Instant Peer Feedback with Google Forms

Peer feedback can be a valuable tool during the learning process.  It can be done before a final product is crafted, or as a way for students to provide commentary and suggestions on a final product.  Facilitating this feedback can be accomplished in a variety of ways, from verbal "sandwiches" to hand written slips of paper and many other techniques in between.  But often you have to choose between immediacy and anonymity when deciding on which method to use.  A verbal form of feedback puts the students giving feedback in the situation of modifying their comments due to the public nature of the forum.  Anonymous paper slips require collection, distribution, and time on the feedback receiver's end to rifle through the slips to get an idea of the feedback given.  This leads to delay in reflection, and the longer it takes to reflect, the less effective the reflection is.  Using Google Forms and an add-on called docAppender, you have the best of both worlds!

Overview

With this feedback method, students will be filling out a Google Form to provide feedback to their peers.  The feedback will then instantly appear in a Google Doc that the the original student can see and reflect upon.  This system allows for anonymity and instant feedback, two things that are vitally important for students.  But as the teacher, you can always see who provided what feedback so that you can manage anyone who is critical without reason.  Here's how it works...

Setting Up the Google Doc Template

First, we need a file that will belong to each student and collect their feedback.  We will create one in Google Docs and then push it out to all of our students via Google Classroom.  Here is a sample of what this template can look like...



In this example, the template includes a prompt and space for the student to reflect on the feedback that they receive.

Feedback Form

docAppender Add-on

Create a new Google Form.  Navigate to the top of the form where you will see a menu that is called Add-ons (Note: currently [9.18.15] the new version of Forms does not have the ability to use Add-ons.  Revert to the old version if needed.).  Open the Add-ons menu and choose Get New Add-ons.  Search for the docAppender Add-on and add it by clicking on the +Free button.  Finally, make sure that the Add-on sidebar is running.  You may need to go back to the Add-ons menu > docAppender > Open Sidebar.  In the end, your form should look like this.

Creating the Form

With the sidebar open, we can now finish creating our form.  First, we need to add a question that will allow students to choose the person to whom they are providing feedback.  That question is typically best as the "Choose from list" question type (see Question 1 in the image above).  Second, we create feedback questions for the rest of our form.  These typically follow a rubric that you have previously provided to students.  Lastly, we follow the steps outlined in the docAppender sidebar.

1. Choose the folder which holds all of the Google doc templates that your students have opened through Classroom.  This will be the assignment folder for the assignment that you created in Classroom to push out the template to your students.


2. Choose the question that determines which document the feedback is appended to.  This is the "Choose from list" question that we created earlier.  When you click "Save and populate selected question", docAppender creates an answer option to choose any of the docs that are present in the folder that you identified in Step 1.


3. Choose the questions on your form that you want to be appended as feedback for the students.  This allows you to, for example, require that every student provide their own name when giving feedback, but not push that name out to the presenter who is receiving the feedback.  This way students can be anonymous to their classmates.  But because you require everyone to provide their name on the form, the name will be displayed to you in the spreadsheet attached to this form.  That way, you can allow for anonymity and still track responses if anything inappropriate occurs.


4. Choose how the feedback will be displayed to students.  I recommend "Rows in a single horizontal table".

Now you can make the form available to your students by putting the live form link on your CMS, Google Classroom, or web page.  Below is an example of what the finalized feedback document would look like for a student.



This is an extremely valuable and flexible feedback system that has been universally praised by every teacher who I have worked with.  If you are interested in trying it out, I highly recommend contacting your instructional technology coach to help walk through the process and provide support.

Sean Mullins | Instructional Technology Coach

Microsoft Viewer in Google Apps

Do you have PowerPoints which have a lot of animation in them and when you transfer to a Google Presentation the animation gets lost?  Well here is a solution for you. Download the Google Drive app Office Viewer for Google Drive.  This app will allow students  who do not have Microsoft Products on their computer to view PPT presentations in full animation mode.

 

Go to the New Tab in Drive, More, Connect More apps.  In the search area key in Office Viewer  and several will pop up.  Select this one:



 

 

 

Once the app is installed you will open it.  In the upper LEFT hand corner click on the icon below and login to your Google Drive:



 

 

 

Once access has been granted, you will be able to open any Microsoft PPT, Word or Excel docs.

Google Updates Core Apps

On September 2nd, Google announced a set of updates to many of the core Google Apps that you are familiar with (Docs, Sheets, Forms, etc...).  Highlights include Voice Typing in Docs, updated See New Changes feature in Docs, Templates across all apps, a data visualization feature called Explore in Sheets, and an awesome new feature where users of Google Classroom can push out their current webpage to their whole class through Chrome.  Check out the full details in the official post below!

 Posted by Ritcha Ranjan, Product Manager

School’s in! As you settle into your classes and start to juggle soccer practice, club meetings and homework, we’re here to help. We’ve been spending the summer “break” creating new tools to help you save time, collaborate with classmates and create your best work—all for free.

