Integrating Google Classroom into Middle School and High School Education Reed Peterson

Hello! In this presentation, I’ll be giving information on integrating Google Classroom into any middle school, or high school, curriculum. Google Classroom is a free-to-use, user friends interface that lets teachers upload assignments, links, post questions, and topics for students to discuss, while being globally available.

Google Classroom is accessible through the main “honeycomb” shape on your Google homepage, or through any website, on the top right of your tool bar. Clicking it will give you a scrollable drop-down area, an d it can be found relatively close to the bottom, at default. This can be changed in settings to be at the top, as well. Your school- issued email can be used to create a school-safe account, which could then be used to access your Google drive associated with schoolwork.

Once GC has been opened, you and your students will be met with tabs that look like this; the title of the course that you’ve given, the assignments due, and other information you put on the tab. You, the teacher, will be the only one who can see how many students are in the class.

When you click on the course page, this is your main view When you click on the course page, this is your main view! Your theme can be changed on the bottom left of the upper ribbon, and you can upload a picture that better fits your class theme, if desired. Let’s talk about the top center first; Stream, Students, and About.

These are your main tabs that will be used for course maintenance; Stream is where you’ll be able to see assignments, announcements, and questions for the class, along with links. Students, of course, is the list of students who have accepted the invite code. About is a tab that can be used to find class information, as well as necessary materials.

This is the main toolbar for the Stream This is the main toolbar for the Stream. Here you can reuse posts, which will recall previous postings; create questions, which can be made out of points, given assignment dates, and can be assigned to specific groups of students; create assignments, which can be made from an existing document, or from a blank document; and create announcement, which will post for everyone in the stream to see.

On the create question tab, you can see there is a drop-down arrow to choose if it’s all students, a group, or individual students. There is a space for the question, an optional instructions area, and below are other questions options as well; due date, topic, and if students can answer (collaborate) on the question together.

In the assignment creation tab, you can do the same as in the question; give a topic, a due date, and optional instructions. From here, at the bottom, you can choose which to post; a video they must review; a document with questions; and, if necessary, both; a questions sheet to accompany a link to an online website, or video.

And, finally, the last feature is the announcement tab And, finally, the last feature is the announcement tab. Here you can give instructions, reminders, or create a way to engage your students at home (I’ve suggested bonus questions, or trivia for students). This is a great place to re-enforce schedules, test dates, or even a reminder that an assignment is coming up, and needs to be studied, or finished.

On the left-hand side of your Stream page, you’ll find two boxes; upcoming assignments, and topics. As a teacher, you can organize assignments into different topics, which would be a great idea to keep your weekly assignments under an individual tab for students. Likewise, they can see what is upcoming, overdue, and what is incomplete.

Each assignment, again, can be given to all students, a group, or individuals. This is beneficial if a student has substitutions for work, or if you assign different groups different videos, books, or tasks. Grading (out of points) can be set as well, and a due date can be assigned to each assignment.

One of the wonderful features of the assignments being online is that you can see which students have completed them, and which have not, so there is no “I thought I got it done” excuse anymore.

The completed assignments can be sorted, as well; done, not done, or returned. If there are students who have turned in work, and it is being sent back for review, it will show up as “returned”, and will not be marked as “done” until you have done so.

The second tab, “Students”, is only accessible by you, the teacher; here, you can see every student who is enrolled in your class. A great security feature for you and your students is the access code, or class code, is generated and given to you only, to be used once by students. This keeps other students, or strangers, from being able to enter and interact with your class.

The third tab, “About”, is used for your class title, and materials The third tab, “About”, is used for your class title, and materials. Many teachers use this area to give a brief “about” themselves, the class, and the expectations, as well as a list of materials used in classes. In some instances, for materials that can be found at different locations, teachers have given links to websites that also list prices for necessities.

The other feature in the About tab are these three areas; a Class Drive folder, where students can submit files to be shared with other students; Classroom calendar, where every student can go to see due dates for assignments; and Google calendar, which can be used for school events, breaks, and even lunches.

As touched on in the previous slide, this is the Classroom Calendar As touched on in the previous slide, this is the Classroom Calendar. Not only will it display the assignment for an individual class, but the student can select all, one, or individual class assignments to be viewed, from the drop down arrow in the top left corner.

In the top left, there are three horizontal bars that give you options to change classes, view calendars, or go to your teacher to-do list; here you can see assignments students are working on, how many students are done, and the due dated for each assignment. Not only will your students have the ease of access of seeing their assignments online, you as a teacher will be able to see what you have done, and what needs to be done, without scrambling through papers on a desk.

Based on the SAMR model, Google Classroom could be viewed as a combination of S (Substitution) and M (Modification); the modification factor is given a fresh, easy to access face that gathers all of your information in one area, which is accessible any time, anywhere. The substitution, as well, creates a new area of education in where there is (if you would do without paper) no need for hand-written notes, folders, or flash drives; the Cloud saves all information.