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Weekly Tech Tips 28 November 2021

 Dear Friends,


How ya doin’? 

Weekly Tech Tips


I have written about this before but I have never actually done it. I am trying it out now for the first time and I wanted to share it with you. I am going to use Google Classroom to create a group assignment. Not only that, but I'm going to do another very similar group assignment in another class where I use Google Classroom to collect the work, but not to create and organize my groups. I am interested to see if the time spent upfront organizing the groups and creating separate assignments and documents using Google Classroom will pay off when it comes time to collect, grade and hand back the assignment. 

I have a Grade 9 Criterion D that I'm going to use Google Classroom for to make and assign separate documents for each group. I also have a Grade 10 Criterion D with which I'm going to allow the students to select their own groups, create their own documents, and elect a scribe who will upload the team document to Google classroom. It should be an interesting comparison. Here are the steps for creating a group assignment in Google Classroom.


First make as many copies of any documents to be turned in as there are groups and give them a unique identifying name as I have done above.

Next, make your assignments. You will have a separate assignment for each group so also give them unique identifying names as above left. It is VERY important that you choose Students can edit file. Any other option will not allow them to work on the same file together. Then choose only the students in that group from the All Students button in the upper right corner as seen above on the right, and below expanded.

Click “All Students” at the top to deselect all then go back and click on the students in the group. Then you are ready to assign that group’s assignment. Here (below) I have Scheduled it for next week (Dec. 2) instead of assigning it right away.

 

 

 

Now create the other groups’ assignments. You can save a bit of time (especially if you have typed in a lot of instructions in the textbox) by Reusing a post instead of creating a new assignment.

 

Navigate to the post you just made and hit “Reuse”. You have to be really careful now to make sure that you delete the existing document for Group 1, upload the new document for Group 2, make sure that it's set to Students can edit file and then go and choose the new group members from For All Students. Then you're ready to post the second group assignment. Repeat the process until you have as many groups as you need, always being careful to make sure that each group has its own unique document and that it's set to be edited by the group. Also don't forget to make sure that you've chosen only the students in the group to send that group assignment to. It sounds like a lot of work and the first two times it is tedious checking all the things I’ve mentioned, but by the third or fourth group you find a groove and the hardest part is selecting the group members. When you’re all done you should have your group assignments ready to go.

 

 

When this assignment is submitted I will have six documents to grade. I can open the assignment and see who was in the group AND I can even look through the history to see who did what and when. This took me about 25 minutes to set up (although I was taking lots of screenshots and pasting them over here). 


This Week’s Apps and Resources


Chrome browser upgrade let’s you skip to the good part of a webpage you are sharing. Try “Copy link to highlight” when sharing links. When a recipient opens your link, it will send them right to the part of the page you selected, instead of the top of the page. Highlight the text you want to share.Right-click and select Copy link to highlight Paste the link anywhere, like an email or message thread.


OpenAI now available to the public

OpenAI API


Et cetera


I will host an Open EdTech PD a Sunday in January  from 1:30 to 3:00 PM in the GSIS library (or alternatively room 304 if that is a problem). Google Workspace for Education is my area, but I am happy to try to help with whatever, just don’t bring me your broken macbook, I have no idea what to do with that 😝 . Please let me know if you are interested in that. Send me an email at this modified GSIS email address (did you know you can turn your 1 email address into infinite variations and then set up filters to sort them into a specific folder?)

wigentons+japd2022@gsis.sc.kr and let me know what you’d like to know more about. If it helps and folks come, then I will endeavor to commit at least one Sunday a month to similar live PDs.


Don’t forget you can self study for the Google Certified Educator Program in our

New Google Workspace for Education GCE Google Classroom


You can discuss edtech, education or anything really in a Google Group outside of the GSIS domain here: GSIS2020


And you can read through the Weekly Tech Tip archives on this blog

Weekly Tech Tips



Have a great week,


Scott

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