September 10, 2014
Google has recently announced the official release of Google Classroom in more than 40 languages. Google Classroom is a new tool in Google Apps for Education that helps teachers create and organize assignments quickly, provide feedback efficiently, and easily communicate with their classes.
As a teacher, here are some of the key features you need to know about Google Classroom.
Creating Google Class for your class
Google Class allows you to create multiple virtual classes for your students. Within these classes, you will be able to share announcements with students, create and distribute assignments with them, grade and provide feedback on students work, engage in whole or private discussions with students, and many more. For each class you create, a class code will be generated for students to use to access the class.
Watch this video to learn how to create a class in Google Classroom
Assignments
One of the neat features of Google Classroom is the Assignment functionality. Teachers can use this service to create and post assignments to their students. To share an assignment, just click on the assignment tab and provide a name for it, a short description and a due date. You can embed docs, Google docs, and YouTube videos in your assignments.
Google Drive integration
Google Classroom is seamlessly integrated with Google Drive making thus teachers' work way easier and more productive. When you create a Google Classroom, a folder named "classroom" is automatically created in your Google Drive account and the same happens in students accounts when they join in your class. Not only that, each new class you create will have a subfolder created for it by default in your Drive. And when you create an assignment, a subfolder is created for each assignment in your particular class to gather all students work handed in via Google classroom.
Sharing Assignments with students
Google Classroom has a wonderful feature for sharing assignments with students. When you create an assignment in Google Docs and upload it to your Google Class, you will be provided with three sharing options: first, students can view file, second, students can edit file, and third which is quite handy is to allow Google Class to make a copy for each student in class which saves you the hassle of making and distributing duplicate copies to students
When students log in to their Google Class, they will be able to see any pending assignments right from their home screen. To open the assignment , students can click on the title of the assignment or click on the link next to it to open it directly in Google Drive. Alternatively, students can find the assignment in their Drive under the subfolder that is automatically created for the assignment in the Classroom Folder.
Collecting assignments
When students finsih working on their assignments , they can click on the "turn in" button to submit their work. They can also leave a comment under the assignment for teacher to read. Once the assignment is submitted, students have the option to unsubmit their work by clicking on the "unsubmit" button. This will allow them to edit their work before resubmitting it back to the teacher. Even after the work has been submitted, students have the ability to post a comment under their assignment to inform their teachers about, for instance, any critical issues with their assignments.
Grading Assignments
Once assignments are turned in, teachers can log in to their Google Class and see the number of students who submitted their work and those who did not. Teachers can also grade students work right in Google Classroom by either choosing one of the numerical values provided there or by providing a customized value or by uploading grades from a CSV file. Grades will show up in students accounts in Google Class.
Watch the video tutorial below ( by EdTech Teacher) to learn about these and many other features that you can use on Google Classroom.
