be relevant.
Choose if you would like to print in black & white. If you choose to print in color, the activities will match the color of your calendar.
Click Print. Alternatively, if you would like a PDF copy of your lesson plan, click Save as - this will download a PDF file of your lesson plan calendar.

Link Google Docs in lesson plan calendar

You can also "attach" or link to Google Documents from the activity entry in your "Lesson plan" calendar.

This can be useful if you've created a document with discussion questions, a spreadsheet form/quiz, or a lecture presentation. By attaching the relevant documents, you can easily access them when viewing your lesson plan calendar.

To turn on the ability to attach Google Documents, follow these steps:

Click the Settings icon in the upper right corner and then the Labs menu item. Alternately, you can click the Calendar settings link and then then the Labs tab.
Scroll down to see Event attachments.
Click the Enable button next to Event Attachments.
Click Save at the top or bottom of the page.

Now when you create an event and edit the event details, you will see a new section called Attachments with a link to "attach" a Google Document. This will add a link to a Google Document to your event.

Add and view other school calendars

Add someone’s calendar to your calendar list

If you frequently schedule meetings or appointments with someone, it can be helpful to have their calendar in your calendar list, allowing you to pull it up quickly. If you add another individual's calendar (provided they have set the appropriate sharing access), you will then be able to turn their calendar 'on' and 'off' to view within your calendar window.

To add a friend's calendar, follow these steps:

On the Other calendars list on the left, click the dropdown menu and select Add a coworker's calendar.
Enter the appropriate email address (i.e. teacher@myschool.org) in the field provided, then click Add.

If the other teacher or student has opted to share his or her calendar publicly, it will then appear under 'Other Calendars' in the left column. If not, you'll see a message requesting access to your friend's calendar. Feel free to add a note to the request, then click Send Request.

If a friend has a private calendar, they can directly share their calendar with you by following steps in Chapter 5. Once your friend has granted you permission to view their private calendar, you'll receive an email confirming your access. The calendar will also automatically appear in your calendar list the next time you sign in to Google Calendar.

Add calendars with a URL address

You can only add the 'primary' calendars of individuals using the Add a coworker's calendar box. If you would like to add someone's secondary calendar - such as a group, class, sports, or school calendar - you will need to add this by URL. You will need to know the URL of the calendar, which the owner of the calendar can send as reviewed in Chapter 5.

To add a calendar using its address, follow these steps:

On the Other calendars list on the left, click the dropdown menu and select Add by URL.
Find the address of the Google Calendar in iCalendar format, or if you have the iCalendar address of a calendar from a different application (for example, Apple's iCal), you can use this as well.
Enter the address in the field provided.
Click Add Calendar. The calendar will appear in the Other Calendars section of the calendar list to the left.

Interesting calendars to add

Looking to fill your calendar with interesting information and events? Google Calendar offers a selection of calendars covering popular holidays, sports team schedules, and more.

To access a directory of these public calendars, follow these steps:

On the Other calendars list on the left, click the dropdown menu and select Browse Interesting Calendars.
When browsing, click Preview to view events on the calendar before adding it to your list.
Click Subscribe to subscribe to the calendar -- it will be added to the Other Calendars section of your calendar list. For calendars that you're already subscribed to, you'll see the option to Unsubscribe.

These interesting calendars are categorized into separate tabs, described below.

Holidays
Keep track of various holidays celebrated around the world with Google Calendar. There are a number of holiday calendars to choose from - just make your selection and we'll keep them updated year after year.

Sports
Keep track of your favorite teams' schedules and get real-time score updates all within Google Calendar!.

In the Sports tab, select the sport, league, then team whose schedule you'd like to follow and click Subscribe to add the calendar to your list. Once added, the calendar will display individual game times according to your selected timezone. While the game is being played, click into the event details to view live scores -- refresh the page to refresh the real-time information.
Please note: it's not possible to sync sports calendars with other calendar applications at this time.

More tab:

Contacts' birthdays and events
When you subscribe to this calendar, all of your contacts' birthdays will display as All Day events in Google Calendar. Data is pulled from Google Contacts, which you can access via the contact manager in your Apps mail account.

Here are some things to keep in mind:

As with other public calendars you subscribe to, the Contacts' birthdays calendar will be added as a secondary calendar in the Other Calendars section of your calendar list.
Birthday events repeat every year on the same date.
If you're unable to see any events after adding the calendar, make sure that you've entered birthday information for your contacts.
New birthday information entered into Google Contacts will automatically be added to your Contacts' birthdays calendar.
As a shortcut, enter [ contacts: ] in the Add a friend's calendar field and the calendar will be added to your list.

Phases of the Moon
The "Phases of the Moon" calendar displays the four major phases of the moon - new moon, first quarter, full moon, and last quarter. When this calendar is selected in your calendar list, you'll see a moon icon in the upper-left corner of the day. Simply mouse over the moon icon to see which phase begins on that particular day.

Stardates
If you're someone who would boldly go where no one has gone before, the Stardates calendar is the calendar for you. It's pre-loaded with stardates to help you keep track of time in this universe and beyond (the stardates will appear as All Day events). You can also manually add the calendar by entering [ stardate: ] in the Add a friend's calendar field in the calendar list.

Add weather forecasts to your calendar

Are you planning an event, but unsure if the weather will cooperate? Google Calendar's Weather feature displays the weather forecast directly in your calendar to make it easier to plan upcoming events. Once the Weather feature is enabled in your Google Calendar, you'll be able to view the four-day forecast, including the expected highs and lows for each day.

