Pragmatic Google Classroom May 15 2018.pdf

Digital Maestro Magazine

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Build an instructional site and reference it from Google Classroom every year.

A pragmatic combination digitalmaestro.org

May 15, 2018

Google Classroom with Google Sites

A major drawback to google classroom is that a classroom must be created every year and assignments must be re-created every year. As teachers, we don’t teach the same way each year but the materials and resources remain fairly consistent. It would be nice if we could refer to these resources without the need to re-create the classroom and assignments. A way to work around the limitations is to have a Google site that accompanies classroom assignments. It doesn't have to be a Google site, but a Google site provides ready access to resources which are probably already on your Google drive.

Ale Reyes

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

Table of Contents Creating an instruction site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Creating pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Inserting images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 An overview of Google Docs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Inserting Google Docs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Embed Google Drive folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 YouTube Content. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Embed Google Calendar. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Google Classroom. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Parting Thoughts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

Google sites in combination with Google Classroom is one way to integrate technology resources in a Blended or flipped classroom. Google Sites is part of a Gmail account. We create an account by going to google.com and using the sign-in link in the upper right-hand corner of the search page. The site service link takes us to the old version of Google Sites. This version might be old but it is very good. It provides a great deal of flexibility and many advanced options. We will not be using this older site. There is a new service Click the Apps launcher to access some of the that is much easier to use. The new site creation free Google applications and services. Find the service has drag and drop tools that make the Sites icon and click on it. If you don’t see the site creation process quick and easy. A link to Sites icon there is another way to access the the new Google Sites service is found in the left service. In the address bar, type https://sites. menu panel. Click the New Google Sites link. google.com and press the return key. After creating an account, you will have access to the Google Apps launcher. The Google Apps launcher is an icon with nine small squares. Some people say it looks like a waffle.

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

If this is your first time accessing the new Google Sites service you won’t see any content. With Google Sites, we can create multiple sites. I have created dozens of sites and have not encountered any limitations. To create a site we click the Plus button in the lower right corner of the page.

The options below the Google Drive link allow us to embed content from YouTube, Google Calendar, and Google Maps. Each of these options will take us to services where we can find a YouTube video, select a calendar, or find a location using Google maps.

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The Google Docs options in the last section of the panel are filtered options for adding content. A blank site will be created for us. The site The Docs option will list Docs in Google Drive. includes a banner at the top for the title and The Slides option will list Slides. The Charts a banner image. The white section below the option will find charts that have been generated banner is where we assemble our web content. with Sheets and display the charts. A chart must be created with Sheets before it will be generated on a page. •

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The tools for assembling our site are located in the panel on the right. The first four icons are services to create text boxes, add images, embed web content, and upload content. I recommend uploading all content to Google Drive before adding it to the website. Adding content is much easier once it is on Google Drive.

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At the top of the panel, we have sections. We are currently in the Insert section. The Pages section lists all pages created within the site. We click the Plus button at the bottom of the Pages panel to create our first page. This would actually be the second page on the site. The first page is the home page currently on the left side of the panel.

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

The themes section has basic site templates with banner images and basic colors. There aren’t many templates. We can easily modify our site with our own banner image and colors. I begin with the simple site template and use it to develop a custom site.

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While stretching the box you will notice faint vertical lines in the background. These are column layouts. There are 14 columns with a small gap between each column. These gaps are called gutters. The number of columns and their width cannot be adjusted. The columns are here as guides. They are used to help align content. They are also used to help resize and crop images.

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Creating an instruction site There are many ways to develop content. I will cover the broader content options. These should get you started and help guide your development of a useful classroom site. We all have our teaching style and the site should reflect that style. Your students will come to expect it.

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ss While stretching content to the edges you will notice that we cannot stretch the text box all the way to the edge. The last column serves as a border or padding between the content and the edge. Think of it like the margins on a page.

