Tuesday, December 8, 2015

Google has been listening to teachers

Google Classroom Updates

Many new changes have been rolled out in the last couple of months that have made Classroom even better in its second year.  While debate still continues about whether or not Classroom is a Learning Management System (LMS) or just a Content Management System (CMS), few could refute that it is the best tool for working with Google Docs with your students. With the new features added this year, it is getting easier to manage assignments, assess students and engage them in discussions.

Assignments:

Move to the top of the stream - for those assignments that last many days or weeks and you need to bring it back to student's attention, you can now move a post to the top of the stream.  If you have a very active Google Classroom with lots of assignments, posts and discussions, important assignments can get

Calendar:

Now you have two ways to view and share assignments.  Whether a student or teacher, you can view the calendar view of just one class or all of your class assignments either within classroom or in your Google Calendar.  There is a separate google calendar created for each class.  The added bonus for this is that you can then embed a google Calendar on your website for a public view of the assignments due for your class.  This way parents can see what their child has due without giving them special access to the online classroom.  The only drawback for those who also want to post class notes and presentations is that the only things that go on the calendar are assignments which have due dates. 

Reuse Posts:

While you could always post assignments and announcements to multiple classes at the same time, there are times that you may need to either repost a similar assignment on a regular basis or want to use a post from a shared class as an assignment in your own class.  Now you have the option to re-use a an assignment or announcement to help save some time.

Questions:

Checking for understanding, exit tickets, Do Now's, class discussions, and the list goes on...  This is one of my favorite new features in Classroom.  This adds a more interactive aspect to Google Classroom allowing for more student-student discussions.  This is also a good tool for formative assessment.  

Posting Forms:

Now when you post just a Google Form to an assignment, Google Classroom will mark that assignment "done" for students when they complete the form.  WooHoo!  Now you can track your students completion of quizzes right within Google Classroom.

Check back again for more (hopefully more timely) updates on what it new with Google Apps and many other tools.