Google Classroom

The structure of my blended learning class would not be possible without Google Classroom.  I’ve been using Google Classroom since it was introduced ~2 years ago in August 2014 and have continued to grow and adapt my teaching as the program improves.  Classroom definitely has its pros and cons and I have submitted quite a lot of feedback to them letting Google know what parts of their system do not work intuitively.  However, on the whole it is a powerful tool that I hope will continue to improve.

I use Google Classroom as the main starting point for all tasks related to my class.  Every day I post an announcement letting students know what the expectations are for the day.  The expectation is that students will read this announcement at the start of class before getting to work.  Some students will read it when I post it the night before or that morning in homeroom.  I often project the announcement on the screen when students arrive as a reminder to read it.  Does everyone actually read it?  No, but then if they ask me a question from it, I can tell them to go back and read the announcement.

Classroom Post

A breakdown of the daily announcement:

  • Type of Day- Is today going to be a Quiet Day, Table Day, Building Day, or something else?
  • Supplies needed- this remains fairly constant but is a daily reminder for students
  • Assignments I have graded/not graded- Because students are working on different assignments every day, I wanted some way to let them know which assignments they should check for feedback from me and which ones I hadn’t gotten to.  This enables me to have a life and be honest with the students if I wasn’t able to look at everything before the next class.
  • Announcements- This varies depending on the time of year and activities.  I generally include reminders but can have specific to-do lists if I need students to get certain tasks done in a certain order.
  • Upcoming- A list of either upcoming deadlines, tests, or the types of days so that students can mentally know what to prepare for

I will occasionally attach documents, surveys, or links to the announcement, but with the structure of announcements rather than assignments, there is no way to keep track of all the students that visit the link.  It worked well this past year to allow students to comment on the announcement if they had questions, but you do need to monitor to make sure the questions comments are relevant and not just an off topic distraction.

I also post and manage all of my assignments in Classroom.  The assignments are numbered so that they are easier to find.  For example assignment 6305 is for 6th grade, trimester 3, and then the 5th assignment of the term.  Here’s a sample assignment:

assignment

I’ve played around with how I post things in classroom and I’ve settled on a standardized format that gives students the basic information they need at a glance but then has them click to open the assignment and find out more.  The students get quick instructions, the days when they are allowed to work on this to help them budget their time, the supplies they will need, and groups to let them know who they can work with.  The information here answers the majority of initial questions students have about the assignment.  The vast majority of the time, the additional details of the assignment are included in a document for the students to look through.

I used to post each day as an assignment but then assignments that took multiple days got confusing and days where we didn’t turn anything in became odd empty assignments.  Now I only post assignments once but using the new Move to Top feature will rearrange the stream periodically to sort the assignments to make them easier to find.

Google Classroom has its own gradebook that does not directly correlate with our provided gradebook.  I use the score feature more as information for the student rather than the official record.  Unfortunately you can only record point scores and not proficiencies so I had to adjust things a bit.   I’ve played around with my grading this year (see Standards Based Grading) and changed how I recorded scores as well.  First trimester everything was out of 4 so students would feel bad if they got 3/4 even if it was considered proficient.  Second trimester I made everything out of 1, so proficient was displayed as 3/1. This was ok except for the students who were below expectations and got 1/1 which they thought was 100% and wouldn’t go back and revisit their work.  Third trimester I made everything out of 3, meaning a proficient score was 3/3 and students who exceeded expectations received a 4/3.  This seemed to be the most meaningful for the students and is probably what I will use next year unless Google updates their grading scheme.

One major concern with Google Classroom is that the app version of the program works differently than the desktop version.  Classroom has three settings for student assignments- Not Done, Done, and Returned.  Done means that the student has clicked submit and the assignment is ready to be graded.  Returned means that the teacher was the last person to work with the assignment and that it has been volleyed back to the student.  These three categories are useful and the app sorts assignments into all three sections.  Unfortunately, the web version only has Done and Not Done and groups all the returned and done files into one large group.  This means that for my scenario where I am grading a few files from every assignment, it was extremely time consuming for me to sort through the web Done list to figure out what I was supposed to be grading.  Once I figured out the trick on my phone, I have ended up using the app to quickly figure out what’s left to grade and then accessing the files through my Drive on the computer.  This workaround is a bit obnoxious and I hope they make all platforms the same in the near future (I’ve submitted a request for fixing).

Google Classroom is not perfect, but is definitely a good platform to start from.  Because it is created by Google, the interaction with Google Drive etc has been seamless from the start, which is not always the case with other LMSs.  Google Classroom is not an LMS or a social media platform but has a few features of both.  I highly recommend Google Classroom as an organizational tool to move your classroom into a 21st century, all access environment.