To view weather forecasts in Google Calendar, follow these steps:

Click Settings at the top of any Google Calendar page.
Select the General tab.
In the 'Location' section, enter your desired location information (e.g., "Los Altos, CA" or "94024").
In the 'Show weather based on my location' section, select either °F or °C.
Click Save.

Once you've enabled the Weather feature, a Weather Calendar will be added to your calendar list. You'll also see weather icons in the upper left corner of today and the following three days in your calendar.

Each icon serves as a visual representation of the forecast for that particular day. For more detailed weather information, including a brief description, location, and high and low temperature, just click the weather icon or point your mouse to it. You'll see, for example, this information: "Clear in Los Altos, CA (80° | 53°)."

Please note: the Weather Calendar pulls data based on your own settings; information from this calendar will not display if embedded on your website.

Import iCal, Yahoo!, Outlook, or other calendars

Import from other calendar software

If you have previously set up calendar information in another application or web service, you can import the information into Google Calendar.

Google Calendar imports events using the iCalendar or CSV (Comma separated values) file format. If you can export your calendar data into this format, the following instructions will allow you to import the data into Google Calendar:

To import events from iCalendar or CSV files, follow these steps:

Click the Add down-arrow button at the bottom of the calendar list on the left side of the page, and select Import Calendar.
Click Browse and choose the file that contains your events, then click Open.
Select the Google Calendar where you'd like to import events, then click Import.

Please note: recurring events may not be recognized when importing events from CSV files. In this case, individual items will be created for recurring events that fall between the dates you've selected.

If you'd like to migrate your events from another calendar service, there are detailed instructions on how to import these events to Google Calendar from a few other calendar services in the next steps.

Microsoft Outlook

If you have a calendar in Microsoft Outlook, you can export from Outlook and import into Google Calendar, just follow these steps:

Open Outlook and go to File > Import and Export > Export to a file.
Select Comma Separated Values (Windows).
Select the calendar you want to export, save it to your desired location, then click Finished. (Note: When exporting more than one year's worth of data, we recommend that you divide your calendar into multiple, one-year segments and export each file separately; otherwise, you may encounter errors.)
Select the desired date range of events to export, then click OK.
In Google Calendar, ensure that you've created the calendar that you'd like to migrate events to. Then, at the bottom of the calendar list on the left, click the Add down-arrow button and select Import Calendar.
Click Browse and select the appropriate file, then select Open.
From the drop-down menu, select the calendar to which you'd like to import events, then click Import to complete the import.

Please Note: The exported file doesn't support recurring Outlook events. Individual items will be created for recurring events that fall between the dates you've selected.

Apple iCal

If you have a calendar using Apple's iCal application, you can export from iCal and import into Google Calendar -- just follow these steps:

In Apple iCal, select the calendar from the list of calendars in the iCal window.
Select File > Export.
Name the calendar, then save it.
In Google Calendar, ensure that you've created the calendar that you'd like to migrate events to. Then, at the bottom of the calendar list on the left, click the Add down-arrow button and select Import Calendar.
Click Browse and select the appropriate file, then select Open.
From the drop-down menu, select the calendar to which you'd like to import events.
Click Import to complete the import.

Yahoo! Calendar

If you have a calendar with a Yahoo! account, you can export from Yahoo! Calendar and import into Google Calendar, just follow these steps:

In your Yahoo! Calendar account, go to Options, then select Import/Export.
Click the Export button in the Export to Outlook section. (Note: When your calendar contains more than one year's worth of data, we recommend that you manually divide the file into multiple, one-year segments and import them separately; otherwise, you may encounter errors.)
Save the CSV file to the desired location.
In Google Calendar, ensure that you've created the calendar that you'd like to migrate events to. Then, at the bottom of the calendar list on the left, click the Add down-arrow button and select Import Calendar.
Click Browse and select the appropriate file, then select Open.
From the drop-down menu, select the calendar to which you'd like to import events.
Click Import to complete the import.

Please note: The exported file doesn't support recurring Yahoo! events. Individual items will be created for recurring events that fall between the dates you've selected.

Print a calendar

Sometimes it's handy to have a print-out of your calendar to take with you when you don't have a computer handy.

To print a calendar or multiple calendars, follow these steps:

Make sure the the calendar(s) you wish to print are selected in the calendar list to the left of your calendar window. (The calendar names will be highlighted by a colored bar.)
Click on the view that you would like to print: Day, Week, Month, 4 Day, or Agenda.
Click the 'print' button in the top right corner of your calendar window under the More dropdown menu, adjacent to the calendar view tabs (Day, Week, Month, 4 Days, Agenda).
A 'Print Settings' menu will appear in a new window. Simply select the desired options for your printed calendar.

Print range: Select the dates you would like to print of your calendar.
Font size/Orientation: Choose the size of the font and the orientation of your calendar (landscape/portrait)
Events you have declined: Choose to have events appear even if you have declined.
Black/White: Check if you want to print in black and white.
Agenda view only options:

Descriptions: If you would like to have all the details for your activities printed, select the Print descriptions check box (Please note: this is not checked by default.)
End times
Attendees
My response
Events you have declined

Click Print. - Alternatively, if you would like a PDF copy of your lesson plan, click Save as - this will download a PDF file of your lesson plan calendar.

Please note that if you've scheduled a large number of events, your calendar may print on multiple pages to better display all your entries.