Teachers are often asked to create course pages for their students. Many schools utilize LMS or learning management systems like Moodle, or Blackboard Connect (Wright et al, 2014). These services often offer school subscriptions, and are robust and full of tools that teachers can use to customize their course pages so that they suit the particular and specific needs of their schools and students. The interface on many free, more basic LMS course pages is often a more user-friendly stream-based page, like a Facebook feed.
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Services like Edmodo or Schoology use this style of interface, and at the moment Google Classroom's setup is no exception. This type of interface is familiar to many of today's students who are accustomed to this style of social media design, increasing the chance of student motivation and student buy-in. Some have even used Facebook itself as an LMS (Arabacioglu & Akar-Vural, 2014). It is also easy for teachers to set up, build, and use the sites mentioned above to create a good-looking, easy-to-use, interfaces for their courses.
Schools that are subscribed to Google Apps for Education (GAFE) have exclusive access to Google Classroom - learn about its many features on this user-built site.
One of the big advantages of Google Classroom is that it seamlessly ties together Google Calendar, Google Drive, and other Google apps so that students can jump between classes quickly and easily from one place. For example, Assignments built in Google Classroom are immediately incorporated into student calendars, and reminders can be automatically generated when due dates near (or have passed!) Unfortunately Google Classroom lacks many of the features of a more robust purpose-built LMS like Moodle. Another complaint about Google Classroom is that a long stream of posts comments and replies is not useful when a course is often divided into many separate units. Students who wish to review an old assignment find themselves scrolling over many days, weeks and months of posts just to find the relevant assignment.
The new and improved Google Classroom offers a radical improvement to the current interface. It now contains all of the features of a robust LMS that were missing up until now. Please watch the following video to learn more!
One of the big advantages of Google Classroom is that it seamlessly ties together Google Calendar, Google Drive, and other Google apps so that students can jump between classes quickly and easily from one place. For example, Assignments built in Google Classroom are immediately incorporated into student calendars, and reminders can be automatically generated when due dates near (or have passed!) Unfortunately Google Classroom lacks many of the features of a more robust purpose-built LMS like Moodle. Another complaint about Google Classroom is that a long stream of posts comments and replies is not useful when a course is often divided into many separate units. Students who wish to review an old assignment find themselves scrolling over many days, weeks and months of posts just to find the relevant assignment.
The new and improved Google Classroom offers a radical improvement to the current interface. It now contains all of the features of a robust LMS that were missing up until now. Please watch the following video to learn more!
So what's new?
The new Google Classroom has been dramatically improved. Please watch the video above to see how.
Instead of a single, seemingly endless stream of comments and assignments the new and improved Google Classroom allows teachers to subdivide courses into separate units.
Previously the plus button at the bottom right corner of a course page offered teachers only 4 options. The new Google Classroom offers a full list of options previously only available in applications like Moodle or blackboard. These new assignment and activity options are fully integrated with the students Google drive and calendar.
Course Chat rooms and Google hangouts can be created for students to interact and collaborate.
Feedback and discussion board forums can also be created for more collaborative learning. Journaling can be done directly through the Google Classroom app.
Questionnaires quizzes and other lessons can now be built within the cloud-based platform.
SCORM packages, wikis, and other tools are now available directly from the interface.
Using the Google Drive desktop app also allows for the automatic and immediate creation of folders for assignments without the need for teachers to organize files manually.
When students click "turn in" on an assignment it immediately appears in the relevant teacher folder, and students cannot edit those files until they have been viewed, marked and returned to them.
The new and improved Google Classroom also now seamlessly integrates with your Mark/Gradebook.
The ideal choice for course pages, benefitting students and teachers alike. Here at Google we think you will love all of the new additions to Google Classroom!
Instead of a single, seemingly endless stream of comments and assignments the new and improved Google Classroom allows teachers to subdivide courses into separate units.
Previously the plus button at the bottom right corner of a course page offered teachers only 4 options. The new Google Classroom offers a full list of options previously only available in applications like Moodle or blackboard. These new assignment and activity options are fully integrated with the students Google drive and calendar.
Course Chat rooms and Google hangouts can be created for students to interact and collaborate.
Feedback and discussion board forums can also be created for more collaborative learning. Journaling can be done directly through the Google Classroom app.
Questionnaires quizzes and other lessons can now be built within the cloud-based platform.
SCORM packages, wikis, and other tools are now available directly from the interface.
Using the Google Drive desktop app also allows for the automatic and immediate creation of folders for assignments without the need for teachers to organize files manually.
When students click "turn in" on an assignment it immediately appears in the relevant teacher folder, and students cannot edit those files until they have been viewed, marked and returned to them.
The new and improved Google Classroom also now seamlessly integrates with your Mark/Gradebook.
The ideal choice for course pages, benefitting students and teachers alike. Here at Google we think you will love all of the new additions to Google Classroom!