Thursday, June 30, 2016

Google Classroom - Collaborating with other teachers

Do you have a collaborating teacher or support staff that would like to have access to your class assignments?  That's easy to do with Google Classroom.  Simply go to the About page and click on the link to "invite teacher" to add anyone within your school domain.  It is a great feature for those of us that share students with other support staff to save time sending emails about what we covered in class on a particular day.  

Just remember, if you have invited someone to be a teacher in your Google Classroom, they have all of the rights that you do, so they can add and delete posts, see student information, send emails and more. 

Watch the video to see the steps on how to invite a teacher. 

Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Google Classroom - what to do with the About page

When you click on the About page in Google Classroom, it initially appears very boring.  But there's more to it than simply adding a description about your class.  There's a link to your shared classroom folder, the Classroom Google Calendar and also a place for your to Add your own resources.  The resources section is the portion that may be most underutilized but incredibly useful if organized thoughtfully.  I like to use it to post links to the following:

  • online textbook
  • class Quizlet site
  • shared folder for copies of class notes
  • class blog
  • class syllabus and templates for common assignment structure (ex. lab reports)


Watch the video to learn more about the "About" page in Classroom.


Google Classroom - Reusing posts

Do you teach multiple sections of the same class?  Do you recycle certain assignments from year to year with slight modifications?  

The feature to Reuse a previous post in Google classroom is the answer to save you time!  Reusing posts allow you to find posts from other classes, including an archived class, and posting it to a different class also allowing you to modify the post prior to adding it to the stream.  

Google Classroom - Posting questions or polls

One of the newer features in Google classroom is the ability to post a question or a poll to your stream and allow students to respond directly to the post within the stream.  There are two options - open ended questions or multiple choice style questions.  Teachers have implemented this feature in many ways such as: 

  • Polling students about preferences
  • Gaining feedback about a particular topic to check for understanding
  • Pre-lesson questionnaire
  • Exit tickets 
Watch the video above to see how to set up a question/poll in Classroom.  Feel free to leave comments or ask questions. 


Monday, June 27, 2016

How to post an assignment in Google Classroom

Google Classroom has many features that make life easier for classroom teachers.  Posting assignments helps teachers to share resources with students and allow students to return items for feedback or grading by the teacher.  


Google Classroom Tutorial - Adding announcements to your stream

Google classroom has been a wonderful tool for teachers to easily assign materials to their class and keep digital assignments and submissions organized.  The following tutorial shows you how to post an announcement to your students in google classroom.  An announcement is a one way tool for the teacher to post something that they want the students to view but not return submitted work to the teacher.  Announcements can be used to post test reminders, links to sites, view only versions of class resources for students to make their own copies, and more.  



Thursday, June 2, 2016

Computer science for high school

Our country is coming to a stark realization that we need more computer science education for our teachers and students, including an announcement from President Obama declaring Computer Science For All (#CSforAll).  

On the forefront, Google has created its own resources and PD on their Google Computer science for High School web site. The site offers resources for funding CS in schools, teacher professional development, resources for teaching CS, and a Google+ community to share information with colleagues. 

If you're looking for more resources for your classroom to teach computer science, I highly recommend the site as a launching point, as well as the Google+ community.