Google Classroom Updates

This issue focus on all the updates that have happened in Google Classroom while you were on Summer Break.  

Google is continually adding features and making updates to its products.  There have been several updates made to Google Classroom. Below is a description of the changes:   

Google Classroom Updates

1. Single View of Student Work: This change will help both teachers and students by providing a page that lists all of a student’s work for that class as well as the status of that work. To access this page, click on the “Students” area, then click on a name of a student to see a page listing all of the student’s work.
2. Reorder Class Cards: Both teachers and students can reorder the classes on the Classroom homepage.   Now you can put your classes in order by period, subject, or what ever order you want.  To move the order, login to your classroom account and you will then be able to click and drag your classroom tiles in the order you desire.
3. Decimal Grades: Teachers can now use decimal grades to award partial points on student work. These grades are added just like you did in the past, but now you have the option to include the decimal portion of the grade.
4. Display the Class Code: At the beginning of the year, teachers can make the class code to join display in full screen making it easier to see.  Go to the “students” area, on the left side next to “Class code” you will see a drop down menu option. From this menu choose “display” and the code will be displayed in a new larger window.
5. Transfer Ownership: Do you need to give someone else a class that you taught in the past?  Teachers can now transfer ownership to another teacher. To do this the first thing you need to do is invite the teacher to the class to be a “co-teacher”.  Once they are a co-teacher you can transfer ownership by clicking on the three dots by their profile and choose “Make class owner”

Just in case you missed it, I am adding the info from the May Check This Out! Google Classroom Tips.   This issue talked about how to deal with the Google Classrooms you created last year.

What to do with all my Google Classrooms from last year?
If you have spent a lot of time this year building assignments in your Google Classrooms, you don’t want to lose all that work.  Here are some recommendations to continue what you have done next year.

1. Start the school year with a new blank Google Classroom for each class/period:  You could just remove all the students from the Google Classroom and add next years students, but having all the content for the whole year/semester visible at the start can be overwhelming.  Plus the newest content is at the top, so moving things around can be time consuming for the teacher. Another issue is that due dates and other interactions are no longer valid for this new group, so we recommend always starting with a fresh new Google Classroom.
2. Archive old Classrooms: Go to Google Classroom main page and click on the three dots.  You will see the option to “archive” the classroom. This will move the classroom out of the main area to help clean up your Google Classroom area.  You can still access the old Google Classrooms and use your old assignments even if the Classroom is in the Archive area.
3. Pull assignments from previous classrooms: As mentioned in number 6 above.  You can pull in assignments from old Google Classrooms into your new fresh classroom.  This allows you to use assignments and posts from the previous school year in your new Google Classroom.
4. DON’T DELETE YOUR OLD CLASSROOMS: unless you never want the content in that classroom ever again in your future teaching career.  Once deleted it can’t be recovered.

As you begin to wrap things up for this year and plan for next year, keep these tips in mind!

For more helpful information and the archive of previous Check This Out! Digests, go to http://www.greenlocalschools.org/technology.aspx