The first step is to give the site a title. Click once On my banner, the name of the class wraps onto on the page title text box in the banner. Provide a second line where it ends with the word class. a title like, Mr. Reyes Astronomy Class. Click once before the word astronomy and press the return key to force the word astronomy to Title • C-J j the second line. ~

Mr Reyes' Astronomy Class

The title will be longer than the available text box width. Circles appear to the left and right of the text box. These are handles to resize the text box. Use them to stretch the box.

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The basic formatting options for text in Sites includes standard text styles for websites. These styles include titles, heading, subheading, and normal text. The title for our site is using the title style. This style can be selected and changes using the toolbar above the textbook. Above the site banner and to the left is the site name. The site name is currently in a light grey color. Click once on the site name box. Type Astronomy Class 1A.

Google Classroom with Google Sites

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Above the site name is a blue icon for Google Sites. Click once on the space to the right of the icon. The title we just entered for the site will be placed here by Google Sites. This is the document name. A site in Google Sites is referred to as a document. This document name is part of the link that will be used to access the site. We don’t have to accept this name. It can be changed. Change the document name to astronomy.

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Type an introduction to your class. It can have instruction for navigating the site and finding content. You don’t have to put a lot of information here in the beginning. The information you want to include here will become evident as the site is developed. Type anything you want and the text box will grow to accommodate the information. Don’t press the return key to go to a new line, the text will automatically wrap. Press the return key once to insert a new paragraph. Paragraphs on web pages are usually formatted using the block style. We can indent paragraphs by pressing the space key twice. Don’t press the tab key to indent paragraphs. A tab is too much for an indent.

Okay, let’s review. We have learned that a site can have one name for the banner, another for the site title and another for the site document name that is used for the link.

Our first text box Go to the panel on the right and click the Insert section. Click the text box button. A text box will appear below the banner. This text box has a few more options because it is used in the body of a page. This box has the options to bold or italicize text. It has the option to create numbered and bulleted lists. Digital Maestro Magazine • digitalmaestro.org – 7

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Hover over the main page title again and add other subpages. Title each subpage Venus, The main site page is often called the home Earth, and Mars. Each subpage is created and page. We create additional pages to organize added below the previous. Repeat the same and group content. Content is grouped under process with the other pages. pages with sub-pages. We will create several pages and sub-pages.

Creating pages

Organizing pages

I find it useful to set up pages in a structure that mirrors the content to be taught. In astronomy, I will begin by covering the inner planets. After that I will cover the outer planets, constellations, and galaxies.

The pages on our site are nicely organized. The order of these pages is easy to change. Click and drag a page up or down to change its order. Release the page when a blue line appears at the location where you want it to be placed.

Click on the pages section and click the Plus button near the bottom of the panel. Title this page Inner Planets and click the done button. Repeat the process to create the other pages for outer planets, constellations, and galaxies.

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Create subpages to organize content within each category. Hover over the first page we created. Three vertical dots will appear to the right of the page title. The is the actions menu. Click the actions menu and select the option to add a subpage. Title the page Mercury and click the done button.

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To place a page as a subpage we drag the page above another page and release when a rectangular highlight appears around the page title. To promote a subpage it has to be dragged out of the main page.

Hiding pages Created pages are viewable by anyone once a site is published. We don’t always need pages to be viewable. Sometimes we need to hide pages while they are being developed. To hide a page we click the actions menu and select the option to hide page. Repeat the process to un-hide the page.

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Inserting images

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Click the images button. There is a variety of ways we can add images to a page. The option to add an image through a URL will link to an image located somewhere on the Internet. Be careful of copyright when linking to images from other sites. Linking to images from other sites is not always the most reliable. The owner of the site could decide to remove the image at any time. I recommend placing all images in your Google Drive and then linking to those images.

Find a photo and double-click the image. You can also click on it once then click the select button. We can insert multiple images. To insert multiple images we click on each image then click the select button. This is a good way to insert a handful of images. This is not the way I recommend inserting an image gallery. There is another way to do this and I will cover the process later.