Schoolwork, minus the work 

Writing papers is now a lot easier with the Research tool in Docs for Android. You can search Google without leaving Docs, and once you find the quotes, facts or images you’re looking for, you can add them to your document with just a couple taps. That means less time switching between apps, and more time perfecting your thesis statement.

  

With Voice typing, you can record ideas or even compose an entire essay without touching your keyboard. To get started, activate Voice typing in the Tools menu when you're using Docs in Chrome. Then, when you’re on the go, just tap the microphone button on your phone’s keyboard and speak your mind. Voice typing is available in more than 40 languages, so we can help with your French homework, too. Voilà!

Do more, together
We’ve made it easier for you to tell what was added or deleted in Docs—and who made the changes. Now when you’ve left a document and you come back to it later, you can just click “See new changes” to pick up right where your classmates left off.

Forms helps you get a lot of information easily and in one place—so when you want to vote on your class field trip or collect T-shirt sizes for your team, you don’t have to sort through dozens of emails. With the new Forms, you can survey with style—choose one of the colorful new themes or customize your form with your own photo or logo, and we’ll choose the right color palette to match. Easily insert images, GIFs or videos and pick from a selection of question formats. Then send out your survey and watch as the responses roll in!

Your best work, your best you 
Creating presentations, crafting newsletters and managing your team’s budget is hard enough without having to worry about making everything look good. With the new collection of templates in Docs, Sheets and Slides, you can focus on your content while we make sure it gets the expert polish it deserves. Choose from a wide variety of reports, portfolios, resumes and other pre-made templates designed to make your work that much better, and your life that much easier.

With Explore in Sheets, you can now spend less time trying to decipher your data, and more time making a point.  Explore creates charts and insights automatically, so you can visualize trends and understand your data in seconds on the web or on your Android. It’s like having an expert analyst right by your side.

  

Mission control, for teachers and students

A year ago, we launched Classroom to save teachers and students time and make it easier to keep classwork organized. Today we’re launching a Share to Classroom Chrome extension to make it easy for teachers to share a website with the entire class at the same time—no matter what kind of laptop students have. Now the whole class can head to a web page together, without losing precious minutes and focus to typos.

  

Rock this school year with Google Docs and Classroom. Your first assignment? Try these new features, which are rolling out today.

Google Classroom Updates

Recent updates to Google Classroom have added a new collaboration tool (forum-like questions), the ability to reuse old posts, and the option to move a post to the top of the stream.  Calendar integration and more are coming soon too!  Read the official post below for all of the details.

Posted by Will Phan, Google Classroom Software Engineer

As you gear up for the new school year, try the newest features in Google Classroom for more ways to save time, engage your students and keep everyone organized. Most of these features are rolling out this week; stay tuned in the next few weeks for more back-to-school goodies in Google Classroom, Google Docs, Sheets and Slides, all designed to help you make this school year yours.

 

Keep students engaged with question-driven discussions

Since Classroom launched last year, teachers have been using their class stream to host student debates, Q&A and discussions. Starting today, you’ll be able to do this in a more collaborative way. You can post questions to your class and allow students to have discussions by responding to each other’s answers (or not, depending on the setting you choose). For example, you could post a video and ask students to answer a question about it, or post an article and ask them to write a paragraph in response.

“Often, teachers want to do a quick check-in on what their students are learning. Now with this built in to Google Classroom, teachers can easily do this on the fly, any time,” said Michael Fricano II, who teaches at Iolani School in Honolulu. “Your class can have a really engaging, focused conversation.”

 

Reuse posts

You know those lessons that worked so well last year that you want to use them again? Now you can reuse assignments, announcements or questions from any one of your classes — or any class you co-teach, whether it’s from last year or last week. Once you choose what you’d like to copy, you’ll also be able to make changes before you post or assign it.

“The reuse post feature gives teachers the gift of time. Making changes to something already created is way easier than starting from scratch,” said Heather Breedlove, Technology Integration Coordinator at Flagstaff Unified School District in Arizona. “It’s working smarter, not harder.”

 

Calendar Integration

In the next month, Classroom will automatically create a calendar for each of your classes in Google Calendar. All assignments with a due date will be automatically added to your class calendar and kept up to date. You’ll be able to view your calendar from within Classroom or on Google Calendar, where you can manually add class events like field trips or guest speakers.

And a few more improvements you’ve asked for:

• Bump a post: When you want to make sure an older item is easy for students to find, you can now move any post to the top of the stream.


• Due dates optional: For long-term projects or student-driven assignments, you’ll now have the option to create assignments that don’t have due dates.


• Attach a Google Form to a post: Many teachers have been using Google Forms as an easy way to assign a test, quiz or survey to the class. Coming in the next few weeks, teachers and students will soon be able to attach Google Forms from Drive to posts and assignments, and get a link in Classroom to easily view the answers.