by +Sarah Woods
This is the first of a series of blog posts based on a first look at Google Classroom. We know we’re looking at a sneak peek, so it may not have all the features Google intends, but we still thought you’d like to see what there is!
Announcements and Assignments: the flow of your stream
Google Classroom is set up as a “stream” much like we see on Google plus. The teacher adds both “Announcements” and “Assignments” as posts and then students can comment on both types of posts.
Announcements look like this:
The purpose of an announcement is to add something to the stream that your class can look at and comment on. For example, if you wanted your students to watch a Youtube video of a cat playing piano and then to give their review of its musical skill.
Teachers can add files, drive files, Youtube videos, and web links.
Students can comment on Announcements, creating a discussion amongst themselves about a post.
Assignments look like this:
The purpose of an assignment is to add something that everyone in the class needs to submit something to. This is a “do” kind of post where you can give a task and each student needs to respond to the task.
Teachers can add files, drive files, Youtube videos and links and students can submit existing drive docs, links, and upload files as well as creating new docs, presentations, spreadsheets, and drawings.
Students can comment on Assignments, creating a discussion amongst themselves about a post.
Assignments: delving into the work
When a teacher creates an assignment, it looks like this:
Multiple attachments can be added to one assignment.
The teacher can edit or delete the assignment by clicking here on the three dots to the right of the due date in the right hand corner of the assignment.
All assignments are on a specific points system (you can find this by clicking on “edit assignment”
Once an assignment is posted, it looks like this:
If you click on the title of the assignment (to show all students), the number turned in (to show only students who have turned in the assignment) or the number not turned in (to show students who have NOT turned in the assignment), it takes you to the “Student Submissions page” which looks like this, showing the status of their assignments:
If you select certain students and click “email”, you can email those students. If you click “folder”, it takes you to the Google Drive folder where the files are located. If you click download, you can download all the assignments.
Click on a student to view their assignment and to add a grade and a comment:
To give the student a grade, just click under grade and start typing. Once you are ready to send grades to students, check the boxes next to all of the students that you want to notify and click the blue “return” button at the top of the page.
They will get an email with a link to the assignment.
See more:
- Part 1 – Google Classroom: From the Teacher’s Perspective
- Part 2 – Google Classroom: From the Student’s Perspective
- Part 3 – 6 Things You Can’t Do with Google Classroom…Yet
- Part 4 – 4 Ways to Impact Your Students’ Learning Experiences Using Google Classroom
- Part 5 – 5 Problems Google Classroom Solves Right Now
- Part 6 – Google Classroom: FAQ
UPDATE:
Lots of interesting changes to Google Classroom recently. Make sure to check out our comprehensive online course on Google Classroom by Google in Education guru Allison Mollica. The course will help you get up to speed with ‘Google Classroom’ and features video lessons with an online quiz after each video chapter to test your knowledge. The course is being updated regularly to reflect the most recent changes. Get access here: http://goo.gl/ddspKc
All our upcoming summits will have a dedicated session about Google Classroom. If you want to learn best practices from Google Certified Teachers and Google Certified Trainers, register for a Google in Education Summit in your area! We will also be running Classroom Workshops soon. Use the sign up form below to get exclusive updates from us.
About the Contributor
Sarah Woods
Sarah Woods is an MYP Design Technology teacher at the International School of Amsterdam; previous to that she was was the IT Director and an IT Integration Coach at Pechersk School International in Ukraine. She can also be seen on the TEDx stage in her talk, “Identity: Where Fear and Change Intersect in Education”. She is a member of the ECIS technology committeeand holds a Masters of Science in Education in K-12 Technology Integration.