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The search option is similar to linking to an image on the Internet. The search option is good if you do not already have an image saved. The option, in this case, is useful because the images returned in the search are in the Creative Commons or in the Public Domain. Images in the Creative Commons or Public domain do not violate copyright law.

Organizing and formatting images Images are placed within image boxes on the page. Use the handles to resize images. Bringing the handles inward too close to the image will result in distorting the image or cropping the image. Cropping occurs when edges of an image are hidden or taken away. Use the handles to resize and crop the image as needed. Images can be moved by clicking and dragging the image around the page. The column guides help align the image to other sections on the page. Use the column guides to space and tile images.

The option to insert images from your album will display images uploaded to your Google Photos account. Images can be added to this account from smartphones, tablets, and computers. The albums option is a good way to collect and insert images provided by students. Google Photos has an option to share albums for contribution. The option to add photos from Google drive will access all the folders and files in your Google Drive. This is where we need to be organized with folders for content we intend to share. I recommend creating a main folder for all your instructional content. Create additional folders within this folder to organize documents and Digital Maestro Magazine • digitalmaestro.org – 9

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Click the Docs icon in the Google drive section near the bottom of the panel. Google sites will Google has a suite of applications called G filter for word processing documents. Click on Suite. This suite of applications includes a word a document and click the insert button at the processor called Docs. The application for bottom of the panel. presentations is called Slides. The spreadsheet application is called Sheets. There are other applications but we will stick with these for now.

An overview of Google Docs

Google Docs is a web-based application for word processing. Docs have many useful features. All documents are stored online in Google drive. They can be accessed and edited from a variety of devices. The share option included in all G Suite applications allows us to collaborate with others in real-time. Documents can be shared with anyone and with the world in a variety of formats. They can be shared online as web pages or can be distributed for easy download.

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This document has been embedded within the page. This is a convenient way to display one or two documents but can be difficult when we need to display several documents. Stretch the box that embeds the document to view more of Google Slides is a web-based presentation the document on the page. Without stretching application. The slides are stored online in the embed box, visitors will need to scroll within Google drive and can be shared for collabora- the document to see the rest of the content. tion. We are able to publish slides as interactive web pages. We are able to generate links to Hover over the document we just inserted. Three distribute and download presentations. icons will appear to the left of the web page. Click the trash can icon to delete the document Google Sheets is a web-based spreadsheet from the page. application. Documents created are stored in the cloud and are shareable like the other docuMa·, ment formats. We are able to share and collaboIn 2003, hi close rate on sheets in the same way. I[) nickn and

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Inserting Google Docs

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Inserting Google Docs onto a page is a useful No olh r pl n way to display information. This information can be updated by editing the document. This avoids the need to log into the site. Let’s see Another way to delete the document is to click how to add individual documents from Google the document once and then to click the trash Drive first. can icon that appears above the document.

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

Inserting slides

Inserting Google Sheets

Inserting slides may make more sense than inserting full-length documents. Click the Slides icon. Click one or more slides. The selected slides will be tallied next to the insert button. Click the insert button.

Click the Sheets icon in the Google Drive section of the panel. Select a sheet to embed on the page. The sheet is inserted as a read-only document like the word processing document. Displaying Google Sheets on a web page is a good way to display information that needs The slides are arranged on the left side of the tables. In this example, we are able to display page. Each slide is placed on a section below the planetary information for the inner planets. This previous slide. Click and drag a slide up and to provides a handy reference for students on the right of an existing slide. The slot where the assignments. slide once was, will be replaced with an existing slide that might have been added below.

Inserting Forms

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Forms is an application that is part of the G Suite of applications. Forms are designed to collect information from polls and surveys. They are also used to provide assessments. Forms include an option to turn any form into an assessment that is graded for teachers.

