Five Ways Teachers Can Use Google Forms For Classroom Administrative Tasks

There are a number of ways a teacher can incorporate Google Forms into their lesson plans. But what about the administrative side of teaching?  We know that there are many classroom administrative tasks that teachers do in order to keep their classroom running like a well oiled machine.  Here are five ways Google Forms can help with some of those administrative tasks.

1. Sign out form.

If you keep a sign out sheet for when students leave the classroom, Google Forms is a great way to keep it paperless!  Simply create a form with pertinent information such as name, period, reason, leave time.  Link the form to a Google Sheet and you've got a record of students that leave the classroom.

2. Contact form.

This is a great way to keep all of the times students and/or parents have been in contact organized.  Create a Contact Form with such information as parent or student name, best contact email, and reason for contact.  Imbed the form in your website (especially easy to do if your using the new Google Sites) in your Google Classroom site.

3. Discipline referral.

A reality of teaching is that sometimes students need to be referred to the administration or discipline office.  A Google Form can easily help with the appropriate referral form.  Simply create the form with the relevant information that your school needs.  Then, on the occasion that it becomes necessary to use, you can simply and quickly fill out the form.  You can print it, email it, or share it with the appropriate person.  This is also great for keeping track of discipline referrals when linked to a Google Spreadsheet.

4. Teacher lesson plans.

Another way to stay organized with your lesson plans.  You can create drop down menu's for grade level and standards.  Use text areas for your objectives and other relevant information.  Link to Google Sheets to keep all of your lesson plans quickly accessible and organized.  If needed, you can quickly email the spreadsheet to an administrator.

5. Material check out.

There are times when a student wants to borrow a book or some other classroom item.  Instead of trying to remember or jotting it down on a piece of paper (which you'll lose), set up a check out form.  You can easily refer to the attached spreadsheet to see who has what item.

Five Ways Students Can Use Their Cell Phones in the Classroom

Five Ways Students Can Use Their Cell Phones in the Classroom 

 

Want to do something that will shock your students?  Ask them to take out their cell phones in class!  Usually, teachers are fighting the good fight and asking students to put their phones away during class.  But, with these five interactive teaching methods, students can use their phones in class to their hearts content.

Kahoot

Kahoot is a fun game that the whole class can participate in.  Kids learn and and fun doing it at the same time.  Kahoot presents teacher made multiple choice questions where the students answer and in doing so, compete against their classmates.  Students simply download the accompanying app, sign in to the Kahoot that you created, and off you go. Students uses their phones to choose the best answer that is presented in front of the class. 

Quizizz

Create an account and you’re off and running.  As the teacher, create your quiz, make it public (where anyone can search and use it) or make it private.  Create your quiz adding pictures and time limits for each question.  Quizizz works great with math classes as there is a symbol dash board.  Teacher’s also have the option to play the quiz live or share it for homework.  When the quiz is done, go to your dashboard and click on a particular report for that quiz to view specific results.

Pear Deck

 

Pear Deck is an awesome classroom tool where students can use their phone to participate in a variety of questions.  Questions in Pear Deck question types include short or long answer, true/false, and multiple choice.  Drawing answers in Pear Deck is also possible.  Pear Deck also has a feature called "Takeaways" where the student can view the questions and their answer at the conclusion of the session.  When combined with the Google Sheets add-on Flubaroo, teachers can use Pear Deck as a formal assessment tool.

Google Slides Q & A

Slides Q & A uses the power of Google Slides to get kids thinking and inquire about certain aspects of a Google Slides presentation.  The cool thing is, this is done while you're giving it!  Students use their phone to pose questions about your Slides presentation.  While doing so, they can see other questions posed by other students and vote those questions up if they have the same question.   The teacher can view the questions as they come in on their dashboard.  At the conclusion of the presentation, the teacher can address those questions with the most votes while displaying them in front of the class.

Socrative

 

It’s the Space Race game that gets students excited about Socretive.  But there are other ways to use Socrative.  You can use it as a quiz, as an exit ticket question, or asking a "quick question" to do a quick check for understanding.  To join, students simply use their phone to enter their room name and their off and running!  But it's the Space Race that really get's the students involved.  Students team up (could be pairs or small groups) and choose a color.  Teams answer at their own pace.  Each right answer moves their rocket ship closer to the end.  Give a wrong answer, and your ship remains stagnant.  The winner is the ship that either reaches the end or gets closest to it.

Ten Great Uses for Google Slides in the Classroom

Ten Great Uses for Google Slides in the Classroom

Google Slides is not only useful for teachers to present information, it’s a great tool for students too.  Here are ten great ways Google Slides can be used in the classroom:

1. Use Google Slides Q & A.  This is great way to be interactive with your class while presenting a Google Slide deck.  While in the presentation, click the drop down menu.  Select presenter view.  Make sure you’re in “Audience Tools,” tab, then press “Start New.”  A link will be generated at the top of your presentation that can be accessed by any device.  Students can ask questions which will be seen by you in real time.

2. Students create vocabulary slides.  Students can use each slide to describe vocabulary words.  Put the word on the top of the slide, ask students to include a definition as well as pictures from the internet that describes the vocabulary word.

3. Use it for introductions.  This is great at the beginning of the year.  Not only do they tell the class about themselves, but they are also introduced to the idea of using technology in the classroom which sets the tone for the rest of the year.  Students create a Google Slide show describing themselves with not only text, but find pictures from the internet and include them in their presentation.

4. Create a timeline.  Students create a timeline of events by using each slide as a particular part of time.  This is great for a history class.  Each slide can contain a year, a description, and pictures that represent the event.

5. Note taking at their own speed.  Students review the Google Slides presentation and write down the notes at their own pace.  After taking the notes, the students can be required to complete a question sheet or Google Form assessment based on the notes.

6. Play Jeopardy!  There are Google Slides templates out there that you can copy into your Google Drive and edit as you please.  Great for a review game.

7. Create a PDF ebook.  Creating a PDF ebook is a good way to create your own study guide or other information that can be easily given out to the students.  Simpler create a slide presentation and download as a PDF.  Distribute as you please.

8. Create a Story Book.  This is great for summarizing information.  Much like a timeline, students scour the internet finding appropriate images to go along with their story. Each slide contains a piece of the story and an appropriate picture.

9. Create a class shared presentation.  Another cool way to review.  The teacher would create a Google Slide presentation and assign a slide to each student in the class with a particular topic attached to it.  Share the slides with the class and have each student complete their individual slide.  Share the slideshow with the class when complete.  This works for assessment as well.  Assign each student a certain slide with a particular question.  Share the slides and have each student answer their assigned question.  Share the questions and answers with the class.

10. Take the class on a virtual tour slideshow.  This is a great history exercise using Google Earth or Google Tour Builder.  Students can present a tour of a historic place by simply taking screenshots of a particular location and pasting it into a Google Slides presentation.  Walk historic places and battlefields.  Show where historical events occurred.  In language arts, show where a particular story takes place.