Using Google Apps for Education
5 Tips for a More Efficient Classroom
Create a Digital Sign-Up with Google Forms
Creating a Google Form is a quick and easy way to streamline things when students have to "sign-up" for a topic, a field trip, or a group. Forms lets you create multiple choice, dropdowns, check boxes, short answers, and more fields that then fill a Google Sheets document. And you can automatically collect student email addresses. There are even some add-ons that let you limit the number of choices, or eliminate a choice after it has been selected a certain number of times. A Google Form could also be used for parent-teacher conference times, collecting student data, or anything else you need to schedule.
Use a Google Docs Template
Did you know there is a Google Docs Template Gallery? Go to docs.google.com/templates to see templates you can use, or better yet, you can assign to your students for a uniform look to a project.
Create a Team Drive
Team Drives are a relatively new Google feature that let you share a space among a group like a grade-level or content-level team. The neat thing about Team Drives is that no one "owns" the drive, so when one person on the team leaves, the drive isn't affected. It's as easy as clicking on 'Team Drives' and 'New' to get started. Sharing permissions can be edited for each member as well.
Interactive Bellwork with Google Slides
Rather than just project your "Bellringer" activities on the SmartBoard, use Google Slides to share them with your students. You can include photos, videos, links, and more to make these everyday activities more interactive. You can even post a QR code that links to your presentation and students can go back to previous days' activities for review.
Get Organized with Google Keep
Create to-do lists, notes, voice memos, and reminders with this app from Google. You can also save pictures, screen clippings, links, and just about anything else. The great thing is that is syncs across all of your devices, so you can take a note on your phone and it's there on your PC when you get to school. Find out more at keep.google.com (more on Google Keep coming in the next SMORE).