Click the Forms icon and find a form to add to the page. The form is like a word processing Each slide on the page is represented by the document where most of the form cannot be first slide in the slideshow. This is referred to as easily seen. The form can be opened in a sepathe poster image for the slide. The slides have rate tab. controls to play the slide on the page or to set the slide to full screen. The controls include Forms save all the responses to a spreadsheet. options to skip to specific slides and show As we saw earlier, Sheets display information in table format when embedded on pages. The speaker notes. Sheet information is live and we are able to see the results from polls or surveys as they are submitted. We can display the results of polls or surveys by embedding the responses spreadsheet below the form or on a separate page. Placing the responses sheet on another page allows us to hide the page until all the responses have been collected.

This is a useful way to distribute presentations to students and to include notes about the presen- It is often better to provide a link to a form rather tation. This is definitely very useful in Blended than to embed a form in a page. and Flipped classroom environments. Digital Maestro Magazine • digitalmaestro.org – 11

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Click the gear icon that appears above the section. Change the view type from list to grid. Charts are part of Sheets. They are created from A thumbnail of each file will be generated and information created or generated on Sheets. displayed. The grid view is very useful when Click the Chart icon to insert a chart from a sharing media files like images and video. Sheet. The chart must be created from data first before it will be available to embed on a page. [Zl 0

Embedding Charts



Sites will prompt us to select a chart before it TITLE is embedded. The embedded chart is live. The C Earth chart will update as information on the sheet is changed. Charts are a good way to display form C Me rcu ry information. This is especially useful when using forms to collect student assessments. We can f""!I ' select the information that is displayed on tables and charts. We can easily add or remove documents from the folder. We don’t need to update the site because the site will automatically update the Embed Google Drive folders folder view with any changes. We have been embedding documents from Google Drive onto a page in a previous lesson. We can add a folder that contains subfoldAdding one document at a time gets difficult ers. With this structure, all I need is one page when we need to quickly add lots of documents. that provides access to all the files and folders There is a better way add multiple documents needed in my class. Try not to add too many folders because this can be difficult to navigate onto a page. when finding files. Click the From Drive icon in the panel. Find a folder with documents and click it once. Click Organizing folders within folders don’t have the Insert button. Files inside the folder are to be an all or nothing option. Create folders shown in list view. Click once on the section with within folders and share one of the subfolders at a time. This works very well when setting up the folder we just added. folder permissions. Let’s look at folder permisdesi gn elemen1s Apr 30, 201 5 sion when sharing documents.

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Folder and file permissions When sharing files and folders it’s important to make sure you have given permission for those folders and files to be viewed by others. Begin by creating a master folder that will hold all folders and files. Share this folder with everyone in your district or with the world. Assign view only permission to the folder.

Google Classroom with Google Sites

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I highly recommend Edpuzzle. It has tools for embedding instructions and audio to the video. On - Anyo ne a! Ys leta ISO willh the link The assessment tool is a good way to get inforc-e, Anyon.e at Ysleta ISD who has ttle lirik can access _ mation from formative assessments. The inteOff Speci fic people • Sha red with specific people. gration with Google Classroom makes it easy to distribute content and get feedback. Edpuzzle generates a link to share. This link works in That’s all I have to do. Any new folders or docu- Google sites to embed the video on a page. ments created in this folder will have the same permission. This is called inheritance of permis- Safeyoutube is another option designed to sions. Folders and documents placed in this provide a link to the YouTube video with no folder are referred to as child folders and files. advertising or link to other videos. The service As such, they inherit the permissions of the provides a Safeyoutube link for sharing. This is parent folder. Copy or move documents into a good alternative if you are not interested in the folders and they will inherit the permission anything as elaborate as Edpuzzle. of the main folder. I will still be able to edit and modify anything within the folder because I am Embedding YouTube video the owner of the folder and documents. Click the YouTube button under the embed Students make copies of these view only docu- section in the panel. A YouTube search page ments by choosing the option to make a copy. will open. Search for a video on Mars. A list of This option is available from Google Drive. results will be listed below the search box. Click Shared items like images and PDF documents the play button over the video thumbnail to get are copied to the student drive using a similar a preview of the video. Click the select button process. to add the video to the page. The video will be embedded on the page with a poster image. Click the play button to play the video on the YouTube Content webpage. YouTube is a great way to bring instructional content from a variety of professionals. Teachers Embedding YouTube from Edpuzzle are often reluctant to use video from YouTube because of the possibility of inappropriate Go over to Edpuzzle and create your account. content and advertisements. Edpuzzle integrates with Google so all you need to do is select the Google option when creating There are services that can help remove some of an account. Provide your Google account inforthe annoyances. These services include Edpuz- mation when prompted. Select your instructionzle.com and safeyoutube.net. al content and search for the campus where you teach. Edpuzzle is squarely aimed at educators. It removes advertisements and prevents other Search for a video on Mars. Hover over one of videos from playing. The service allows teach- the videos and click the Use It button. Edpuzers to add their own audio notes and to include zle will take us to a configuration page. There assessments. The whole services integrate with are steps to add annotations, voice over, and @

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

assessments. Skip these steps for now and click the Save button in the upper right corner of the page. Click the Edpuzzle logo on the upper left side of the page. Click the My Content button in the button bar.

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Click the video in the My Content section. Click the assigned and share button above the video. There are two share options. The button on the left will assign the video to a class and help create an assignment. The button on the right will generate a link. We will use this link to place the video on our web page.

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Click the embed button at the top of the panel. Paste the link into the link dialogue box. Click the Insert button. A poster image of the video will display on the page. The user will be taken to the Edpuzzle site when the image is clicked. Images

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Using Edpuzzle embed code Go back to the Edpuzzle page with the links. Highlight the link option to embed the video. Copy the link to computer memory. Return to your site and click the embed button. Above the field where we placed the previous link is an Click the share with anyone button. A dialogue option to display embed code. Click the embed with two link share options will open. Highlight code button and paste the embed code into the the first link and copy it to computer memory. code box. Click the Next button and then click Leave the Edpuzzle page open and open anoth- the Insert button. er tab to return to the site. If the site is open, BYURL EMBED CODE click that tab. This is Mars 2018, Curiosity IRover

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

Preview the page and click the video play button. ed to repeat year after year. Repeated events With the embed option, the video will play on the can be updated if the dates or times change. It is much easier to update a repeating event than page. to create one from scratch.

SafeYouTube links Safe YouTube provides a link but we need to do a little more work. Go to YouTube and find a video on Mars. Click the share option and copy the link to the video. Return to Safe YouTube and paste the link. Click the Generate Link button. The generated link is used the same way we created a link with Edpuzzle. SafeYouTube does not provide embed code to use the embed option so we can play the video on the page.

Embed Google Calendar With the Calendar embed option, we can embed a calendar created under our account or one that is generated with the creation of a Google Classroom. Click the calendar icon to select a calendar for display. Calendars associated with a Google Classroom will be titled with the classroom name. There are two things to consider when embedding a Google Calendar. Embedding a calendar from a classroom ties all the events related to the classroom and students in that class. This calendar is available from the website and from within Google Classroom. Creating a separate account has some advantages. Calendars not associated with Classrooms will remain available after a classroom has been archived or deleted. These calendars can be reused year after year. There are many events that are part of every school year and using one calendar avoids the need to create a new one each year. Google Calendar automatically deletes old events so they are not visible to students in the following year. Events that repeat can be creatDigital Maestro Magazine • digitalmaestro.org – 15

Google Classroom with Google Sites

to use the term period instead of section. This is in reference to the period in which the class is Google Classroom is an entire lesson on it own. available. The subject section provides an addiIn this section, we will cover the fundamentals tional field if the title of the classroom doesn’t of creating assignment as they relate to Google correctly identify the course. Provide a classSites integration. Anyone can use Google room title and click the create button. Classroom. This service is part of a free Gmail account. To go https://classroom.google.com to Astronomy begin your first classroom.

Google Classroom

Google Classroom is a portal for the distribution and collection of assignments from students. Assignments are manually created by teachers. Teachers select to assign an assignment immediately or schedule it for release at a future date and time. Assignments include an option for a due date. Assignments may include links to resources. These resources include documents from Google drive, links to videos, and links to web pages. The first step is to create a Classroom. A circle button to create a classroom appears in the button bar section of the site. The button looks like a plus sign. The button is used to create or join existing Google Classrooms. Students join Classrooms by entering a code provided by a teacher. Click the Plus button and choose to create a new class.

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Google classroom has three main sections. These sections include Stream, Students, and About. The Stream section is where the majority of the activity takes place. This is where we create assignments. The Students section is where we invite students to join the class. The invitation can be done with an email or with a code. With email, the teacher must manually enter each student email. This is time-consuming, most teachers choose to use the invitation code. With the invitation code, students join the class by selecting the join class option in Google Classroom. The invitation code is displayed to the class from within the Students section. The code is next to the invite students button. To display the code so more people can see it, click the triangle to the right of the code. Click the display option to display a larger version of the code.

A class setup box will open so we can provide information about the class. There are sever- The display version includes a full-screen button al options but only the name of the class is so the code can be displayed even larger. required. The section is useful when teachers teach several sections of the same content. For example, English Section 1, English Section 2, and English Section 3. Some teachers choose 16 – Digital Maestro Magazine • digitalmaestro.org

Google Classroom with Google Sites

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name and subfolders with assignment names. These folders are within the main folder titled Classroom.

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Managing so many folder and assignments can be difficult without Google Classroom. It takes care of displaying submitted assignments without the need to navigate hundreds of folders.

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The About section includes a link to the Classroom Calendar. This is a calendar especially created for the class. The calendar is accessible from here or from the teacher’s Calendar page at https://calendar.google.com.

The About section is very useful. In this section, we provide links to resources. These resources are available all the time. This is where we include the link to the Google Site that supports the assignments distributed in Google ClassIn this section, we can invite teachers to the room. classroom. Invited teachers have the same The About section includes links to the Google access to students and assignments. Invited Drive Classroom folder. Every classroom that teachers cannot archive the class unless they is created includes a folder created just for the are made owners of the class. classroom. This folder is created within the main folder titled Classroom. The Classroom folder Assignments is accessible from here and from the teacher’s Google Drive account. The option to create assignments is in the Stream section. Click the Plus button in the lower right corner of the page. Click the Create Assignment button. • Class Drive folder Astronomy1A

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Each classroom folder contains folders that are created in response to each assignment that is created. These folders are used to store distributed documents and collected documents from The create assignment box has several options students. and settings. At the top, we see the classroom name and a student selector. Assignments are The assignment folder includes folders from available for distribution to several classrooms. each student that submits a digital assignment. This is very useful for teachers that teach multiThe folder structure is mirrored on the student’s ple sections or periods. Assignments are availGoogle Drive account. Students do not have able to all students or to select students. With access to the teacher folder or to folders of the student selector, we choose which students other students. They have a folder with the class will see the assignment in their classroom portal. Digital Maestro Magazine • digitalmaestro.org – 17

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Click the classroom selector to see a list of all classrooms under your account. These classrooms include ones created by you and ones where you have been invited as a teacher. Place a check next to each class that will receive the assignment.

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Some teachers will write an assignment title that reads, Math assignment fractions. The problem is that we are likely to have multiple math assignments for fractions. A better title is one like this, Math class assignment: Multiplication of fractions: proper and mixed. A title like this might be verbose but it provides a lot of precision. This precision is important when looking for assignments. If you have been teaching for any length of time you know there is always a need to pull up information on student performance. This information is often for meetings where we are discussing the need for modification of student assignments.

Google classroom does not have a search function but we can use the search option is the Chrome browser. This is a little off topic but I think you might find it useful. Press the Control key on Windows or Chrome and press the letter Click the student selector. All students enrolled F. On Mac press the Command key and the in the class will be listed. Students enrolled in letter F. This combination opens a search box at other classes will not be listed. The selector is the top of the page. Use this search box to look not available if the assignment is going to be for the assignment. Use keywords in the assigndistributed to other classes. When we select ment. These keywords would be something like other classes, the assignment is automatically math or fractions. Use both at the same time to sent to all students in all the distributed classes. find the exact lesson faster. When we choose to distribute an assignment to other classes we lose other options. We cannot select specific students to receive the assignment and the assignment cannot be scheduled.

Distributing assignments to other classes works best when the assignment is to be distributed and available at the moment to all students. Distributing assignments to other classes does not work when the assignment includes a scheduled release date.

Assignment title and instructions The assignment title is very important for a variety of reasons. The title is a clear indicator of the assignment. Is the assignment for homework? Is it a project? Is it an assessment? What is the assignment about?

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In the instructions area, we should provide as much detail to help the students understand the assignment and to help us find the assignment later. The instructions area does not have to be the location where we provide all the assignment instructions. These instructions are part of an instruction document. The instructions area might read something like this.

Google Classroom with Google Sites

Use the link below to open the instructions document. That’s it. The title takes care of any search needs and the instruction document takes care of all the instructions needed for the assignment.

Topics

After to the due date, we have a topic option. I use topics like categories. For example, class assignment, homework, quiz, test, or project. These topics turn into filters used to organize assignments. These filters are useful when lookDue date ing for assignments. They are also useful when Click the arrow for the due date. Click on the looking at student performance on assessments. due date field. A calendar selector will open. Click the topic arrow and create a topic for the assignment. Create topics that are consistent Due date & time and can be used for all assignments during the year. May 15, 2018 ideo X May 2018 S

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After selecting a due date we will see an option to include a time for the due date. Click on the time field and enter a time value in hours and Providing resources minutes. The last row at the bottom has buttons to add resources. The icons from left to right include Due date & time an option to attach files. With this option, we have access to content on our computer and in May18 ,20 18 ideo X Google Drive. The Google drive icon to the right of the attach icon provides the same options Time (opti onal) to attach content from our computer or Google Drive. The due date and time option does not prevent the student from submitting an assignment after the due date. This will mark the assignment as late when it is submitted after the due date and time. This allows us to impose late penalties on grades if they apply.

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

The third link opens a search panel. In this search panel, we are able to search for videos on YouTube. Not all videos are on YouTube so there is also an option to paste links to other video sources.

Resources and Google Sites

We shouldn’t be providing many resources for the assignment. All the resources should be on the Google site. The only resource should be the one to the Instructional Document. An instrucThe fourth option is an option to provide a direct tional document goes by other names. This link to any web-based resource. We need to document provides instructions, information, copy the link to our source and paste it into the and links to resources. link field. The instructional document should direct There is an increasing number of web resourc- students to resources on your site. The whole es that provide a Google Classroom integration point is that your assignment should be as minioption. Some of these sites include Mindmeis- mal as possible so you spend less time creatter, Canva, and Newsela. There is a Google ing the assignment and more time facilitating Classroom extension that takes any web page student instruction. link and uses it for a classroom assignment. This extension is available in the Chrome web-store. The extension is called, Share to Classroom. Share to Classroom

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

Assigning and Scheduling

Parting Thoughts

Once we have the basic information for the assignment, we can click the assign button. This will make the assignment available to students immediately.

This process can easily be repeated with any assignment. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel every year. Updating content on our site and in Google drive is easy.

We can schedule the assignment for a future date and time. This option is not readily visible. We need to click the arrow next to the assign button. There are two additional options for the assignment, schedule, and draft. The draft option will save the assignment but not make it available to the class and the students. Drafts are saved and accessible at the top of the Stream page. Click the schedule option.

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The schedule option is much like the due date option. There is a field for the date and one for the time. Select a date and time then click the schedule button.

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Google Classroom with Google Sites

"Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid" ~ Albert Einstein

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